#if this ever leaves the drafts just know that I’m terribly sleep deprived

[dykes4mako]

Asami: omg I can’t believe I just hit you with my motorcycle! Are you alright?

Mako:

[whump-a-la-mode]

I'm sorry for being rude, but can you please continue the scintila villain's story? Sorry again for being rude ^^;;

You aren’t being rude in the slightest! I haven’t thought about that story in ages. It’s an oldie but a goodie. I hope you enjoy this little follow up!

Continued from here.

CW//Brainwashing, mentioned emetophobia

At Villain, Hero could not help but stare.

They felt as though every last ounce of breath had been whisked away from their lungs, leaving them breathless. They could only imagine how ridiculous their looked, eyes dinner plates and jaw hanging ajar.

Villain looked back with a smile. The same smile that had refused to leave their face, ever since Director had led them into the meeting room. It looked almost as though it had been painted there, pried painfully in place with pins.

Teammate’s killer. Public enemy number one. Villain. Here they stood, before Hero, their face broken by a grin.

Hero felt as though they were going to be sick. And, yet, they could not help but wonder if it had anything to with Teammate at all. Certainly, their murder had been tragic. Agonizing, the grief of it wrenching still at their gut. The fact that Director had thought that the best replacement for the murdered team member was their killer drove only salt into the wound.

Yet, when they tried to feel upset, tried to grieve, their eyes could only snap back to Villain. Something was wrong with them. Something was terribly, horribly wrong.

“Villain?” Hero’s mouth could barely form words, given just how parched their tongue had become. They struggled to form a sentence, a question, anything, but found that their jaw could only hang open dumbly.

“Yes, Hero?” Their foe, on the other hand, seemed to have no such trouble. They chirped in a tone that was far too high-pitched, given their past sins. “Is there something I can help you with?”

In that moment, Hero almost wished that Villain was acting normal. Acting normal, in this circumstance, involving terrorizing civilians and destroying buildings. It would have been better than their current plastic smile.

“Villain?” What could they say? What could they do? “Villain, drop the act. Please. Director is gone, now.”

“The act?” Villain cocked their head to the side like a confused puppy. “I don’t understand, Hero. I’m only trying to be polite.”

“That’s the problem!” Hero leaped to their feet, hands slamming down upon the nearest desk. “You aren’t polite! You’re a supervillain, so act like one!”

Once more falling into a canine persona, Villain gave a soft whimper, taking a step back. “Have I done something wrong, Hero?”

“You-” Outraged beyond any sense of reason, the hero shot their hands forwards, cupping either side of their foe’s face. Forcing them to stare head-on. “What did Director do to you?”

Villain cocked their head to the side.

“They fixed me, of course. I am ready to serve you, Hero. Please, just tell me what you want me to do. I have learned to obey.”

Hero’s eyes shot to the nearest garbage bin, just to ensure that they had somewhere to hurl if need be.

“Just... Just follow me.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 

From the rear entrance of the Organization headquarters, a heavy draft whistled, accented only by the outside symphony of cicadas. Of course, there was quite a logical reason for the draft. After all, the door was wide open.

“Just go.”

That was all Hero could say, even as they felt as though they were struggling to convince a domestic pet to wander into the wild. Villain stood before them, the only thing standing between them and the great outdoors. And, for the villain, nothing stood between. They were free to go, free to run, to roam.

So why wouldn’t they?

Every attempt to Hero made to push them was met with staunch and immediate resistance from their foe, who skittered backwards further and further. They were acting as though they were being pushed into a volcano!

But they weren’t. It was only outside. In the distance, beyond a small lawn, civilization could be seen. Skyscrapers challenging the clouds, night shattered by fluorescence. A concrete jungle in which Villain could lose themself easier than anything.

They refused. Staunchly, they refused.

“Go!”

Hero didn’t know what else to do. They could only shove, only push.

“Hero, I need to stay!” Their foe insisted in a panic, hands balling nervously to and from the form of fists. “Please, I need to serve you, I-”

“Then serve me by getting the hell out of here!”

“Hero?”

But, it was not Villain’s voice. No, it was another tone, one far more concerned and far more sleep deprived; after all, it was the middle of the night. Pulling this sort of stunt wouldn’t have been safe at any other time.

“Friend?”

Hero swirled on a heel, shivering as the chill of night air ran up their now-exposed spine.

“What in the world are you doing?”

From the end of the hall, their comrade stumbled, wiping sleep from one eye. Another member of the team, one of Hero’s most trusted. One who had fought by their side, even when they were merely vigilantes.

And now they were watching as their trusted ally attempted to push a captive out a back door.

“What in the world are you doing?”

Hero couldn’t help but pale. What were they doing? But... Yes, Friend they could trust. Friend they could tell the truth, they were sure of it. Well, at least half sure.

“Something’s wrong with Villain.” That was the long and short of it, after all. “I’m... They’re going to leave.”

Friend blinked in confusion.

“Oh, Hero. They’ve only been reprogrammed. Don’t you understand? It’s better this way.”

[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 290: It’s Touya Time

Previously on BnHA: Iida and Hadou showed up like a couple of Pennsylvanias and Georgias to bail Shouto out at the last minute. Ochako and Toga had an exceptionally strange fight which consisted of Toga being all “guess what Ochako, I used your quirk to murder someone, how do you feel about that”, and Ochako being all “I do not like that”, to which Toga was all “:(”. There was some doll-stealing and some bookcase-yeeting, and then Toga left in tears because Ochako was all adamant that murder has consequences. Anyway so I have absolutely no idea what Toga is thinking now, but I guess we’ll have some time to stew on it, because we ended the chapter by cutting back to the Iida+Hadou+Shouto VS Afomura battle, which was interrupted by Gigantomachia and the LoV showing up like a bunch of Floridas to ruin everyone’s nice day.

Today on BnHA: Horikoshi hands the mic over to Dabi and is all “take it away, kid.” Over in Room 315 of Musutafu General, Rei is all “may I please watch some TV” and the hospital staff is all “sure”, and so she tunes in just in time to catch Todoroki Touya’s Peabody Award-winning documentary “Number One Hero, Number One Fraud: The Todoroki Enji Story”, which is being broadcast nationwide courtesy of Skeptic and his magic laptop. Meanwhile in Jakku, Dabi is all “I’M TOUYA, BITCHES”, and Shouto and Enji are all, “(゜◇゜ )”, and Dabi is all, “anyway so just to sum it all up, because of how much of a jerk Endeavor was, I am now Evil.” Everyone continues to be all “(ﾟoﾟ)” except for Dabi, who is all “└(˘▾˘┌ )≡ ( ┐˘▾˘)┘≡┗( ˘▾˘)┛≡┏( ˘▾˘)┓≡┗( ˘▾˘)┛” for pretty much the rest of the chapter. Idk. Just let the man have his fun, guys. He’s waited a long time for this.

y’all I have a confession to make. I am technically not spoiled for this chapter thanks to my robustly paranoid system of spoiler-tag-filtering, which is extensive enough that it pretty much will catch whenever someone so much as breathes something even remotely new-chapter-related. that being said, I like to think that I am capable of making basic logical inferences! and so the fact that for the past 36 hours, my dashboard has pretty much nonstop consisted almost entirely of this...

