#i’ve walked a million paths but they all lead to this damning truth

[holliwoobz]

i’m back into reading the locked tomb lore theories SOMEBODY HELP ME shrieking wailing ripping my hair out

[stardustprompts]

the poppy war - r.f kuang   sentence starters change tenses/pronouns as needed !!  some lines have been edited for clarity / length / ease of roleplaying tw :   drugs , death , murder , nsfw , prostitution mention , language

‘take off your clothes.’

‘why would anyone drug themselves before a test?’

‘you’re about to be a very lucky girl, sweet.’

‘wow that’s great. really great. Terrific.’

‘your folks are assholes.’

‘well fuck the heavenly order of things.’

‘don’t you have actual responsibilities?’

‘I don’t want to get on _____ ‘s bad side.’

‘you would make a terrible prostitute. no charm.’

‘what is so wrong with getting married?’

‘do you want to die?’

‘everything is spilling out of my head as quickly as I put it in.’

‘please do not commit spousal homicide.’

‘give me a way out of this shithole.’

‘hello, I’m praying.’

‘I seduced him with my nubile young body. you caught me.’

‘you can’t scare me into a confession, because I’m telling the truth.’

‘and that means you’re shit at your job.’

‘if you cross them—- if they even think you’ve looked at them funny—- they can and will hurt you.’

‘it’s easy to lose a language when you never speak it.’

‘you’re offending them with your very presence.’

‘they’ll make you an outsider, because you’re not like them.’

‘no matter what they say, you deserve to be here.’

‘I’ll kill you. I will fucking kill you.’

‘I went out in the sun once. you should try it sometime.’

‘oh, you’re the one ____ hates.’

‘you’d be a prick too if your family was both rich and attractive.’

‘honestly? I think he just comes in here to get high.’

‘I think you’re flattering yourself.’

‘unless you’ve got a weapon, don’t aim for the face. the neck’s a better target.’

‘we aren’t here to be sophisticated. we’re here to fuck people up.’

‘this is the only kick you’ll ever need, really. a kick to bring down the most powerful warriors.’

‘power dictates acceptability.’

‘he hasn’t done anything to earn my respect. all he’s done is act high and mighty.’

‘you’re nothing. you shouldn’t even be here.’

‘consider me bullied and intimidated, just let me sleep.’

‘he’s playing with her. he’ll end it soon.’

‘they’re good at fighting, but not much else.’

‘spend a lot of time looking at ____’s eyes do you?’

‘a betrayal of that sort would not have been out of character.’

‘come on, you belong here too.’

‘they’re not going to get rid of me like this. not this easily.’

‘I’m calm! I’m extremely calm!’

‘you’d rather kill your own people than let the opponent’s army walk away?’

‘you don’t let an enemy walk away if they’ll certainly be a threat to you later.’

‘he can’t stop raving about you.’

‘oh, don’t pretend to be bashful. you love it.’

‘you’re a walking disaster.’

‘anyone this obstinate deserves some attention, if only to make sure you don’t become a walking hazard to everyone around you.’

‘I heard he got drunk on rice wine last week and pissed into ____’s window. he sounds awesome.’

‘it’s me, your favorite person in the whole wide world.’

‘I do not have a problem. you are making up this problem for reasons unbeknownst to me.’

‘you’re killing the mood.’

‘they were weak as shit. scrawnier than you, even.’

‘you’re a real asshole. you know that right?’

‘your state of mind is just as important as the state of your body.’

‘sometimes you must loose the string to let the arrow fly.’

‘because I want to break his stupid face.’

‘he’s the most dangerous when he’s desperate.’

‘from this point on you’re just going to be a danger to yourself and everyone around you.’

‘you’re too reckless. you hold grudges, you cultivate your rage and let it explode, and you’re careless about what you’re taught.’

‘I knew I was the only one that could help him.’

‘they honed his rage like a weapon, instead of teaching him to control it.’

‘one urinating statue for my easily entertained friend.’

‘I don’t believe in gods. but I believe in power.’

‘one might say you’ve been obsessed with ____.’

‘don’t look to your left. pretend you’re taking to me.’ / ‘I am talking to you.’

‘we’re studying very weird things.’

‘I don’t actually know what I’m getting into.’

‘here is what happened: you called a god, and the god answered.’

‘you know that if you don’t get answers now, the hunger will consume you and your mind will crack.’

‘you’ve glimpsed the other side and you can’t rest until you fill in the blanks.’

‘supernatural is a word for anything that doesn’t fit your present understanding of the world.’

‘I’m supposed to take it as true that you’re a god?’

‘I’m not a god. I am a mortal who has woken up, and there is power in awareness.’

‘are we getting high? oh, wow. we’re getting high.’

‘ah. the law. so inconvenient. so irrelevant.’

‘we are not madmen. but how can we convince anyone of this, when the rest of the world believes it so?’

‘the price of power is pain.’

‘I understand the truth of things. I know what it means to exist.’

‘prey do not question the motives of the predator. the dead do not question the living. mortals do not challenge the gods.’

‘I killed for you. I would have done anything for you.’

‘I have seen the end of things. the shape of the world has changed.’

‘war doesn’t determine who’s right. war determines who remains.’

‘it’s alright. I know what you are.’

‘I thought I was the only one left.’

‘we have developed the power to rewrite the fabric of this world. if we don’t use it, then what’s the point?’

‘I don’t mess with that shit. it screws you up.’

‘I understand the appeal, I really do, but I like having my mind to myself.’

‘he’s a charmer. like a new puppy. you think he’s adorable until he pisses on the furniture.’

‘there’s no routine. no discipline. nothing you’re used to. am I right?’

‘so you’re the last of your kind. that’s sad.’

‘If you hold the fate of the country in your hands, if you have accepted your obligation to your people, then your life ceases to be your own.’

‘____ feared, and so he held you back.’

‘great danger is always associated with great power. the difference between the great and the mediocre is that the great are willing to take that risk.’

‘don’t ever let go on that anger. rage gives you power. caution does not.’

‘don’t give in... you’ve been so brave... but it takes more bravery to resist the power.’

‘the nature of this god is to destroy. the nature of this god is to be greedy, to never be satisfied with what he has consumed.’

‘so. screaming at rocks. is that, like, normal behavior here?’

‘fix this. prove your worth. do your fucking job or get out.’

‘I saved your life. doesn’t that make us at least a little square?!’

‘I was scared of you. and I lashed out.’

‘I thought I was better than you, and I’m not. I’m sorry.’

‘when I killed it, it felt like murder.’

‘look, I’m happy to discuss this, really, but I’m currently leaking life out three different wounds and I think I may pass out. would you give me a moment?’

‘well maybe ____ should get his head out of his ass.’

‘ ____ is more fragile than you think.’

‘look, asshole, I don’t need you to tell me what to do.’

‘they say he can read the future. shatter minds.’

‘you misunderstand the nature of our relationship. I am not your friend.’

‘he’s not human. he—- I don’t know what he is.’

‘but ___ was never allowed to be human.’

‘do you trust me?’ / ‘no. but that’s irrelevant.’

‘you don’t know what true suffering is.’

‘I have seen more than my fair share of suffering.’

‘that boy is beyond redemption. that boy is broken like the rest.’

‘I don’t want to be saved! I want power!’

‘that power will destroy everything you’ve ever loved. you will defeat your enemy, and the victory will turn to ashes in your mouth.’

‘we’ve missed something. something’s been laid out for us, but we can’t see it.’

‘fretting won’t make the dead come back to life.’

‘there was nothing human in those eyes.’

‘It was a nightmare, and I couldn’t wake up.’

‘I don’t need your pity. I need you to kill them for me.’

‘whatever it takes. swear it on your life. swear it for me.’

‘I won’t judge him. I don’t dare, because I don’t have the right. and neither do you.’

‘you asked me why I wouldn’t stop him. now you understand. you can’t stop an avenger. you can’t reason with a madman.’

‘I am afraid of what he might do in his quest for vengeance. and I am afraid that he is right.’

‘I am about to do something terrible. and you will have a choice.’

‘they give nothing to the universe, and the universe owes them nothing in return.’

‘you cannot survive my death.’

‘you’re trying to deceive me. you don’t get to deceive me.’

‘this is not the way. this path leads only to darkness.’

‘when are you going to stop being such a damn coward? what are you running from?’

‘you will turn the world to ash, and only demons will live in the rubble.’

‘you dress up your crusade with moral arguments, when in truth you would let millions die if it means you get your so-called justice.’

‘you have not cared about anything for a very long time. you are broken.’

‘I am terrified. but only because I’m starting to remember who I once was. don’t go down that path.’

‘your country is ash. you can’t bring it back with blood.’

‘I’m so sorry. I tried to warn you.’

‘you know the worst part? we’re so close to home.’

‘did you miss me? did you miss this?’

‘I just gave him some of his favorite medicine.’

‘resistance here means suffering. there is no escape. no future.’

‘you have nothing to fight for anymore’

‘what are you defending? you owe ____ nothing.’

‘we were disposable. we were tools. tell me that doesn’t make you furious.’

‘I am sick with fury.’

‘I will die on my feet. I will not die a coward. and neither will you.’

‘we could stay here. we could stay here forever. we wouldn’t have to go back.’

‘you’ll have to live with the consequences. but you’re brave ... you’re the bravest person I’ve ever met.’

‘I have lost everything I care about. I don’t want peace, I want revenge.’

‘I don’t need to sleep. I need to feel nothing.’

‘do you want forgiveness? I can’t give you that.’

‘we avenged him. he’s gone, but avenged.’

‘you have to believe that it was necessary. that it stopped something worse. and even if it wasn’t, it’s the lie we’ll tell ourselves, starting today and every day afterward.’

‘aren’t you supposed to be a seer? do you ever see anything useful?’

‘we have an enemy whom we love.’

‘I’m going to find and kill everyone responsible. you cannot stop me.’

‘oh I’m not going to stop you.’

[zigtheeortega]

incomparable

pairing | logan x mc

word count | 7.4k

warnings | there’s a lot of angst in this one, and it’s definitely an emotional hurt/comfort fic! if you don’t like the idea of logan trying to move on, then this one isn’t for you!

tags | @raleighcarrera, @pixeljazzy, @senatorraines, @dionneserrano, @blainehayes, @rodappreciationweek

author’s note | a while ago, my sweet friend and fellow mod @/pixeljazzy suggested a fic plot that’s angsty and absolutely demonic, aka logan tries to move on, so i decided to write it! i’d been working on this before the mods decided to create the time capsule challenge, so i’m very content that this fits into the theme well !!! and to clarify, this is an au where my mc raquel writes down her experience with the mpc and ends up publishing it and unintentionally becomes a best selling author! also yes rodaw brought me out of my choices writing break and i’m not mad at it at all

•─────────────────•

She wasn’t Raquel.

That much was obvious – she was taller. Her shoulders were broader. Her hair was short, bluntly cut at her collarbones, and dark brown.

She was tattoo free. The skin of her arm was bare – a clean slate. Untouched.

She seemed more innocent, too. Not in the way that Raquel was when they first met.

This woman was grown with a full time job and a comfy apartment in the heart of the city, but… there was something missing.

She probably had no clue that there was a seedy underbelly to her home. Didn’t have the misfortune of crossing paths with someone like him when he was at his worst.

She was privileged enough to go about her life while a whole microcosm of crime happened right under her nose. And she didn’t want to know. Didn’t need to know.

Logan wasn’t exactly jazzed to shatter another woman’s innocence the way he did with Raquel.

This girl seemed… safe. Level headed, secure, and millions of miles away from the life he’d abandoned.

It kind of happened by accident. Meeting her, that is.

It wasn’t a carefully crafted “accident” like with Raquel. She actually just… caught his eye.

He’d gotten an honest job as a mechanic on the outskirts of L.A., working mostly with the struggling working class that had long been banished to the dingiest corners, despite being the most important cogs in the city’s machine.

The autoshop was family owned, and had been for generations – the owner, Nicandro, had accepted Logan as his own, and Logan had practically become a part of the Alvarez family.

He hadn’t anticipated finding his own home in the same city that’d chewed him up and spat him out time and time again.

A couple months into working there, he was finally settling into his routine. Nine-to-five job on weekdays, community college classes on weekends, and the occasional Saturday mass when he was invited by the Alvarezes.

He was functioning. He had a routine. And then this girl came in and disrupted it all.

The Honda Civic girl.

When the average looking car pulled up outside, he didn’t give it a second glance.

He went back to work, arms deep in the engine, grimy and stained from repairing Miss Anita’s ancient artifact she insisted on saving even though it was less than a thousand miles away from crumbling cartoon-style till only the wheels were left.

(But she was family to the Alvarezes, so Nicandro insisted on repairing the car for free nearly every week when she needed something new tweaked.)

He heard her voice from across the room and still didn’t look up from his hands.

“Hi, this is embarrassing, but my engine light thingy came on and I have no clue what it means,” she said with a nervous laugh. “I’m on my way out of town for a couple of days, so I thought I’d stop and get it checked out before you closed for the night.”

“Aye, Lo, can you help her out real quick? We’ve gotta truck coming in with parts soon and I gotta keep watch,” Nicandro called across the garage, shooting Logan a toothy grin as soon as he looked up.

“Sure,” Logan smiled politely, scrubbing his forearm over his brow, the sweat managing to hold a couple strands of his hair captive against his skin.

He was assuming it’d be a typical oil change, but the second she came into view, the ghost of the last time he left L.A. gripped his heart and squeezed until adrenaline shot through every vein in his body.

Her t-shirt, tucked neatly into her denim shorts, read “Langston”.

It wasn’t the sweatshirt, but it was the same design, same color.

He knew staying in L.A. was a gamble, but he was willing to risk it. Staying away from Raquel was priority for her safety, but… he couldn’t bury the inkling of hope that pushed its way to the surface when he walked into a coffee shop or a bookstore – places he knew she’d love.

Once he saw the shirt and her big brown eyes, he was done for.

She wasn’t Raquel, but something about her lived in this stranger.

Before he could stop himself, he was comparing her to his first love – a disaster waiting to happen.

Their first date was anything but – she insisted on bringing him a vanilla milkshake from his favorite burger place to his work.

“How’d you know I was working?” He asked earnestly, mirroring her soft smile.

“I didn’t. Nicandro told me vanilla milkshakes were your favorite and I didn’t want to ruin the surprise so…” she shrugged, her cheeks flushed. “I’ve, uh, brought milkshakes up here every day this weekend.”

He laughed – a real genuine surprised laugh – and took a sip from the styrofoam cup. “You didn’t let them go to waste, did you?”

“Nah, Nicandro’s been really happy with me.”

“Yum,” he hummed. “I’m happy with you, too.”

She grinned in delight, taking a sip from hers. “I’m glad my hard work paid off.”

She stayed there for his whole lunch break, and they chatted, casual conversation with no substance, and he actually enjoyed himself.

The last time he remembered having casual conversations about nothing with a girl his age, he was curled underneath the sheets with Raquel, tracing the outlines of her sleeve of tattoos. He could’ve listened to her talk for hours.

This girl… she was pretty tolerable – she listened to him (hung on every word, even) and cared about what he had to say, even though it was a laid back, low stakes conversation.

“My name’s Renée, you know. I realized I haven’t told you,” she smiled, resting her cheek on her hand. She was facing him, and they were seated on the same side of the old wooden table out back behind the garage.

“Renée,” he repeated, shaking the styrofoam cup to gather the last bit of milkshake at the bottom before tipping it back to lap it up. “I’m Logan.”

“Logan,” she nodded. “It suits you.”

“S’not my real name,” he shrugged.

He didn’t know why he was telling her that. If he told her too much, it’d end the same.

She tipped her own cup back, tapping the bottom to get little stray ice chunks out. “Fine by me. I still think it suits you.”

She was way too trustworthy of a man she didn’t know, but… wasn’t that what attracted him to Raquel in the first place?

Without a shred of judgement in her eyes, Raquel took everything Logan said as the truth, despite how many times he’d fucked up. Betrayed her.

Renée didn’t look at him like he was a criminal and… well… he wasn’t one anymore. He was still in the criminal mindset, though, since he’d been ostracized for so damn long.

The next couple weeks were uncomfortable – not because Renée made him uncomfortable in the slightest. If anything, she was doing the opposite, and that was the problem.

He’d had to reopen himself to caring about another woman, and to say it was a difficult task was an understatement. The gates were stubborn, rusted shut, so much so that he had to force them apart, ignoring the grating screech of metal and the inevitable pain that came with being vulnerable again.

They went on a few dinner dates. She brought him lunch at work. She invited him to her apartment. They went to a food truck festival together.

Renée disrupted his routine, and it was a breath of fresh air.

He’d gotten so comfortable with his quaint life and his work family that he hadn’t pushed himself to do much more than that.

But the first time she held his hand, he froze.

She casually grabbed his hand to lead him through a crowd and his body reacted like he’d been electrocuted. It wasn’t wrong, but it felt wrong.

“Are you good?”

“I’m fine,” he reassured her, wiping his clammy palm against his jeans before letting her grab his hand again.

It wasn’t wrong, but it was wrong.

He should’ve ended it that moment, but he didn’t. He’d convinced himself that if he could push through the initial weirdness of it all, he’d be happy. Eventually.

So he went through the motions with her, trying his hardest to push his comparisons of her to Raquel to the back of his mind, but every so often it’d bubble to the surface.

It’d manifest in the most random ways.

She liked Coke icees, not cherry.

Oh we watched that rom-com together, and she hated it because it was too corny.

She likes that TV show as background noise because she thinks it’s dumb, and I do, too.

It was unhealthy to think of Raquel that much – to compare Renée to her that much – but he couldn’t help it.

The last time he was happy, safe, loved, was with Raquel. He hadn’t chased that feeling for a long time (because he wasn’t sure he could find it again), but with Renée he was getting closer to what he used to have.

Maybe it was selfish, but he wanted that warmth – that comfort – again.

She wasn’t Raquel, but she’d have to do.

A month into their casual dating, Renée kissed him. Well, she tried.

She’d insisted on driving him to a boujee rooftop bar near her place and was thoroughly buzzed off a couple of cosmopolitans less than an hour into them being there.

The party was in full swing around them, the corny ass cover band on their fourth “tribute” to Billy Joel.

He was out of his element to say the least. 

Just as he was about to lean over to tell her he needed to use the bathroom, she’d wrapped her arms around his neck and smashed her mouth against his, planting sloppy, sugary, open mouthed kisses on his parted lips, frozen in shock.

“Logan,” she breathed, squeezing him tighter, not even registering how tense he was.

“Renée… hey, hey,” he said, gently but firmly pulling her away from him. “I think you’ve had a bit too much to drink.”

Her big brown eyes welled up with tears and his chest twinged with guilt, the distant memory of the first time he’d betrayed Raquel floating around the back of his brain.

“I’m sorry I – I don’t know what came over me –” she turned away from him, dabbing her eyes with the crook of her finger.

“It’s okay. No need to apologize,” he reassured her, rubbing his palm in small circles on her back. “We’re good.”

“I wanted our first kiss to be special and I royally screwed that up,” she sighed, swivelling back till she was facing him again.

“Can’t do worse than me.”

She chewed her lip, trying to hold back a smile. “Oh yeah?” 

“I was a girl’s first kiss… five minutes after we’d outrun the cops.”

Her laugh was a surprised one, her bright smile replacing her disappointed expression almost immediately.

“That’s surprising. I never pegged you as a law breaking type,” she blinked, the alcohol clearly making her a bit more ballsy than she normally was.

It was his turn to laugh – he doubled over, nearly knocking over her half empty glass in the process.

“I used to be quite a troublemaker.”

Despite her not-so-subtle hints over the next few weeks, he couldn’t bring himself to kiss her.

She probably thought he was the prudiest of the prudes, the local catholic church’s golden boy,  the working man’s poster child of abstinence till marriage.

He just couldn’t bring himself to do it. Yet.

He was wearing himself down more and more each day – he was on the track to kiss her in… a couple months to a year. Probably.

Two months in, she invited him to a swanky event her job was hosting.

She was one of many accountants working in the financial department for a large publishing company. She had a really cool gig, and she knew it. She never bragged, but she was proud of her accomplishments. 

So why was she dating a mechanic who was making a third of her income? He had no idea.

Either way, he tried to enjoy himself. The car that picked them up was luxurious, and that and the food and booze reflected just how much money their company had made that year.

The venue was huge and packed to the brim with hundreds of people, the standing tables a couple feet apart all throughout the ballroom.

“Damn, they weren’t playing around with this, huh?” He mused, taking a sip from his mug, filled to the brim with locally brewed beer.

“Yep, they’re serious about giving a warm welcome to new authors,” Renée said over the rim of her drink, gesturing vaguely to the room around them.

“Yeah, so is that what they’re doing?”

“Mhmm. Every year we hold a big party to celebrate our deals for that year. It’s really just to pat ourselves on the back and give our new authors a sense of comfort here, you know?”

“Can I get a booklist or something? I might wanna check out some of these books afterwards. I feel guilty as hell eating duck, drinking their expensive ass alcohol, and rolling back home without, ya know, doing anything,” he shrugged, the fabric of his hand me down suit straining with effort at the motion.

“One of the authors insisted on not being included in any of the party promos so… she kinda ruined it for everybody. But she’s our number one best seller for this year, so…” she rolled her eyes, tipping back the last of her cosmo.

“And don’t worry about it. We budgeted for this and we’re good,” Renée nodded, giving Logan’s hand a squeeze over the table.

“So what’s the itinerary for the night?” Logan asked, rolling his mug around by its base, the beer swirling around the edges, just barely kissing the rim, but not quite overflowing.

It was stupid to relate to a fucking mug of beer, but he did.

Anytime he pushed himself to his limit with Renée, he retreated, never breaking past that threshold, that barrier he set in place for himself long before he’d ever met her.

“The President is gonna give some speech – he’s that guy right there –” she said, scooting around the table till her arm was pressed against the sleeve of his jacket, “Then the Vice President – that woman – is gonna introduce the guests of honor, and they’ll give introductions. Then a brief presentation from my boss about how much money we raked in this year, then… yep. We can leave.”

“Sounds painless enough.”

She laughed, leaning her head against his shoulder. “Thanks for coming with me, Lo. I really appreciate it.”

Before he could register what was happening, she’d tipped his chin towards her, pressing a tender, gracious kiss on his lips.

She pulled back, a soft smile tugging at her lips.

He mirrored her smile, but inside he was screaming.

He felt nothing. The kiss elicited absolutely nothing from him.

She kissed him and it felt like he was kissing a friend. Completely platonic.

He’d sunk months into getting comfortable with her just for it to blow up in his face. The second he’d let his guard down so things could progress naturally, it backfired.

He’d taken Raquel for granted. Being with her was so effortless that he didn’t have to think about it, and he let that slip away without trying to get her back.

He thought he was doing the right thing by her, but it was hurting him more than he’d ever anticipated.

It wasn’t that he considered her another notch in the bedpost. It was the opposite – the bedpost didn’t exist anymore.

There was only her. No one else. No matter how many times he tried to remedy his broken heart, it’d just bring him right back to her: the only woman that ever had the privilege of making herself a home there.

“I, uh, need to go to the restroom. Excuse me,” he said, jabbing his thumbs toward the double doors, heading outside before she had a chance to respond.

He pushed his way out of the room, his heart in time with the slap of his shoes against the flooring.

As soon as he was out of the doors, he kept walking, striding past the laggards mingling in the hallway, past the bathrooms, past the security, till he felt the dirty L.A. air coat his lungs.

God, if he could only catch his breath maybe he could go back in there and salvage the night. Maybe even make himself look less like a skittish idiot.

Despite the fact that his brain was wired to unintentionally treat her like a friend, he didn’t want to hurt this girl. 

He didn’t smoke often – just a taste of nicotine when he was drunk or the occasional cigarette when he was stressed.

There was a crumpled pack in his glove box that’d been there for months.

Why didn’t he just drive? He was fucking stranded. He couldn’t run. Couldn’t put distance between him and this situation that he’d willingly put himself in.

None of this was Renée’s fault. There wasn’t a single aspect of the situation that was her fault.

She was a girl who wanted to date a boy because of reciprocated interest.

He felt like the biggest loser in the world. Here she was, a beautiful girl with a lust for life and ambitions that dwarfed anything he’d ever imagined for himself.

And all she wanted to do was love him.

And he wouldn’t let her. Couldn’t let her.

His back slid against the brick wall until he was squatting, arms braced against his knees while he tried to gulp down fresh air as fast as the wind whipped at him.

He’d managed to find the one corner of the building that was completely unoccupied. For once, he was thankful for his gut instinct to lurk in the shadows.

He’d barely gotten a minute of solitude before the door closest to him flew open, a blur of tulle streaking across his peripheral.

The person’s breaths were labored, panicked, as they ran the opposite direction until they were at the edge of the pavement.

They bent down, just like he had, and clasped both hands over their mouth, letting out a small muffled scream.

When she was finished with that, she tilted her chin upwards, her skin illuminated by the light from the parking lot that spilled onto their side of the building.

If he thought breathing was difficult before, it got a whole lot worse when she noticed he was there.

She jumped, yelping like a wounded animal before stumbling back, catching herself with her hands. “Oh my god, I didn’t know anyone was here – I’m sorry –”

Pushing herself back up to stand, she brushed her palms off and shook the tulle skirt clean. “I’m just a little stressed. Sorry again for the outburst.”

That can’t be her. There’s no way, he thought, his mouth drying out when he got a clear view of her face.

“Raquel?” He asked, timidly, voice cracking on the first syllable.

She froze, searching the shadows, her hands white knuckling her skirt.

He didn’t speak, and neither did she. He couldn’t tell how long they’d been quiet when he pushed himself to his full height and took a step towards her.

“No, no, no, there’s no way,” she whispered, stumbling backwards, catching herself on the brick wall.

“It’s – uh, it’s me –” he said, laying his palm flat against his chest. “It’s Logan.”

His voice trembled, the effort of speaking (despite nearly being rendered speechless) was more than he could handle – it was as if he had to manually pick up his words like stones and drop them, and they were heavy, and he was weak.

She slapped a hand over her mouth, eyes wide. She didn’t respond.

“I… uh, what are you doing here?” He asked finally, forcing the question past his lips.

If he didn’t say something he’d be drinking her in all night. It’d been a couple years, but she looked exactly the same.

Yeah, her hair was mid-length, the ombre traded for a black tone, and she’d gotten a few more tattoos that he could see, but she was the same old Raquel.

Same old Raquel, but professionally styled. He wasn’t self conscious of his hand-me-down suit until he noticed how polished she looked.

“I could ask you the same thing,” she breathed, a strained tone followed by a struggled breath.

His heart dropped to his stomach. He’d completely forgotten about Renée.

He opened his mouth. Closed it. Opened and closed it again, like a fucking fish out of water. There was no way to beat around it.

“I’m a plus one.”

Her perfectly gelled brows furrowed, and his gut clenched at the motion.

He was scared as hell, but damn did she look exactly like she did when she was hunched over a textbook, scrawling notes as quick as her brain summarized the words on the page.

“You didn’t… deliberately come here to see me?” She asked, searching his face for something (the truth, probably).

He ran a hand through his unruly hair, an inch or so shorter than she’d last seen it.

Why’d he have to run into her after he’d gotten a trim? He’d imagined this moment going so many different ways, and every scenario he’d pictured them looking like they did the moment they parted – if he had it his way, every detail would be exactly the same as the day he disappeared into the night, from his head down to his shoes.

“I, uh… No, I didn’t,” he stammered, taking another step her way, and that time she didn’t move back.

Shaking her head, she watched him, expression incredulous. “I don’t know what to say.”

“Just because I didn’t come here for you doesn’t mean I’m not happy to see you,” he said, reaching out towards her.

He thought she’d flinch away, but she stayed planted in place, her eyelids fluttering shut when he stroked the pad of his thumb against her jaw, revelling in how soft her skin was. Just like he remembered.

“So beautiful,” he murmured. “The most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen.”

She turned her head just enough till she could kiss his palm, leaving a streak of lipgloss on his calloused skin. “This doesn’t feel real.”

“It is, baby,” he reassured her, before testing her even further by tugging her into a hug. “This isn’t a dream, but it sure feels like one.”

She ran her hands across his back, like she was refamiliarizing herself with his frame, before squeezing him tight, her arms shaking with effort. “You smell exactly the same.”

He laughed, burying his nose into her crown, pressing a kiss there. “You do, too. Like lavender’n’heaven.”

Raquel was in front of him, just as warm and pretty as she was the last time he’d seen her. She even felt the same in his arms, molding to his shape like no time had passed.

Adrenaline surged in his veins, and he took advantage of his momentary courage by tipping her chin upward to get a good look at her.

God, she was so fucking pretty.

Nothing else mattered to him anymore. His mechanic job, his car, his friendships, his home in L.A. –

He’d made a home in those dark brown eyes, and he was willing to drop everything and follow her to the ends of the earth if that meant he’d be back in the one home he’d ever known.

She blinked away a few tears, her bottom lip trembling, dimpling her chin.

He cupped her face between his palms, cradling her face as gently as he would with something breakable, soaking in the moment for as long as he could.

He could’ve held her like that and re-committed every inch of her face to memory, but she broke first, closing the gap by pressing her lips against his and Christ did she taste sweet.

Their mouths, arms, bodies, slotted together perfectly, not an inch of space between them.

Just as he parted his lips for her, she stiffened, retreating from him immediately.

“You taste like cherry. I hate cherry.”

Her tongue darted out to lick her bottom lip. “You hate cherry.”

He went rigid, the details from a few minutes before flooding back to him. Renée was wearing cherry gloss.

“Oh my god… you’re here with someone?” She asked, but she said it with such conviction, because she knew it was true, and she was begging for it not to be.

His mouth popped open and shut again. “I’m sorry –” “You don’t have to apologize. You’ve moved on and that’s okay. I’m happy for you.” Her voice was trembling with each word – the stones were heavy, and she was struggling, and he could tell.

“No, Raquel, it’s not like that. I promise –”

“Please don’t make me any promises, Lo. I don’t know if my heart can take it,” she said, palms up in surrender.

And she said his nickname. It sounded wrong coming from anyone but her.

“I’m serious, baby, I didn’t think I’d see you again, especially at a schmooze fest like this.”

She blinked, once, twice, processing what he’d said. “So… not only did you insult me by showing up with another woman, but you’re insulting this event that I’ve worked so hard to attend, and you’re insulting me.”

“Raquel… I never meant it that way, I… I don’t know. I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

He dug the heel of his palms into his eyes, groaning in frustration. “I stayed in L.A. in case I ever saw you again, but I didn’t think it’d be this soon, and I dreamed up lots of scenarios but none of them went like this. I fucked it up majorly and I don’t know how to fix it. I don’t fucking know.”

She didn’t say anything for a while, her arms folded across her chest while she mulled over his words. “I never tried moving on.”

It hit him like a gut punch, grabbing his organs and twisting till pain shot throughout his body. “You didn’t?” Was all he could manage.

“No, I couldn’t. There’s no way I could when I’m still in love with you.”

She screwed her eyes shut, a sob leaving her before she could contain it.

“Raquel, please believe me –” Logan pleaded, stepping towards her. “If I woulda known you were gonna be here, trust me, I’d be dressed better and you’d be my date and I’d be showing you off to the world –”

Her watch buzzed, startling the both of them. “I… have to go. We can talk after, if you want.”

“Yes, please. That’s all I want,” he laced his fingers with hers, gently tugging her hand towards his lips to press a soft kiss on her knuckles. “I’ll find you after. I promise.”

Giving him one last once over, drinking him in, like she was second guessing if he was real, she stepped back through the doors.

He took a few deep breaths to compose himself before heading in – explaining his outburst to Renée hadn’t crossed his mind till he walked back inside.

He made his way back to the table, running over how he was going to apologize, but nothing stuck. He couldn’t think of anything but Raquel.

Renée was sipping on her second drink of the night, and his beer looked like it’d been dipped into as well.

“Are you okay?” She asked immediately. “I’m sorry about kissing you like that I just – I just thought you were comfortable enough. I screwed up again, Lo, and I’m so sorry.”

“Renée…” He couldn’t get over how unnatural “Lo” sounded coming from her. “The way I’ve been acting has nothing to do with you, okay? You’ve done nothing wrong.”

“Kinda sounds like you’re breaking up with me,” she laughed once, rolling her eyes. They widened as soon as it dawned on her. “Wait… are you?”

“Can we talk outside? I really want you to hear me out –” “Logan, if you’re gonna dump me, at least respect me enough to not do it in the parking lot,” she sighed, chugging the rest of her drink.

“Yeah, you’re right,” he agreed, sliding his half empty mug of beer her way. “I do respect you, though. A lot. You’re an amazing person.”

Sighing, she tipped back the beer, gulping until he could see her eyes through the transparent bottom of the glass. “I’ve definitely heard this spiel before.”

“I’m gonna tell you this story, and you’re probably not gonna believe it, but it’s true, and it was my life – it is my life,” he started, leaning against the table so she could hear his low tone.

“Years ago, I met the woman of my dreams, and she was innocent and way too fucking good for me. I was breaking the law daily by doing jobs with crews of criminals like me, living off the grid, making money in ways I’m not too proud of.

“She was a part of one of my last jobs before I left L.A. to lay low and I, uh, I fell in love with her. I’m still in love with her. I don’t know what my life would look like if I wasn’t in love with her, you know?”

Her face screwed up in disgust, and she all but slammed the mug down, whispering furiously. “Are you mocking me? Did you seriously just regurgitate the plot of Ride or Die to me? That’s the story you’re going with? One that isn’t even your own?”

“Huh, what? What are you –”

The speakers crackled and a mic squeaked as who Logan assumed to be President tapped the surface of it, cutting off his response.

“Hello everyone, I hope you’re all having a wonderful night so far. As most of you may know, my name is Arnie Harris, and I’m the President of Harris Publishing. When my grandfather founded Harris Publishing back in 1901, he only did so because he wanted to be able to publish a few of his wife’s poems as a gift. Publishers refused to register it under her name, so he made his own company so my grandma could achieve her dream of being a published author, and throughout the years, we’ve been committed to giving voices to women and minorities alike.

“This year’s been one of our best yet, and I’m so thankful to our new authors for seeing something in us and our mission statement. A big thank you to everyone here tonight – Editing, Marketing, Finance, all the staff and employees, hell, the caterers here tonight, valets, everyone. Tonight wouldn’t be possible without you.”

He droned on for a bit longer before the Vice President took the stage, and she began introducing the newest authors that they’d signed that year.

They’d copped quite a few best sellers, which was impressive. Each author took the stage briefly to thank Harris Publishing and give a brief summary of their goals for the next few years.

Renée was ignoring him at that point, refusing to even look his way. He’d be more upset about that if he wasn’t scanning every inch of the room for Raquel, trying desperately to spot the rose colored tulle and midnight hair in the crowd.

“– and the last author of the night, the number one young adult New York Times’ Best Seller for five months and counting, Raquel Olvera with Ride or Die!”

His head snapped towards the stage, his eyes wide. “What the fuck –”

“Renée, she… who…”

“She’s our top seller. The one I said didn’t wanna be in the promos?” She answered flatly, still staring straight ahead.

“Renée, that’s – that’s her, that’s the girl I’m in love with –”

“Oh, please –” She stopped when she saw how genuinely caught off guard he was. “Oh my god, you’re not lying.”

“No, that’s her – I didn’t think – I ran into her outside and she said we’d talk later, but I – I didn’t think she was coming back inside for this –”

“You’re who she wrote about,” Renée whispered, her eyes as wide as Logan’s were, words beginning to slur just a bit. “Holy shit, I just thought the names were a coincidence, but no, you’re him.”

“What… huh?”

“Oh, Logan…” Her eyes filled with tears. “Ride or Die is about you, your old crew, and how she fell in love with you.”

His heart sank. “About me?”

She nodded. “She changed most of the names but kept some, including yours. The ending… you really had to leave L.A. to flee the cops?”

He nodded. “The feds were on our tails.”

“My god… she’s so in love with you. You have to go to her,” Renée shook her head, her hair swaying around her. “No hard feelings at all. You can’t let her go – I’m serious.” 

She’d taken the stage, and had begun thanking people while Logan and Renée whispered furiously at each other. By the time they looked up, she was beginning her speech.

“I never really set out to become a writer. Even though I’m a published author, I don’t really feel like one. Every time I step back to assess the response I’ve gotten to ‘Ride or Die’, I’m rendered speechless without fail. I just wanted an outlet to get my story out, and surprisingly – thankfully – the lovely staff of Harris Publishing decided to take a chance on me. I never thought this level of success was possible, and I’m so grateful for everyone here.”

She held for applause, smiling as though she was grateful for each clap.

“But beneath the positivity and praise I’ve received, I’m still healing. I’m still hurting. Most people know that ‘Ride or Die’ is somewhat of a true story. And yes, I know there’ve been discussions on whether this is a fake autobiography and that I wrote this for attention. Honestly, for the first year after they left, I wished that it was fake, because I was in a lot of pain. Emotionally, I was in shambles.

“I’ve loved telling my story as a form of therapy, but I wouldn’t wish this pain on anyone. The love of my life vanished into the night and I couldn’t do a single thing about it. No closure, no healing, no moving on.

“Stagnancy’s been the norm for me for so long that I forgot what life was like when I was smiling every day. I’m still getting used to happiness being an everyday feeling for me.”

Raquel shook her head, taking a deep breath and dabbing at the corner of her eyes. The audience took this cue to clap again, encouraging her to continue.

Logan watched the monitor on the wall, which zoomed into her face, catching her dazzling brown eyes. He was in awe. She was tough as nails with a heart of gold and he still didn’t deserve her.

“I thought that a life without love was bleak, and that I was doomed to suffer because I didn’t know if I’d ever see Logan again.”

She took another deep breath, squaring her shoulders.

“I’ve realized that I’m surrounded by more love than I know what to do with. By those who love my story, who resonate with my story, and who want or already have a Logan of their own. I get to experience love every day through that affirmation, and I took it for granted till… well, tonight, honestly.

“The end of the story wasn’t really the end of the story for me. I thought that ‘Ride or Die’ was the first and final book, and I’ve been terrified for a while that by the time the hype for this book died down, so would my hope, and I’d have to move on… but like I’ve said, the closure I’ve craved is in everyone that carries my story with them. You’re all healing me by making me feel seen and heard and loved.

“This might be a lot for a speech at a fancy event at the publishing company that signed me, but through all of you who’ve made this possible, I feel like the version of me from years ago when I hopped in a sports car with a stranger who later turned out to be the love of my life.

“The adrenaline, the lust for life, feeling alive – I owe it all to you. Thank you.”

The cheers were raucous by the time she stepped off stage.

Logan’s throat was tight – she still loved him no matter how much it hurt.

Jesus fucking Christ, he would never deserve her.

Renée was sniffling next to him, hand over her mouth. “Logan, you seriously need to go to her. You can’t let her get away again.”

He pulled her in for a quick hug, leaning down to kiss her cheek. “Thank you, sweetheart. You really do deserve so much better than me.”

She grinned and patted his cheek lightly. “You’ve never been more right.”

He turned, darting towards the doors, shoving past anyone and everyone to get outside.

When he made it out of the doors, he ran smack into Raquel.

Thankfully, the only people outside of the room were the security guards, who’s attention was focused on the front door.

Raquel pulled him down the hallway and stopped at the last door on the left, a sign with her name on it taped to the outside of the door.

She fumbled with the keycard, her hands trembling.

“Shit –” she cursed, the card tumbling from her hands and onto the tile floor.

He snatched it off the ground and scanned it in one swoop. Within seconds, she’d shoved the door open and slammed it behind them.

His heart was racing. The last time she’d been this hasty was their final kiss, and he couldn’t fathom going through that again.

She stood in front of him, his back to the door, her gaze trained on his chest.

From his height he can see that her face is contorted, but she buries her face in her hands before he can get a good look.

“She looks just like me.” Her voice was a mere whisper, like she couldn’t manage anything more than that.

His heart sank to his feet. “Raquel –” “You say you didn’t know I was going to be here, but then why’d you date someone that works at the same company my book’s being published at?”

“I know it’s hard to believe, but I didn’t come here with the intention of hurting you,” he started, gently resting a palm on her shoulder. “Especially knowing how hard it’s been for you, I –”

He broke his sentence off, cursing himself. “Shit, I didn’t know you were having just as hard a time as me. I figured you’d go to college and meet someone better than me. I don’t know.”

“You can’t just say you expected me to move on because you clearly haven’t. What, is her name Rachel or something?” She pulled back, putting a step of space between them. 

He shook his head. “Renée.”

“It even starts with the same letter,” she shook her head, biting her lip. “You thought I’d move on so you started dating the first person that reminded you of me?”

“I – I’m –” He stuttered, dumbfounded that she’d gotten it in one try, as much as he didn’t want to admit it out loud.

“I want you to understand why I’m upset, Lo. You came back to L.A. because you thought there was a possibility that you’d see me again, but you ‘figured I’d move on’. You’re seeing a girl that looks like she could be related to me, yet you’re avoiding discussing that. “I’m mad because while I’ve been trying to heal, you’ve been making yourself suffer, and that’s not fair to Renée. You had no idea if you were gonna see me again so you tried to get the next best thing. You have to see why that’s fucked up, Lo.”

“Even if I was dating Renée because she reminded me of you, none of that matters now.”

“You can’t just dump Renée because you took one look at the girl you dated for a month years ago and decided you wanted her instead –”

“Stop. Don’t try to downplay your role in my life, Raquel. You’re not ‘just the girl I dated’, alright? I loved you then and I love you now.” 

“You can’t love me and string her along at the same time, Logan,” she furiously whispered, her voice nearing hysterics.

He blinked, shaking his head. “Did… you think I was coming here to show you that I’d moved on? And wanted to rub it in your face?”

She chewed the inside of her lip, her dark brown eyes downcast. “Maybe.”

“Renée ended things first. Just now, actually. The minute she realized that I’m the Logan from your book, she told me I needed to go to you,” he reassured her, reaching out to tip her chin up with a crooked finger, forcing her to meet his eye.

“Raquel, I had no fucking clue you’d written about us and the old crew. All these years, I’ve always known how much I love you but… goddamn, I didn’t know you loved me the way I loved you.”

Her eyes glistened, her surprised laugh coming out as a soft sob.

“So… you really do love me? It wasn’t just circumstance?” She asked, leaning into his palm when he slid his hand up to cup her cheek.

“It doesn’t matter how we felt back then, baby. None of that matters now because we fell for each other while we were apart,” he smiled softly, leaning in to press a soft kiss on her lips.

“God, I love you,” she whispered against his lips, deepening the kiss.

“Say it again,” he murmured. “I need to hear it again.”

“I love you,” she repeated, louder, more confident this time. “I’ll say it as many times as you want, as long as you say it back.”

“I love you,” he said, no hesitation, tangling his fingers through her hair and pulling her in again.

The only time they came up for air was to whisper sweet affirmations against each other’s skin before delving back into silently relearning what they could about each other.

Logan had never been the best with words, and he was at peace with that. He knew that when it mattered, he’d show it. And in the dim lighting of Raquel’s green room, he showed her over and over just how much she meant to him.

Kiss by kiss, they adhered themselves to each other, undoubtedly deciding they’d never let each other go again.

She wasn’t Raquel. That much was obvious. She’d grown into much more than the timid girl he’d met on her 18th birthday, and even more than the headstrong driver he’d left behind. 

And he loved her this way and that way – any way he could get her. His love for every version of her was boundless, incomparable to anything he’d ever felt before.

[katehuntington]

Title: Black Dog - part eight Word count: 1900± words Episode summary: When Sam gets an anonymous phone call with information about his father, Dean receives a text message with coordinates to different location. The brothers clash and split up, one following orders, the other trusting his instincts. Meanwhile, in the wilderness of Cascade Range,  Washington State, Zoë loses grip on a personal case and is forced to confront her  demons. Without back up, this might very well turn out to  be her final hunt. Part eight summary: Sam finally arrives in Nashville and is about to begin the search for his father, when an unexpected call comes in. Episode warnings: Dark! NSFW, 18+ only! Angst, gore, violence, character death. Description of blood, injury and medical procedures. Supernatural creatures/entities, mentions of demon possession. Swearing, smoking, weaponry. Descriptions of  torture and murder. Illegal/criminal practices. Mentions of nightmares and   flashbacks. Descriptions of suicidal thoughts and tendencies, depression, panic attacks, hallucinations. Author’s note: Beta’d by @winchest09​​​​​​​​ & @deanwanddamons​​​​​​​​​. Thanks, girls!

Supernatural: The Sullivan Series Masterlist

S1E03 “Black Dog” Masterlist

     Nashville, Tennessee      December 3rd, 2005 - Present Day

     With a sigh, Sam gets off the bus. The rain beats down on him straight away, but instead of being annoyed by it, he finds it refreshing. Finally, he’s in Nashville. It’s  taken him three days to get here. Three days of torture - which included waiting for his damn transport to arrive in the first place, being forced in a seat made for someone who is 4’8, and having to change twice to get to his final destination - but he’s in Nashville. 

     Of course, he could have hopped on a plane for a journey of only several hours, but he had a hunch he would have a bit of trouble getting through customs, carrying a duffel loaded with blades, guns, and ammunition. He might always be complaining about his brother’s driving skills or his collection of Metallica, Motorhead, and Black Sabbath tapes which he plays over and over again while he sings along, but seventy-six hours of traveling to get from Texas to Tennessee wasn’t a joy either. 

     He watches the touring car take off into the night, continuing its trip, the droplets that run down the side catching the light of the overhanging streetlights. The sound of the engine fades as the carrier merges into traffic again. Suddenly, he feels alone, left behind, and not just by the bus. It’s not the first time he experiences this uneasiness, because Sam has pondered about the fight he had with his older sibling more than once. Truth be told; he never expected Dean to leave him on the side of the road. He called his bluff, and when his brother didn’t give him an inch, he himself refused to surrender as well. If he’s completely honest with himself, he started regretting this impulsive act the minute he saw the Impala drive away, but he couldn’t let it show, he couldn’t let Dean win. He is so tired of being bossed around and being treated like a little kid. Stubborn? Maybe. Guess it runs in the family.

     Sam can take care of himself, but tracking his father will not be an easy task without Dean. When it comes to Dad, the oldest son knows him best and Sam realizes he’s going to be missing him on this search. He hopes the woman who set him on this path will call him again, because he could use a lead.

     So, what now? He decides it will probably be best to settle down in a motel and get online, see if he can find some information, then he will start asking questions. There’s not much he can do right at this moment, considering it’s 2.30 AM. It’s going to be quite a task, finding a man in a city covering 550 square miles with over 600.000 citizens. And all he has is the word of a girl he has never met, of which he didn’t even catch her name.      “This is insane,” he mutters, looking around.

     A voice of reason whispers in his ear again: go back. Dean’s words had some truth to them. What if this is a trap? What if he’s walking straight into it? Sam’s doubts will not make him turn around, though. He is here and he is not going to stop searching until he finds Dad. 

     Sam keeps his head low and buries his hand in his pockets, protecting himself from the rain as he shivers. It’s not particularly cold for this time of the year, but 39 °F isn’t anything near Texas. Raindrops bring down the temperature as well and continue to fall down on the hunter as clouds block out the moon.

     He starts to walk in the direction of what seems to be a hotel. The interstate, which lays directly next to the parking lot, crosses Highway 70. Lines of cars travel by, their white headlights and red tail lights lighting the road like it’s Christmas already. 

     Through the curtains of water, the young Winchester spots a neon sign at the entrance of the building he’s approaching. He was right; it is a hotel, funnily enough one from the same chain where Zoë spent the night in Paragould. The Hampton Inn Bellevue looks like a fancy place from the outside, and remembering the luxurious room of the huntress, he reckons this hotel will not be any different. Sam doesn’t like to waste money, but he will do anything for a decent bed after being crammed into that touring car like a canned sardine. Not that he’s planning to sleep much; he has better things to do. He has to find Dad, it’s all he can think of. 

     Right when he’s about to enter the establishment, he hears his cell phone ringing. Hastily, he takes his Blackberry from his pocket, hoping it to be the anonymous caller who tipped him off three days ago. The display announces the caller as ‘unidentified’, it might not be so far fetched. Sam picks up immediately.      “Hello?”      A relieved sigh sounds from the other side. “Hey, Sam.”

     It’s a feminine voice alright, but it’s not the ��mysterious lady’, as Dean called the woman who passed him the information about their Dad. He does recognize the person on the other end, though. She is the last human being on earth he expected a call from.      “Zoë,” he concludes, stunned.      “Yeah… hey, listen,” she cuts to the chase. “I’m in deep shit.”

     Sam stops dead in his tracks. He thought she might be after she left so abruptly back in Arkansas, but the fact that she’s admitting that she’s in trouble means that this is serious.

     “Where the hell are you?” he asks.      “I’m just outside Darrington, Washington State.”      “Are you hurt?” Sam asks worriedly.      “Yeah, but that’s not the point.” She pauses for a moment, knowing what she is about to say might come as an unpleasant surprise. “Your brother’s here.”

     Completely staggered, Sam stares ahead with his phone still close to his ear. What did she just say? Dean is there? With her?! A million questions pop up in his head, but he finds it difficult to choose the first one to ask. 

     “What?!” is the only thing he can cry out.      “Yeah, I thought you might say that.”      “But, how the…? He went out to do Dad’s dirty laundry!” he recalls, stunned.      “Are you calling me dirty laundry?”      Sam’s eyebrows reach his hairline, remembering the coordinates John sent his brother. “You are Dad’s dirty laundry?”      “Apparently, but it doesn’t matter.” She interferes before the receiver of the call has the chance to ramble on. “Listen, Dean’s life is in danger. If he stays here with me, he’ll die. You have to get him out bef--”

     Now, it’s Zo who gets interrupted. Puzzled, Sam stares at his phone for a moment, assuming the connection might be bad. When the display shows three bars in the right upper corner, he presses the Blackberry against his ear again and listens carefully, trying to identify the sounds he hears. It seems like Zoë is fighting someone over the phone, then he hears Dean in the background.      “Give me the damn phone! Give it!”      “No! Let go!”      “Zoë!”      “Don’t Zoë me, you son of a--”      “Hand me the fucking phone!”

     The line cracks, but then the noise of static stabilizes. Dean has apparently won the fight over the device, because he can hear his voice loud and clear.      “Sam?”      “What?” he replies coldly.      “Whatever you do, don’t hang up,” Dean pleads before Sam does something he will regret later.      “I thought you were on Dad’s job?” the younger brother confronts, still angry with his brother.      “I am, this is the job. The coordinates led me to Zo,” he explains. “This is not some ghost hunt, Sam. This is unlike anything I’ve ever faced before.”

     The hunter hears the concern in his sibling’s voice and he immediately swallows back the smart response he had waiting for him.      “I need you to get over here, and while you’re at it look up everything you can find about hellhounds,” Dean demands, calm but stern.      “Hellhounds?” Sam repeats, perplexed. “As in the actual soul claimers of the crossroad demons?”      “Yep, and we’re on the menu.”      “How did that happen? You have to make a deal before they claim your soul at the arranged time,” Sam remembers from one of the lore he studied.      “They were let off the hook,” Dean claims. “Sam, you have to find out a way to kill them.”      “You can’t kill hellhounds, Dean,” Sam replies.      “No, you don’t understand. You have to find a way to kill them,” Dean repeats slowly, making sure the words sink in.

     The youngest gulps, realizing how much trouble Zoë and his brother are in. He has read some books that mentioned these creatures, but he never found anything about killing them. He turns around and stares up, letting the rain fall down on him, the water clumping his brown hair together in strands. The hunter scoffs; and he thought he made it to his final destination. He just traveled half the country to get east, now he has to travel all the way up north?

     “This better not be some excuse to get me away from Dad, Dean,” he warns.      “I wish it was, Sam,” Dean says, concerned. “Hurry it up, will ya?”      “Will do.”      “And - uh, about what happened down in Texas…”      “That’s not important now. We’ll talk about it later,” Sam replies to Dean’s unspoken words.

     Knowing they both can bury their pride and work this out, the younger brother closes his eyes as a burden falls off his shoulders. It must, for him to be able to carry a much heavier weight on them. Zoë’s and Dean’s life will depend on him.

     “One more thing,” Sam states, before hanging up. “You do know what happens when these things catch you. You don’t just die…”      “I know. You go to hell,” Dean finishes.      The young Winchester nods his head, although his sibling can’t see that. A short silence follows, after which Dean ends their conversation.      “See you soon, Sammy.”

     The line disconnects and a tone beeps in his ear, but it takes a few seconds before the young hunter actually lowers the phone and puts it away. Well, that changes things. There is no time to lose; he needs to get to Washington State and fast. 

     Determined, he stalks back onto the parking lot, observing his surroundings. No bus ride this time, he needs faster transportation. His gaze glides over the parking lot. Then he spots a silver 2005 Chrysler Crossfire Roadster amongst them. He nods, approving, knowing that the vehicle would make good time, but his conscience kicks in soon enough. He can not just connect some wires and steal a car like that! Or any car! But the thought of his brother and Zoë ending up dog food because he was too civilized to go grand theft auto isn’t something he could live with either. He’s left with no other option. 

     Reluctantly, Sam groans and eyes the vehicle, but then steps towards it while shaking his head and mumbling to himself, “I am so gonna regret this.”

Thank  you so much for reading. I appreciate every single one of you, but if you do want to give me some extra love, you are free to reblog my work or buy me coffee. Link in bio at the  top of the page.

[rpmemesbyarat]

RP Meme from "Chapter One: Caliah (Lore)" in the Bastet breedbook from "Werewolf: The Apocalypse"

Once there was a cat who dreamed he was a man.

Like the morning mist, she appeared from nowhere, or so it seemed.

The winds have spoken of your dilemma and I have come to show you the way home.

Why do you call me brother?

We are family.

We have different parents but share the same blood.

You need to meet your people

You are my sister

I have no other family. Don’t leave me!

We all have family

What are the dreams of a cat?

Let us welcome each other and speak of hidden things.

If they come in peace, we welcome them.

I’m just a mutt.

Listen up and listen close, ‘cause this isn’t stuff you’ll hear from any old place.

I’ve got friends with friends, if y’know what I mean, and this is good stuff.

They don’t get along, y’know.

A good lorespeaker tells different stories every time, and she makes ‘em as cool as possible.

Sound like anyone we know? Nah! Couldn’t be!

So how do you trade secrets, anyway? After all, isn’t a secret shared a secret lost?

If you don’t play the game, you don’t learn a thing.

Each element of the message becomes a metaphor, and the message becomes a story.

Florid? Hell yeah! But ya gotta admit it’s more graceful — and exposes a hell of a lot less — than blurting out the truth.

You might say, “I heard a story about so-and-so” but you’d never say “I did so-and-so.” If your audience has a clue, they’ll catch on.

Everything’s told in metaphors.

A good obtuse metaphor makes you look imaginative if someone gets it, really stupid otherwise.

Everything is larger than life. People don’t just cry, they “explode in showers like the sea.” Folks don’t just get mad, they “turn into coals that burn through the floor.”

If what you’re saying is important, bigger is better.

Simple? Not if you don’t get the lingo.

A wounded cat can surrender without disgrace.

Not enough to go around.

Hey, don’t let on you know what I told you, huh?

It was a time before life, a longing when the dream of birth was yet to be.

This marked the end of peace and the beginning of struggle.

Such promises are soon broken.

Why does even the skin of my daughter flee from my hands?

Why must I always be alone?

Master, what would you have of us?

Nothing exists for him but annihilation.

Go across the world

Let that which is pure stand whole, but erode that which is impure from within.

He tells many tales, but all of them are lies. He is rage made manifest, and he coils within us all.

There was no want, no war, no anguish, and all living things gave of themselves to help others exist.

Until some cataclysm happened, everything lived in peace and plenty.

Life has ever been a struggle, my brothers and sisters. Life has always meant that some may die for others’ pleasure.

That pleasure may be as necessary as hunger or as frivolous as sport, but it has always been fatal and always will be.

Only through struggle can we progress.

Only through sacrifice can we succeed.

We were born from conflict and we grow through adversity. Our ancestors are predators, great cats and human hunters who rose above their surroundings and mastered them.

We know our place in the Great Order, and it is not passive.