...has led me to conclude that MAYBE, POSSIBLY, PROBABLY, BUT ALSO DEFINITELY, a certain someone is finally going to reveal his ~secret identity~ woop woop. lmao

anyway so everyone, please remember to act surprised though, as we would not want Dabi’s feelings to be hurt at all. he has been planning this moment for the last decade or so and I wouldn’t want him to feel like all of that effort was for naught. so just play along, okay. OH MY, IF IT ISN’T THE LEAGUE OF VILLAINS’ MYSTERIOUS DABI. WHATEVER COULD HIS ARRIVAL POSSIBLY BE HERALDING, I JUST DON’T KNOW

“Dabi’s Dance” lmao. I’m sticking with Touya Time myself. ngl I had this recap title planned out for at least the past year or so. just waiting for that day to finally come

anyway so some people in some building somewhere are all “TURN OFF THE TV IN ROOM 315” and idk. I’m guessing the LoV is hacking the airwaves to livestream the reveal, as predicted

-- oh shit. UHHHHHHHH

did she always have this TV or did she get it just recently?? jfc of all the times for the hospital staff to finally loosen up

um... so that’s... (・＿・；)

well but I mean, she was gonna find out one way or the other at some point though. like you can’t really just keep her locked up and isolated from all news of the outside world forever and ever and ever. granted, this isn’t exactly the ideal way for her to learn this particular bit of information, but it’s not really ideal for anybody else either! EXCEPT DABI, THAT IS. have yourself a day you funky little terrorist

oh shit what is this?? it’s not live???

over in Jakku, a red-faced, sputtering Dabi makes a frantic grab for Skeptic’s laptop. “WAIT, NO, JESUS, NOT THAT TAPE!”

lol. but seriously Dabi are you even wearing a shirt. like I’m not one to slutshame anyone bro, but it’s just, exactly what type of mood were you looking to set here??

anyway so we really are cutting back to Jakku now, and Gigantomachia is all, “MASTERS”! which, I wonder if he really did use the plural? that’s right Machia, both of them in one place now! that sure is convenient for you huh

lol what is this with all this AFO monologuing. you’re really gonna make me read through this when I’m sitting here all sleep-deprived from election week. JUST GET TO THE TOUYAS. WE WERE PROMISED TOUYAS!!

sigh

“tee hee it’s fucking hilarious how goddamn powerful I am now lol”

alas, in spite of myself I do have two serious takeaways from this. one is that AFO is still controlling most of Tomura’s body behind the scenes, which both does and doesn’t bode well for Tomura (like, at least he’s not dying, but the long-term implications of this for his free will and such certainly are not Good). and two is that this confirms that Ujiko did give Tomura at least one powerful mutant quirk, which explains why he was still so deadly and indestructible even when Aizawa was using Erasure on him (since Erasure doesn’t work on mutant quirks, just emitter and transformation ones)

MEANWHILE ON TODAY’S EPISODE OF “TODOROKI SHOUTO’S TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD LIFE”

I like how he doesn’t actually say that he can’t take on Gigantomachia. just that he can’t take on him and Afomura at the same time. that’s confidence, baby. that right there is why you always draft Todoroki Shouto in the first round for your fantasy team

HADOU!!!!

OOOH, TOMURA’S ALL “MAN, THIS GIRL’S WAVE POWERS AND THIS KID’S ICE POWERS ARE A SUPER-STRONG COMBO DAGNABBIT.” YESSS I LIKE THAT, TELL ME MORE ABOUT HOW COOL AND POWERFUL THEY ARE

HOT DAMN LOOK AT THAT

um but not to take away from this exceptionally cool moment or anything, but why is Endeavor dying and shouting “RUN” down there in the corner um

oh

excuse me. not to take away from How Bad This All Is, but!!

just a little, smol, IidaBaku for everyone. Iida, who apparently doesn’t know a damn thing about first aid and is all, “hmm that’s a pretty bad-looking puncture wound he has in his left shoulder there, I think I’ll just let his arm dangle freely like that and I won’t bother taking off his heavy gauntlets either. I mean. he’ll be fine, probably.” smh. at least Shouto probably cauterized the wounds

EXCUSE ME WHAT

TIME FOR MORE OF THAT GOOD OLD FASHIONED SHOUNEN RIDICULOUSNESS I GUESS LMAO. KACCHAN YOU HAVE A HOLE IN YOUR TORSO. THERE IS A HOLE IN YOUR TORSO, AND YOU LOST LIKE FOUR GALLONS OF BLOOD, BUT SURE. “PUT ME DOWN” HE SAYS. FIRST OF ALL, PUTTING ASIDE THE FACT THAT YOU ABSOLUTELY SHOULD NOT BE CONSCIOUS, THE FUCK ARE YOU EVEN GOING TO DO, LIE DOWN AT THEM?? LISTEN, YOU SWEET IDIOT. TAKE HEED, BELOVED DUMBASS!!

ah well. I guess he gets to watch the Touya Show now too then lol

LMAOOOO now Machia’s lifting Tomura carefully in his palm like a broken action figure and Spinner is all “THE FUCK, YOU LOOK LIKE DEATH WARMED OVER”

“oh hey there Spinner. well let’s see, I woke up from my three-month coma and destroyed a city, had my body incinerated, and am currently being possessed by a diabolically evil potato. but please, tell me more about everything you've been through”

AW YISS AND THE FOCUS NOW SHIFTS TO THE TODOROKIS. EVERYTHING IS PROCEEDING EXACTLY AS WE HAVE FORESEEN

Endeavor my dude. it’s as if you want to die here. also holy shit, that bit about his lungs definitely does not bode well for him either

MOTHERFUCKER

GO AHEAD AND SIGN YOUR OWN DEATH CERTIFICATE, WHY DON’T YOU!! FLAGS UPON FLAGS. JESUS CHRIST

meanwhile Dabi’s just waving at ‘em

lmaoooo please oh please Caleb please keep this ‘EYYYYYYY’, it’s fucking perfect kdlshk;hg

AHHHHHHHHHHHHH

(ETA: so as you will see very shortly, I completely missed this detail in my first read-through because I was so anxious to get to the reveal page, but THIS MOTHERFUCKER LITERALLY DOUSED HIMSELF WITH INSTANT HAIR DYE REMOVER THAT HE’S JUST BEEN CARRYING AROUND IN A LITTLE HIP POUCH APPRENTLY SINCE THE BEGINNING OF TIME. MOTHERFUCKER. I HAVE NO WORDS.)

IS THIS THE TIME. IS THIS THE MOMENT?! HERE IT COMES SLKFHS BRACE YERSELVES LADS

EYYYYYYYYYYYY

OKAY EVERYONE JUST LIKE WE PRACTICED!! SURPRISED FACES ON THREE! ONE... TWO... (•̪ o •̪) !! okay how was that

LMAO ENDEAVOR

at least Shouto looks properly stunned. Enji just looks like endeavor.exe just straight up stopped working

meanwhile Deku’s out here trying to do the math on this latest surprise family reveal! first Tomura is related to Nana, and now this. what’s next. who are you related to, Spinner. he rips off his boots to reveal engine legs and declares himself Iida’s long-lost uncle

oh shit Touya

it’s as if a million fanworks suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly jossed. who knew that all this time he was secretly sporting a crop top scar

also, THIRTY?! holy shit son you been busy

la la la two-page spread of Touya casually driving the dagger into Endeavor’s hero career and rocking the foundations of hero society as we know it la la la

la la la!!!

OH IS THAT THE END OF THE STORY THEN

almost got confused for a sec. there’s two monologues happening at once here. Endeavor doesn’t even know that his dirty laundry is being aired out nation-wide as we speak ffffff

btw while I appreciate the close-ups of Enji and Shouto here for sure, ngl I would also really love to see everyone else’s reactions right now. SHOW ME BAKUGOU AND THE LOV YOU COWARDS

is his hair actually turning white all of a sudden?? your hair dye just reacts on command??

(ETA: in all seriousness though, the hell kind of hair dye was he using? all he has to do is pour a bottle of that stuff and not even lather it in and it’s just gone just like that?? what the fuck would have have done if it ever rained lmao.

and this motherfucker just goes and leaves the dye remover in afterwards, too. I have never dyed my hair in my life and even I can tell you that’s probably not a good idea, Dabi.)

is this it. is this the legendary Dabi Dance in action. lmfao

oh hey what the fuck

so you figured you’d just murder your innocent younger brother to get revenge on dad, huh. well that’s nice

is that really all there is to the origin story though?? feels like we’re still missing a huge chunk of it. what was it that finally sent him over the edge? or was the trauma of being created as Endeavor’s perfect little hero tool and then being subsequently rejected by him enough on its own? because I’m still kind of confused on the part where he goes from “abused and discarded by his father” to “killed thirty people and was plotting the murder of his own brother” to tell you the truth

(ETA: lmao the initial fandom reaction to this did not disappoint. listen guys. people can be traumatized and shaped by awful circumstances that are completely out of their control, and grow up to be people they wouldn’t have grown up to be if things had been better, and all of that absolutely sucks, but. it doesn’t mean they get a get-out-of-jail-free card for all of their future actions, either! the tragedy of this situation is that terrible things happened to Touya, and he then went on to do terrible things himself. the tragedy of it is that this is exactly how the cycle of abuse keeps repeating itself on and on and on. maybe one of the people Dabi killed had a child who will now grow up traumatized themselves, and potentially go on to pay it forward themselves when they grow up. the tragedy is that the eye-for-an-eye justice that Touya is seeking out won’t actually make anything better in the end. the tragedy is that we understand why Touya is so angry, but that anger has basically warped him into the gleefully sadistic dancing figure we see in this chapter who has stopped caring about anyone else’s pain or suffering and just wants his own revenge.

anyway. basically what I’m trying to say is that it’s possible for the concepts of “Todoroki Touya was an innocent child and a victim of abuse” and “Dabi is a grown-ass motherfucking adult who killed thirty people and PROBABLY NEEDS TO BE HELD ACCOUNTABLE FOR THAT” to coexist lol. like, y’all wanted your moral grey, well HERE YOU GO lmao, eat up.)

lol but LOOK AT THAT BOY DANCE HIS LITTLE HEART OUT though

Todoroki Touya confirmed not a fan of the Endeavor redemption arc huh. well we all saw this coming lols

anyways here’s a sexy Touya for y’all

you really are the most theatrical bitch I s2g lmao

also for real though, what is happening with his hair? anime team in shambles here. they’re probably just gonna double down and keep it red. too bad though cuz this is a surprisingly good look on him

SO MANY CLOSE-UPS OF THE TODOROKI FACES

friendly reminder that Dabi without a doubt REHEARSED this speech like a thousand fucking times. LET US FALL TOGETHER!! COME DANCE WITH YOUR SON IN HELL. apparently if you fake your own death in middle school you will never mentally age past that point and will remain a permanent chuuni

OH LMAO THAT’S THE END

we really just gonna end on “DANCE WITH YOUR SON IN HELL”, huh. very well then. you know what song to play, Horikoshi. one, two... YOU ARE MY DAD. YOU’RE MY DAD!! BOOGIE WOOGIE WOOGIE

[mkstrigidae]

Current WIPs and Fic Concepts

I promised I would do this yesterday, and then I forgot!!! (I was very sleep deprived). Anyways, here are a bunch of the WIP premises that I have in my 'unfinished drafts' folder. Most have at least a few pages written for them, but I love them all! ☺️💕

- A Santa Clarita Diet AU (Jonsa) Takes place in sunny southern California, where a shitty dinner at a mediocre restaurant turns into a huge problem for Jon and Sansa when Sansa's heart stops beating. Although she seems fine, Jon is flabbergasted several days later as he watches his wife- who alphabetizes their pantry and refuses to let anyone wear shoes in the house- rip the throat out of one of the sleazy new partners at their law firm, eating half of him before anyone processes what's going on. Hilarity ensues as Sansa's inhibitions and filter disappear, Arya ropes an extremely confused Gendry into helping figure out what the hell is going on just because he moderates the zombie forum on reddit, and Jon tries to deal with the fact that the woman he loves more than anything is now a humanitarian. He really could use a drink. (This one is actually mostly complete, but i need to refine a few things- i really love it. It's as gory and irreverent as the show, so viewer discretion advised, but it's a BLAST to write).

- A Thor/MCU AU (Jonsa, Steve Rogers/Sansa)- Asgardian prince Aegon is banished to Midgard after one too many arrogant decisions, and is promptly hit by a van containing Dr. Sansa Stark, Dr. Barristan Selmy, and Margaery Tyrell- two astrophysicists studying wormholes and Sansa's best friend and pseudo-intern. Marg yells at him, he yells back, Sansa tases him, and Barristan didn't sign up for the kind of heavy lifting that getting a 200+ pound slab of muscle into the back of a van takes. And then Aegon's younger brother, Jon, shows up, in the middle of an identity crisis because, apparently, he's adopted. He wasn't intending to stay, but he's rather drawn to Dr. Stark and her brilliance, and against her better judgement, she starts to trust him, and maybe even like him. This story is in about three parts so far- the first is based on 'Thor' and the second on 'The Avengers' and are fully Jonsa, and the third started as a family bonding story between the Stark kids and Tony (Ned and Tony are second cousins, and Ned was really supportive of Tony in rehab without expecting anything in return), and accidentally turned into a Steve Rogers/Sansa Stark story, which is a pairing i am HERE for. A lot of this one is written, but it needs some fill in before publishing, although it's one of my favorites that i've written to go back and actually read.

- A Star Wars AU (Jonsa) where Sansa and Arya are Alderaanian princesses who are off planet when Alderaan is destroyed- Sansa as a senator and Arya as a pilot, both working for the rebellion, and jon is a smuggler who does not know how all of these people got on his ship and why two princesses are sassing him. His copilot, Tormund (yes he's a wookie), thinks it is hilarious. I started this one just the other day, and it's already thirty pages long, most of them involving Sansa and Arya sassing people. Dany is a leader in the rebellion, Roose Bolton is the emperor, and Barbrey Dustin is a disgruntled former jedi trying to live in peace on a remote planet until another Stark crashes into her life and harangues her into teaching again.