Like the moon, our world waxes and wanes.

Each era glows brightly, then fades into night before rising again as some new age.

As creatures of light, dark and twilight all, we are not moved much by the vagaries of fortune.

Each tribe has its creation story, and they differ in many ways.

I have my own ideas.

We are a breed eternally apart, and we are rare.

Water runs silent, yet crushes with the power of an elephant.

Its depths hold secrets that only the brave can find.

The first of our kind were nearly the last.

Those it caught were devoured.

Let this be your legacy

My tears, shed for you, will boil in your veins.

All people will fear you, and all animals, too.

Begone and tend the flocks that need killing.

I banish you from sight!

They still live on in us, and we carry their curse to this day.

As the humans prospered, they grew quickly out of hand.

It was a bloody, useless time, and we fractured as a people.

Secrets became the only thing to bind us.

It’s hard to forgive these raging bastards.

Very territorial, and I know how that feels.

There are enough horrors in the night already.

Corruption has a million voices; sometimes they drown out the song of the moon and lead us over cliffs.

That song wails from nightclubs, boom boxes and televisions every day.

Stop up your ears, my friend and listen to the wind.

Those secrets led the wolves to our door — literally.

Gods damn the dogs for that!

Their misbegotten crusade killed hundreds of our Kind and Kin.

She mated with serpents, wolves and great cats in an effort to become like them, but gave birth to monsters instead.

Some legends portray her as one of our kind, but we know this isn’t so.

If the tales I’ve heard are any measure, they have no pity for us at all.

We are where we are born.

I think our unique insights show us that humanity is a mixed blessing — especially where the earth and the wild are concerned.

Men are the cleverest monkeys, no doubt, but they don’t have much sense of self-preservation.

Our forebears fought to let humanity prosper.

We have an amazing world at our fingertips, but it’s filled with poisons and lies.

Honor seems to be a fading dream in lands where the rich starve their people and the poor kill each other.

We hold magic within ourselves, within our hearts and minds and spirits. To dishonor ourselves is to disperse that magic and scatter our souls.

It’s acceptable to lie to other creatures; they’re not of our blood and not bound by our laws.

We will flee to survive a fight, but will not run when others depend on our strength.

We must make restitution to those we deceive, in deeds, trade or money.

We may be exiled or branded.

Our weapons are many — secrets, claws, teeth and allies — and we will not hesitate to employ them for our world’s

survival.

Our people have walked too close to extinction for us to take such matters lightly.

We will not ally ourselves with shadow powers or drink corrupted wisdom.

We do not fail our Earth and mother. That path leads to death.

We are the keepers of secrets, and our fates depend on silence.

Each of us bears the hidden doom of our own people, and we know the cost of betraying that trust.

We also know that we have what others want — or what they think they want — and it amuses us to make them squirm.

Our knowledge is our concern.

We will not share it unless we wish to.

We will hide ourselves from outsiders; they will think they know us, but we will delude them.

We will wrap our lore in riddles and tales; let the clever ones puzzle out their meaning.

We will act as if we know even more than we do, for it keeps outsiders guessing.

Let them wonder at our insight; they value us more highly when they do.

We will cover our tracks with misdirection, pretend to be other than what we are, fill the air with idle rumors and hide messages in code.

There is no forgiveness for this crime.

Well, let’s just say I know what I’ve seen. And I’ve seen a lot.

His eyes were so filled with pain that I decided to help out.

I’d swear he was grinning as the semi ran him down.

That felt good.

Guess they’ve gotta live here, too.

I say they’re not as smart as they might think.

Maybe I’m the one who’s being fooled.

I could tell you stories all night, all week, all month and more.

As the temples rose and the hordes crossed through, our parents sat on the sidelines of history and observed the passing of kings.

The cultures we witnessed shaped our own ways.

Cities rose, each with secrets too tempting to ignore.

For a long time — 4,000 years — there was all the room in the world for us, and no lack of secrets to keep us entertained.

We should have seen the signs in the Classical Age, when armies swept across the land in the names of gods, kings and conquerors.

We should have met en masse when trade and crusades brought East and West together.

I will not belabor the point. We know what happened.

Explorers, slavers and great white hunters bounded into the wilderness and cast a chain around our kind.

Suddenly, we went from having all space to having little.

I can’t say I don’t share the sentiment just a bit.

We didn’t stop until a greater evil forced us to align, but that’s another story.

It’s a wonder anyone survived.

We studied their secrets, but could learn nothing from them.

We have no one to blame but ourselves.

For all our vaunted sight, we’re blind. For all our gathered lore, we’re stupid.

The world is falling apart.

I don’t know whether to believe it or not, but we are living in interesting times!

We must pool our secrets, combine our efforts, and bring the world’s secrets to light.

We must act on what we discover and disperse what we learn.

Do I lose my cool?

The modern age is the greatest puzzle we could want endless streams of secrets, enigmas, wonders and dazzles, wrapped up in an explosive package that could blow us all to hell.

Anywhere, at any time, the whole ride could fly off the rails.

Those who ignore the warning feed the vultures the next morning.

I’ll simply say the tigers are not where you’d expect.

People have begun to open their eyes, but they still need your counsel to see the cliff’s edge before falling off

Those stories are true — violently true — and they add up to an appalling picture if you string them all together.

They get an idea, work on it a bit, and try to rule the world. Typical. We’ve seen their kind before.

Look around you if you doubt it.

Surely the secrets you’ve uncovered have given you the idea that maybe, just maybe, something’s going on, something bigger than another plunder, another invasion, another city that falls to ruin in a century.

Discover what you can, but bury your tracks well.

We’re strangers to each other for most of our lives, and we like it that way — a few careful gatherings are all we

can stand.

The moon is our patron, but the shadows are our father too, and they call to us at our weaker moments.

Most of us dance on the edge, though, and that’s where we like to be!

Despite our pains, we’re spirited and wild, inquisitive yet careful, sensual yet refined.

Our beauty is our greatest pride, and our wits are second to none.

We know what we are.

To hell with them all!

Still, we cannot let pride blind us to the facts.

The morning it foretells is up to us.

We must come together, yet retain our pride.

We are the keepers of secrets.

Perhaps it’s time those secrets were revealed.

[shanie-the-toyaddict]

In The Space Between A Zowens Fanfic (Into The Horizon Universe... vaguely)

OK, so I’ve decided. I’m not posting it on AO3 because people on there might not want spoilers. But I WILL post it here because I’ve already told all yinz how that Future Fic ends for Sami and Kevin. So here you go. One songfic, behind the cut.

EDIT TO ADD: The song is “Until Eternity” by Blackbriar and the idea came from @write-it-motherfuckers

Being soulmates, or whatever the hell Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn were, it was a concept hard to express through simply one term.

There were many different languages and cultures across the globe and beyond that had notions of what two lovers, forever entwined would look like. Earth alone had more than Kevin could personally keep track of, although he’d always tried. One of the earliest accounts dated back to Plato, who wrote about how originally, people had four arms, four legs, and two heads, and Zeus split the humans in half, leaving them forever yearning for the rest of themselves. It was a quaint enough notion but didn’t quite cover it. In Buddhism, the idea was that all lives were interconnected. Those connected in one life were connected in the next. That was closer, but if you were to ask Kevin, it wasn’t quite the right idea either. In Hinduism, they believed that in the karmic cycle, a force called lenhu caused two souls to forever intersect, positively impacting each other in every lifetime. That one seemed fairly accurate in Kevin’s eyes, except for the “positive” part. Truth be told, his impact on Sami Zayn over the many lifetimes they shared was far from exclusively positive. Personally, Kevin always liked Sami’s explanation of the Twin Flames, two souls fundamentally identical on a cosmic level that, when brought together, can lead to either tremendous beauty, or absolute havoc and chaos.

Kevin had never been so sure about the first part of that, but the second part was spot on. Between the two of them, in every lifetime they’d shared together, it was either beauty, chaos, or sometimes both. But there was rarely ever indifference. No, the universe wasn’t indifferent to Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens. They’d always thought, upon having their first match, that they were destined to fight forever. Now, looking upon the thousands of paths they’d walked, Kevin realized that, by that point, they already had.

And now, floating beside his soulmate, resting dormant once more in the space between worlds, Kevin couldn’t help but wonder what the cosmos held for them next. He never had any idea beforehand who or what he’d be. He’d given up long ago trying to guess genders. If living thousands of lives had taught him anything, it was that gender was an absolute fallacy. Earth was one tiny speck in an infinite ocean of possibilities, and they weren’t always the same species let alone the same gender. The universe was a funny thing like that; much like Forrest and his damn box of chocolates, you never knew what you were going to get. The only constant in their infinite existence was each other and, while they never retained their memories from lifetime to lifetime, they always found themselves together in the end. One way, or another, be it as friends, lovers, companions, rivals, or even bitter enemies, they were together.

Actually, Kevin was pretty sure that wasn’t how it was supposed to work. It had been countless lifetimes since their time as 21st Century humans trapped in the future, but he was still certain he recalled something being said about their souls always being in love.

Or maybe that was just wishful thinking. It certainly wasn’t how it had turned out.

Kevin felt movement beside him in the aether.

Sami was stirring from his sleep, curling instinctively around Kevin. KO didn’t push him away, instead placing a ghostly kiss on Sami’s copper curls. In that place, wherever they stayed between lives, you appeared as you best knew yourself. They’d had so many different bodies and appearances since their souls were made one that even Kevin was surprised that they still kept their old human visages. But after thousands of years, thousands of lives, they were still Sami and Kevin.

And Kevin was just fine with that.

He’d always found Sami attractive as a redhead.

Sami yawned, stretching his arms out and arching his back.

“Nnnng, how long was I out?” he asked Kevin.

Kevin groaned. If there was one thing that never changed, it was his tendency to ask stupid questions.

“Come on, Sami,” he replied. “You know time has no meaning here.”

“Yeah, I know,” conceded Sami, before adding, “but you’d think there’d be some measure of time here in the time vortex.”

“The time vortex? Wasn’t that Back to the Future or something?”

“Mmm, Doctor Who. Back to the Future was the space-time continuum.”

Kevin sighed, rolling his eyes.

“You’ve spent too many lifetimes as nerds,” he told his lover, the annoyance in his voice dancing with joviality.

Sami raised an eyebrow.

“And what about the one where you were a 1960’s single woman writing Star Trek fanfiction?”

“Hey, I had Leonard Nimoy over for dinner, that life was pretty fucking cool. Got better after you showed up, though. God that was scandalous.”

Sami smiled. “It always is between us.”

Kevin laughed, before Sami suddenly leaned over to put his face directly beside Kevin’s.

“Nerd,” Sami whispered at him, before breaking away and laughing.

Kevin’s jaw dropped slightly at his own accusation returned to him, before shutting his mouth and pushing Sami away.

“Oh shut up,” Kevin told him.

Sami began to drift away. It wasn’t like they had form there, at least nothing outside of what their minds created. It was almost like drifting in space, weightless and alone. Honestly, were it not for what had occurred back in the Gorosian Empire, they would both be floating alone, still cosmically linked to an extent, but without the companionship between lives.

And powers was Kevin grateful for the companionship.

Time had no meaning where they were, that much was true, but it still felt like an eternity. Even when you slept, you didn’t dream. You just woke up in the same empty space a moment later, right where you started. There really wasn’t anything to look at besides endless fog and darkness, although despite the darkness, he never had a problem seeing Sami next to him, as though his pale skin and ginger curls were bathed in unseen moonlight. There was nothing to do, nowhere to go, and nobody to talk to. You were just waiting.

At least now they could wait together.

Sami was still floating away, eyes closed and a content look on his face and Kevin willed himself closer to him.

“Sami, where the hell are you - “

Sami cut him off with a chuckle, pushing his foot off Kevin’s chest and doing a backflip. He spun himself around a few times amidst the fog before stopping, the grin on his face doing little to conceal his giggling.

Shaking his head, Kevin decided he should ask. Sami had something on his mind, and the guy was going to drive him crazy with his chipperness if he didn’t figure it out.

“Ok, Sami,” Kevin demanded, “What’s up. What’s got you so happy?”

Sami replied by floating over toward Kevin and placing a soft hand on his cheek.

“You,” he said, and pulled him into a passionate kiss. It wasn’t a needy or urgent kiss or anything like the affection they used to show each other back when they were in the Indies on Earth. It was the type of kiss that lovers shared when they knew each other completely. When they had been down a million roads together and knew full well there would be a million more.

When they weren’t two separate souls at all, but one, forever and eternally joined.

And as the soul energy surged between their spirits, Kevin knew he’d found home once again.

But therein lay the trouble, and with a creased brow, he broke off the kiss.

Sami’s pout was damn near audible.

“Shit Sami,” Kevin swore, “I don’t understand what’s got you so excited. You know the routine. We spend time here, then we get shoved into new bodies and have to spend another lifetime finding each other and getting back together. I don’t understand why we can’t just have this forever!”

The one-time Intercontinental Champion looked sad for a moment, before turning his eyes to Kevin.

“Do you want to know what I dreamt about?” he asked KO.

“Bullshit,” Kevin grumbled, “you didn’t dream anything.”

“No, I did, I swear. And it was glorious.”

There was that damn word again.

Glorious.

Kevin both hated and loved when Sami used that word. He hated it because somehow, in almost every situation they found themselves in, he had an equivalent for it and was far too liberal in its usage.

He loved it because, whenever Sami used the word, his eyes would brighten, catching whatever light was nearby, and Kevin would drown in them and fall in love all over again.

And this time was no different.

“Sami...” Kevin sighed, the word a breath across his lips. He gazed into Sami’s hazel eyes, they were always hazel in that space, and he could see himself there. With Sami, where he always belonged and where he always would be.

It was so damn easy to get lost there, but Sami noticed (he always did) and wrapped his hand around Kevin’s head pulling their foreheads together.

“Focus, Kev,” Sami told him, and after closing his eyes for a moment to do just that, Kevin reopened them and pulled away.

“Right,” he said, his mind clear once more, “what was this dream?”

Sami smiled. “It’s about our next lifetime.”

With a tilt of his head, Kevin looked at him like he was crazy.

“Sami. We never get any indication of our lives ahead of time. You know how it is. We’ve certainly been through this enough.”

The redhead shook his head. “No, I swear, I had a vision. You and me. A happily married couple. No fighting, no trauma. Just domestic bliss.”

Kevin made a face.

“Ew, yeargh,” He practically gagged at the idea. “Domestic? Who the fuck wants domestic?”

“You know, Luv,” Sami chided, “We don’t have to be at each other’s throats every time.”

“No, but it’s more fun that way.”

“Maybe for you. I’m usually the one on the receiving end of the beatings. I’ll take a round of domestic bliss if it means I don’t have to get beaten, threatened, tortured, whatever by you for a change. Why are you so determined to hurt me in every single possible future we have together?!”

“You know I don’t do it on purpose!” Kevin shouted, and immediately regretted it afterward. They rarely fought between the worlds, but Sami was right. It always seemed like Kevin had it out for Sami. No matter what configuration the universe put them in, there was always some level of pain involved.

Kevin closed his eyes to focus once more and started again.

“Sami,” he said, “You know I love you. Here, to eternity and back, I love you. I’ve loved you in more ways than either of us could have ever dreamed possible. In this space, looking ahead, you know I don’t want to hurt you. But, I don’t know, maybe it’s just my nature. Maybe I’m just a naturally negative person. All we’ve been through? I think I’m just the bad to your good. The rage to your peace. The darkness to your light.”

“The Yin to my Yang,” Sami added, a kind look on his face.

“Yeah, something like that,” Kevin responded.

Sami reached his hand out, taking hold of Kevin’s shoulder.

“You know, Kev, The Yin Yang? There’s always a bit of light in the darkness, and vice versa. They say that the yin and yang represent...”

“Nope,” Kevin said, shaking his head and cutting him off, “I’m stopping you there. Go much further and I guarantee you’ll lose me. Just stick with ‘there’s light in the darkness’, ok?”

“’K. But you know that means that there’s also always part of you in me as well, right? We’re one soul, not just joined or intertwined, but intermixed. Ever since the powers of the universe blinked us into existence, we’ve been together. I mean, who needs all the marriages, joinings, ceremonies, rituals, all that fluff and stuff. You and me, we’re one unit. Why the hell do you think we’ve always had such chemistry, even when we’re fighting? We’re meant to be together, one way or another. By whatever name, in whatever form. You’ve always been a part of me Kev. Your soul in my soul. Your heart in my heart...”

“... my mind to your mind, my thoughts to your thoughts, yeah yeah, I got it. Fuck, Sami in what lifetime were you that much of a sappy romantic?”

Shrugging, Sami replied, “Probably most of them. You just never spent enough time in love with me to notice.”

Kevin smirked. “I’m always in love with you. Always have been, always will be. It’s just sometimes I’m too stubborn to realize it.”

Sami couldn’t contain his snort. “Now who’s the sappy romantic?”

It was a fair enough question, but one that Kevin didn’t feel like answering. Instead, he shut his lover up by pressing his lips against him, kissing him once more. And once more the energy surged. Granted, even in their living forms there was always some amount of electricity that flowed between them, but in that netherworld-like space, it flowed the strongest, unhindered by any physical forms or bodies. There it was just their combined soul, floating and waiting to be reborn, and as Kevin tasted the sparks on Sami’s lips, he felt himself start to grow heavier, the way he always did before he was pulled into a new body.

He felt Sami start to pull away, obviously feeling a similar sensation, but Kevin grabbed ahold of Sami’s head and maintained contact. Wherever they were going, it would likely be years before they could kiss once more, and Kevin wasn’t going to miss out on his last chance for who knew how long.

A white light began to glow and blossom between them, starting first in their chests before wrapping its way around their bodies and encircling their arms and legs. He could hear wind blowing, like something out of a blustery spring day, and the sound began to engulf them both.

Still, Kevin didn’t let go. He could feel Sami’s energy pulling away and he struggled to hold on, but it was no use. The contact was broken and as the white light turned to gold, he felt his astral connection to Sami break as he was pulled through the cosmos to whatever destination the powers of the universe had picked for him this time around.

And as he flew through space-time towards his new, waiting life, a thought sat firmly in his mind.

Domestic, huh?

Wouldn’t be the end of the world.

Might be nice even. Possibly glorious.

Maybe we don’t have to fight forever after all.

And then his consciousness lapsed as the light turned to darkness and his new life began.

[keeperofhounds]

Lost & Found (Chapter Two)

Special thanks to my beta reader @rachelbethhines and special thanks to Varian 66 on Discord for their part in developing this story.

We all know how the original story started. We all know how it ended too. Let’s see an alternate take if Eugene were to have been adopted rather than being alone for most of his life.

Turns out outrunning the royal guard wasn’t as easy as he thought. It wasn’t even the guards that were Flynn’s biggest problem, it was the damn horse. That horse made him really work for that escape. The ridiculousness of the entire situation would be a good story to tell later on though. He at least knew one person who would get a laugh out of the entire thing.

Once he and the horse fell off the cliff when the branch broke, the thief took the opportunity to get out of the beasts sight. Doing his best to avoid catching the stubborn horse's attention Flynn stumbled along the side of boulders covered in overgrowth. Placing his hand over the overgrowth the thief attempted to regain his footing only for his hand to meet nothing but air. Surprised Flynn almost fell through the opening before catching himself.

Moving the overgrowth to the side Flynn saw an unused path in a dark tunnel. He didn’t think it would hide him from the superior sense of smell of a horse, but at this point the man was desperate. Stumbling through the overgrowth and cringing at the amount of noise his boots made on the forest floor. Flynn leaned against the wall of the tunnel holding his breath as the shadow of the horse stalked towards his hiding place.

Flynn froze when the shadow of the horse placed his nose on the floor hoping to find him. Those tense moments seemed to last forever before the shadow snorted stalking away from the hidden tunnel. Flynn didn’t move, he needed to be absolutely sure the threat was gone.

Backing away and slowly gaining confidence that the horse was long gone. Flynn ran from the tunnel entrance not believing his luck the horse should have been able to smell him but maybe the plants were able to hide his scent. He had been told that some plants had really strong scents it’s what he used when avoiding guard dogs, whatever the case if that horse didn’t find him then no one was going to.

Once he was out of the tunnel Flynn found himself in a clearing with green grass and many wildflowers growing without restraint. There were no worn trails leading in or out along the grass and the tower at the center looked abandoned. Although it looked lonely and gloomy with the lack of sun shining within the area not that Flynn had any reason to be picky. It was the perfect place for someone like him to hide out.

Staring up at the tower he could feel the strands of a plan forming within his mind.

Flynn Rider would like to say that, that was the end of his story. That he scaled the tower to find it deserted returned the crown with his impeccable skills and ran off into the sun set for his next great adventure. Yes, in Flynn Rider’s perfect life all of this would have happened, but life doesn’t really work that way and it’s never perfect. For the record Flynn would like everyone to know that he was no amateur, but after being threatened, chased, and exhausted from climbing a tower it was only natural that someone finally got the drop on him.

Which is how he found himself shouting awake after feeling something soggy thrown into his ear, honestly it felt like a wet willy. Tied to a chair with the strangest rope imaginable, human hair. It wasn’t even cut it was all long strands that seemed to go on forever no matter where he looked until his eyes found the person the hair was.

“Stru-struggling is pointless,” the shadow on a beam shouted in false confidence.

Squinting his eyes Flynn tried to get a better look at the person hidden in the shadows. They sounded young maybe younger than him and definitely a girl. If it wasn’t the fact he was tied up, he would have thought this was one of the strangest situations he’d ever been in.

Flynn watched the silhouette of the girl jumped to the floor slowly getting closer to Flynn, “I know why you’re here...and I’m not...afraid of you.”

The tied up man only gave her a look of disbelief, there was no way she knew. Although the stranger seemed pretty sure she knew why he was there but he thought it would be better to voice his thoughts, “What?”

The girl walked into the sunlight finally giving Flynn a face to go along with the unnaturally long hair and nervous voice. “Who are you?” She asked, holding a frying pan with both her hands tightly showing off her nervousness but putting on a brave face. She slowly raised it as if to smack him, “And how did you find me?”

The thief couldn’t take his eyes off her. The girl was in fact very beautiful with her long golden locks and her pretty dress that he was at a loss for words.

“Who are you?” The girl asked again getting more nervous at Flynn’s none answer. Slowly raising her frying pan higher as if expecting him to attack her, “And how did you find me?”

Flynn cleared his throat seeing how nervous the girl was. He could still sort of feel the pain on his head which he can only assume was from the frying pan in her hands. In this case he thought it best to just be honest with her and maybe try to lighten this tense mood, “I now not who you are nor how I came to find you but may I just say…” He gave her his best smile, “Hi, how you doin’ my name's Flynn Rider. How’s your day goin’?”

This normally worked with people when he was trying to pretend that he wasn’t up to something, but the attempt fell flat with the girl pointed her makeshift weapon at him like a sword, “Who else knows about my location? Flynn Rider.”

Flynn thought that this would be too easy. So, he told her the very condensed version of what happened how he ran into trouble and found her tower. It wasn’t even a lie it was all true. That was he noticed the missing satchel which held the one thing that could get him from becoming a criminal in Corona. As he turned wildly or tried too with the hair around him he asked the girl where his satchel was.

Rapunzel who she was apparently called herself crossed her hands over her chest in a self satisfied manner. Not unlike younger siblings and children would do when they think they got one over the clearly smarter people. “I’ve hidden it somewhere you’ll never find it.”

Flynn was unimpressed, he had enough experience to at least have an idea of where she could have put it. It also sounded like she didn’t get out often with how she acted with him early. Looking around the room his eyes landed on a lone pot close to the girl. “It’s in that pot isn’t it?”

When Flynn next woke up from his most recent bout of unconsciousness he saw the culprit of once again the wet willy. Shouting in disgust the chameleon jumped away in surprise as he tried to wipe away the ickiness with his shirt. It also didn’t help with his annoyance at the situation, who goes around hitting people beside the head with a frying pan? “Will you stop doing that.”

Acting more confident than ever with the familiar pose of arms crossed over her chest, “Now it’s hidden somewhere you’ll never find it.”

The professional thief gave her look at her words. He could think of a few places that she could have hidden the crown. Under her bed, in the same pot, under a floorboard, in the walls, maybe even under a step. The problem with that was he didn’t really have a lot of time to just go looking for it.

So, satisfied with outwitting him, Rapunzel shot out question after question which strangely enough all seemed to revolve around her hair. Eugene would never in a million years would have thought he would have met someone more eccentric than the one he knew but she definitely took the cake. Why would anyone want hair?

He told her as such making sure to emphasize that what she was accusing him of trying to do was ridiculous. While he was pretty sure that if anyone even wanted her hair could make a pretty penny making wigs out of all that hair the fact was that stealing hair wasn’t even a thing. No one did that especially if it was still attached to a person. Rapunzel looked shocked at his denial of her claims as if the thought that no one wanted her hair was ridiculous.

The frog glared at him trying to do what Flynn could only assume was see through his truthful words and find a lie. The entire situation was getting too weird for him and he lived with weird for years. This type of weird though had no charm. As the girl talked to her frog he tried to struggle his binds and escape but of course it was useless.

“Okay, Flynn Rider I am prepared to offer you a deal.”

“A deal?” He asked as he fell face first to the floor as Rapunzel moved her long hair.

Rapunzel explained the deal. She wanted him to take her to see the lanterns that the kingdom held every year for the lost princess. The very thought of doing that when the crown was missing didn’t sit very well with him not only is he still in hot water with the kingdom but he was being expected to escort a girl who in turn stole the crown. It sort of felt like a spit in the face to the poor monarchs.

He remembered being seven when the guards searched desperately for the girl and how the villagers and townspeople aided in the search. Heck, he had tried helping too because it was the right thing to do, but no one found her. Now he didn’t think that she was out there, but he couldn’t fault the monarchs for believing that their daughter was still out there. There is still no evidence of her demise and he can at least relate to holding onto that one certainty. Maybe if he found their daughter the crown wouldn’t matter, but the reality was, he needed to give that crown back.

“Fine, I’ll take you to see the lanterns.”

[bitsandbobsandstuff]

Safe with me (Epilogue)

Summary: When an unknown threat enters your life, protection is offered at the highest level. As Bucky Barnes comes into your life, the game changes, and you realise falling for the man tasked with keeping you safe is the last thing you expected.

Characters: Bodyguard!Bucky Barnes x Reader Warnings: Bad language. Brief description of smut. Mentions of depression.

A/N: The end has arrived! This Epilogue is a complete homage to CHAPTER 1, so I suggest giving that a quick re-read before diving in. 

I am genuinely blown away at the reception this story has received - I never expected it and I’m SO grateful to each and every one of you. I’ve spent six months writing these characters and thinking daily about this story, and I’ll admit I’m feeling a little emotional about the end. I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed writing.  

SAFE WITH ME MASTERLIST PREVIOUS CHAPTER

*****

NEW YORK TIMES SUNDAY EDITION Features Section

The measure of a man By Anonymous

James Buchanan Barnes sits primly before me, mismatched hands folded on the table. Pushing a cup of coffee toward him, he unlinks his fingers, clasping them gratefully around the steaming mug.

"I don't really do interviews," he confesses. "Not sure what to say."

"That's okay," I tell him. "This isn't about being perfect or saying the exact right thing. It's just about being yourself."

He makes a face at that. "I don't think myself is something people want to hear about."

Looking into his nervous blue eyes, I give him a reassuring smile. "They absolutely will. People want to know the man behind the mask."

He doesn't like talking about himself, has never been overly comfortable in the limelight. Rolling his shoulders back, he takes a deep breath and gives me a tentative nod.

Like any good story, context is important, so we begin down the familiar route.

"Let's start at the beginning."

******

Crisp morning air wafts through the small kiosk, fluttering the bright covers of the magazines and newspapers lining the shelves. Taking a long drink of coffee, Riz smacks his lips and leans over his front counter, watching Manhattan's morning routine play out around him.

From out of nowhere, a giant stack of newspapers is hurled onto the counter and Riz tumbles back in surprise.

"What the - "

Bucky Barnes stands before him, wearing an old leather jacket and a delighted grin.

"Morning Riz, I need them all today. Oh, and by the way," he digs into his back pocket and pulls out a crumpled sheet of paper, tossing it carelessly on the stack. "Got something to show you."