- A witches/magic AU (Jonsa) where the Starks run an apothecary and spellcasting supplies shop. Jon had been completely in the dark about magic before his mother confessed to being born into a family of witches. He finds himself traveling to her hometown, trying to understand her world more clearly, and what it means for him. On the way, he develops something of a crush on the red-headed shop clerk who brews the best headache potions in town. Featuring lots of magical shenanigans, this is one of my favorites in the folder :)

- A 24 hour diner AU (Jonsa) where Jon is a local mob boss, and Sansa works the late shift at Seaworth's diner to buy textbooks for the PhD she's working on in botany. Sansa's running from memories, and Jon has a soft spot for the red-headed waitress who always remembers how he likes his coffee.

- An East of the Sun, West of the Moon AU!!! (Jonsa) This is one of my fav fairy tales, and of course i couldn't resist Jon as a direwolf striking a deal with the starks!

- A Roomates AU (Jonsa)- Arya, Jon, Tormund, and Sam have been renting the same house together off Winterfell's campus for years- but when Sam moves in with his girlfriend, they need one more person on the lease. Sansa, about to relocate to Winterfell for grad school, finds out that her boyfriend has been cheating on her and that her housing plans have fallen through, all on the same day. Needless to say, she's a bit upset when she calls Arya to relay the news. There's a simple solution here, if Arya and Tormund can stop teasing Jon about his crush for five minutes. (any excuse to write tormund and arya roasting jon, tbh).

- A Fae AU (Jonsa)- When Sansa, a baker living in the city, washes her face in an enchanted spring on a camping trip, she gains the sight as a result. Suddenly able to see the fae underworld all around her is disorienting and terrifying. Sansa tries to conceal it- afraid of what might happen if the fae around her know that she can see them- but slips up, and catches the attention of Jon Snow- one of the lords of the unseelie court.

- A nuclear winter wasteland AU (Jonsa)- (?? I don't even know how to describe this premise, haha) where the Starks are living and running the Free Winterfell settlement in Siberia after a worldwide nuclear meltdown. Before the fallout, Sansa was one of the world's preeminent researchers in plant genetics and pathology, and works at the settlement to create newer, disease and radiation resistant crops to distribute for free to other settlements, aiming to break up the monopoly that Lannister Corp has on the market. Jon is a scavenger, searching throughout Siberia for his sister Rhae who disappeared several years previously. When he runs across Arya Starkovna, helping her fight off another band of radiation ravaged scavengers is just instinct- he doesn't think twice about it. In thanks, she brings him to the Winterfell settlement, where her brother Robb offers Jon sanctuary and resources, in exchange for serving as a bodyguard for Sansa when she travels to other settlements. Sansa is not particularly thrilled by this arrangement, but given that multiple parties seem to want her dead, she doesn't have much of a choice but to accept his company.

- A reincarnation AU (Jonsa)- of sorts. Robb is an archaeologist who finds a strange set of runes at a site up north, and immediately calls in Jon Snow- a historian and expert in said ancient language, as well as an old university friend of Robb's. When he arrives though, Robb shows him their most valuable finds- two mysterious ice blocks, with what appear to be perfectly preserved bodies from over a thousand years ago. No one could ever have imagined that either of them were still alive, but when the ice melts, revealing two very alive girls, the entire crew is instantly buried in NDAs, and given an assignment from the Westerosi government to figure out what the hell was going on. Sansa and Arya wake up, extremely confused about the world they live in, trying to adapt and mourning all that they've lost, even as the people around them wear familiar faces.

- Soulmates AU (Jonsa)- (Yes, another one, I love this dumb trope) Trauma surgeon and medical resident Sansa Stark is having a very bad day, and ends up meeting her soulmate during what she thinks is a mugging gone wrong. Fortunately, he’s not the one mugging her, just an intervening bystander, but she ends up slightly shot nonetheless. Sansa’s fretting about bleeding on the upholstery in his car, but Jon is a bit more worried about her injuries than the blood stains. He’s a bit confused when she threatens him if he takes her to a specific hospital, nearly has a nervous breakdown when she insists on doing her own triage, and is very charmed when she insists on ice cream after taking pain meds at the hospital. On Sansa’s part, she’s a little less concerned about being shot, and a bit more concerned about whatever weird first impression she’s making to her soulmate while high as a kite on pain pills. (this one just needs some tweaking to be postable- I'm not sure if it's going to be a oneshot or a series, but i love what I have already)

- A Demon/Archivist AU (Jonsa)- where Sansa works in the university's historical archives in Oldtown, and is learning to restore old texts with her fellow student and friend, Alleras (Trans Sarella is an amazing concept). When Joffrey Baratheon shows up with a pile of old books from his family's library to donate, Sansa is eager to get away from his sleaze, and accidentally takes one of the books home with her in her rush to leave. Unbeknownst to her, it's more than it appears, and when she leaves it open overnight, she accidentally summons forth Jon- an ancient, powerful, and extremely annoyed demon who is under a curse, and now hers to command. As Jon and Sansa try to get used to this new normal, the Lannisters (unaware that Joffrey had donated the tome) try desperately to find the book and it's owner, wanting Jon's power for themselves, and putting Sansa in considerable danger unless she can figure out how to break Jon's curse. Fortunately, she's a pretty good researcher, even if Jon is initially a bit of a grump. (This is based on a total wish-fulfillment mary-sue type premise for something I wrote when I was thirteen, and I revisited it and wanted to see what it would look like if i took it very seriously, and i am really enjoying it so far. It's a love letter to the terrible, heartfelt writing i was doing in middle school that created the foundations for my writing today, and so much fun).

The one that I am MOST excited about though:

- A Pacific Rim AU!!!! (Ned/Cat, Gendrya, Braime, Sansa/Jon Umber)-Twins Sansa and Robb Stark have always been completely in tune with each other, and when your parents are Jaeger pilots and your mother invented the neural handshake, what option is there but the Jaeger academy? Sansa studies to be an engineer, but ends up copiloting the Jaeger 'Winter Wolf' with her twin brother, after they lose Ned Stark to cancer. When Robb is ripped out of the conn-pod and killed by a kaiju while he's still connected to Sansa, she barely manages to kill the creature before stumbling back to shore, traumatized, grieving, and swearing that she'll never pilot again.

Unfortunately, the Kaiju don't stop just because Sansa does, and when the end of the world is imminent, Marshall Catelyn Stark orders both her daughter and former pilot Jaime Lannister (who lost his twin and copilot, Cersei, several years previously) back to Hong Kong for one final stand. Forced to face both her demons and an irate Arya, furious that Sansa had abandoned the rest of them after Robb's death, Sansa and Arya have to figure out how to pilot Winter Wolf together before the apocalypse comes for them all.

Featuring Marshall Catelyn Stark (commander of the Hong Kong Shatterdome, inventor of the neural handshake, former Jaeger pilot, and BAMF), Sansa x Jon Umber (Yes i know it's a rare pair but i've always kind of loved the idea of them, even though we know so little about him), Kaiju parts dealer and smuggler Petyr Baelish, bickering kaiju biologist Dany and theoretical mathematician Jon Snow, LOCCENT officer Theon, lots of snark, lots of angst and heartfelt conversations, and a weird friendship between snarky-grieving-asshole Jaime Lannister and kind-quiet-grieving Sansa Stark, who are the only two people in the world who know what it's like to lose a copilot and a twin in the drift.

Thanks for reading guys!! There are more, but some of them I just don't know how to explain quite yet, haha. I'd love to hear what you guys think about these!

[cinnaminsvga]

⛈ | namjoon

the sleep deprived series (n.): drabbles that i write when i’m sad and tired

→ childhood best friend!namjoon ft. a dash of unrequited love that finally reaches its breaking point | 1K words → a/n: LISTEN this is a wip that i’ve sat on for YEARS now,, the only reason i’m posting this as a drabble is because i’ve finally accepted that i probably won’t ever get the time to write this as a full Thing but i also don’t want this to rot in my drafts so,,, enjoy!! the!! angst!! of!! unrequited!! love!! i’m!! sorry!! namjoon!!

“why do you keep letting boys like that hurt you, y/n? it hurts me to see you so sad all the time,” namjoon whispers, lips wobbling as if he was the one on the verge of crying. as if he was the one who just got dumped from a five-year relationship. thunder looms in the distance, but all you can hear is the hurricane raging inside your eardrums.

the street where you both had grown up is deserted. to your left, there is a house with chipped yellow paint and a squeaky dog door. inside, a family whom you had never met sits quietly around the fireplace, the same one where you and namjoon had once spent countless hours building pillow forts and drinking hot chocolate. 

you didn’t know what pulled you to come here, but your legs had a mind of its own and you didn’t bother fighting for control. for whatever reason, namjoon had known you’d be here even when you did not. 

“i told you to leave it. i just need time to myself, okay?” you say, but namjoon doesn’t budge. an immovable object meets an unstoppable first: who will be the first to crack?

(it’s you. of course it’s you.)

“how can you say that?” namjoon just sounds annoyed now. “how can you expect me to leave you alone when min yoongi just broke your heart! how can you expect me to pretend like everything’s alright?”

“if i can do it, then so can you!” you exclaim, fists clenching by your side. “this is not your business, joonie! it never was! if you keep sticking your nose into every failed relationship that i’ve had, then we’d just keep fighting all the damn time and you know how i hate that.”

“i hate it too,” namjoon takes a step forward. you take one backwards. he huffs. “but please, y/n. let me take care of you. what are you so afraid of?”

“you.”

it comes out before you can stop it. namjoon freezes, mouth gaping in shock. if you could rewind time, you wish you could have taken the words back into your mouth. “i didn’t...” you hesitate, but you can’t lie to him. namjoon already knows it’s true even before you can even try to save yourself. 

“did i... did i do something? what do you mean?” namjoon says slowly, like he’s afraid of doing any more damage. as if he could hurt you any more than he already has, you chuckle darkly to yourself.

you groan, shaking your head. “it’s nothing. i’m just tired, namjoon. leave me alone.”

the thunder is louder now. a flash of lightning illuminates the evening sky for a short moment, and it allows you to see the profound sadness on namjoon’s face. it fills you with a sick sense of accomplishment, followed quickly by guilt.

(what a sad creature you are.)

“at least let me take you home?” namjoon says, defeated. his shoulders are slack and his jaw is clenched tight with nerves. you know he wants to say more, to fight more, and that alone is enough to make the coil inside of you to fray just the tiniest bit. if he wants to talk, then you’ll fucking talk.

“you know what’s wrong with you, namjoon? you always think i need saving. i’m not the same girl who scrapped her knees every other day, okay? i can handle myself just fine,” you snarl. the first drops of rain hit the back of your neck, making you shiver. neither you nor namjoon make a move to duck for cover.

“i know you can, but that doesn’t mean you have to suffer alone,” namjoon is crying, you realize. or it could be the rain. “we’re a team, aren’t we? you and i against the world, like always. no more shitty boys breaking your heart.”

you hate how your stomach jumps at how easily he just says things like that. almost 20 years of friendship and he still doesn’t know the effect he has on you.

how could he be so dense? how could he be so cruel? how can he look at you like you hold the secrets of the world? 

”that’s the problem, joon-ah. i’m terrible. i think i fall in love with every single person i meet. every person i’ve ever cared for, i think i’ve loved.” your voice cracks, eyes burning with tears threatening to fall. namjoon tries to reach out to grasp your hand, but you shake him off. 

“y/n...” he mutters, brows furrowed with concern. “i...”

you continue, “and you know, my mom used to say that i should try and get my heart broken so i’d know what’s it like to be in pain. so that i’d become cautious and stingy with my love.” 

you take a deep breath. you swallow, but your throat refuses to move. after years of pushing everything down, down, down, your body can hardly hold on much longer. the fear, anguish, desperation, love––they bubble up to the surface.

“but that’s the thing, joon-ah. i’ve been experiencing heartache ever since i met you.” 

namjoon is stunned to silence. he’s looking at with a strange expression on his face, somewhere between a cross of fear and curiosity. it feels like you’ve been frozen in time, and the only indication that life is continuing to move is the steady stream of rain pouring down on you. 

the downpour strengthens until namjoon becomes a blurry haze behind a curtain of water. you have to scream to make yourself heard, but you crave the strain it puts on your throat. you want to shout until your lungs fill with blood and your tongue turns to ash. it’s the only way namjoon would understand. 

“min yoongi was not the first person to break my heart. it wasn’t him, it wasn’t park jimin from the grocery, it wasn’t jung hoseok from the exchange program, it wasn’t kim taehyung from summer camp, it wasn’t jeon jungkook from choir, it wasn’t kim seokjin from 6th grade. it was you.”

you’re sobbing, you realize. or it could be the rain. you crumple to the pavement, splashing the puddle water in all directions. you hide your face in your hands. “it’s always been you,” you say, but he does not hear it.

it wouldn’t matter, anyway.

[precuredaily]

Precure Day 183

Episode: Yes! Precure 5 35 - “Nuts’s Key and Komachi’s Heart” Date watched: 4 May 2020 Original air date: 7 October 2007 Screenshots: https://imgur.com/a/fqtuhS0 Transformation Gallery: https://imgur.com/a/6k6SzS0 Project info and master list of posts: http://tinyurl.com/PCDabout

What did I say about sunsets?

This episode has everything! Romance! Adventure! Characters having long and meaningful conversations about their past failings! A new villain! Dramatic sunsets! Bad art! The return of the winter uniforms signifying that it’s truly fall! Let’s dig in!

The Plot

Komachi is on pins and needles as Nuts reads the eighth revision of her novel. As we’ve learned, he’s a harsh critic, but when he finally puts it down, he has nothing but praise for it, and everyone is relieved, so they decide to celebrate by going shopping. Privately, Coco and Nuts argue over Nuts’s serious attitude and being bogged down by certain past mistakes. Meanwhile in Nightmare, Hadenya has the day off so Kawarino suggests that Bloody takes to the field instead. The senior executive does not take kindly to being ordered around, and insists he’ll do things his way after being buttered up.

The girls drop off Komachi’s manuscript at a mailbox and then head into the mall. Urara wants to go shopping for a new outfit for an appearance the next day, so Nozomi, Rin, Karen, and Coco go with her, while Komachi and Nuts head to a bookstore. At one point, Rin and Karen butt heads over what outfits they think would look good on Urara, in typical fashion. Nozomi and Coco branch off and have a small heart to heart of their own, while Komachi and Nuts discuss the importance of life while they wait at the meeting point. You know, just ordinary small talk.