The black ink is smudged in places, but there it is, the numbered boxes filled with careful block letters.

Last Sunday's New York Times crossword.

Completed.

Riz stares at the paper in astonishment. Looking up, he begins to laugh at the smug triumph on Bucky's face.

"I fucking told you I'd finish one," Bucky says, slapping his hand on the puzzle once more to reinforce his success.

Still chuckling, Riz reaches below the counter and produces a dusty rectangle wrapped in tissue paper. Bucky peels away the layers, grinning happily when it reveals a black picture frame. Riz gives him a friendly slap on the arm.

"My friend, I never doubted you."

*****

He needs no real introduction.

Familiar to anyone who cracked a grade school history book in the last seventy years, James Buchanan "Bucky" Barnes is a quiet enigma. The American public first met him in 1943 as Sergeant Barnes, Howling Commando and right-hand man to Captain America. His lopsided smile became so well-loved, a comforting staple in the news cycle, the women on the home front declared it a national treasure. America swooned for him, cheered for him, prayed for him, and ultimately mourned him when the reports came home of his KIA status in 1945.

When he was resurrected in Washington DC, amid a whirlwind of gunfire and explosions, he was another figure entirely. Life ripped to pieces and commandeered for decades by Hydra's brutality, he bore only a faint resemblance to the grainy black and white pictures of America's charming hero.

The history books lean into war, into combat, into the tragedy of his service; it's where the facts are most prevalent, irrefutable and absolute. Barnes' first war was for his country and his second was against it, but both lead to an unfortunate truth – most of his life, has been death.

But, beneath that iron exterior lies something else. Focused on consolidating facts and figures, history so often forgets that war is comprised of a much more important number – the beating hearts and terrified souls of those on the battlefield. Soldiers are the flesh and bone reflection of a generation's ideals and Barnes is no different than the millions who came before and after him. Stretched across the burned-out fields and shattered cities of Europe, his first war was one who's consequences still reverberate decades later.

That was his first taste of battle. It was harsh and unforgiving, but in the grand scheme of things – it was blessedly brief.

His next experience would last a lifetime. As his world careened out of control, his moral compass was broken and recalibrated, setting a man full of soft smiles and boisterous laughter, down a path of unimaginable pain and torment.

Through the course of both his lives, he's been known by a million different names. James Buchanan Barnes. Bucky Barnes. Sergeant Barnes. The Asset. The Winter Soldier. Before we go any further, I want to make something crystal clear.

The man you will meet, is more than a number stamped on a paper-thin set of dog tags, clinking loose around his neck. He is more than the shadowy name in a ledger of Hydra weaponry, carefully and perfectly aimed. He is more than a salacious headline, blazoned across gossip sites for the world to read.

He is more. He is much, much more.

I want everyone to know him, because Bucky Barnes is worth knowing.

*****

Walking through the Tower, Bucky's giant stack of papers grows smaller. Opening every page to the Features section, he leaves copies scattered in every room he visits.

The coffee table in the common room. One in Steve's bedroom. One in Wilson's bathroom. One in Natasha's mailbox, because no fucking way would he try to sneak in her room. A copy in the library. One on each treadmill in the gym. One on Bruce's desk. Pausing outside Tony's lab, he sends the online link to Pepper and asks if she can post it to the official Avengers social handles. She responds with a winky face telling him it's already been done.

"FRIDAY, did you see it?" he asks excitedly, waving his last copy as he plops down on the sofa.

"Yes, Sergeant Barnes," comes the Irish lilt and Bucky wonders for the millionth time, how an AI can sound amused. "I found it to be an inspiring piece. She's a lovely writer."

"Yeah," he agrees fervently. "She's fucking awesome." Rustling the pages, he finds the article and folds it open, swallowing the lump in his throat when he reads the headline. Even though he has your story memorized at this point, he sinks into the words one more time.

*****

"Talk to me about growing up with Steve," I say, turning my phone to record and setting it between us.

Barnes looks to the ceiling and gives a low whistle. "Jesus Mary and Joseph," he says, "that kid needed a leash. Stubborn ass little ball of piss and vinegar, always getting me in trouble."

The pair met in a baseball field behind their apartment complex, when Barnes was seven-years-old, kick starting the most famous friendship in modern history.

"First time I met him, he was getting his ass handed to him. When I tried to pull him away, he was so wound up he took a swing at me. Got an arm around him and the little punk bit me. Still got the scar." Barnes extends his right forearm with a grin, showing me a faint pair of half-moons on his skin. "I knocked him upside the head, and then he wipes his bloody nose on his shirt and apologizes. Been best friends ever since."

Rogers is well-known for diving head-first into any fray, a behaviour an exasperated Barnes maintains he hasn't changed since that sweaty summer day in 1925.

"Look, he's a reckless idiot," Barnes states. "My best damn friend in the world and I'd do anything for him, but he's still an idiot."

Barnes is a colorful storyteller, spinning tales about their adventures through the streets and alleys of pre-war Brooklyn. While he talks, I find myself picking up on a theme, the word future cropping up several times. He doesn't notice until I ask.

"When you were growing up, what did you see in your future? How did you picture your life?"

Barnes raises his eyebrows at the question, falling silent as he thinks. He scratches his fingernail on the edge of the table for a few minutes, trying to articulate his thoughts. When it comes, I'm surprised.

"Not as a soldier. I never wanted to be a soldier." He bites his lip and when he speaks again, his voice is soft. "Guess I wanted what everyone wanted then. Get a decent job, put food on the table, buy a house someday. Find a nice girl to settle down with, maybe raise a couple kids. Grow old together." He gives me a wistful smile. "Always liked learning, would've loved to go to college."

The simplicity of his response is all the more heart-breaking, considering the trajectory he would later be set upon.

"All I ever really wanted, was a quiet, ordinary life."

******

The bruises littering your skin have mostly faded, the rope markings around your neck nothing more than a faint rash. Unconsciously rubbing the scabs on your wrists, you find the pain is gone, leaving behind a dull ache.

It's been over a week since that night and the entire experience still seems like a bizarre dream. There will be plenty of time spent parsing apart the details with a professional, and in fact Steve already booked you several months of weekly appointments with an experienced trauma therapist he knows through the VA. It's a relief to have that on the horizon, someone to help you work through everything.

Behind the walls of your heart though, a strange feeling emerges, one that is deeply frustrating. After everything he did, it kills you to think the traitorous thought, but your brain refuses to cooperate and there it is – there's a tiny part of you mourning the loss of a man you thought you knew. Not the man he really was – Jack deserved his violently bloody ending and you would never take that from Bucky. But Jack was someone you trusted, a mentor and friend, and you're bitterly disappointed in your inability to see the real man until it was nearly too late.

Nearly too late.

"But it wasn't," you say out loud, irrationally proud of the steadiness in your voice.

At Bucky's insistence, you've been comfortably ensconced in the Brooklyn apartment since you came back. Away from the bustle of the city, it's been heaven to hide away, resting and recovering.

Well, and of course – spending every possible minute with the moody, uncontrollable, uncooperative bucket of sarcasm that is none other than James Buchanan Barnes.

Waiting for him to come home, you wander through the comfortable apartment. Picking up his well-worn copy of The Book Thief, you tuck it carefully into the empty slot on the bookcase, tracing your fingers over the lettering down the spine, smiling to yourself.

Stepping back, you scan the familiar artwork on the walls, marvelling again at the cracked and peeling photos, at the beauty of Steve's sketches. Right then, your eye pauses when you notice two new additions.

In a shiny green frame, is an adorably childish marker drawing of a smiling Bucky holding the hand of a little girl with dark pigtails. Everyone is dressed head to toe in pink and the bottom is signed 'Gracie' in bright purple letters. The sweetness of the statement, of Bucky going to the trouble of framing and hanging artwork an adoring kid drew for him, makes your heart flip.

Above the drawing, in a simple black frame, is the other new addition. Peering closer, you find the selfie you took the night of Stark's party. Swallowing hard, you reach to touch the frame, losing yourself in memories of that night. The smooth motion of Bucky swaying, the feel of sinking into his arms, his quiet hums of pleasure sending ripples down your back.

"I had Stark get it off your phone for me," the husky voice is unexpected and you let out a bloodcurdling shriek when strong arms wind around you. Bucky chuckles, holding you tight, mouthing at the soft skin behind your ear. "Sorry, thought you heard me. Least you didn't attack me with M&Ms this time."

"That's only because we're out of them," you grumble, turning in his arms. Bucky grins, rubbing his nose to yours, before catching your lips with a sweet kiss. When he presses you against the wall, you feel every delicious inch of his heavy body and you shiver at the promise behind his hard grip. Smiling into the kiss, you slide your tongue against his, feeling the heat pool in your belly, before reluctantly pulling away. He gives a soft whine at the loss of contact, full lips dropping into a pout.

"Pathetic, Barnes," you sigh and he pouts harder. "Fine, you giant fucking baby. Ravish me then."

"Hell yes," he breathes, lifting you easily and tugging your legs tight around his waist. "Hell fucking yes."

*****

Ordinary was a sweet word, but it wasn't meant to be. Unknown to him, the darkest day of his life was drawing closer, one that would spin him in an entirely new direction.

Searching for more context around that horrifying day, I went straight to the man who saw it first-hand. He sheds the mantle when he talks about this memory, no longer Captain America – here, he is only Steve Rogers, a helpless young man watching his best friend fall to his death.

"I couldn't do anything. Nothing. I just watched him slip away," Rogers says. His guilt is palpable, the musings of a man shouldering far too much. "It pisses him off when I say it, but it's the truth. Won't ever forgive myself."

Barnes shakes his head when I mention this, adamant in his refusal to assign a hint of blame.

"There was nothing he could have done," he states emphatically. "Absolutely nothing."

While Rogers can recount every horrifying detail of that day, in this small fact, Barnes is lucky. I ask him what he remembers.

"It's funny. I remember wondering how the hell my hands could be so sweaty when it was so damn cold outside." He flexes the fingers of his right hand, considering them. "I lost my grip on the bar and I heard Steve screaming. I don't remember the fall itself though, must've passed out on the way down. Next thing I know, I open my eyes and I'm half-buried in snow. There was – the snow was red. All around me, bright red. My arm wouldn't move and I couldn't feel anything from the waist down."

Most of Hydra's files from the start of the Winter Soldier project have been lost, either as they changed hands over the years or through the natural decay of time, but those recovered allude to Barnes suffering catastrophic injuries in the fall that should have left him dead. His left arm was found hanging by no more than a few strips of muscle, his spine was shattered, his lungs nearly collapsed. There was no possible reason he should have survived.

But – running through his veins was something unexpected.

"Knock-off Nazi trash serum," Barnes drily refers to it. During his weeks spent as a POW in Azzano (the Hydra work camp he was liberated from in 1943), Barnes was an unwilling participant in a number of experiments conducted by that same Arnim Zola he was chasing that day on the train.

Laying in the snow, Barnes admits he thought he'd reached the end of the line. Every soldier entertains the possibility they may never return home, and Barnes made peace with that fact.

"Here's the thing. I had a family waiting for me in Brooklyn. A baby sister I promised to give away at her wedding. A best friend I left hanging on a busted train miles above me. I was 27-years-old, lost in another country, and I sure as hell didn't want to die. I kept thinking I had so much damn living left in me, so much I wanted to do."

His words are tragic in their familiarity, a prayer to be repeated by thousands of voices in the decades that followed, from Korea to Vietnam, from Iraq to Afghanistan. Generations of young men and women just like Sergeant Barnes, left broken and bleeding on foreign soil.

He cracks the knuckles on his right hand while he thinks.

"It seemed inevitable though, so I tried to get myself ready. Remember it being dead silent in that canyon, so I had plenty of time to think. Plenty of time to cry. There were definitely tears. But the longer I laid there, I started to feel warm and things didn't hurt so much. So, I thought hell, if I gotta go, maybe this is better than taking a bullet and bleeding out in the middle of a firefight." Barnes gives a hollow smile. "But right as it got dark, I heard dogs barking. Next thing I know, I'm surrounded by men shouting in Russian. Couldn't move a damn finger, couldn't do anything but lay there and panic. Took a boot to the head and passed out."

Here, he gets a distant look in his eyes. "The next time I woke up, it was – I don't understand it, I don't know how, but I guess it was months later. I was strapped to a table and the whole left side of my body felt like I'd been hit by a train." His lip curls. "And there was Zola, looking down at me again. Thought I was having a flashback."

It wasn't a flashback. On that surgery table, was the start of a waking nightmare that would continue unabated for the next seventy years.

******

The first night you spent together was marked with heat and urgency, a clear desperation to feel each other before the moment was lost. When Bucky pushed you away the morning after, it broke your heart, but the night itself, before all hell broke loose – it was beautiful and perfect and right. You wouldn't trade it for anything.

Now, though.

Now.

Fuck.

All his tight control and fervent attention to detail is one thing when he shifts into work mode – but in bed, when he turns that intense focus directly on you, he is devastating. Every stroke of his fingers comes slow and purposeful, building the heat in your stomach. Every kiss drips with love against your sweaty skin, full of unspoken promise. Every move of his body in yours is deliberate, wringing every last drop of pleasure he can coax from your body.

He was the kind of lover you dreamed about, committed to pleasing you above all else, making you feel everything again and again and then once more for good measure.

Never breaking his steady rhythm, Bucky now pulls you to your knees, your back flush against his chest. Wrapping his arm tight across your breasts, his tongue drags a leisurely line up your neck, his other hand slipping between your legs.

Breathless little grunts fall from his lips, warm panting against your skin with each sharp snap of his hips. Closing your eyes, you mirror his movements, clinging to the cool metal at your chest, desire crawling up your spine when you reach down and feel his fingers rubbing quickly.

Murmuring filthy little comments in your ear as he pushes into you, his words spark some unknown part of you that apparently lives for the sound of Bucky Barnes telling you how good you make him feel, how much he loves fucking you. Breath suddenly wrenched from your lungs, you tumble headfirst over the edge with a low, satisfied moan.

"There you go, that's it," he whispers encouragingly, sucking the smooth skin on your shoulder as you tremble in his arms, spiraling further and further.

You hope you never stop falling.

*****

Memories are a strange thing.

Through his time with Hydra, Barnes had his brain repeatedly wiped, cleared and cleaned out again and again. Since his return to the land of the living, thanks to intensive therapy and a determined Captain Rogers, he has broad strokes and frames of reference back in his life, remembrances before the fall settled firmly in his brain. But vestiges of his past still linger, and his time with Hydra has resulted in a sort of shared mental capacity.

"There's another guy in your life," I begin hesitantly and I see Barnes' lips twitch.

"That's one way to put it," he says.

When Barnes speaks of the Winter Soldier, his expression grows grim. The lines of his life are irrevocably tied to this legendary presence, a ghost sitting on the fringes of his mind, something more myth than reality. It is a heavy burden to bear.

"For the longest time, I tried to keep us separate. The Soldier was one thing. I was another. It was easier to blame all the terrible things that happened on him, rather than admit I played any part in it." I remind him he didn't – that's the fundamental issue with brainwashing, and he gives me a patient smile. "In theory, I know. All those years, it wasn't me. I know. But I still did it."

On a personal level, I own a single memory of the Winter Soldier, one that is overwhelming in its complexity. He was everything you've imagined. Hard. Violent. Angry. But behind that mask, I found a man I never expected. Gentle. Confused. Protective. Kind. The Soldier was a kaleidoscope of emotions, neatly packaged in the mind of a man who spent his entire life at the mercy of others.

I will not condone his past and neither will Barnes, but I highlight this simply to signal the opportunity for redemption. Earning that redemption has been a long process, one Barnes started by first bringing back his memories of their shared past. He recalls the experience of remembering cautiously, the process itself a memory that makes him flinch.

"There were days when nothing would happen. Mind would just stay white, it wouldn't show me anything. That was frustrating, but also kind of a relief. If I couldn't remember, then I didn't have to face up to the things I'd done. But other days. God." He blows out a huge breath and leans back in his chair, raking his hands through his dark hair. "They came back with a vengeance."

Sometimes the memories were hazy, surreal fever dreams that felt confusing in their reality. Other times, they were shockingly vivid, nightmares from which he visibly shudders as he recalls.

Not everything was returned, which is both a blessing and a curse. Some things his brain refuses to allow in, a coping mechanism he doesn't try too hard to unravel. He knows there are some things better left forgotten.

But where he can, as much as he can, he is adamant about making amends. He understands it won't change the past. That's not the point.

When he breaks it down for me, I ask a loaded question. Is there a measure of peace that comes with remembering? His nose wrinkles as he thinks, playing with the coffee mug still in his hands. One thing about Bucky Barnes, is that he never delivers a half-baked response. When he finally answers, his words have a philosophical bend.

"Yes. I've come to grips with the fact that all those years weren't something I could control. I don't like to remember, but I think I owe it to people." He nods slowly while he speaks, as if convincing his own heart to get in line. "If remembering is my penance, if my suffering gives others peace, then I guess yeah – I'm happy to pay it."

*****

Sucking tiny hickeys down his neck, you laugh at the sound of his pleased little purrs. Leaving one last purpley-red bruise above his heart, you settle comfortably between his legs and fold your hands across his bare chest. Propping your chin on your knuckles, you study him.

"Do you know my first impression of you, the day we met?"

Bucky raises a lazy eyebrow and grins. "Shock at how devastatingly handsome I was?"

"Don't get cocky Barnes, you're not that good in bed."

"Yes, I am," he promptly replies.

Wiggling against him, you rub your cheek against the bristly hair on his chest. "Hmmm. True. Anyway, I remember that day, you were acting all pissy and annoyed, big shocker I know, and I was looking at your scruffy face – "

"I didn't have time to shave that morning," he interrupts.

"And all your fluffy hair – "

"I was having a great hair day," he confirms.

"And that old leather jacket – "

"It's my favorite jacket, makes me look sexy and intimidating," he says.

"Buck, I'm trying to tell a story here."

"Right. Sorry babe."

"Anyway. You were standing there with your scruffy face and fluffy hair and that leather jacket, and I kept thinking you were the kind of guy who'd screw a girl in a bar bathroom, slap her ass, and never call."

"That sounds very unsanitary," he whispers, tapping your nose lightly. "But if you really want to try, I'll give it a go."

"What a saint."

"I really am."

*****

Just thinking about everything Barnes has experienced is enough to make my brain ache. Imagining what it must have been like for him, is baffling.

"All those years, through everything – how did you cope with it all?"

"I fought it for a long time, until they figured out how to wipe it all out – my memories, who I was. The longer I was out of cryofreeze, the more random thoughts would come back, but it was so confusing. I'd end up trying to compartmentalise it all. Separate it out, put parts of my life and my memories into little boxes in my head. It was the only way I could deal with it.

His ability to compartmentalise and separate himself from the situation at hand, would prove to be useful, a common coping method for trauma survivors. "I'd kind of retreat into myself. I got very good at finding safe spaces in my head." He gives a nonchalant shrug. "Knew if I didn't, there'd be hell to pay."

He must have learned new things then, other ways of coping. What gets him through the days now?

"I guess – it's like, you just put one foot in front of the other. Every day, you get up and do it and at some point, it becomes second nature."

"What was it like in the beginning?"

Rubbing his jaw, he shakes his head. "It was terrible. There were weeks I didn't want to get out of bed. Was terrified of what I might do, who I might see. And everything just felt – heavy, I guess? Not sure that's the right word. It was like my brain wanted to give up, but my body wasn't done yet. I hid from real life for a long time."

Known during WW2 as Combat Stress Reaction, Barnes was familiar with his symptoms. It took no time at all to diagnose him with one of the most disturbingly common conditions affecting those in service: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).

"It wasn't something we talked about back then," he says. "But we all knew what it was. People just tried to deal with it though, they didn't look for help."

The world has changed for the better and now discussions around this topic are no longer taboo. Even then, Barnes says he initially found it difficult, because the idea of it – of help – was such a foreign concept. Now though, he's an enthusiastic supporter.

"We don't talk about it enough," he says firmly. "It's better now, but we need to be more open and honest with each other, so we can figure out how to live." Tipping his mug back, he drains the last dregs of coffee. "Humans are weird, you know? We make things hard sometimes and we shouldn't. You can't be afraid to ask for help. You're not alone."

*****

Bucky picks up his phone and gives a cursory glance at the list of notifications. The screen lights up with message after message, line after line, and he scrolls through nervously, before he realizes what he's seeing.

"Jesus H Christ."

Feeling your heart lurch, you look at him in alarm. "What? What happened?"

Slowly, he turns his phone screen to face you, eyes comically wide, face bone white.

"I'm trending on Twitter."

*****

Part of me expected Barnes to have a limited knowledge of culture and history. He likes to feign confusion at times ("honestly, screwing with Sam Wilson is a highlight in my life"), but in reality, he's one of the sharpest people I've met. Spending so much of his life as an undercover operative, he was required to keep up to speed on the world, always assimilating into new environments.

Finding a work-life balance is key though, so what are the things he does for fun, just for himself?

"Netflix," he declares. "is the greatest thing ever invented. You know Stranger Things, right? I love Eleven, that kid's my hero."

Agreeing wholeheartedly, I push him to expand. What else?

"Um, I like to eat? Tacos, pizza. Snickers. Breakfast cereal. Damn, yeah. Breakfast cereal. I could eat Captain Crunch every single day of my life. Captain Crunch kicks Captain America's ass."

On that note, he has a famous relationship with Steve Rogers, but what about the rest of the Avengers?

"Took me awhile to fall in with the team," he says matter of fact. "Didn't trust them and they sure as hell didn't trust me. But now? I'd take a bullet for any of them. They're – we're family."

Time for our interview is winding down, and Barnes is finally relaxed. With my final set of questions, I struggle to keep the smile off my face, but I can't help myself.

"You know you've got quite the status as a moody broody heartthrob, right?"

His eyes go wide at the question, a red flush instantly staining his cheeks. "What? No. No, that's – no. No. I'm definitely not – no. God no."

The look of horror on his face is entertaining and I wait for him to finish spluttering before I continue. "So, are you saying you're single? A free agent?"

He looks taken aback for a moment, but when realization arrives, along with a sparkle in his eye, he relaxes. He knows what I'm doing.

"I didn't say that."

"So – there's a special someone then?"

Barnes gives me that trademark smile and ducks his head. "Well, there's this girl."

"Tell me about her."

"She's a real pistol," he enthuses. "Smart. Funny. A real ball-breaker. Swears more than anyone I've ever met."

"She sounds like fun."

"She is," he agrees. Tilting his head, he fixes me with an intense stare and his voice grows serious. "She's got my whole damn heart, right in the palm of her hand. It's all hers. I'll spend every day if I need to, making sure she knows that."

At his words, my heart leaps. When I try to respond, I hear my voice crack.

"She's a lucky girl."

"Nah," he replies, bashful at the compliment. Reaching across the table, he picks up my hands and holds them tight. "I'm the lucky one. She makes me feel safe."

*****

"We haven't left this bed for a couple days. Should we go do something?" Drawing random little patterns across his skin, you pause at his nipple and give it a pinch.

"Nope, we're staying put," he says, shoving your fingers away and giving you a stern look. "That tickles."

"Does it?" Tweaking his nipple again, he yelps.

"Woman, don't you listen?"

"Sorry, couldn't hear you over the sounds of someone being a whiny bitch."

With an outraged growl, he rolls you over, using his knee to shove your legs open and pinning your arms above your head.

"Wanna try again?"

Batting your eyelashes at him, you mirror his earlier pout. "I was just saying how devilishly handsome you were and how much I love you."

Bucky grunts his approval. "That's what I thought."

Stretching up, you leave a sloppy kiss on his chin. "So, are we leaving or what?"

"Hard no," he shakes his head. "Made myself a promise, I'm not breaking it."

"Did you now? And what was that?"

"That if I got you back, if I didn't fuck it up again, I was keeping you in my bed for at least a week. Minimum."

"Hmmm," you say, trying to keep your face serious. "Sounds like a solid plan, except what if I want to shower?"

"Excellent," Bucky breathes, eyes lighting up at the question. "Then I'll join you. Never know what kind of trouble you'll find in the shower, when you're all wet and slick and soapy – yep, that's it. You're a dirty, dirty girl. Shower time you hussy, move your ass."

Scrambling off the bed, he tosses you over his shoulder and palms your bare ass, squeezing a handful. Giving you a playful smack, he stalks toward the bathroom, the sound of his happy laughter echoing through the apartment.

******

Recently, there was news coverage around the Avengers taking down a Hydra sleeper cell in upstate New York. The mission was led by Sergeant Barnes and was deemed a success, with the threat being fully eradicated.

That mission, was put in motion to save someone.

That someone, was me.

Here's the thing. In journalism, you need to remain unbiased and when I'm reporting on news, I'll always strive to report the unbiased facts. But if you haven't guessed yet, I have a more personal stake in this story.

Combine everything you know about James Buchanan Barnes, from annals of history to the words I've shared today, and you have a fact-based portrait of this remarkable man.

But facts are not what make up the measure of any human being.

Here's what else I know.

When he gets nervous, his palm sweats. He's terrible at sharing food and shamelessly blames his super soldier metabolism for that fact. When he concentrates, his nose scrunches up and when he laughs you can find little wrinkles circling his eyes. Sometimes when he can't sleep, he wanders down to the local rest home to visit with Alzheimer's patients, because he knows what it's like to not remember. He always keeps a crossword in his pocket because it keeps his brain sharp. He loves Rocky Road ice cream and fuzzy blankets and his favourite colour is actually pink. Bitter black coffee is his drug of choice and he could watch 'I Love Lucy' all day long.

Even now, as I hand you these snippets of his life and let you paint your own picture of the man so many still scathingly refer to as the Soldier, it's only a rough sketch. Like every person on this planet, Bucky Barnes is comprised of more complex layers and subtle nuances than it is possible to describe, a man full of contrasts. Made of unbreakable metal and soft touches, at times frighteningly rough and astonishingly gentle, swathed in despair and brimming with light. He's seen the blackest horrors lurking in the chaos of war and experienced first-hand the depravity of humanity, yet he remains one of the most compassionate people I've ever known.

The first day we met, I contemptuously declared "I don't do soft human-interest stories."

How times have changed.

Here I am, pen in hand and heart on my sleeve, so soft for this man I feel it in my bones. We live in a world where good does not always triumph over evil and where far too often, love is not enough. I am lucky beyond measure to have found Bucky Barnes. So here, at the end of my story, I leave these words, for him and him alone.

If Death sees fit to grant me his heart, I'll offer my own in return. Unreservedly, now and always.

*****

Bucky watches the shadows lengthen through the apartment as the sun sets. Eventually he'll get up and turn on a lamp to chase the dark away, but for now he's content to lay here with you humming sleepily, twirling a finger around his damp hair.

Sprawled together on his bed, tangled up in each other, the word flits through his mind. Bucky understands what he has now, what you gave to him. What it means to be –

Safe.

*****

[swiftwidget]

Narrative as an Active Force and Izuku as an Embodiment of True Heroic Ideals

The Narrative in My Hero Academia is an Active Force for Heroic Ideals and punishes those that stray from the Path of a True Hero. Izuku is an Embodiment of True Heroic Desire and Ideals. Izuku has and can save those that stray from those Ideals. Izuku will someday be tested on those ideals.

(Oh geez this got so much longer than I thought it would be. Hhhhh I’ve been working on this for days...)

What do I mean by “the Narrative is an Active Force?”

The Narrative is just what I am calling the overarching path of the story’s morals. The core ideology that is present in each of the characters aiming to become heroes. And the question that must be asked while walking that road, “What is a True Hero?”

Based on my understanding of the series as I’ve read it, a True Hero: Saves Others Both Body and Heart, Gives Hope in Uncertainty, Pushes Beyond Limits

It is an Active Force because it affects characters in physical and symbolic ways. It lives and works through the characters in the story (Sort of like karma but I prefer comparing it to the Force from Star Wars. Appropriate given Horikoshi’s love of using Star Wars references). That Force is a living idea, the Heroic Ideal. The students and pro-heroes of My Hero Academia strive to follow those ideals - at least in part or facets of them - by their own choice, in their own ways, in their drive to be great heroes. 

So, what happens when someone starts down the path of the True Hero, only to stray or turn their backs on core aspects of it? They are punished by that living force.