However, their conversation is interrupted by Bloody himself, sitting at a piano. He presents a Kowaina mask as his business card and drops it on the floor, turning the entire room into a writhing mass of arms and blocking the exit. His objective is fairly clear, he wants the Dream Collet from Nuts, and then he’ll be on his way. Of course, it’s not that simple. Komachi transforms and fights the arms, but Bloody’s best attacks are not physical, but mental. He stays right were he’s at and informs Nuts that he was the one who destroyed the Palmier Kingdom, and he did it because it was his job. Nuts’s job was to protect the kingdom, and he failed at that, which makes him unsuitable to use the Dream Collet, so he should hand it over. He continues to assault Nuts’s psyche by reminding him that Nuts opened the door that allowed for the siege to begin with, and now that they’re involving innocent people from another world in their battle, this world could end up destroyed like the Palmier Kingdom. While all of this is going on, Nozomi, Rin, Urara, and Karen have found the blocked off room, and try to fight their way in.

Back inside, Nuts very nearly hands over the Collet, but Cure Mint reminds him that he has a dream to fulfill of reviving the Palmier Kingdom, and she starts arguing with Bloody over who is worthy to use its power. He insists that it should be used by the powerful, while she maintains that it should be used by someone who knows, fears, and respects its power. She uses Mint Shield to protect Nuts, but some repeated attacks by the arms manage to break her barrier. Hope seems lost when suddenly her teammates burst through the wall and declare that there’s nowhere they can’t or won’t go to save their friends. Without breaking a sweat, Bloody slyly asks if that’s the source of their power, and why don’t they show him exactly what they can do? Each of them performs their enhanced special attack: Aqua Tornado, Rouge Burning, Lemonade Shining, and Crystal Shoot, dispelling the Kowaina. Bloody smirks and disappears to fight another day.

At a later date, Komachi walks into Natts House after school. Nuts thanks her for saving him the other day, and admits that he’s not as mature as he thought, since he was ready to hand over the Dream Collet. He then turns the subject to Komachi’s writing, since he notices she looks a little sleep deprived. He tells her that writing is important, but not at the cost of her health, and he’ll read anything she writes to help her become the best author she can, so he wants her to prioritize her well-being to do so. Tears of joy well up in her eyes because of his kindness, and the scene transitions to Komachi writing in the library. Karen looks over her shoulder to see what she’s writing, and Komachi says that this story is about a lonely woman who meets someone who opens up her heart. (subtle) The episode closes on her beaming face.

The Analysis

This episode gives me a lot to talk about but for once, I’ll start with the villains instead of the heroes. Bloody is not a character I really remember anything about from my first watch-through of this show back in 2013 or so. He appeared in the Christmas episode I watched in my 2018 Christmas special but he didn’t leave much of an impression there. I’m worried about what that means for his trajectory, because in this episode, he’s fantastic. Without ever transforming or taking any direct actions other than turning the room into a Kowaina he presents a severe threat to the girls. He manages to separate them from each other, overpower and trap Mint, and he nearly convinces Nuts to hand over the Dream Collet just by reminding him of his past failures. Even when Dream and the other girls manage to break through his barrier, he takes it in stride where any other villain would have panicked. They say “We’re stronger when we’re together!” and he goads them into using their attacks, getting a read on them, learning what their abilities are and figuring out how to thwart them in future encounters. He knows when he’s lost the fight, but you definitely get the sense he’ll be using what he’s learned the next time he goes head to head with the girls... which, according to the wiki, isn’t until episode 41. Sigh. It’s a great introduction, anyway.

I also want to highlight the fact that he didn’t create a monster Kowaina out of an object like everyone else so far has done, but he turned the entire room into one, which makes for a much more challenging battle for the girls and is a tactic that I wish was used more often, in all seasons. Instead of there being a singular enemy to focus their attention on, even if it’s fast or durable, attacks can come from any direction using this strategy and you never know where to turn. Even if Mint was able to ward it off for a few minutes on her own, she also nearly succumbed and would have lost if her friends hadn’t shown up at the last minute. Maybe she would have been able to pull a narrow victory, we saw in the last episode what some good old determination can do, but also Bloody is a very different beast from Hadenya. His ability to talk his opponents down is just as impressive as his actual power, which we are told is immense, since he was able to destroy the Palmier Kingdom by himself.

It is never explicitly stated that a Kowaina’s power and abilities are reflective of the one who creates it, only the kind of mask used, but it does seem that Bloody, being in a league of his own, has more powerful monsters, so I do wonder if this is the case... Of course Gamao also has really strong monsters, his main obstacle is being a lazy sack of shit, but we’ll touch on that next time.

Bloody’s ability to get inside of people’s heads shakes Nuts to his core, and it exposes a side of him that we haven’t really seen before. Sure, he’s always been reserved, and we knew he blamed himself for the fall of the Palmier Kingdom when he let in a pinky that turned out to be Girinma, but over the last few episodes the rest of the puzzle is starting to come together. We learned in episode 31 that Hadenya was the one who hurt Nuts so badly he went into hibernation in the Dream Collet, and now we find out that Bloody was the one who leveled the kingdom itself. Nuts has a lot of trauma associated with this, because it all comes back to him. Even if nobody else blames him, he blames himself, and the depths of his angst are a pretty mature topic for a show aimed at a young audience. I applaud the capacity for this show to handle it in a serious way and not brush off his suffering. He’s deeply hurt, and he realizes at the end he’s been holding onto a lot of grief, and he truly appreciates Komachi’s help in beginning to overcome it.

This represents a major step forward in their relationship. They started out rather tense, when he heavily criticized her novel, but both of them have grown closer as Komachi has seen and encouraged the softness inside of him. Now, she stands up for him at his most vulnerable, reminds him that he isn’t worthless or a failure, and that his compassion makes him the perfect person to be caring for the pinkies. In return for her support in achieving his goals, he promises to help her in any way he can to achieve hers, which for Komachi means he’ll read all her story drafts and help her become a better writer. Komachi and Nuts’s relationship is built on a mutual agreement to help and uplift each other, while Nozomi and Coco’s is built on achieving the same goal, and Karen and Milk’s is mostly about helping Milk to become a better person.

In summary this episode is a great exploration of one of the underappreciated relationships from the series, with perhaps the best first outing by a villain in the entire series to this point, even topping Ilkubo’s first appearance. As normal for this leg of the series there is some pretty weak art scattered about but it’s not too prevalent. You can view some of the worst offenders in my gallery. I will say though, the camerawork around Bloody is interesting, he’s often framed in extreme closeups of his face, tilted at an angle, and frequently only half of his face is shown. I’m not sure WHY because he’s not terribly expressive, but it’s something that stuck out at me on my screenshot capturing rewatch.

For record keeping purposes, it is now October in the show and thus the girls are seen back in their winter school uniforms with the lightly colored dress and dark purple blazer.

Lastly, I would be remiss if I let this little visual nod go unmentioned. In one scene, Coco is very clearly wearing Gurren Lagann sunglasses:

Gurren Lagann, Gainax’s high energy salute to super robot anime and the show that put Imaishi Hiroyuki on the map, premiered in April of 2007, so the producers of this series had plenty of time to include this little homage. If you’re not familiar, the pointed, angular sunglasses are a trademark element of both the titular robot itself and one of the main characters.

I can’t say definitively that it’s a reference but the timing of it feels very deliberate, so I’m calling it one.

Next time on Precure Daily, Gamao gets one last chance to defeat the Precures. Will he succeed? (no) Come back to find out how he loses!

Pink Precure Catchphrase Count: 2 Kettei!

[mymindsmadness]

𝐹𝒶𝓉𝑒 𝐿𝒾𝓃𝑒𝓈

Happy MyTake!Monday all!

This Monday I wanted to share something I’ve been messing around with for a while. Several drafts of this have been sitting in my folder forever. It was something I really liked the concept of, but wasn’t sure I could do justice. As of right now, it’s just a one-shot, but I’ve considered writing more. If I do, it probably won’t be every Monday, just for the simple fact that this took me so long to stop messing with. Either way, Enjoy!

Rating: T (as of right now)

Warnings: I’m very much an American. I try to get a lot of the terminology and whatnot as close as I can to not take people out of it, but nothing is perfect. Also, I suffer from insomnia. It doesn’t sound bad, but a lot of my editing was done under sleep deprivation. 

Notes: If you guys like this, make sure to leave a comment. As I’ve said, this is a one-shot right now. For me to even consider writing more, I’d have to know that people were actually enjoying it!

Summary: When Voldemort killed Harry, it was not Dumbledore he met at King’s Cross, but an angel of fate. Harry threw his fate off course, and she’s not happy about it. There is only one thing to do. Start over. 

Although Harry knew death would come quickly, he hadn’t quite understood it until he was standing in the ghostly version of King’s Cross Station. Was this… heaven? Did wizards even believe in such a thing? It didn’t seem like the heaven Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon went on and on about every Sunday after church. There were no puffy clouds or harps. Most importantly, there were no people. Where were his parents? Where was Sirius or Remus or Tonks? Maybe this was some kind of… purgatory? Harry shuttered at the thought. Had he not done enough? Had he not earned his right to be with them? His whole life he had been nothing but a puppet on a string, dancing by the will of others. In the end his life wasn’t even his, but he sacrificed it anyway. If that hadn’t been enough to re-

His thoughts were cut off by his own (admittedly, embarrassingly high-pitched) scream as he turned to find a woman not much other than himself sitting on one of the pearly benches. She looked serene in this place that wasn’t a place. Her eyes were a haunting silver to match everything else around her, but her hair was a wild nest of black curls. “Didn’t mean to scare you.” He didn’t know why, but he had expected her voice to echo within the not-place.

Nervously, Harry wiped his hands down the front of his trousers. “Err – not your fault I suppose.” He tried for a polite smile, but the twitching of her full lips told him he had failed. “Where are we? It looks like King’s Cross…”

“I suppose it does. Though, I’ve never seen it in person.” She hummed, her expression neutral as she looked around. “I think it’s supposed to be symbolic. Either way it came from your subconscious, so it’s hard to say.” She shrugged and moved to one side, patting the bench beside her.

He hesitated, his nerves from being on the run still frazzled. But what was the worst that could happen? He was already dead after all. Carefully, Harry moved to sit beside the woman. “I’m Harry. Harry Potter.”

Again her lips twitched as those sharp mercury eyes turned to him. “I know who you are, Harry Potter.” She hummed again, taking in his appearance. “I’ve been watching you since you were a baby.”

Many people had watched Harry his whole life, it seemed. Still, a chill of unease worked its way up his spine. “Are you… an angel then?” She certain looked angelic enough, if not for the mass of untamed curls that reminded him slightly (unnervingly) of Bellatrix’s.

“In a sense.” Her tone was light. “I’m a fate weave. One that happens to be in charge of your fate line.” His confusion must have been clear because she continued on. “The Greeks had it right – for the most part. Every person on earth has a fate line. Like… a thread that represents a path. You still have freewill, so sometimes that thread gets knotted. It typically sorts itself out, or it had been. Everyone’s thread is woven together into a… tapestry of sorts.” Standing, she held out her hand a moment before a wall of what appeared to be glowing, golden yarn appeared next to her. He couldn’t see the top, as it faded well above the not-place. The edges stuck out over what would have been the tracks, going on for quite some time. Most of the lines ended before it reached the thin frame that held it in place. It didn’t have a particular pattern, and there were loose ends sticking out in places, but it was… beautiful. Harry could have sworn he heard it humming in the silence of the ghostly King’s Cross. There was something about it that humbled him... made him feel insignificant for the first time in years.

“So that - that’s everyone on earth right now?” He asked, standing slowly. Millions of tiny strands, each practically dancing between several others, humming and pulsing it’s siren’s song. “Their fate lines I mean.”

“This is just a small portion.” Standing on her toes, she pointed to a strand of thread, following it with her finger. “This one is yours.” She came to the first small knot. “This is Ron Weasley’s… and a little further down, Hermione Granger’s.” The bands wove together into an elegant braid, at least, from what Harry could see. “You don’t know how hard it was convincing the fate weaver in charge of her line to keep her out of Ravenclaw. In the end, we knew it was for the greater good.”

Hearing their names hurt. He would never see them again. Here he was learning about their lives - their fates that were changed because of him. Maybe this wasn’t heaven or purgatory. Maybe this was hell. Sure, Harry hadn’t been horrible during his time on earth, but he hadn’t been a saint either. “Why are you telling me these things?” It didn’t seem possible in this not-place, but Harry felt… tired. He had been so tired for so long.

“Because you knotted your line.” The woman’s face had been a mask of calm until that point. At this, she looked distraught. “You really mucked it up, you know! I worked day and night to keep you on track, and then you threw your line off course with a bit of idiocy and panic! Because of that, several others were changed.” She pointed to a few loose ends before landing on a tight knot along his own line.

It wasn’t like the small knots that represented his life with Ron and Hermione. This was a nest of tangles that reminded him very much of that one time his Uncle Vernon made him spend the day unknotting Christmas lights. From the sides of the knot, several edges frayed and stuck out in all directions. Only a handful went on after that. Harry’s, he noticed, did not end. “Those ends… are they…”

“Deaths.” She hummed. “I’m going to get demoted now…” Her tiny tone of distress wasn’t meant for him this time.

“So you’re telling me… it’s all planned? I never had a choice at all, and I would always end up here? Dead?” A weight settled in Harry’s stomach that almost made him feel dizzy. “It wouldn’t have mattered if I fought Voldemort or just enjoyed my time with my mates?”

“Of course it mattered, Harry.” Her voice was gentle, her eyes soft. It was almost worse to be pitied. “Typically fate is set, that much is true. You would have always ended up here, but the journey could have been much better for everyone. You’re the first person I’ve ever met that managed to rewrite the outcome of several lives. In fact, this wasn’t meant to be your last stop at all. You were meant to go back.”

“Cheers.” Harry nearly barked. Of course he was the exception. “If fate is set, I don’t see how I could have rewritten it in the first place.”

“It’s like…” She paused, biting her bottom lip before reaching into her nest of hair and producing a hairpin. “This pin is meant to hit the floor, yeah?” She waited for him to nod. “It’s this pin’s fate to land on the floor. It will do so. I want you to try and rewrite its fate.” She released it.