Examples of the Narrative punishing those that stray from the True Hero Path:

All Might 

The Symbol of Peace, Pillar of Society, an Embodiment of a True Hero. 

We are shown that even as a kid, he had a vision of a better world - one that had a Pillar. Someone that could save with a smile and put the public at ease. He became that hero, changed society, and for decades was the Number 1 Hero because at that time he embodied what it meant to be a True Hero. 

That is until his first fight with All for One. My understanding is it was during that first fight that All Might lost his temper - much like he started to do at Kamino. In his rage at AfO, he started fighting with the intent to get revenge. This is the moment he “fell from grace.” He fell off the path of the True Hero. 

He intended to kill and believed he did. In that moment, he turned from the ideals of a true hero. (A True Hero doesn’t aim to kill his enemy. Exception might be made if there is someone innocent in direct danger because of the enemy, but even then that is iffy. A True Hero certainly does not seek revenge.)

As punishment for turning from the path of a True Hero, Toshinori is slowly stripped of his ability to be a hero. His injury slowly weakens him and steals time away from him. And before meeting Izuku, he is also stripped of his hope and optimism that fueled his dream to begin with. 

And that hopelessness leads him to at first say Izuku could not be a hero without a quirk. Something he must have been battling internally because he was losing the use of his quirk. And Izuku’s question is probably reminded him of what he had to face every day in the mirror as he grows weaker. What is he without the use of his quirk? Certainly no hero, he thinks.

(So much more under the cut. I’m so sorry mobile folks.)

Tenya Iida  

Much like All Might, he briefly strays from the heroic path by seeking out revenge for his brother against Stain. This is the kid that defined himself by following in the footsteps of his family and especially his older brother who he idolized much like Izuku idolized All Might. 

In this moment, he swerves off the path of a hero. He is so caught up in his own revenge, he forgets that a hero would be trying to save the Pro-Hero in more danger. Iida was blinded by the desire to take revenge himself that he nearly paid with his life. 

Stain ends up taking the payment in the name of the Heroic Ideal and Iida pays with the stab injury to his arm and health complications.

*** See below for Stain as an example of an extreme, an embodiment of ideology. 

Mirio Togata

One of the Big Three. An upperclassmen U.A. student being trained and raised by Sir Nighteye to be a successor to All Might. An incredibly disciplined young man with a difficult-to-master quirk. Someone who has learned from Nighteye to put the success of the mission first.   

He prioritized a no-conflict/no-suspicion plan, ready to ignore Eri’s fear in their first meeting for the sake of keeping Overhaul lulled into a sense of security. Like Nighteye trained him, he was too busy looking toward the end goal and was blind to the help he could give in the present. He didn’t move to comfort an obviously terrified child. He was ready to abandon her in that moment while working under the idea that Well, they’ll save her when the time is right. 

After realizing what a terrible situation Eri was in, it was then Mirio moved to act like a True Hero.  

Too little to late until he proved it.

And he proved it with sacrifice.  

He made amends, comforting the girl that he didn’t comfort before, and he sacrificed the price to be paid to the Ideals. He lost his quirk, and his ultimate goal of saving 1 million people is cut down to saving only one.

Sir Nighteye

Nighteye was All Might’s sidekick. Loyal and hardworking (and super fan). He was there to aid and support All Might in his work as the Symbol of Peace.

When All Might falls, Nighteye tries to pull All Might from his duty as the Symbol of Peace by telling him his fate. That was an act of desperation, of genuine concern, and incredibly selfish and cruel. It was said to make Toshinori afraid of that predicted fate. That perhaps if he wasn’t going to stop to heal, then he’d stop because of Nighteye’s grim warning. 

In one moment, Nighteye strips Toshinori of hope and only gives him grim, fated certainty. He will die if he continues. 

And when All Might pushed himself to continue down the path of a True Hero, Nighteye left his side.  

Nighteye tried making up for it. Looking for ways to avoid it. But he did it his way and didn’t take into account the desires and decisions of other people. 

Going so far as to select and train a student (Mirio Togata) that he believed would be a good successor for All Might. A hero with One for All and could not be touched, could not be gutted. A better version of All Might in Nighteye’s view. It was, quite frankly, another selfish act that took autonomy from both Mirio who was not aware that Nighteye was training him for that and Toshinori Yagi whose quirk was his own to pass down, his choice. 

Nighteye went as far as reject All Might’s choice and discourage Izuku before an important part of his hero training under his own wing. 

Nighteye only sees things his way. It may be a personality trait built on his belief that his Quirk Foresight is absolute truth. That he knows best because of the way he sees things turn out according to his visions. He is stuck doing things his own way and only his way. He, in his selfishness and arrogance, took away hope and tried to do everything himself to obtain a certain end goal without properly handling the present. In those ways, he went off the path of a True Hero. 

While he did end up seeing that he made those mistakes, and he hoped for a better future where he is proven wrong, he still pays for his years of arrogance and selfishness with his life. (And his death symbolically allows for his certainty to die with him. It is no longer a certain thing that All Might will face a grim end, Izuku proved that Nighteye could be wrong. This allows for the existence of uncertainty and hope. Because there cannot be hope without first uncertainty.) 

Endeavor

(Oh boy, here we go. The impetus that finally got me to actually write this damn thing and get it out of my head and on paper.)

Previous Number 2 Hero, defacto Number 1 Pro-Hero that abused his position and family. This is a man that, through his career as a pro-hero has:

Not Saved the Hearts of People, in fact keeping distant and cold toward people, scaring them.

Stole hope from his wife and family. Abusing them and driving them into hopeless despair. Causing trauma to his wife and children.  

He misunderstood the kind of hero All Might was. Gave up on his own abilities. He didn’t push himself beyond his own limits until recently. Instead “entrusting” his own dreams and ambitions to Shouto by pushing him way too far as a child.  

Endeavor was only recently faced with the reality of the depth of his mistakes. (See my recent post on that here.) 

And to my surprise, Endeavor has been showing self awareness. He realizes that he doesn’t fit into All Might’s shoes, he never gave hope to society and it shows with the rocketing crime rate. He is aware that he isn’t good enough, isn’t on the right path. And he begins his attempt to fix things or at least better things from this point on by asking All Might for advice. 

Endeavor is an incredibly flawed man who has recently been making an attempt to make amends. But that by itself does not erase what he did in his past. 

He is currently being punished by the narrative with symbolic scars to mirror the scar on his son’s face and the scar on the side of the man he tried to force his son to surpass. As if to say, you may change, you may better yourself, you may even be forgiven, but you are marked by what you have done because those you’ve affected have been marked for years. It is only fair he too bears the marks of his sins. 

If the Dabi is a Todoroki as theorized, it may be that Dabi is the embodiment of all the worst feelings toward Endeavor and the results of Endeavor’s actions. Endeavor is literally facing the consequences of his sins in the form of his possible son. 

His punishment isn’t finished yet. I think we will soon see the depth of it soon. Also, we will see whether or not this will affect Endeavor’s standing as a hero and society’s views of him. Because right now, he’s the strongest hero they have and his defeat of the noumu only just gave them some sense of security after the retirement of All Might. A very complex situation.  

How is Izuku the Embodiment of True Heroic Ideals?

Izuku grew up watching and studying all heroes. Especially All Might. He emulated All Might from an incredibly young age. During those formative years, All Might was the Embodiment of Heroic Ideals. Izuku learned from him and those ideals became what he lived for. “Save with a Smile” neatly packages it.

His main desire is to become a hero, but not just any hero. A hero that saves everyone. His body moved on it’s own to save Bakugou in the beginning and that impressed All Might, changed him, and Izuku was given the opportunity to earn One for All which allowed him to chance those heroic desires.

Izuku doesn’t embody quite the same thing as All Might did. Where All Might was the Symbol of Peace, bringing peace through his cleanup of the villain underworld, Izuku is growing in a now tumultuous time, a shifting away from peace into uncertainty. So while All Might grew into the Symbol of Peace, Izuku must grow into the Symbol of Hope (See my short thoughts for that here and @aoimikans expansion on it here).

Izuku embodies this living ideal of a True Hero: Saves Others Body and Heart, Gives Hope in Uncertainty, Pushes himself Beyond his Limits

These ideals drive him ever forward. 

Many of the other characters embody these in part or at varying levels or prioritize things not necessarily a core tenet of a True Hero (for example, being the strongest. Being the strongest is certainly helpful when being a hero, it makes saving others easier when strength is needed. A fine trait, but not a true end goal of a hero by itself.)

*** Let me note here, Izuku and All Might aren’t the only ones that are shown to be the Embodiment or the Extreme of an Ideal or Desire. My Hero Academia has a few others. Bakugou is a bit of an embodiment of Ambition and deals with the complications of unregulated ambition - He has been learning, growing, and maturing as the series progresses. Endeavor is or was an embodiment of Envy and deals with the wounded pride and fear that usually sticks to envy - though he is now trying to change. Sir Nighteye was the embodiment of Obsession and Consuming Desire for Control that follows obsession - super fan, need to fix everything himself, not taking into account others’ desires. All for One being an Embodiment of Evil, Greed, Timeless Undercurrent of Unease in All Societies. And Stain. 

Stain is an example of an Extreme, Fanatic Ideology. It’s one thing to live as an example for others and influence them by merit of the good in what you do yourself (i.e. Izuku, All Might). It is another thing to force your ideology on others with violence. Stain recognizes what it takes to be a True Hero, but in his Fanaticism he deems anything less than perfect to be unworthy of the title and must forfeit their life. That and once he judges someone unworthy, he does not allow for the individual to leave and change. 

During the Stain Arc, Stain scolds Iida as if trying to teach him in his own way, but then proceeds with trying to kill him as if he has no faith in a person’s ability to change which is hypocritical since he recognizes that his crimes do change other heroes in the areas he’s been too. And he himself does not live by the rules he holds above everything else. 

So while he holds these ideals of a True Hero above all else and acts upon what he views as the narrative’s will, he is not embodiment of them. He is only the embodiment of his own fanaticism. 

Izuku has and can save those that stray from those Ideals. 

(Hhhhhh nearly done. It’s almost finally out of my head.) 

SO. Izuku is an embodiment of a True Hero, and because of that his actions speak to and affect those around him whether or not that is his intent. He can save their hearts and help nudge them back onto the True Heroic Path. Giving them that nudge saves them or gives them the opportunity to change and save themselves or go on to save others.  

Those he has affected for the better and perhaps saved them from worse punishment by the force of the narrative: 

All Might 

Izuku has saved All Might’s heart twice. 

When they first meet, All Might is in a deep hopelessness. He is running out of time, unable to be a hero when he can’t use his quirk, and thinks himself a pathetic doomed man. Granted, we didn’t know the extent of that at the beginning, but now I think we can draw those conclusions. 

Because Izuku ran out, acted heroic without a quirk, All Might was knocked out of his malaise and remembered what it meant for him to be a true hero. He pushed himself beyond his limit - perhaps after not doing so for years - and beat the slime villain.

Not only that but he went to Izuku after, recognizing the same spirit of a True Hero in him, made amends and gave him back the hope he’d momentarily taken from him. 

The second time was at Kamino. All Might went in thinking This is it. This is likely what Nighteye saw. This is the end. But Izuku’s presence there and the reminder that he had to survive to teach him was what pushed him to not only defeat All for One but also 

He got his hope back for survival. He got back his will to live, his will to fight for it. Even started jogging and caring for his body so he could properly train Izuku with the only body he has left. 

And (after a bit of a rough patch post-Nighteye) even more recently growing as a teacher - giving his advice to students and even Endeavor when he was asked for it. Also, he is growing as Toshinori Yagi, the man he is as a retired hero (and Dadmight).

Todoroki Shouto

This is one of the more obvious ones. 

Todoroki was only using half his quirk due to his view of his fire half as a result of childhood trauma. Using only half of his power was never sustainable and would have kept Todoroki from becoming a hero. In this case, Izuku lost the physical battle, but his actions won him the moral battle and pulled Todoroki onto the path toward coming to terms with his own power and growing as a hero student. 

Tenya Iida

When Iida briefly strayed to seek revenge and almost got himself killed, Izuku was the first there to save him, quickly followed by Todoroki who is shown using his left side because of Izuku’s previous actions. 

Because of Izuku’s and Todoroki’s actions here, they are able to snap Iida out of it and help encourage him to get back up on the right track and Iida is able to grow from this. 

And Iida uses this experience as motivation to get involved when he believes Izuku and Todoroki are going to make a similar mistake at Kamino.  

Which brings me to my final thought (thank fucking goodness).

Izuku will someday be tested on those ideals.

I believe there will come a day that Izuku will be tested much like All Might was. Something or someone will be put in a great amount of danger, Izuku will be at risk of losing something and will be faced with a difficult decision. Do the harder right thing or fall off the Path of the True Hero. 

Izuku will either make the proper choice himself or with emotional support from those he has saved/affected in a positive way (like Iida at Kamino). He will finally decide on the right course of action and be rewarded by the narrative with the return of the thing or person at risk of being lost. 

I personally think that person at risk will either be All Might or his mother. It will look incredibly grim, but should Izuku stick to the right courses of action as it is his wont to do for the most part then it will turn out alright.  

He’s already twisted fate once. I have faith he can do it again and give hope to us as readers even in the darkest points of the story should they come.

Nighteye said something on his deathbed that I think strengthens this idea of this Living Force of the True Hero Ideal working through Izuku and Izuku embodying it. 

Energy. Force. Ideals. Wishes. Anything you’d like to call it. It’s there. It’s been there since before Izuku and will be there long after I think. It’s been living and moving and affecting characters that choose to follow it. Working through them too. 

The only truly certain thing now is that I’m excited to see how it continues to do so. When it comes down to it, it’s just damn good writing and a damn good story with damn good characters. 

[dysfunctionalmasonshasmoved]

Confession

RECORDING

“July 26th, 2019...

  I don’t know how long I’m going to be able to keep this up - I’m running out of time, I can feel it. I’m losing...I’m losing time, resources, patience - but most of all...I’m losing my chance. As much as I want this to end in the way I've been planning it, I understand that things don’t always work out like that - so, I’m recording this message to be delivered to someone I trust with all of my heart so that it may be used to finish what I started and put an end to this nearly three decade long nightmare...

 I’ll start from the beginning: My name is Nicolas Joseph Mason, I am - was a homicide detective for the Boston Police Department for a number of years before my...arrest in 1990. I was charged with a crime that, while I will fully admit to committing, I don’t take all of the responsibility for. Please, let me explain and listen carefully to what I have to say:

 In 1990, I was working on a homicide case that lead me down a path I would never have dreamed of walking in a million years. While investigating the murder of a 26 year old man, I uncovered a terrible secret that has been buried within Boston’s own police department for, what I can assume to be, years. The victim was connected to a crime organization that had close dealings with corrupted police officers in our own police force. I made it my mission to expose the corrupt upon solving the murder case I was assigned to - however, my investigation was put to a halt and I was taken off of the case. My suspicions remain as strong today as it did back then - someone in the corrupt got wind of what I had uncovered and was trying to shut me out. But I wasn’t going to let them. Those scumbags, they needed to be punished for breaking their oath to serve and protect and to uphold the law - because of them, I have no doubt that many of the tragic cases of deaths and murder primarily involving illegal narcotics took place. Dozens of innocent lives were lost because they betrayed their word and turned their backs on the good people of Boston. I swore to put a stop to their crimes and expose them for who they truly were: no better than the pieces of shit we captured every goddamn day.

  ...But that was easier said than done. And unfortunately, I made mistakes.

 I was captured by the corrupted and was forced to cooperate, for if I didn’t agree the consequence would have been catastrophic to the people that I loved and cared about. So I joined them and did their dirty work...But that wasn’t enough for them. They didn’t trust me...They wanted me to prove to them that I wouldn’t rat them out...And yet again, I was faced with an impossible decision...

 I wanted to turn it down - believe me, I would have done anything not to have been caught in that circumstance...I tried, once. It nearly cost me everything, and more. They weren’t playing around, there was no bullshit to call on. “Choose one,” they told me...

 “Your wife...or your children...”

  ...I chose my wife.

  August 15th, 1990...our tenth wedding anniversary. We sent off our children to their aunt and uncle’s for the night, so we could have time to ourselves...But my wife - Fiona - she could see that something wasn’t right. I had no choice but to tell her...I’m not going to lie, we argued - loudly, but there was no fighting as the prosecution had claimed. I never abused my wife - I would never hurt her...I...not...

  I didn’t want to do it, but Fiona...I couldn’t believe what she had told me that night - then again, it was an unselfish act, one that she seemed fully prepared to make if it meant our children could live. She kept telling me, “Save them, Nicolas - save our babies,”...I promised her - it was the last thing I ever promised her.

 So yes, I killed my wife, Fiona Mason - but you have to understand something: for the future of our children, Fiona Mason gave up her own. She sacrificed herself so that they could grow up and have whatever life she was hoping for them. She knew - she fully understood that that this would undoubtedly change their little lives forever - possibly even in a bad way, but she truly believed that our beautiful children would make it through. “They’re strong,” she told me, “they’re so strong and smart, and loving and kind, compassionate and so full of life. They’ll be okay, I know they will.”...Somewhere, perhaps deep inside of me and under all of the pain, misery, guilt, and regret I have, I believe that too...

 I was played for a fool. From the very start, I was set up to take the fall and this was the execution point. I was arrested and charged immediately, sentenced to spend the rest of my life behind bars not but less than a week later. Twenty five years, I waited. And plotted. And then I escaped. I understand the idiocy here, I know I’m only making things worse for myself but honestly? I don’t really give a damn. I don’t care what happens to me after this, all I care about is uncovering the truth and finishing what I started so many years ago. This is the only way I know how to make those bastards pay.

 And I’m close.

 Kimberly...Kole...If you ever get to hear this before I can tell you myself...I’m sorry. I know this may not seem like the best way in your eyes, I understand that you may feel I should have said something sooner, but also try to understand that I know that nobody would have believed me. The corrupt would have shut me down and convinced everybody - and I’m ashamed to say, including you - that I was lying. I need proof and I’m getting it.

 I know this most likely won’t fix anything. Since that year I-I haven’t been a very good father - hardly a father at all. But please don’t doubt that I never stopped loving you and I never will. You are my children and that will never change, no matter what is said or done. I do hope that one day, maybe not in the near future, but one day you both can forgive me...

 Kimberly, my baby girl, I leave this message to you in the event I can’t complete my mission. Please, look into your heart and believe what I’m saying is true, and do the right thing. If I can’t go on, finish what I started.

 I’m counting on you, baby. I love you - always and forever.”

END OF RECORDING.

[triumphorce]

under umbras of bundles  of stars,

canopies of leaves & branches that shatter-scatter sky image held indirect

as a gleam in eyes

as conscious lay in fabricated gardens watching memories, & desires in dream form

from across highway covered by

blue-white, 

yellow,

& orange lights

sound of tires, mufflers, sirens, 

amidst a higher sense 

attuned to

muffled far cries muffled while crossing empty lands

filled with chilling wind howls, stealing hope, 

which

kickstarts the power on survival mode..

ups& downs 

drown the cries further,

that

war, warn, or cheer..

or just sing..

maybe

a hymn made by souls for souls under same umbra to set free to lead to wonder & beauty beyond the surface of senses directly to free to seek love loss between me and me

buried beneath  road of longest journey to reach

turn feet all around

all about a world I have no idea about

just mad ideas about Kept in journals i turn over

to all but from in front of views not yet exploited by value of which is, views are power,  & are the will in word- to-page transaction

self diminished to substantiate

entries from entrails, not shown to be conquered

win or lose is how I never saw things.

win or win, only optionss, only progress..

yet..,always over complicating;

marathon sprints from start to finish

as I choose, If i choose, to continue to choose to overlook slopes in existence, where hides I, in ruins, digging for recognition

contribute to a mind overloading with what I know I owe society, &me,

burden of see-through beast, I see illusions of future thru,mistaken as truth, play victim, get stressed or believe I'm down on luck ,in dumps of depression and slum of beliefs,

 in a slump with headphones on temple and music up, reminisce about the golden olden, me and broseph, SSB, PSO, kanto, johto, cartoon cartoons, many one saturday morning’s, plenty cinnamon toast, fruity pebbles, so many card games at Books-a-million

but when I open eyes from trance

I'm forever face to face with today is today

not then not later...

just

 changes who changed how I changed regret and anger to compensate for blaming everybody but me

now I stare afraid at dilemmas mass effect decisions

 daily in-and-out-terventions

to keep from falling back into resentment.. spite blinding shelves of subconscious-self- disappointed perpetuating judgment of others binding progression, tying tongue, boiling blood because old habits die hard and I continue fucking up, up raging rapids w/o a paddle,   almost 3 decades of failing infinite (according to projections) feel I missed and am missing out on so much, so much world, so many words coiled inside, waiting to explode,

all the time, just like everybody.. everything mind sets sights on turns to target issue     how unfortunate for aforementioned coordinates, for anyone close enough for me to put in poems' , important enough to torment conscious over, used to be everybody, used to be nobody, used to be just some people, now its just me and i dont know him

   attempts to speak, to learn again, to teach me about me       to learn to teach                     myself, to set example for ambition directed toward a better version, better verses, better reimbursement of time given tryna be an extrovert, free from bitter, free from bitch asses, set internal standards to never  get fucked with again, fuck you, fuck him, fuck her, i only fucks with a journal & question  everyone,  everything, every word, every whisper, shit ima tell my children every day, breakfast lunch dinner,  do your best and fuck the rest, get it, get lit off enlightenment, fuck rest, save roosting for death, dont look at me, looknat the sky, seize the day in everyway brain permits, dont reach for others' and if anyone tries to take yours, that means they dont fundamentally respect life, so always permeate passion, ignore distractions keeping you from creating, test limits, test intentions, challenge imperfections with wisdom, know that perfect is just cosmetics, but i remain quiet.. remain tied up being alone, wondering..           whether I'm right to do any god damn thing        'cause if I don't do it right..       was I right to think I could, wrong to think I understood

am i wrong not to try?

what of what's sacrificed ?

how do i keep count

how did I end up here       in standby...

standing squeamish & deer eyed in light of opportunities rising in horizon of night skies, to step in to obtain warmth, maintain from days before, to do something, do the one thing, but when will I be ready will eyes be ready to comprehend right or wrong

only me, here. only us, on planet.

only who's responsible? how is who is affected by, afflicted by? when is too late? when is just right, always too soon to tell and.. if I don't do it now, then why expect change..

why, why, why

'cause I expect anything at all

anger toward unmanned vehicles imminent to collide with mine

driven mad up eighty-five degree angled walls during rush hour, sun beaming heat into ride, where i travel on path, thru battlefield of past where fallen intentions decompose to ignorance and wisdom sprouts in the mean time.. I'm in between times, feelin down, down down down down by the way

a trail thru fears past dead ends, rotting trees, looks like fallout hit

a past I try an' forget..

but remember out of reluctance 

to accidentally revisit regret,

stand next to biggest fears,  see if facing them uproots soul

rolls ideas in head, non-stop

like trolls troll under bridges 

to which billy goat gruff temper charges like crono's katana on zenan crossing,

lodes of odes to oaths, lightning loaded, aimed at negative minded sapiens bioshocks via rhythm and syntax, cryo cascades of ideas, locked away in moleskine or computer files to put to rest the rest of an inside in arrest to judgment, in side quest of public playthrough, i feel im on public display, static complaining in front of pretty much strangers   modes of awareness to mental problems i exploit to people who might not think im crazy, who might like what i write, might like to write about the same thing, might see giants in those same nodes i stand near, i hear crisp crackles filling an awkward air as i stare at words on sheets that i might tear, might let collect dust, or share prolly might be quiet, only sound is poetic drafts that fill in under open windows, I open slowly, cool rush, goosebumps, awake aware always, even when mind is a crinkled, crumbled candy wrapper still just construct wrinkles in time via           hairs stand, ovation, and encores to

     helping to cross over doubts, screams of slander, stop it all, right now, shed truth in another light, fed through veins like pen's ink to go over and correct vision of pinheads vane turnin art, free thought to cash and competition, trade purpose blow for blow with obstacles in the name of the next step, over opponents, trade nervous for nerves robust to withstand standing up to stretch and spread chest to stand up for work where time invested is braided circulation    goin in circles,        time wasted pet peeve number 1

    a nowhere never felt before        but something seems familiar.. overlooked,   under yards, under pressure of bone leverage, give life a lift thru cracks of a collapsing effort stretched behind chest and ribs

a heart glows in

hot coal hues hearth warmth under carbon sheets

till blood boils till steam coils from pores to kill the cold along roads

sun or none

no light above, isn't lack of.. 

(look inside)

----

harsh heat of reality hot enough to feel cold

make me go ghost in dark times..

friction strong enough to spark moist..

continue until i sear nerves disembody fromm pain till im felt by meta-form of others

heartfelt arcs between soul and soul-mind 2 mind

light releases thru iris folds spectacle in spectacles----

spectrum wheel of emotions spins &spins to  understand self an urge that intensifies the more  i live life as well as I can Improve every day, no excuse, don't ignore the corners, get behind my ears,every nook and cranny in creative muse-um, uhm, duh, raised on books, nintendo, animation,& wishbone, outside, only myself as playdate, use every square inch as play-scape under every hair in head, a mind uses face and body as way to create 4 fourever& vice versa to escape who ever & know I can do whenever, wherever

wherever i go, a voice in mind goes

that keeps on talkin , keeps me talkin tellin me I've talk--, wrote enough hoped enough to last a lifetime, but that's not enough

and I still got a lifetime

to either solidify or fuck it up

gradually let go of 

to concentrate on life's finest moments i build to build form in appreciation, saying get up, enjoy the sun rays breaching clouds just before dawn; gett off yo butt and do what you know what you taught you to do when you were at multiple low points and you promised you, you'd never fall to end, even if you fall again, again, and again, never stall in the middle of  takeoff stop in middle of road, cant press play if you lost remote, might as well get up and do it, crawl, run or walk away when the times calls to brawl dark-inner energy only honorable mentions defend health during dishonorable discharge of nega, into rivers, into blue sky.. bordered by white clouds and linear silver

a safe place, work space, desk clerk sifting day to day thru file cabinets memories in memos in notebook; written relativity explaining how I see, what I think say what i want like im eight, glad i spent so much time with words and space-bars,   to escape judgment, hatred,

anxious surrounded by bad vibes

above an Earth, below expectations; over a self under surveillance by approval from inside, crazy dimensions, On the fence between people and myself I close eyes, ride waves of nostalgia once more..

see plenty light to traverse pathways, walk fer hours, walk like back in younger days, playin, runnin, completely captivated immersed in games played, tv, roller blades, monopoly, scary stories, trampolines

&10thousand songs later, 10million thoughts later, here I am doing what I made me to.

can't wait for the next chance

supplied energy through lines to hidden gracelands.

[scrawnydutchman]

Paradise P.D: Animated Series Review

I’ve reviewed a lot of animated - and live action - shows and movies on my blog. Nearly everything I’ve felt the need to comment on has been seen in a positive light. I don’t shy away from harsh criticism nor do I actively avoid notably poor content; it just so happens that the things I’m most interested in discussing are things I have mainly positive comments on. Paradise PD has come along to break the mold. The genuine disgust I have for this series is a first for me. I hate this show. This is quite possibly the worst show I’ve ever given a complete watch. The characters are either heinously cruel or insultingly generic. The premise is cookie cutter and derivative as hell. The humor is forced, predictable and just depressing more often than funny. The animation . . . . oh God, the animation. I’ve had non flavored rice cakes with more taste than this show. It’s like anti-creativity. Even as I’m typing this Ii’m getting riled up just thinking about it again. Alright, let me calm down. Let’s break this show down piece by piece, starting with the writing.

Writing

*ugh, the animation in these gifs is terrible. I’ll get to it when I get to it.*

Synopsis: Kevin Crawford is an aspiring young police officer who is determined to prove himself to his dad, Chief Randall Crawford of the Paradise PD. Chief Crawford has a hard time trusting his son because of a firearms accident that occurred when Kevin was very young (the less details you know about that the better) but his ex wife mayor Karen Crawford forces Randall to bring Kevin into the department anyway. Kevin thus joins a motley crew of  . . .ahem . . . “”””hilarious””””” cops including Gina; the badass uber violent super cop who’s both the sex appeal of the show and has a fetish for morbidly obese men (yes, seriously), Gerald Fitzgerald; the Cleveland Brown of this show who’s basically just a well mannered  token black guy, Dusty Marlow; the morbidly obese innocent cop whom Gina constantly harasses sexually (and yet when male characters harass her on the show she threatens to beaten them for pervy comments, so . . . hypocrite), Stanley Hopson; an elderly officer whose whole schtick is being senile and doing gross shit . .  and finally Brian Griffin-I mean Bullet; the canine unit who’s also a drug addict . . . and being a drug addict is basically his whole shtick. They get into a bunch of wacky shenanigans, a lot of gross stuff ensues, yadda yadda yadda

So admittedly, this isn’t a bad premise for a show of this style. If Brooklyn 99 has proven anything it’s that a police department is a great and refreshing setting for a sitcom with tons of potential for jokes as well as diverse characters having great chemistry with each other. Plus it’s an archetype I don’t see very much of (I’d like to point out that I consider this different from the “buddy cop” archetype which is literally everywhere, because rather than focus on two cops it involves an entire precinct). This show is kind of like if Seth Macfarlane made a Family Guy spinoff centered around Joe Swanson (except that sounds a million times more amazing). But while Paradise PD sounds like a good concept for a show on paper, it’s execution is poorer than poor. Ironically for being such an off-the-beaten-path premise for a sitcom the show doesn’t take very much advantage of it. It’s not like the case in every episode is particularly interesting and it’s certainly not like Archer or Brooklyn 99 where the humor comes from the mundane nature of the job that nobody really talks about (filing a lot of paper work and performing basic job duties). Instead it’s premises about banging police cars that have AIs that behave like abusive girlfriends . . .which is a premise we’ve seen before. Or it’s about a father not understanding his child’s hobbies . . .which is a premise we’ve seen before. Or it’s about a fighter being overly confident in the ring only for his cohorts to discover he’s rigged to lose in the next fight . . . which is a premise we’ve seen before. Here lies the biggest problem of this show: it’s so rinse and repeat it’s insulting. For every episode this series has at the moment I guarantee the Simpson’s  has done it and has done it better. Or Bob’s Burgers has done it. Or Archer has done it. Or Brooklyn 99 has done it. Hell, Family Guy and American Dad are the most comparable shows to this besides Brickleberry for obvious reasons and as much as I have distaste for those shows even they do these recycled premises more justice than Paradise PD does. Basically the only thing giving this show a real identity is it’s intense gross out visuals which, given this shows shockingly limited animation style, gets stale very quickly. But what is Paradise PD missing that all those shows have in common (besides maybe Family Guy/American Dad)? The answer of course is likable characters.

Characters

*it’s worth mentioning that the intro is the only bit of decent animation this show has. In fact it’s deceivingly good. Be patient . . . I’m getting there.*

If the synopsis I gave at the beginning is any indication it’s that every character suffers from one of two problems; they’re either intensely unlikable or are bland overly used archetypes . . . sometimes both. Gerald Fitzgerald, Dusty Harlow, Stanley Hopson and Bullet are all archetypes you can find in every animated sitcom ever made. It’s the token black guy, the morbidly obese dumbass, the senile old man and the drug addict/self centered misogynist. They all have one joke and one joke only dedicated to each of them. They are walking talking punchlines. So is every character in this show, though everyone else to a lesser extent. Gina is my favorite because her backstory episode is the only one where I felt even a little bit intrigued about how one of these assholes came to be. Our leading man Kevin is a bland standin. He’s just an overly naive, wide eyed kid with a dream. He’s an empty husk for literally any kind of viewer to step in (except for women when it comes to the love interest stuff). The chief is an angry, pompous asshole. In fact every character is just a horrible human being. Even characters that are either overly innocent or are meant to be good natured like Kevin or Dusty are constantly selfish or arrogant in some way. I get that that’s just the way the show is written comedically and in truth all comedy is rooted in the flawed. It’s why a lot of sitcom scenarios are written around characters acting selfishly or stupidly. But there’s being flawed and then there’s . . . being relentlessly cruel. It makes it hard to root for any of these characters in the end, especially since the show also occasionally tries to have a moral center and because . . .well . . . y’know . . . everyone is bland as shit.

Cast Performance

So this is by far the best aspect of the show and the number one thing it has going for it. Why? Because the show has a cast that’s .  . . depressingly a bunch of all stars. Tom Kenny, Spongebob himself, voices the chief and he does a great angry authoritative father. Grey Griffin, the actress behind such favorites as Daphne from Scooby Doo, Frankie from Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends, Vicki from Fairly Odd Parents and Azula from Avatar: The Last Airbender, is the mayor and also turns in a great performance for what she has to portray. Not to mention the occasional guest like John Dimaggio and Tara Strong. If you’re any fan of voice acting chances are you’ll find a favorite of yours in this cast if not a handful of them. I say this is depressing because all of these people could do so much better. I get it, a paycheck is a paycheck, but . . . . imagine the immensely creative and stunning projects they could have been a part of instead. If a contract with Netflix is what you want, hit up Alex Hirsch! He’s signed on with them now and I bet he’s got something worthwhile! There’s not a whole lot to say about the rest of the performances, mainly because again, it’s hard to care about any of these characters.

Visuals (Animation, Design, Composition, Visual Storytelling, ETC.)

sigh . . . .okay . . . let’s talk about the animation. Before I go into it I just want to be real and sentimental for a second. I’m an animator. I just recently broke into the industry by working with Copernicus Studios . . . and it’s been nothing but a sincere pleasure. I’ve learned more about animation and Toon Boom in 4 months than I ever learned in 4 years of freelancing. It put into perspective just how much thought and effort goes into even the most minimal of shows. It’s a popular trend to shit on professionally animated content for looking such a way or moving in such a way but if those people only knew the countless hours and passion that goes into even just a couple of seconds of footage they’d never talk shit about these shows ever again. Not only that, but I’m an admin for an animation study group on Facebook with thousands of members from all over the world. Animators from every country and every skill level share their work for constructive feedback. Through this I’ve met many people who work in the industry . . .including someone who worked on Paradise PD. And I know them to be among the most skilled and masterful animators on the page. For all of these reasons, I will NEVER call animators lazy or unskilled if they produced a show like this. It’s typically the result of a certain type of direction or method of moving the production pipeline along. I have no doubt on my mind that every animator who worked on this show is wonderfully skilled and will do well in their careers going forward.

But this show does not demonstrate that. Far from it. This show goes out of it’s way to be lazy. It cuts so many corners they’ve made a perfect circle of hell. Just take a look at most of the gifs I’ve posted in this review. Notice the popping of proportions and lines in moving pieces. Notice certain features like noses or eyes that move around for no damn reason at all. Look at features like eyebrows where there’s no easing or seamless transition or any basic understanding of the 12 principles of animation aside from perhaps arcs. Just watch a couple of seconds of this show and count how little frames are in every motion. If you told me this show was made in Go! Animate I would believe you. This makes Family Guy look like Studio Ghibli. Maybe this show could have been more pleasant to look at if it had vouched for motion keyframes instead of what appears to be the occasional stop motion keyframe (users of Toon Boom or Flash will know what I mean) but even then there’s nothing to look at really. Add to that the eyesore of a colour scheme, the uninspired character designs that if I put them in silhouette you would not be able to tell what show it’s from, the absolutely barebones backgrounds that look like early 2000s Newgrounds cartoon sets and the unimaginitive shot composition that consists almost entirely of wide shots and medium wide shots and you have what can hardly even be defined as animation by mainstream televisions standards. The last show I reviewed was Matt Groening’s Disenchantment and while I had my issues with that shows animation, at least they were only errors a trained eye could see in a show that was otherwise appealing. Paradise PD is just a tragedy. The only positive comment I can make about the animation is that the FX department did a great job animating the blood and the boogers and any type of nasty body liquid . . . .and I am depressed that that is my one positive comment.

Audio (Soundtrack, Sound Mixing, Sound FX, ETC.)

*In case you thought I was joking about one of the episode summaries I gave earlier*

Like most of the stuff I review, the audio isn’t particularly notable in this show. There’s no memorable soundtracks to speak of. The sound mixing is fine. That’s really all there is to say. I’ll be honest; I’ll talk about remarkable soundtracks in this section or clever/bad sound mixing when I can, but I mainly just include this section so I can score what i’m reviewing in a way that adds to a 10.

Conclusion

Paradise PD is the worst show I have ever given a review for and quite possible the worst show I’ve ever made an effort to sit down and watch. Almost nothing is redeemable about it. It’s the lowest common denominator for animation and it unsuccessfully trades any hint of originality for unfunny shock humor. It fails not because of missteps, but because of a refusal to make the necessary steps in the first place.

Writing - 0.5/2- Below Average

Characters - 0.5/2- Below Average

Cast Performance - 1.5/2 - Above Average

Visuals - 0.5/2 - Below Average

Audio - 1/2 - Average

4 out of 10 - My most hated show thus far.

[bevioletskies]

Here's a Starmora prompt for you to consider. An AU where Peter and Gamora are private investigations based on Knowhere like Sherlock and Watson and cross paths with the crime lord Thanos.

(sorry for the delay, anon! i had way too much fun with this prompt)warning for canon-typical violence and non-graphic mentions of blood and injuries.word count: 7.9k | ao3

Peter leaned back with a thoughtful hum, the well-worn chair creaking precariously beneath him in warning. His eyes were fixated on the old-fashioned corkboard before him as they so often were, attempting to make sense of anything he was seeing.

“If you get any closer, all you’re going to get is cross-eyed.”

He startled out of his own thoughts, turning in his chair to watch as Gamora stepped into the room with two coffee cups and a sly grin, passing one cup to him. He smiled gratefully before downing half of it in one generous gulp. “We gotta be missin’ something. Thanos had three separate factions, right? One led by two brothers, one led by a married couple, and one led by two sisters. All dealin’ in drugs, weapons, and murder.”

“Yes,” Gamora said evenly. She leaned against the desk, taking a neat sip of her own drink.

“We saw the brothers - Cull and Ebony - shakin’ down that Kree warlord, Ronan, on Hala, for information on the Kasius family.” Peter stabbed a pushpin through the photo he’d taken of them arriving at an abandoned loading dock. “The married couple, Corvus and Proxima, makin’ a deal with the Astrans so they’ll vote Qovas into the Confederacy in exchange for the mines on Easik.” Another pushpin, this time into old mugshots from the time they’d been caught with Chitauri weapons while passing through Sakaar.

“Your point, Quill?” Gamora sighed.

“The sisters!” Peter exclaimed. “I know you’re still kinda green to the whole P.I. business, but they haven’t been seen in over a year. No one knows their names, or why they worked for Thanos, or where they went, but they were known for bein’ the deadliest women in the galaxy, and suddenly poof - gone.”

Gamora swallowed. “Isn’t it obvious?” Peter looked at her curiously. “They’re probably dead. That lead is going nowhere, Quill. Focus on the ones we know about. We’ll get Thanos someday, but focusing on two women who are either rotting in a jail cell or six feet deep in the ground won’t bring us any closer to finding him.”

“But doesn’t it bother you?”

More than you know, Gamora thought privately. “Don’t dwell on it, okay? The Corps are counting on you, of all people, and we’ve got better things to be doing than chasing shadows. Rumor has it that the Grandmaster is paying a visit to his brother at the casino tonight, and he’s bringing the weapons that were confiscated from Corvus and Proxima in exchange for one of Tivan’s toys. Chances are, they’re coming here to Knowhere to get them back. We gather the rest of our investigation team, go undercover, and see if we can parse some more information about Thanos’s whereabouts.”

“We’re not gonna arrest them?” Peter protested disbelievingly as Gamora moved to sit at her desk, opposite his.

She merely smiled. “Patience, Peter Quill, is a virtue.”______

Peter, Gamora, and the rest of their team arrived at the casino hours later, appropriately dressed and for the most part, secretly thrilled. Their dingy little investigation office, started by Peter and Drax, had really grown over the past couple years, but right from the beginning, it had always been about taking down the Mad Titan’s crime empire. Their smaller jobs were, of course, interesting enough, but it was the ones that took them one step closer to Thanos that really got their adrenaline going.

Gamora glanced around the rented car at her companions, feeling uneasy. After hearing about their successes and surprisingly decent reputation almost a year ago, she was quick to travel to Knowhere and offer herself as another partner, fudging her credentials and references so they would take her seriously. They had immediately accepted her into their little clan, almost as if she’d been there from the beginning, and she had become irreversibly fond of them, Peter in particular. It was hard to look at him sometimes, though, when he got uncomfortably close to the truth, and this was one of those times.

“You look real pretty. Don’t think I’ve ever seen you in a dress before,” Peter said teasingly as he helped her out of the car.

“Don’t get used to it,” she replied dryly, pushing her hair out of her face. “Remember, Tivan doesn’t usually show up until the end of these parties, but there’s a good chance Corvus and Proxima will arrive beforehand, or possibly send scouts to ensure the legitimacy of the deal. Any suspicious behavior, and - ”

“And we report it to you. We got it, Gam.” Rocket scoffed. “You’d think we haven’t done this a million times before.”

“We haven’t,” Drax interjected unhelpfully. “This is perhaps only our third time infiltrating the Collector’s place of business - ”

“I was just exaggeratin’, you big lug.” Rocket elbowed Drax before he could continue on. “Me n’ Groot are gonna be at the tables. You got a problem with that?”

The two of them walked inside before anyone could object, though Peter called after them in vain. “Don’t spend all our money like last time! I still can’t show my face in the bar on 12th, no thanks to you.”

“Drax and I will go talk to bar patrons,” Mantis offered with a sunny smile. “I promise not to let Drax get too drunk.”

“What are you implying?” Drax protested, though Mantis dragged him away before he could defend himself. Peter glanced over at Gamora, who seemed unusually fidgety.

“Guess it’s down to you and me to hang out up high,” Peter said, nodding towards the balcony that overlooked the casino’s enormous entryway, where the rich and shameless were currently tossing their spaceship keys to the valets like they were worth nothing at all. “Ready, partner?”

“I suppose,” Gamora said reluctantly, allowing him to lead the way. Once they were upstairs, she could almost see that telltale glint of mischief in his eyes, something that told her he was thinking about it again. “Stop.”

“I didn’t - what?” Peter looked bewildered.

“You’re thinking about the sisters again, aren’t you?” she said accusingly. “You have too many tells, Quill. I’m not sure how you made it as P.I. in the first place.”

“Hurtful.” Peter clutched at his chest in mock offense. “But nah, I wasn’t. I…uh, I was actually thinkin’ about you.”

Now it was Gamora’s turn to look confused. “Me?”

He smiled almost shyly this time, lacking the usual smug, upturned corners of his mouth. No, this was something softer, sweeter. “Well, we’re comin’ up on one year of you being with us, and um, it’s been pretty awesome, don’t you think?”

“It’s had its moments,” Gamora said diplomatically, though she couldn’t help but smile, too. She stepped closer to the edge of the balcony, resting her hands on the railing as she stared out at the night sky. “I’ve enjoyed myself. Really, I have. Not just the work, but…the people.”

“Yeah? You got a favorite?”

Gamora laughed. “Are you actually asking me to compliment you? How the arrogant have fallen.”

“Can’t hurt to try, right?” he chuckled, taking a step closer. His hand settled on the railing by hers, their fingertips barely brushing. “I’m kidding…mostly. I just…I wanted to say that I’m really glad you’re here. Y’know, it kinda felt like the team was - we were doing great, but we were missing something, and when you showed up at our door…it all made sense again. And you’re not just our co-worker, Gamora, you’re our friend. I hope you know that.”

A lump formed in her throat, her fingers tensing around the cool metal. “You trying to soften me up for something, Quill?” she said hoarsely. “Vacation time, maybe?”

“No.” Peter laughed again, but this time, he sounded far more nervous. “I wanted to ask, if maybe, you’d, uh…be interested in - ”

“Sister.”

Gamora’s blood ran cold as she slowly, but reluctantly turned on her heel; that voice was unmistakable. “What are you doing here?” she said in a horrified near-whisper.

“Saving you, if you can believe it,” the other woman said snidely, snatching up Gamora’s wrist and yanking, hard. “Come on.”

“Hey, hey, hands off!” Peter tried to pry her fingers from Gamora’s arm, only to get backhanded across the face for his efforts. “ Ow - hey, you can’t just do that - ”

“Nebula!” Gamora scolded, wrestling out of her grip. “Quill, it’s okay. She’s my sister. Saving me from what, Nebula?”

Nebula scowled at them both. “Corvus and Proxima are coming here tonight.”

“I’m aware. Why else would I be here, of all places?” Gamora snorted.

“No, I mean they’re here for you,” Nebula snapped. “You think they give a damn about Chitauri weapons? They’re a unit a dozen on Sanctuary. They were always going to find you eventually, since you’re so insistent on trotting around with the rest of your team, solving mysteries and stopping crime like a good little detective - ”

“And they intend to kill me?” Gamora drew to her full height. “I’d like to see them try.”

“Wait, why’re they after you specifically? It’s my agency,” Peter interrupted, but both sisters ignored him in favor of narrowing their eyes at each other.

“They intend to bring you to him.”

Gamora finally fell silent, her heart drumming painfully fast in her chest as she tore her gaze away from her sister. She leaned against the railing once more, only this time, she wanted to vomit. Of course it was always going to come to this; how could she have been so naive? It was only a matter of time before her past caught up to her, before he caught up to her. “Then we have to go into hiding. Tell me you have a ship.”

“Registered, but untagged,” Nebula nodded. “Come with me, we’ll have wheels up in two minutes flat.”

“Seriously, can you guys tell me what the hell is going on? I can help, okay, I still got some pull over at the Nova Corps. We can do this together!” Peter squeezed Gamora’s shoulder. “C’mon, Gamora. Let me help.”

Gamora turned back around to face him, her eyes now filled with unshed tears. “Not tonight, Quill. You’ll have to finish this job without me.”

Peter stared at her, alarmed. He’d never seen her so shaken before. “Who is ‘him’, Gamora?” he asked softly. She merely shook her head and stepped out of Peter’s grasp, moving to stand beside Nebula. Still, his eyes followed her. “Is he…is it Thanos?” His gaze flickered between her and Nebula and suddenly, everything fell into place for him - or more accurately, came crashing down. “You…” he breathed. “It’s you. You’re the…the sisters.”

“Quill - ”

“You showed up on Knowhere two months after they went missing,” Peter whispered. “After you went missing. Said you had no family, but you had experience, and you knew we were workin’ hard on bringing Thanos down.”

“Please, Quill - ”

“Did you come here just to take us down? Dismantle our agency or, or…or kill us?”

Gamora bit her lip so hard she drew blood, hot tears spilling down her cheeks before she could stop herself. “I have to go,” she murmured shakily. “Please, just let me go. Tell the others…tell them I had a family emergency.”

His eyes darkened. “Oh, I’ll tell ‘em a lot more than that.”

Nebula didn’t give Gamora a chance to reply, digging her nails into Gamora’s arm and harshly pulling her away, knocking people over as they disappeared into the crowd. Peter was left staring at the spot Gamora once occupied, truly and utterly speechless.______ 

The rest of the night went by in a haze; Peter could barely concentrate on looking out for Corvus, Proxima, or any other suspicious behavior, only focusing on what seemed to be Gamora’s complete betrayal. He tried to give her the benefit of the doubt; from what he could tell, she was no longer on Thanos’s side, judging by her terrified reaction at the mere thought of him. Still, she had kept it hidden, played it off like it was nothing, stood by Peter’s side for almost a year and said nothing, did nothing. She probably had all the inside information he could ever want and more, and here he was, begging for scraps, desperate to catch a glimpse or a whisper of anything that would bring Thanos down, once and for all.

“Where is Gamora?” Drax asked when the team met up again at the end of the night.

“Left early. Family emergency,” Peter muttered, running his fingers through his hair.

Mantis frowned. “I thought she doesn’t have any family.”

“Then she lied, I guess,” Peter grumbled. Wouldn’t be the first time. “C’mon, let’s go home.”

He was silent the whole ride back, only perking up to absentmindedly say his goodbyes whenever someone exited the car. When it was down to just him and Mantis, who lived in the same building, she leaned in closer to look at him inquisitively. “It was not a family emergency, was it?”

“I don’t wanna talk about it,” Peter said tersely, waving her off.

“I know you wanted to ask her out,” Mantis said sympathetically. “Oh, Peter, did she say no? Is that why she left?”

He scoffed. “I wish that was what happened. No, Mantis, just drop it, okay? I’ve got some stuff to figure out.”

Peter tossed and turned all night, at a loss for what to do. Objectively, he knew he couldn’t let his emotions dictate the rest of the case. He needed to report her to the Nova Corps; after all, they were the one who legitimized his operations in the first place. He had to tell them he’d found the two missing daughters of Thanos and that Gamora had been lying this whole time about her qualifications, her background, her everything.

However, he still couldn’t help but feel hurt, betrayed, and yet, still worried about her well-being. After all, Thanos was probably going to do unspeakable things to her and her sister if he ever found them - in the end, they would welcome death. Peter hesitated. Maybe it would be better for him to bring her in instead of call her out…only the Nova Corps would surely shut him down the second they found out he was protecting her, maybe throw them all in jail. Groaning, Peter face-planted into his pillow. He really needed to sleep.

Unsurprisingly, he woke earlier than usual, unable to get more than four hours of rest. He reluctantly pulled on his coat and dragged himself to the office, hoping Mantis couldn’t hear the squeak of his door hinges from her apartment across from his. He could barely keep his eyes open when he flipped the lights on, and it took him a second to even realize they were switched off immediately after. “What the hell…”

“Please. No one knows I’m here.” Gamora stepped out from behind him, holding her hands up in surrender. “Well, except for Nebula.”

“Gamora,” Peter breathed, almost dropping his bag in shock. “What - ”

“It didn’t feel right, not explaining myself. Besides, I figured you were either going to report me to the Nova Corps or hunt me down yourself.” She let out a dark laugh. “I wouldn’t blame you either way.”

“You said you needed to hide. I saw some of Thanos’s Outrider agents at the casino last night, probably lookin’ for you,” Peter said in disbelief. “You shouldn’t be here.”

“According to Nebula’s intel, the other Children of Thanos know about you, but not the others. I’ve been seen with you in public too many times.” Gamora sucked in a breath. “So…I need to protect you, too. You have to come with us, and I’m hoping you’ll come quietly. I can’t let you report me, and I definitely can’t let you kill me.”

“Oh, you’ve gotta be kidding me,” Peter groaned, rubbing his hands over his forehead.

“I know the last thing you want to do is trust me. But my only option, for both my protection and yours, is to take you with us. We don’t have time to argue, okay? I saw the Outrider agents, too. They were outside the safehouse that Nebula and I were staying at, ready to tear the place apart.” Gamora held out a trembling hand. “Please, Quill. Don’t make me ask again.”

His heart felt like it was racing in his throat, his head spinning, though that might have been from exhaustion. Sighing, Peter hefted his bag over his shoulder. “Fine. But don’t think I don’t got questions for you. A lot of questions.”

Once they boarded the ship parked out back and Nebula got them in the air, Peter was feeling more and more uneasy. What was he doing, uprooting his life and going against protocol to let Gamora, a supposed former lieutenant of Thanos, drag him along with her? He needed to call the Nova Corps, or Mantis, or Drax, or hell, Yondu was probably skulking around a few planets over, just something -

“Give me your communicator.”

Sighing in defeat, he pressed the device into Gamora’s palm. “You’re really not helpin’ your case here.”

“You don’t have the authority to arrest me, only the ability to call it in. Excuse me for being cautious,” Gamora retorted, tucking it neatly into her belt. “We’re on the same side, Quill, I promise. I just…I needed a way into Thanos’s head that wasn’t my own. And legitimacy.”

“And yet you came to me and Drax, of all people. Why? Why didn’t you just go to the Nova Corps directly?” Peter shot back.

“Because the Nova Corps would either imprison me or kill me on the spot. Believe me, they won’t give me or Nebula the time of day. They’ve seen our faces before. You hadn’t.” Gamora sat on the bench opposite him, her shoulders slumping a little. She looked absolutely exhausted. “When I heard there was an investigation office working to take our father down…I had hope. I still do. But now, you know too much, and they know who you are, and…I just want to keep you safe, okay?”

Peter leaned closer, eyes narrowing. “No, you want to keep me quiet. That’s why I’m here. You spent years doing Thanos’s dirty work, why stop now?”

“Guilt, pain…though really, that’s an understatement.” Gamora shrugged sadly. “Nebula and I were tortured for years. Physically, mentally. Every morning, I woke up wishing that Thanos had just killed me alongside my family instead of taking me to be a part of his. Usually, we had to travel in groups, but this time, it was just us. He wanted us to retrieve an Infinity Stone from Morag. We fled to Knowhere instead. We already knew Tivan from a previous job, so we called him and he set us up in a safehouse, no questions asked. Told us where we could find you. The rest, you already know.”

“And why all the secrecy? A whole year, and you never once spoke up! All those times that I speculated about who the sisters were, where they went. I was practically begging for just a hint of information about Thanos’s whereabouts and his deals, and you just sat there and pretended.” Peter scoffed. “You’re damn right, I don’t trust you.”

“That’s fair.” Gamora smiled remorsefully. “I was going to tell you someday, but honestly, I didn’t know much more than what you had already uncovered. You’re clever, Quill. Resourceful, too. Really, the only things that I knew about that you didn’t already figure out were mostly irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. Little illegal dealings here and there, a few trafficking operations that were already dismantled by the appropriate authorities. But we are after the same endgame here - taking him down for good. And he’s not an easy target to find.”

Finally, it seemed like Peter had nothing left to say to her, his eyes glazing over a little as he stared out the window to the stars. He got to his feet. “I need a nap,” he muttered. “And possibly some booze, once we get…wherever it is we’re goin’.”______

Peter woke a couple hours later to bright sunlight streaming in through the tiny bunk window and the sounds of two hushed, but urgent voices by the door. “We can just leave him to rot here forever, sister, I don’t see the problem.”

“He’s…he’s important, okay? We spent so long trying to track Thanos’s progress together, abandoning him would do more harm than good.”

“You just said he knows no more than we do.”

“Just…trust me, Nebula. We have to keep him with us. Think of the consequences if we let him go. Not just for us, but for him, too.”

When he finally had enough, Peter emerged from the cabin, catching them both off-guard. “Where are we?”

Gamora smiled tightly. “Sakaar.”

“Oh, you gotta be - ”

“It’s the last place he’d expect,” Gamora interjected. “If you’re done questioning everything I’ve said, there’s work to be done. Let’s go.”

They trekked through the literal garbage dump that Nebula had landed them on, Peter pinching his nose in mild disgust the whole way. “Where are we even goin’?”

“Do you ever stop talking?” Nebula groaned.

“Hey, it’s part of being a P.I.,” Peter said defensively. “Seriously, Gamora, what’s the plan here?”

“I have a contact. One of the lieutenants of the Grandmaster,” Gamora replied, taking long, steady strides. “They’ll make a deal with him so we can hide on Sakaar without intervention, and send forces out for Corvus and Proxima. We can’t let them get me, or else Thanos will gain more power than you can ever imagine.”

“What’s that s’posed to mean?” Peter frowned. He could practically hear Nebula rolling her eyes in response.

Gamora paused. “I know the location of something precious to him. No one, absolutely no one, knows. We need as much distance between him and me as possible. Follow me, the back entrance is over here.”

They slipped in through the ‘back entrance’ - which was really the end of a garbage chute, much to Peter’s chagrin - before emerging in a boiler room. The three of them barely had time to wash up in a nearby supply closet and remove all the grime when the door slammed open and a figure strolled in. Peter let out a startled yelp, while Gamora and Nebula drew their weapons, seemingly out of nowhere.

“Relax, G, it’s me.” A woman stepped into the light with a sort of casual (or perhaps somewhat drunken) swagger. She wore dark armor, white facepaint, and a relaxed smirk. “Who’s this?”

“Quill runs the investigation office on Knowhere. I need him to be part of the deal, too. The Black Order know about him.” Despite herself, Gamora let out a sigh of relief, lowering her sword. “It’s good to see you, Valkyrie. It’s been too long since I last visited.”

“Yes, well, Sakaar isn’t exactly an ideal vacation spot.” Valkyrie dragged her finger through some of the mold accumulating on one of the boilers, wincing slightly as it crumbled to pieces. “The Grandmaster already approved my request for the empty apartment beside mine. It’s not much, but it should serve well as your - temporary - home. There are guards patrolling the halls at all times, not that it’ll do much if your siblings come knocking, but it’s better than nothing.” She gestured for them to follow her, and they began making their way through the maze of hallways in the Grandmaster’s Palace.

“Were you here when Corvus and Proxima tried to smuggle Chitauri weapons by the Sakaaran soldiers a few months ago? I know Thanos also had his eye on the Grandmaster’s champion, whoever it is,” Gamora added.

“The champion doesn’t need weapons, he is the weapon,” Valkyrie replied. “And yeah, I saw those smug bastards hanging around. The good thing is, the Grandmaster does talk to his brother, so he didn’t give up your whereabouts when they asked. But you know, for a P.I., you’re terrible at the ‘private’ end of the deal.”

“Private doesn’t mean anonymous,” Peter interrupted. “And those news articles were - ”

“Whatever,” Valkyrie sighed, waving him off. “There’s a Contest of Champions happening tonight, if you’re interested in chasing down any other leads. They’re a hotbed for illegal activity and just about the only time you’ll see some of the most influential - and immoral - people in the galaxy come out to play. Besides, I know you like a good fight, Gamora.”

“We need a low profile,” Gamora said apologetically. “And an army.”

“You don’t have an arrest warrant?” Valkyrie teased, finally bringing them to a stop in front of their door. “I can make some calls. But I’ll be at the Contest tonight, seeing how my champion is doing. Drop by if you want the information early. Otherwise, I can come by in the morning, provided I even have something.”

“Thank you, Valkyrie.” Gamora’s shoulders finally relaxed for the first time in hours. “If you ever need a favor - ”

“How about a drink?” Valkyrie smirked, yanking the door open. She cocked her chin. “Go on, get inside.”______

Peter, much to his dismay, spent the next few hours sitting on the couch and twiddling his thumbs impatiently, watching as Gamora and Nebula pored over the documents that he hadn’t even realized Gamora had taken - or more accurately, stolen - from his office. They were knelt at the coffee table opposite him, photos and articles spread out all over its surface, muttering to each other under their breaths like they didn’t want him to hear. “What was it like?”

Gamora looked up at him. “What?”

“Your life with Thanos. I guess I still don’t really know the whole story,” Peter shrugged.

Nebula shot Gamora a disbelieving look, but Gamora shook her head in return, moving to sit beside Peter instead. She twisted her hands in her lap, contemplating what she wanted to tell him. It alarmed her to think that she was just about ready to tell him everything. “Thanos started off as an influential member of Titan’s social circles, making his way up the ranks. He became more and more corrupt as time went on, as he began believing in things that no one should ever believe, fighting for causes that were misguided and harmful. He truly thought he knew what was best for the planet, and eventually, for the rest of the universe. He was frustrated by the lack of movement by the Titan government, and believed it simply came down to money.”

“So he started dealing in illegal trade; nothing too harmful, just goods that were banned for one reason or another. Then it became drugs. Then weapons. Then…people.” Gamora swallowed. “Both Nebula and I were taken from our parents as children, and intended to be sold for…other purposes. But for whatever reason, he decided to keep us instead. He raised us to be his protectors, and then his lieutenants. We were never left alone until a year ago, when he became too greedy, and sent out every last one of his Children to carry out jobs for him at the same time. That’s how we ended up being sent to Morag by ourselves.”

Peter nodded thoughtfully. “And he’s making a play on…what was it you said? The Infinity Stones?”

“Tivan is in possession of one. It’s why he helped Nebula and I find a place to stay, free of charge. In exchange, we protect his business and his life from our father, as shady as he may be,” Gamora replied. “And you? How did you come by Knowhere?”

“Finishing one last job.” At her confused expression, he patted the empty spot on the breast of his jacket, where the ghost of a cloth patch remained. “Ex-Ravager. But I wanted to get out of that life, do somethin’ honest. Cleaning up the streets of Knowhere seemed like a good start. Then I met Drax, and he told me all about what happened to his family and countless others…it just made sense.” He smiled apologetically. “I guess I’ve been keeping things from you, too.”

“That’s why the Nova Corps know you so well!” Gamora exclaimed. “You’ve done prison time.”

“More than I wanna think about,” Peter chuckled sheepishly. “Okay, so I was hard on you earlier. We both got pasts that we kept from each other ‘cos it was convenient, and I decided to be a hypocritical a-hole about it. I just…I thought I’d grown to trust and care about someone who wasn’t who I thought she was, at all.”

Gamora smiled gently, nudging his knee with hers. “I wasn’t pretending to be someone else. I promise, all I did was conceal my former affiliation with Thanos. Everything else is true. In fact, I’ve never felt more myself when I was with you and the others. I meant it when I said I was enjoying my time with the team. I never had any intention of harming you, ever. All I wanted was a legal way to take Thanos down, see if I could follow the law and stop him, instead of just killing him outright. When your agency’s name popped up, it just…it felt right.”

Before Peter could respond, Nebula let out a sudden snarl of distaste. They both looked up, only just realizing that she had crossed the room to stand guard by the window. “Chitauri,” she hissed.

“You see the weapons?” Gamora jogged over to join her, Peter following closely behind.

“No…Chitauri.” They both followed Nebula’s pointed finger, eyes widening in horror as at least thirty Chitauri soldiers marched their way through the startled Sakaaran crowd, knocking over every last passerby without so much a glance. They didn’t appear to have a commander with them, or a particular target, but their presence could only mean one thing.

“Thanos is here,” Gamora said in a near-whisper, stepping back from the window. “He might not know that we’re here, but he’s already come for the Grandmaster’s champion.”

Peter blinked. “So, uh, something tells me we should rethink skippin’ out on the Contest of Champions, after all.”______

Valkyrie, unsurprisingly, was delighted to hear they had changed their minds. She sent some clothes ahead for them in preparation, and invited them to sit with her in the Grandmaster’s private box (“I usually decline since some of his other favorites are creepy, but if you’re taking on the Mad Titan himself, you at least deserve a good view,” she had grinned salaciously). Peter, meanwhile, felt like he was experiencing deja vu from the previous night (had that really only been just yesterday?) with Gamora on his arm, only this time she was wearing ceremonial Sakaaran armor instead of an evening dress.

“Scrapper 142, how about that! You finally decided to join me, after all these years,” the Grandmaster beamed, squeezing Valkyrie’s hand with a vigorous shake. “You’re always hidin’ up in the nosebleed section on that rustbucket of yours, I was almost about to give up asking. But I’m sure glad I didn’t, hey?”

“I brought my guests with me. I thought they’d appreciate the view,” Valkyrie replied, gesturing behind her.

“Why, hello there. Aren’t you all somethin’ to look at?” The Grandmaster’s scrutinous gaze was intense enough, but the twitchy eyelash fluttering soon became too much for anyone’s comfort, and the three of them quickly settled into their seats on Valkyrie’s other side.

“You must have seen the Chitauri soldiers arriving earlier,” Gamora murmured to Valkyrie, who hummed in confirmation. “Any progress on finding combatants?”

“Let’s just say that you really owe me that drink,” Valkyrie said, grinning. “How does the full force of the Asgardian army sound?”

Peter leaned around Gamora. “How’d you pull that off?”

“It’s…a long story.” Valkyrie’s face fell a little, her mouth twisting unpleasantly. “Now hush, it’s starting.”

The next hour went by in a blur, starting with a couple warm-up fights that were only mildly interesting. They were far more invested in scanning the crowd for any signs of the Chitauri or worse, the Children, than to pay much attention to some lackluster combat. Gamora was steadily becoming more anxious as time went on, half-expecting Thanos to burst through the fighter’s gates at any moment and tear her apart. Then:

“Is that him?”

Gamora and Nebula went numb, cold sweat breaking out across their foreheads at the familiar baritone that rumbled not too far behind them. Oblivious to their predicament, the Grandmaster go to his feet, cheerful as ever as he greeted the newcomer. “No, no, not yet, much too soon. Trust me, you’ll know my beloved champion when you see him. Sit, sit. I’ll give you the rundown on what you’ve missed, huh?”

“Aw, crap,” Peter muttered under his breath. Through his peripheral vision, he watched as the Mad Titan himself settled into the chair on the Grandmaster’s opposite side, resting his elbow on his knee as he leaned forward, furrowing his brow, squinting intently into the stadium. He didn’t need to look behind him to know Gamora and Nebula were absolutely petrified. “Hey, uh, Valkyrie, can you do something?”

Valkyrie stood abruptly. “I’m taking my guests to the bar,” she announced loudly, quickly yanking Gamora and Nebula up by the wrists and practically shoving them out the door. Peter sprinted after them as they exited the Grandmaster’s private box, ducking into a side stairwell, away from the watchful eye of the Chitauri soldiers stationed at the doors.

“I wasn’t expecting him to be that close,” Gamora said breathlessly. She seemed seconds away from vomiting profusely. “We didn’t plan for this. We can’t take him on, not now, not without the full force of an army behind us.”

“So what, we run? He’s right there!” Peter exclaimed. “Let’s get the frickin’ guy and get this done.”

“You don’t know him like we do, Quill. He may look like nothing more than a brute, but he’s far too clever. He would have to be to get this far.” Gamora raked her fingers through her hair, pacing back and forth, her heels clattering against the metal grates below. “Our only option is if we can catch him by surprise. I might have an idea, but it means we have to go find his transport pod and wait for his return.”

“This better be a damn good idea, because I didn’t come here to die,” Nebula grumbled.

“It’s the best I’ve got,” Gamora shrugged with a wistful smile.

“I’ll go back to the box and keep an eye on him,” Valkyrie offered. “Besides, the Grandmaster’s champion is my friend. I need to make sure he doesn’t get traded off Sakaar, not before his other friends come to take him home.”

Peter looked puzzled. “Friends?”

“Another long story. Now go before the Grandmaster gets suspicious. It doesn’t usually take me this long to order drinks,” Valkyrie chuckled wryly.

The three of them moved to leave, keeping their eyes and ears open for Chitauri soldiers, though Gamora couldn’t help but call over her shoulder, “At this rate, I owe you the entire top shelf!” as she sprinted away.______

Thankfully, it wasn’t too difficult to find Thanos’s transport pod among the swarm of vehicles and spacecraft crowded in beneath the Grandmaster’s Palace, considering it was surrounded by Chitauri soldiers. They ducked behind a rundown M-ship, watching intently as the soldiers circled the pod in slow, menacing strides. “You’re lucky I remembered to take my blasters to the office,” Peter whispered, unearthing them from his bag. “And you guys got your - where the hell have you been keeping swords?” Nebula merely glared at him in lieu of a verbal response. “Alright, alright, sorry I asked.”

“Forget your guns, Quill,” Gamora murmured, gently pushing his hands down. “The Chitauri are tough; they require brutality, not bullets. Remember my instructions?”

“Get into the pod, send out a scrambled tracking signal. Once the pod docks with Sanctuary, we can track him wherever he goes,” Peter recited diligently. “I mean, not gonna lie, I’m kinda bummed out we’re not gonna take him down for good today.”

“It’ll be better in the long run,” Gamora smiled sadly. “Find the rest of his operations, all the little hiding spots that even we didn’t know about.”

“Yeah, makes sense,” Peter nodded. “We don’t exactly have the authority to kill or arrest him, either. Hell, he could probably kill me with a snap of his fingers.” The sisters both stared at him incredulously. “What?”

“Stay here and wait for our signal,” Gamora said firmly. “When you have a clear path, make it quick - get in, get it done, get out.”

“Yeah, I got it - oh.” Peter watched helplessly as Gamora and Nebula went barreling over the broken wing of the ship, charging into the crowd of Chitauri soldiers with a mighty cry. They barely had time to react before the sisters descended upon them, slashing their way through every single body like they were made of paper, the ground rumbling with the sheer weight of the army’s sudden collapse. “Okay, I’ll just be back here - ”

“Now, Peter!” Gamora hollered over the sounds of metal hitting flesh and the helpless screams of fallen soldiers, driving her sword straight through a Chitauri’s heart.

Peter nearly tripped over his own feet as he sprinted towards the pod, using his blaster to blow the door open - this was no time to hack the autolock. He collapsed into the pilot’s seat, and with trembling hands, yanked open one of the utility panels underneath the console and began digging around, holding a penlight between his teeth. “Focus, Peter,” he muttered to himself as his shaky fingers untangled the wires that connected the navigation system. The minutes felt like hours as he worked, sweat rolling down the back of his neck. He tried his best not to look out the window to keep an eye on the sisters as they fought a seemingly endless stream of Chitauri, though his heart beat painfully fast out of nervousness for both him and them.

Just as he was finishing up, an enormous thud erupted from somewhere above his head, almost like someone had jumped on top of the pod. Slowly, Peter peered out of the dashboard window, his blood running cold at the realization of who it was. He held his breath as he retreated into a shadowy corner of the already-miniscule pod, quietly closing the door behind him.

“Daughters.” His deep baritone rattled its way through everyone’s bones. “What a surprise.”

“Believe me, we aren’t excited to see you, either,” Nebula growled, brandishing her electrified blades.

“You’ve been doing this for too long, Father. All the pain you’ve caused people…the pain you made us complicit in…it needs to end.” Gamora drew her sword as well. “Either we take you in, or we take you out.”

“You think because you’ve chased a few leads, solved a couple crimes, called yourself a private investigator, you’ve absolved yourself.” Thanos let out an unsettlingly dark chuckle. “Oh, Gamora. Still unbearably naive, all these years later. Still believe that your purpose is to help others, when your purpose is to save them.”

“I will not help you find the Soul Stone. It will do you no good in your quest for ‘salvation’ or whatever it is you tell yourself to feel better about your irreversible sins,” Gamora snarled. “I want to wash my hands of your wretchedness and atone for my own. We can do this the easy way, Father. Let us take you to the Nova Corps. Confess to everything you’ve ever done - give them numbers, give them names. Live the rest of your days freed from your truths, or they will hunt you down for the rest of time.”

“And you think they’ll listen to me?” Thanos advanced, his strides long and thundering against the dense Sakaaran soil. “Or will they kill me where I stand? What do you know of freedom, Gamora? Or truth?” He leaned down, bringing himself eye-to-eye with his daughter. She held her breath for a moment, taunting him with her silence. Then he knocked her sword clean out of her hand and grabbed her by the wrist in one fell swoop, yanking her up into the air. Gamora shouted and spat in his face, struggling to free herself, but his strength far outmatched hers. Peter, still hidden in the pod, dug his fingernails into his palms in anger.

“You always told us we were terrible liars.” Nebula stood tall. “And our freedom began the day we left for Morag.”

With a roar that rivaled his, Nebula ran straight for him, propelling herself up and slashing across the tops of his shoulders with her blades. In his haste to retaliate, Thanos dropped Gamora, who snatched up her sword and went sprinting for the transport pod. Peter watched in confusion as she ducked out of his view, his heart speeding up even faster as Thanos and Nebula continued to spar. The sisters’ reputations, he found, were not for nothing - Nebula, despite her relative size to Thanos’s enormity, was doing her best to keep up, though she seemed to be directing him closer and closer to the pod, the expanse of Thanos’s back grazing the glass every few seconds as she pushed him back.

Finally, there was a pause, though if either of them were out of breath, they didn’t show it. “What do you really think you can accomplish here, Nebula?” Thanos sneered. “Your life was best lived under my guidance, and even then, you had half the strength of your brothers and sisters.”

“And you think you can rattle me, spit venom in my face and pour salt in my wounds. But your words do nothing but fuel my desire to kill you where you stand,” Nebula hissed, narrowing her eyes. “But today…and just today…we have something else in mind.”

Thanos barely had time to blink before Gamora leaped from the top of the transport pod, slicing her sword clean through the shoulder wound on his left, severing his arm completely from his body. He let out a bloodcurdling scream of anguish, collapsing to his knees with a dizzying thud, trying and failing to brace himself on his right hand as his nose hit the dirt.

Gamora landed neatly on her feet, pacing around to his front in a deliberate manner. She pressed the tip of her bloodied sword into the back of his neck, leaving the slightest, almost surgical incision at the top of his spine. “Consider that a warning, Father. You taunt us and doubt us like you weren’t the one who instilled our thirsts for violence and fear.” She glanced briefly at Nebula. “We’ll let you go. But only because you’re currently more useful alive than dead.” Gamora smirked. “Besides…I don’t have the authority to arrest you.” She tilted her chin in the direction of the transport pod. “Leave us. Now.”

Thanos only just managed to struggle to his feet when Peter came crashing through the door of the transport pod, donning a mask and additional gear that Gamora had never seen before. He somersaulted through the air, slapping a small device onto Thanos’s back before flipping right over his head, coming to a stop by Gamora’s side, hovering a few feet above the ground in his jet boots. “Catch you later!” Peter said cheerfully, pressing a button on a remote that also seemed to have come out of nowhere.

Gamora and Nebula watched incredulously as Thanos was suddenly yanked back into the pod with a mighty clang, the door slamming shut after him. Peter unearthed a tablet from his bag, and with a couple quick commands, the pod activated, its engine and systems humming for a brief moment before it shot straight up into space at an immeasurable speed. The three of them stared up at the night sky in dumbfounded awe, Thanos’s helpless thundering shouts fading into the distance.

“Peter…what the…” Gamora breathed, turning to look at him in half-pride, half-disbelief.

Peter merely shrugged. “What? I was in there for a long time. Figured I could put some of my other skills - and old Ravager tech - to good use.”

“Looks like my sister’s faith in you wasn’t as misguided as I thought.” Nebula patted Peter almost condescendingly on the shoulder before turning and walking back toward the Grandmaster’s Palace, stashing her blades back into her boots. “Well? Are we leaving this literal trash planet or not?”

Peter and Gamora looked at each other. “Don’t have to ask me twice,” Gamora remarked with a relieved smile.______

“Still doesn’t feel real.” The three of them had returned to Nebula’s stolen ship after saying brief goodbyes to Valkyrie (and, to their chagrin, the Grandmaster as well). Peter and Gamora were once again sat on the bench, though side by side this time. “I’ve been chasin’ that bastard for ages, and to be that close…to almost beat him…I know I should be more pissed about letting him go, but you made the right call. And the fact we survived at all is a major win.”

Gamora nodded in agreeance. “You know what? I feel the same way. I’ve spent so long running from him and chasing after him at the same time, and to get all the way here…looks like joining your office wasn’t such a bad idea after all.”

Peter grinned triumphantly. “So…what’re your plans now?”

She frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Well, I’m heading back to Knowhere so I can return to my life, the team. I bet Mantis freaked out the second she realized I was gone. Plus, you kinda took all of our stuff.” He gestured towards the stack of documents currently stashed in her bag. “Anyways, you and Nebula don’t have a place to stay anymore, and there’s no way the Black Order aren’t gonna come back. So where are you gonna go?”

“I…was thinking we would go to Knowhere with you.” Gamora chewed her lip. “After all, we managed to make it this far. Who says we can’t do it again? Actually take Thanos down for good?”

Peter smiled, something soft and sweet and a little mischievous, just like two nights ago on the casino balcony. “Sounds like a plan.”

She broke her gaze, the intensity of his eyes becoming far too overwhelming for her senses, opting to look out at the stars instead. “You had something you wanted to say to me, back at the casino. Something you wanted to ask.”

“Oh,” Peter chuckled awkwardly. “I, uh, don’t worry about it, really.”

“Try me,” Gamora said simply, glancing back at him.

“I was gonna…well, I was gonna ask if maybe, you’d be interested in going to dinner sometime. Just you and me. O - or, it doesn’t have to be dinner, we could go to - I mean, there’s nothing really to do on Knowhere that’s legal, exactly, but - ”

“Elsewhere, then,” she suggested, her smile growing. “We’re both seasoned travelers, after all.”

“Yeah?” The crease between Peter’s brow slowly relaxed, his smile widening in anticipation. “You want to?”

“Oh, why not? I was starting to wonder if you were ever going to ask, or if I should just do it instead.” Gamora reached over to squeeze his hand between both of hers. “So it’s a date…partner.”

[sassysweetstories]

Diamond in the Rough

Summary: you’re an androgynous woman who has a rather groggy voice. due to your social anxiety and shy nature, you refuse to let your beautiful, sexy voice free. that is until you do something that might lead you down a dangerous path. 

Ship: Shawn Mendes x Fem!Reader

Warnings: angst, swearing, vulgar words, bullying, fluff, hyperventilating, borderline anxiety attack, gender bashing, etc. 

Notes: none of these gifs are mine, credit to the owners. 

Tagged: @bailey-hoover @kiralivelove @thalia-prior-of-ravenclaw @anamcg317 @bellasett @queentiffanyyy @archer-whovian-violinist @beingmadinwonderland @princessisabelle19 @violence-and-velvet @lachicadelamanzana

Your P.O.V

[two years ago] 

“Oh! Waiter!” A girl says mockingly to me, a sadistic sinister grin making it’s way onto her already harsh features. “Or, are you a girl? I can’t tell. Whatever. Pick up our stuff.” I don’t hesitate to start loading some of the dishes in the little cafe shop I worked at. Whilst rearranging objects, I do my best to ignore her and her friends entirely, already having to deal with their abuse during school hours. College was a wonderful escape but not enough when it came to bullying. There’s always a group of girls that bash on others. I just happened to stumble upon the worst. “Hey, dyke. You forgot something.” I watch helplessly as she pushes the mug off the table, smirking as it crumbles into a million little pieces. She enjoys the slightest flinching motion from me. “Clean it up.” Her friends damn near cackle like hyenas and despite the fact that my blood is boiling, I keep my mouth shut and pick up the remains of the shattered cup, almost cutting myself up in the process. Before I know it my boss, Belle, a curvy yet short and stout, black woman doesn’t hesitate to cuss them out. “Get the hell out of my shop. That is no way to treat my worker. I’ve already called the police due to your repetitive behavior. Expect that I’ll be suing.” 

I don’t even have enough time to look up to know that they’re gone, not before they scoff at me with disgust. I’m glad Belle has no longer made it a problem at work but I’m sure it’ll only get worse at school. The cafe is like a home away from home type of feel. With it’s Barnes and Noble / Earthbound vibe, it’s exactly what the kids these days are enjoying. I love the interaction, simple but sweet nonetheless. But my anxiety does wonders when I try to step out of my comfort zone only to be forces backwards again. The best time to escape though is when I’m closing. Belle and the rest of my coworkers leave a little after ten where I close at one. Once alone, I dip my toes in my nighttime en-devours and breathe. And by that I mean sing. Ya see, ever since I was little, I knew I could sing but I’d never done in public due to the fact that I had a very masculine voice, and not to mention I have terrible social anxiety. I have a low voice to begin with but nobody really knows that except Belle and Charlie. Only they know and I’m not gonna expand that comfort bubble. I sway to the rhythm of the song, smiling softly as the lyrics sprung happily through the sound system. 

Out There from Hunchback of Notre Dame

“Safe behind these windows and these parapets of stone Gazing at the people down below me  All my life I watch them as I hide up here alone Hungry for the histories they show me  All my life I memorize there faces Knowing them as they will never know me All my life I wonder how it feels to pass a day Not above them  But part of them. 

And out there Living in the sun Give me one day out there All I ask is one To hold forever.”

Before I know it, I’m jumping all around the empty cafe, dancing and singing with such passion I don’t even realize I’m sweating through my shirt. There’s something so inviting about music much less musicals. When I do it alone, the drive is stronger than anything I’ve ever experienced, this kind of adrenaline rush that makes me wild with childlike wonder.

“Out there Where they all live unaware What I’d give What I’d dare Just to live one day out there

Out there among the millers and the weavers and their wives Through the roofs and gables I can see them  Ev’ry day they shout and scold and go about their lives Heedless of the gift it is to be them  If I was in their skin I’d treasure ev’ry instant

Out there Strolling by the Seine Taste a morning out there Like ordinary men Who freely walk about there Just one day and then I swear I’ll be content

With my share Won’t resent Won’t despair  Old and bent I won’t care I’ll have spent  One day Out there.”

When the music dies, I’m drenched in my own perspiration. Heart thumping with a different kind of adrenaline rush. For the first time in weeks, I feel like I can breathe again, like I’m alive. That is until a loud clapping irrupts from the front of the cafe. Gulping, my heart drops in fear. “Well aren’t you something.” A girl half my height grins up at me as if she’d just found gold, a faint mischievous smirk arising onto her plump lips. “Names Fray. Fray Jay-white. But most of my friends call me FJ. I’ve got a proposition for you.”  Oh no... 

[Now]

“Are you nervous about performing tonight?” I ask FJ, twiddling my thumbs with nervous and uneasy fingers. She shrugs mindlessly. Of course she’s not afraid and yet you are despite the fact that you’ll be behind a fucking curtain. She was born for this kinda thing, a lover of attention. FJ had been working with me, lip-sinking while I sung behind the stage or in the audio-booth but this was our second live performance in front of the biggest artists in the world. Our- my voice had gotten so much attention in the past few years, people wanted to hear it for themselves. Apparently the cast of Hamilton is suppose to be here tonight, too. 

Literally everyone I love will be behind that wall and I won’t get to see them because I’m so afraid. She notices my discomfort and takes her hands in mind, much smaller but they calm me nonetheless. She’s become one of my closest friends since our agreement and I could thank her enough for listening to my whole story, caring as much as she does. “Hey, we’ve got this. It’ll be okay tonight. And guess what, Dylan and I found a one sided mirror. Ya know, like in all of those cop shows?! You can perform on stage behind the one sided mirror!-” She lifts my chin up ever so slightly, coaxing me with her gentle voice. “I think this is a step in the right direction.”

And in that moment, I don’t doubt her even though I should’ve. I accept the words effortlessly as truth, a way to break out of my bubble. I prepare backstage with the rest of the crew, grinning at their shenanigans. As I look out at the oceans of people that I call family, I feel whole and content despite the performance butterflies. “(Y/n), it’s time.” Dylan says to me with excitement and pride in his eyes. Patting my shoulder like a sibling would, I slip past the curtain and hide behind the one sided mirror, microphone at the ready. In that moment as FJ walks out onto the stage, I decide to lay on one of the spare boxes and it brings me immediate comfort. They can’t see you. A voice reminds me. The music starts and my nerves slowly vanish. 

For Forever From Dear Evan Hansen

“End of May or early June This picture-perfect afternoon we share Drive the winding country road Grab a scoop at A’ La Mode An open field that’s framed with trees  We pick a spot and shoot the breeze Like buddies do Quoting songs by our favorite bands Telling jokes no one understands Except us two  And we talk and take in the view

All we see is sky for forever We let the world pass by for forever Feels like we could go on for forever this way Two friends on a perfect day We walk a while and talk about The things we'll do when we get out of school Bike the Appalachian trail or Write a book or learn to sail Wouldn't that be cool? There's nothing that we can't discuss Like girls we wish would notice us but never do He looks around and says to me "There's nowhere else I'd rather be" And I say, "me too"And we talk and take in the view

We just talk and take in the view All we see is sky for forever We let the world pass by for forever Feels like we could go on for forever this way, this way All we see is light for forever 'Cause the sun shines bright for forever Like we'll be alright for forever this way Two friends on a perfect day And there he goes Racing toward the tallest tree From far across the yellow field I hear him calling, "follow me" there we go Wondering how the world might look from up so high

One foot after the other One branch then to another I climb higher and higher I climb 'til the entire Sun shines on my face And I suddenly feel the branch give way I'm on the ground My arm goes numb I look around And I see him come to get me He's come to get me

And everything's okay All we see is sky for forever We let the world pass by for forever Buddy, you and I for forever this way, this way All we see is light 'Cause the sun burns bright We could be alright for forever this way Two friends True friends  On a perfect day.” 

I’m so lost in the song, I don’t realize I’m crying until it’s all over. This song means everything to me I can’t help but lose myself.  Apparently I’ve moved the audience because they’re weeping, too. But it’s all too much, their eyes. I look back at FJ for reassurance but she’s long gone. But- If she’s gone, who are they- Oh god... In that moment, everything around me slows down and my heartbeat quickens. The mirror slowly climbs upward but it’s too late. They’re beady, demon eyes watch me with hungry teeth, ready to take a bite at me and my insecurities. I can’t breathe but I can move and I do. My name is being called from behind but I don’t ever turn back, I can’t. I push past everybody, not even bothering to say sorry. Once I get to the hallway, the fresh air hits me like a ton of bricks. I search the halls for my next direction before noticing a pair of honey eyes watching me with worried brows but I don’t stop moving. Apart of me is glad I took up track in high school cause nobody can catch me. 

Before I can bolt past the next aisle, a massive body tackles me off to the side and I land with a loud thud. The tears have blurred my vision almost entirely but I’d know that voice anywhere. “(Y/n), listen to me! It’s going to be okay!” Dylan must’ve followed from the venue. How he kept up, I don’t know. My entire body shakes, harder than it’s ever done before. This was by far the worst panic attack I’d ever experienced. I try to push Dylan away but he only holds me tighter, almost like he knows what I really need. Cradling my cheeks with his calloused hands, I’m surprised that those warm fingers belong to him. I don’t even realize we’re moving until we’re not longer in the hallway, out of sight and out of prying eyes. Through blurry eyes only, we shuffle into an empty sound booth and I’m glad to finally sit on something solid, the only feeling of assurance I think I’ll get tonight. As Dylan runs his hands up and down my arms, I finally come to a heavy realization. 

FJ betrayed me. The mere thought leaves a bitter taste both in my mouth and in the pit of my stomach. I want nothing more than to curl up, shy away from the world and stop existing entirely. But another hypothesis, now turned theory, arises, too. Everyone has seen your face, your performance. There’s no point in running. I think for a minute about the thousands of dollars it’d take to alter my features, to be able to hide in plain sight again, maybe this time without the ridicule. Realistically I don’t have the money for any of it, nor would I want to. A burning feeling starts to fester in my heart and I can’t quite place it until my breathing finally steadies. Pure fucking rage. Heartbreak turned into a scorching inferno. Despite the fact that my hands are still shaking and my legs are far from ready to bare weight much less my own, I push Dylan’s hands away. He gawks at the gesture but even more so when I present an accusation more so versus a question, “Did you help her?! Did you plan this?!” 

His deep blue eyes turn sad, hurt that I’d think so little of him. But I was just humiliated in front of the entire world. Right now, I have no time for compassion. That patient, kind side is gone. Ripped away for selfish purposes. “No! (Y/n)! When I bought the one sided mirror, that’s exactly what it was! One-sided! Not a window! Someone must’ve switched it out right before you got on stage. I didn’t know about any of this!” All of a sudden, the music booth door flew open with a loud thud. FJ is one of the first to enter, followed by some of our crew and I don’t hide my angered state. I push myself up onto unsteady feet and glare into her soul, damning her to hell. “(Y/n)- I-” She tries to speak but I’m not having any of it. “You did this.” She flinches under my rough tone, a sound I’m not even use to. “I trusted you. Told you about every bully, every night I cried. And you put me out there when I wasn’t ready. You threw me to side, FOR WHAT?! GREED?! MONEY?!” I don’t feel a lick of remorse for the tears that start to fall down her cheeks as I continue. “You’ve ruined my life! I CAN’T GO ANYWHERE NOW! ALL I WANTED WAS TO BE HIDDEN! TO BE UNSEEN!” 

She screams back, “BUT THE WORLD NEEDED TO SEE WHAT YOU HAD!” I cuss back louder, voice hoarse with passion and anger. They dance together like lost partners. “YOU HAD NO RIGHT TO DO THAT! IT WAS MY CHOICE AND YOU RIPPED THAT AWAY FROM ME!” FJ has nothing to say. But that’s because she knows I’m right. She’s cognitively aware of how bad this situation is starting to turn. I can’t go anywhere now that I’ve been seen. I have two options: vanish, never leave my house or the other, one I don’t even dare to utter. “Get out.” I reply shortly. The rest of the crew look terrified of my retched state, more disappointed in FJ than anything. She attempts to talk again, “(Y/n), please-” But begging won’t get her anywhere. It seems she did this alone because nobody attempts to vouch for her actions. Throwing her to side should be easy but it only closes the door on my torn heart, a brand to seal everything shut. “I said. Get. Out.” FJ needs no more than that before she runs out sobbing. I all but faint, exhausted and more drained than ever before. I sit for a moment before a person creeks the door open. 

“Umm.. Miss (Y/L/N). There’s someone who’d like to meet you.” 

(I hope you guys liked it. I’d like to make this a series after I finish my two requests. Tell me what you think in the comments please it really helps)

[amberlynnmurdock]

DINER SERIES (11)

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Reader Insert

Genre: ANGST!!! like prob the angstiest chapter of this series 

Series Summary: After the fall of S.H.I.E.L.D. and HYDRA out in the world, Bucky Barnes is on the run. He finds himself in a small town in Pennsylvania and in it a diner he likes to come to late at night. He only planned on staying here for a week, until he meets you. And he finds a few reasons to stay.

Chapter Summary: Bucky helped you, but you saved him. 

MASTERLIST

The ride back to the motel is quiet. The only sound that fills the air is the sound of the tires running over pavement, a comforting sound for both of you. Bucky has his left hand tucked deep into his jacket pocket, the jacket which now has three bullet holes. Bucky glances at you every so often but your attention is kept out the window. He can’t tell what you’re thinking right now. He doesn’t think he wants to know.

When you arrive at the motel, Bucky quietly leads you to his room. He didn’t expect to have you here so he didn’t make any time to straighten up and hide anything suspicious. Museum pamphlets are scattered all over the desk in the room. His only bag rests on a chair near the bed. None of that matters now, Bucky thinks, now that you have seen the only thing he has tried to keep hidden from you.

When you’re finally all settled in, your duffle bag sitting next to his own bag, you don’t say anything about his arm. You don’t question the pamphlets and lack of luggage for someone traveling. He knows you notice these things. Maybe you’re just too tired to question them.

“We’ll talk in the morning,” You say in a strained voice. You’re trying to hold yourself together, Bucky sees that, and he wants to make it better–he just doesn’t know how.

“Okay,” Bucky replies, taking off his cap, “You can have the bed. I’ll take the–“

“Don’t you dare say floor,” You gently argue, a hint of a smile on your face. Bucky looks down and then back to you with a small grin,

“Okay. I’ll be up for a little bit, though,” Bucky tells you. You get under the covers and nod,

“Alright. Well, good night. And James?”

You call his name as he’s about to head into the bathroom. He looks at you and you smile a little, “Thank you.”

Bucky nods his head silently and shuts himself away in the bathroom.

He’s been in here for what feels like hours. After taking a scorching hot shower for longer than he should have, Bucky stays put in the bathroom only wearing sweatpants. His hands grip the sides of the sink as he leans over; metal on one side, flesh the other. His teeth are gritted. The steam from the shower still in the room is suffocating Bucky from cool air. He doesn’t care. He lets the fog coat his skin, a thin sheen of sweat covering his body. His arm. He can’t see his reflection in the mirror because of the steam. Good, he thinks. He doesn’t want to see his scars, his arm, himself.

The thought that he wanted to kill Nathan put Bucky off a bit. He shouldn’t want to kill even if it was someone who didn’t deserve to breathe the same air as you. But HYDRA made Bucky into a killing machine; a monster. This is who he is and who he always will be. The thought–no��the fact unsettles him beyond words and to think that he could do it to anyone scares him.

He would never hurt you.

But the fact is that his mind is still scattered. He could wake up from a nightmare and hit whatever is in his path. He could turn anything into a weapon. He is a weapon.

The fluorescent light in the bathroom buzzes and illuminates a soft teal glow in the room, casting a dark shadow around Bucky’s figure. The mirror is still fogged up. A blurred image of himself is all he sees, a dark shadow in the dim light, a simple figure. He almost scoffs at the irony but finds himself too weak. Bucky reaches his flesh hand to wipe the fog away, and when he does, he hates the image he sees. He hates his arm. He hates the scars embedded in him so deeply both physically and emotionally. He hates that he almost killed a man in front of you and that he wanted to.

Maybe you weren’t as safe with Bucky as he thought.

Something in him snaps as he launches a metal fist to the fluorescent tube light, shattering the bulb into a million pieces that fall in the sink of the bathroom and to the floor. That damn buzzing.

“James?” It’s your voice. Your sweet, sweet tired voice is muffled through the thin bathroom door, “Are you okay?” It pulls Bucky from his thoughts, like a crack of light in his darkness.

Bucky composes himself quickly, letting go of the sink and wiping his face, “Yeah. Yeah, I’m good. Just go to bed, it’s late.”

“It’s six in the morning,” You say, “Have you been in there all night? Are you okay?”

“I–I’m fine, ___. I’ll be out in a second,” Bucky says as he slips on a tight black shirt. He takes a deep breath before opening the door to meet you.

When he does, he notices you’ve changed. You’re in black yoga pants and a black long sleeve shirt. Even though you’re safe from Nathan now, Bucky still can’t help but feel rage when he sees the bruises scattered on your neck and the ones hidden by your sleeves.

Your eyes fall to his left side and you raise your eyebrows. Bucky doesn’t bother in trying to cover it up. He knows it’s too late. He’s afraid of what you’re going to say.

“I, um,” You stutter, “I noticed the pamphlets of museums on your desk. All have one thing in common,” You say in a shaky voice. Bucky prepares for the worst. “They all have had that same Captain America exhibit. The one with the Howling Commandos and… yeah. World War Two stuff.” You say quietly. Bucky can see by the look on your face that you’re trying to make sense of how it all connects to him.

“And well…” You trail off, gesturing to his arm, “You said you had scars.”

“I do,” Bucky says without hesitation.

“I just–Can you help me out a little? I’m just trying to figure out something–maybe I already have–but I need some sort of explanation. I think I deserve to know who is helping me get back to Manhattan,” You say in the calmest voice to Bucky. It’s not argumentative. It’s not threatening. His heart feels heavy in his chest when he looks down, unable to meet your eyes.

“I don’t know where to start,” Bucky says in a defeated tone of voice. Once you know the truth about him, he’s sure you’ll pack your bags and go without him. He’s done what he has had to, he supposes. You don’t need him. You don’t need this stress, this uncertainty, this fear of being with him. You don’t deserve it.

“Just…” You shrug, “Anywhere is okay. I’m listening.”

Bucky still hasn’t looked up to your eyes. The amount of shame he feels right now is immeasurable. He’s not who you think he is. He’s not a good man, he’s not a lover, he could never be a lover, he’s not any of that. He’s a monster. How can he explain this to you? Bucky’s eyebrows furrow as he locks his eyes on his feet, a lump forming in his throat. He shifts on his feet.

“James,” You whisper, “Anywhere.”

When Bucky looks up to meet your eyes, so full of innocence and concern, Bucky almost breaks down on the spot. He feels terrible for lying to you this entire time. He hates himself for putting you in this position. He knows the thoughts he cannot put into words will simply make him lose your trust, something he holds dearly to his heart.

The worst part? He thinks you already know by the tears forming in your eyes. His own tears fall down his cheeks, his eyes never leaving yours. He is utterly speechless. Torn. He just got you, and now he’s about to lose you.

He should be used to this by now.

“I haven’t been honest,” Bucky finally manages to say, though his voice is deep and throaty, just waiting for a sob to escape his lips. “I’m sorry.”

“I know who you are,” You reply, trying to make it easier for him, “after D.C. I read all the files Natasha Romanoff released to the public.” You want to desperately make this better, Bucky can tell, but your words just make him hurt even more. He begins to pace. You reach for him, but he pulls away quickly, and the hurt look on your face is evident. He doesn’t deserve your touch. He doesn’t want to hurt you.

Bucky turns his back to you. He can’t look at you. Through teary eyes he looks down at the floor, like the longer he stares at it the sooner it will swallow him up, leaving the world with one less burden.

But you’re insistent. You stay where you are but you don’t fall back on your words. Bucky watches as a tear drop falls to the floor, the carpet soaking it up.

“Don’t do that,” Your voice is quiet, but Bucky hears you loud and clear, “don’t shut me out.” He hears a quiet cry escape your lips.

“I’ll take you to a bus station out of town. You’ll be safer without me–“ Bucky starts with a strong voice over his tears but it falters when you interrupt him.

“James,” You say louder, though your voice is shaking, “don’t say that, please.”

Bucky turns around, stepping further away from you as he feels panic and guilt spread across his chest. He is disgusted with himself, undeserving of your concern and the tears that fall down your face. He wants to wipe them away but he can’t.

“If you read those files,” Bucky begins, trying to find some sort of steadiness in his voice but can’t, “then you know what I’ve done. You know who I am.”

“Do you think any of that changes what I think of you?” You ask, finding more steadiness in your voice than him. You step closer to Bucky, trying to meet his averted gaze. When you finally do, he finds it hard to look away from you.

“It should,” Bucky says, “It should give you every reason to walk out right now.”

“It doesn’t. And I won’t,” You tell him, “It only gives me every reason to stay. Do you want me to walk out?”

“No,” Bucky replies immediately, and he’s startled at the urgency in his voice, “no,” he says softly.

“Then don’t push me away.” You plead in a voice barely above a whisper. Bucky looks at you without speaking. Pushing you away is the last thing he wanted to do, but the first thing he knows he should do. For your own sake.

When he doesn’t respond, you speak up again.

“Please, James, I’m not going to leave you. I’m not scared of you. I want to help in any way I can,” you plead, voice filled with tears. Bucky can see you clearly but he can’t believe what he’s hearing from you. You’re crying now, desperate for him to listen.

“Do you know how hard that is for me?” He asks.

“I know it must be hard but do you know how hard it was for me to show you these?” You pull the collar of your shirt down with your fingers, revealing your bruises to Bucky once again. He lets out a harsh exhale at the sight, looking at them through bleary eyes, “and you didn’t run away from me.”

“That’s different.”

“In what way?” Your voice is strained, “in what way? Do you remember what you said to me when I showed you them?”

Bucky swallows, his tears not shortening. They’re coming out hot and fast on his cheeks as he feels like his whole world is shaking.

“You said to me ‘this isn’t your fault.’ You said that to me,” you’re desperate for him to understand you, he knows that, and his heart hurts every time he hears your voice crack, “I’m here to tell you the same thing. This isn’t your fault.”

And that’s when it comes crashing down. It’s all too overwhelming for Bucky. He thought you would hate him, despise him even, but no. Here you were, telling him that the horrors HYDRA put him through were not his fault. He may not believe you, but he does believe you truly are an angel, one he promises to keep to himself to keep close, even if it was a bit selfish. He lets out a heart wrenching sob. His shoulders are shaking but it stops when you wrap your arms around him in a tight embrace. It’s all Bucky needs right now. To know that you’re still here with him.

“You have me, Bucky.”

He holds onto you as if his life depends on it, and maybe it does in a way, and he buries his head in the crook of your neck. You run your fingers through his hair and he thinks it’s heavenly, something he doesn’t deserve. He doesn’t deserve to hear what you’re saying. He doesn’t deserve your comfort. Bucky doesn’t deserve you.

You’re both crying holding onto each other. A mix of cool and warm spread across your back in a comforting way, a safe way, and all Bucky feels is the same as you hold onto him. You called him by his name and the gravity of it sends Bucky even deeper into his feelings. Deeper into his connection with you. Deeper and closer to you.

And you don’t stop there. You pull back to meet his eyes, because you truly want Bucky to believe you, to understand you and listen when you say what you’re about to say.

Meeting his stormy blue eyes, rimmed red from crying just as you assume yours are too, you wipe his tears away, your fingers grazing his stubble and jaw, as his hands rest on your waist, both metal and flesh.

But no words can come out from either of you. Too overwhelmed, too moved by the other, too enticed by this moment. You just stand there, looking at the other so deeply. There’s no denying that you both saved each other.

[depechemodespiritera]

At 56, Depeche Mode bandleader Martin Gore no longer feels the need to pull any lyrical punches. So he gets right to the prickly, political point on the band’s latest Spirit set, starting with its clickety-clacking rhetorical question of a lead single “Where’s the Revolution,” with a grim societal accusation intoned in unusually ominous fashion by frontman Dave Gahan: “You’ve been kept down/ You’ve been pushed ‘round/ You’ve been lied to/ You’ve been fed truths/ Who’s making your decisions?” And the album – in scathing indictments of our corrupt, fossil-fuel-favoring, technology-dependent, extinction-bound culture – just gets angrier from there, in “Fail,” “Scum,” “Poorman,” “The Worst Crime,” and the drone-warfare-damning “Going Backwards,” which posits that “We can track it on a satellite/ See it all in black and white/ Watch men die in real time/ We have nothing inside.”

Gore didn’t set out to pen a set of turbulent protest songs that throb with the dark zeitgeist pulse of our post-Brexit-and-Russian-influenced-Trump-election times. It all arose from an instinctive gut feeling he had two years ago that something had gone wrong with humanity. Something horribly, perhaps irreversibly wrong. When he began composing the Spirit material at the end of 2015, none of these startling global U-turns had happened yet, he recalls. There were serious forebodings, to be sure. “The Syrian crisis was going on, which obviously led to the refugee crisis, the Russians had invaded Crimea, and there was a war going on in the Ukraine,” he sighs, in uncomfortably 20/20 hindsight. “It just seemed like we were getting into bad situations everywhere you looked. And there was that whole spate of police shootings in America – black people getting shot – so maybe I was feeling particularly sensitive or something. But I could feel something in the air that did not feel good.”

Gore also had the unusual vantage point of being a British expatriate who now resides in Santa Barbara, California. Gahan lives in New York, but keyboardist Andy Fletcher has remained in London, where his favorite non-touring activity is going down to his local pub every night and – having been kept up to date on world affairs by the less-biased coverage of BBC News – discussing political frustrations with his good mates. “That’s his thing, and I suppose once you’re a few pints in, those discussions get very lively,” Gore says of his childhood chum, who first formed Composition of Sound with him back in 1980, before adding Gahan (who changed their name to Depeche Mode) and releasing their frothy synth-pop debut Speak & Spell a year later. Whereas in America, he adds, “I do get into discussions with people, but they’re not quite as lively. But I have a 14-month-old and a six-week-old at the moment (with second wife Kerrilee Kaski; he has three kids with first wife Suzanne Boisvert), and the song “Eternal” on the new album I wrote for Johnnie Lee, my 14-month-old daughter, reflecting the EPA and climate change and stuff. And it was kind of serious, but almost meant to be a black comedy, as well, when it mentions the ‘black cloud rising’.” Considering the giant miasma of pollution hovering over China, and the current arms-proliferation posturing of North Korea, he sighs with parental chagrin. “But unfortunately, right now we’re in the middle of that. I mean, I’m not old enough to remember the Cuban missile crisis. But I feel that now we’re in a situation that’s almost as scary as that. Well, scarier because now it’s actually happening.”

When Fletcher first heard his friend’s thought-provoking new compositions, he remembers being somewhat taken aback. Especially considering the fact that Gore traditionally writes on acoustic guitar, which must have made the music sound even more like Dylan-skeletal protest anthems. “At the time, I think me and the producer (multi-instrumentalist James Ford, who also contributed drums on every cut) were a bit worried,” he says. “But then, as we recorded the album, the world situation got worse and worse. We had Brexit. And then Trump actually winning? And then Marine LePen, this hard right-winger, running for election in France, which is not good in a country that is so cosmopolitan? By the time we finished the album, we all thought it was a perfect time to release it. And I’ve always been interested in politics – it’s what I studied at school. So for me, everything that’s happened has been really interesting, and I have to admit that the chatter in the pub has gotten very good because of it.”

Fletcher gets his information from the London Times, the Financial Times, and, of course, the BBC, which he swears by. “The news in Britain is so much better than the news in the States, because you’re really only covering one thing at the moment, and that’s Trump. And all the other things happening in the world? They’re not really covered.” One of the toughest hurdles he ever had to deal with was when Gore relocated to far-off California, and the pair could no longer hang and ruminate on the day’s events, Earth-shattering or otherwise. “It’s weird, because Dave and I sort of connnect as brothers, but – like brothers – you don’t want to be in their company all the time,” he explains of how the Depeche Mode dynamic works. “But Martin is different – he’s been my best friend since age 11, and him moving to America was terrible for me, because it’s difficult, calling someone from London to Santa Barbara, when one person has just woken up and the other’s going to bed.”

What else is in Gore’s livid litany of pet peeves? “Hey – what have you got?” He chuckles. “Trump defunding the EPA and putting a man in charge who doesn’t even believe in climate change? It’s lunacy,” he growls, menacingly. “And unfortunately, he’s not the only one who’s a denier – you find them everywhere you go. And I always say to people, ‘Well, if you don’t believe in climate change, then why don’t we – just for caution’s sake – say that maybe it is happening? What do we have to lose?’” This directly inspired the deceptively gentle Spirit march “The Worst Crime”, which proposes public lynching as penance for ignoring, or harming, the environment (“Once there were solutions/ Now we have no excuses… we are all charged with treason”). “For me, the worst crime is destroying the planet,” Gore declares. “We have this great opportunity to change things, and we’ve had so much evidence, so much scientific proof for so long, but we keep choosing to not do anything about it. And it’s not just destroying the planet for us. It’s destroying it forever. And the system in America is just very, very flawed. I mean, I can’t quite work out when lobbying was a good idea, and why it still exists – and is accepted – I don’t understand, because it’s just so corrupt and so… so wrong. It must happen in other parts of the world, but nowhere near the extent that it does here.”

Even the most sonically-uplifting Spirit number, “Scum,” calls an unspecified antagonist on the carpet for being ‘hollow, shallow, and dead inside.’ Could it be a Wall Street hedge fund manager who bilked the middle class out of millions then walked away, scot free? Gore snickers. “That song is far more powerful if I don’t tell you who my ‘scum’ is,” he elaborates. “Because if I say, ‘It’s this person,’ then it kind of detracts from it, because when a listener hears a song, they put their own imagination to work on it, and then it becomes far more powerful.” But in the “Black Celebration”-ish thrummer “Poorman,” (“Hey, there’s no news/ Poorman’s still has got the blues/ He’s walking around in worn-out shoes/ With nothing to lose,” Gahan murmurs in his classic catacomb-cryptic croon), he demands more accountability. “Again, I think the system is completely screwed and flawed,” Gore says. “People should have gone to jail, but instead they’re getting called into the White House. And the song “Fail” is kind of the synopsis of the whole album, really.” As a species – mistakenly thinking it’s the entitled end product of evolution, “we’re not doing a very good job. We need to start finding the path again.”

Hence the ethereal album title, Gore adds. Some naysayers might describe the record as unequivocally pessimistic, but he respectfully disagrees – pay close attention to what Gahan is singing, and you might fidget uneasily in your seat. “But Spirit is quite realistic – I’m being realistic about what’s going on at the moment, and kind of pointing things out. And by naming it Spirit, I’m hoping that it gets people to think, and maybe somehow rediscover that sense of spirit that we once had, but now seem to have lost.” Mention that DEVO predicted this – humanity’s atavistic de-evolution – four decades ago, and he laughs softly, almost to himself. Everyone’s obsession with their personal device is not only a mass distraction, he believes, but an omen of some kind of impending Apocalypse. “With all of our technological advances and the way we’re using them, it’s, uh, not turning out so well for humankind,” he says. “The only thing that’s headed in the right direction at the moment is medicine. We are getting breakthroughs in medicine, although if we end up in some nuclear holocaust, the medicine’s not going to help us as much.  So I think that if we don’t destroy ourselves, we could get to a point where we’re actually able to live for a lot longer.” He pauses to let out a protracted sigh. “But I don’t know what that would actually do for our species, either.”

Fletcher is more optimistic. From an almost scholarly distance, he analyzes England’s recent Brexit snafu, wherein non-London outliers were roiled into enough of a xenophobic frenzy, they essentially voted against their own self-interest to leave the European Union. “The crazy thing is, it was all the villages across Britain – who don’t have any migrants – who voted for Brexit,” he says. “And the fact is, it was a 50/50 vote, and I think any major constitutional change should be more like 60/40, or even 70/30, not 50/50. But I’m not that doom-y about all this stuff. You get stages where things like this happen, so I don’t think the world is any closer to coming to an end.” He has hope, then? “I do, really,” he replies. I mean, what will Trump be able to achieve? Not much through Congress. The only way he can cause a bit of trouble is as Commander in Chief. So yes, this album is pretty angry, but we do normally write about these subjects, but we usually use sex and religion to get the point across. It’s just that Spirit is very direct, although we had one album, Construction Time Again, which was this direct, as well.”

Fletcher also secretly enjoys all of the intrinsic irony involved. Whereas Depeche Mode began as a percolating danceable outfit, it gradually streamlined itself into a sleek, undulating serpent of a synth-rock machine that purred like a long, black hearse leading a funeral procession, aided immensely by Gahan’s ebony-garbed, drone-voiced stage persona. Gore-sculpted songs like “Strangelove,” “Personal Jesus,” “Behind the Wheel,” and “Shake the Disease” straddled the aesthetic line between Goth, New Wave, and industrial, and the band’s diverse audience grew accordingly. And – no matter how grim the trio gets – Fletcher says, “there’s always a lot of people clapping their hands and singing along. And in fact, we got the best reviews we’ve ever had in our career for Spirit, and Depeche Mode generally doesn’t get good reviews. The way our music is made, you need to listen to it a lot of times – you can’t just listen to it twice and then do a review of it. I remember our album Violator – which is a 10 out of 10 record in anyone’s book – just getting average reviews when it came out.

“But we put on good shows, we make good records,” he continues, “And for some weird reason, we’re in our 50s but we seem to be more popular than we ever were. So we’re in a very lucky position – we’ve got loads of our old fans, and they still buy CDs. And then we’re picking up young fans, as well. I mean, we can’t do anything wrong! This American tour sold out faster than our last two tours, and I can’t work out why – I mean, it’s a similar tour, but it’s just gone through the roof. And we’re not a high-profile band – we’re not on the magazines or in newspapers. I just can’t work it out.” And Depeche Mode is one of the few bands from the post-punk era that’s not currently out on an advertised retro tour, playing some vintage cornerstone from its decades-old past, note for note. The group is as relevant – and thought-provoking – as ever these days.

And the three musicians still work well together as a collective. Gahan – who also put out the occasional solo effort – co-wrote four less-political tracks on Spirit, “You Move,” “Cover Me,” “Poison Heart,” and “No More (This Is the Last Time).” “And I used my usual range of analog synths, guitars, and everything came together really fast – we mixed the record on our third session,” Fletcher says, citing Ford’s studio assistance as crucial. But I think technology makes your job harder, not easier, because it gives you hundreds more options. And now there’s this situation with all the superstar DJs,” adds the musician, who still books old-school DJ gigs himself. “In the old days, a promoter would have gotten some young bands to play, but now it’s some superstar DJ who just uses his laptop. And the fact is, it’s replacing bands now – it’s a very unhealthy situation, and for young bands at the moment, it’s just terrible now. Record sales are embarrassingly low, you’re not given any tour support from record companies, so the income available is almost nonexistent. That’s why we no longer get hundreds of great rock bands around the place.”

Gore has yet to see Mike Judge’s hilarious satire Idiocracy, in which Luke Wilson – playing a man of average intelligence from our era – is accidentally frozen in cryogenic slumber for 500 years, during which so many stupid people keep mindlessly breeding that, when he’s awakened in the Great Landfill Collapse – he’s the smartest man in the world. The director’s vision for the future is as grimly dystopian as Gore’s on Spirit, save the public execution “Worst Crime” part. But he has one thing to thank for the album’s relevance, which increases every scandal-beset day. “The American electoral process is so long, the beginning of it had only just started when I began writing this record,” he says. “And it just takes soooo long over here, doesn’t it? It gets so long and dragged out that everyone’s just completely bored with it by the end.” It gave the dirges time to grow, take on even creepier, bigger metaphorical meaning. Or, as Fletcher succinctly puts it, “it’s not like every one of our albums is like this. But I think it’s good that a band like Depeche Mode does a record like Spirit. And people can’t say that we’re jumping on a bandwagon, because, Hey ��� the songs were written two years ago!”

– By Tom Lanham

Appearing 8/30 at Hollywood Casino Amphitheater, Tinley Park.