It was only through war-trained senses and years of playing seeker that Harry was able to reach out and grab the hair hairpin mid-air. Holding it up for her to see, he raised an eyebrow feeling satisfied with himself. “That wasn’t very hard. I’m surprised more people don’t rewrite their fate.”

“But you haven’t rewritten it.” She pointed out, a smug smile lighting her face. “Its fate is the same. You might not put it down now, but I imagine you don’t intend to carry it with you always. Maybe to make a point you would for a while, but sooner or later you’ll forget it. Eventually, it will fulfill its destiny. We can manipulate or alter the roads humans take based on their choices, but the outcome will always be the same… except... in your case.”  

“Look, I’m sorry miss…” He balled his fist around the hairpin, willing it to dig into his skin and take away some of his pain.

“Lyra.” She offered, her eyes moving to his fate line in dismay. “Lyra Black.”

Harry’s anger left him in an instant. “As in the Black family? Sirius Black?” It would make sense, now that Harry thought about it. She had the eyes and hair for it, though she looked younger than Sirius.

“Yes.” She was smiling again now, the tapestry nearly humming in protest as she turned from it. “I was his aunt - or second aunt’s cousin? It’s all terribly confusing when it comes to pureblood lines. I never cared for them. I am sorry about him passing through the veil, love. You’ll be happy to know he talked my ear off about you when he passed through here.” She gave him a small smile. “But where were… ah yes.” She pointed to the beginning of the large, unsightly knot. “Mr. Malfoy.”

Harry was still processing the information about his godfather when she mentioned the name. He scoffed, taking a step back in shock. “Lucius Malfoy screwed up my timeline? I should have known-”

“No, no. Don’t be silly.” She waved him off with her free hand. “Draco Malfoy. You used a spell on him… Sectumsempra. Nasty bit of work. Poor dear.”

“P-Poor dear!?” Harry’s anger returned in a flood. “He was going to crucio me! I’ve been fighting a war while he sat on his arse having tea with the dark lord! I hardly think-“

“Don’t be daft.” He was cut off by the sharpness of her gaze. It was easier to her relation to Bellatrix at that moment. “He was a scared child. Don’t you remember what Voldemort told you when you tried to use the cruciatus curse on Bellatrix? He wasn’t wrong when he said that you have to mean it. I hate to be the one to tell you this, Harry, but Draco wouldn’t have meant it. You weren’t meant to hurt him that day, you were meant to save him. 

“He never wanted anyone’s life on his hands. Why do you think he didn’t give you to Voldemort when he had the chance? Doing so would not only have saved his family, but given them a standing social status in the new world. He chose to save your life instead.”

Harry blinked, his eyes moving back to the tapestry. The gaudy knot stuck out more than anything else. Was it true? Was it all true? Part of Harry wanted to believe that Malfoy had not recognized him that day at the manor, but the larger part knew that he had. “I was meant to… save Malfoy? That’s ridiculous! Dumbledore tried!”

“Well Albus wasn’t meant to save him, now was he? Keep up, Potter!” He couldn’t argue with that. “Because you found that blasted book, everything was thrown off. Several deaths could have been avoided and now- are you alright? You’ve gone a bit green.”

Deaths. More death was on his hands. It had been more than just cutting Malfoy open, which he had already felt terrible about… he had killed people. “I think I need to sit down…” He sunk back into the bench behind him as the tapestry flew upwards and out of sight, making the not-place seem even emptier. “All those people… I could have…” He took a deep, shaky breath.

“You still can.” Harry’s chin jerked upwards to meet Lyra’s determined gaze. Suddenly, she looked a great deal more like Sirius than Bellatrix. “It’s against the rules, you see... There will be some things that you cannot change. And you certainly wouldn’t be able to tell anyone. However… if we can unknot the tapestry, you’ll get the fate you deserve and I won’t get sacked.”

Harry wasn’t sure how an angel could even get sacked, but he imagined it wasn’t pleasant. What did she mean? Did she want him to dabble in bringing the dead back? He had no desire to make Inferi, and he didn’t know of any other way. “I… I won’t bring them back to life.”

“Of course not, Harry.” She rolled her eyes. “But what if you could go back to that moment? What if you could do it all over knowing what you know now?”

In the back of his mind something prickled dangerously. It sounded an awful lot like Hermione warning him not to meddle with time. But what if he could. He would still be a horcux… he would still have to fight… but maybe, with more time, he wouldn’t have to die. Not like this. “Okay… yes. I want to do it over.”

Her smile was cat-like as she placed a hand on his shoulder. “Chin up Harry. You’re going to love where this leads.”

As everything faded to white, the last thing Harry saw was the glint of light off the small black hair pin sitting quietly on the floor... 

 Also being posted to AO3 (in case). You can follow it HERE

Buy Me A Ko-Fi?

[junionigiri]

and you say, stay Chapter 6 - What You’re Missing

Chapter summary: Secretary Uraraka goes out on a date.

Rating: T

Thanks to the Director, she sleeps a grand total of 4 hours that night. Seems that no matter what that guy does, she ends up sleep-deprived. If it’s not deadlines, it’s unwarranted marriage proposals, and if it’s neither of those it’s his weird words and his clueless stare and his warm jacket and his infinite mochis and the silly boop at her nose and the best first date she’s ever had.

Granted she doesn’t have another first date to compare this to, except for that one guy in high school who gave her the french fries that came with his burger. Maybe it’s too presumptuous for her to say that it’s the best date ever. But, Director Todoroki closed down MightyLand for a date! And let her ride Space World seven times!!! If another guy existed in the world who could bring her to a private date in an amusement park and then feed her five-star food under the stars please stand up.

Actually, it didn’t have to be as stellar as this one. Anybody else who isn’t her Demon Boss is welcome to make her feel as giddy as she does now. Ochako still hasn’t accepted that she can allow herself to feel this way for her demon-of-a-boss. It doesn’t stop her stupid mouth from smiling the entire night, though.

“Your owner is too much. He totally ruined all the other first dates for me,” she tells Her Very Own Victoria (Victoria II for short) sourly. “And you smell like him so it’s also your fault I couldn’t sleep!”

The doll smiles innocently.

“Humph! You’re lucky that you’re really cute and really soft,” she mutters, burying her face into the cat doll’s plush head for the umpteenth time. She’s so frickin’ fluffy and just the exact size for hugging. Ochako can forgive that she looks like the first cat she’s ever met who has managed to become the bane of her existence.

Mid-hug, she feels something within the doll. Something hollow with edges, hidden within Victoria II’s little jumper. Warily, she inspects the pocket and fishes out a pretty box tied with a ribbon.

A teardrop-shaped moonstone hanging from a delicate silver chain shimmers prettily when she opens the box. It’s nothing like the big or flashy white gold/diamond encrusted pieces the Director gave his previous girlfriends, but Ochako instantly likes it without question. It’s dainty and so, so pretty, glowing a shade of blue that’s just like moonlight.

But she keeps herself from becoming too excited. There’s no note, no labels, nothing. Director Todoroki didn’t mention that he had two gifts for her and there’s no reason why he’d buy her anything like this. Maybe he left it here by accident?

She could have waited to ask him when she visits his penthouse in an hour, but she’s impatient and it might be awkward to tell him he gave her the wrong gift in person. She takes a chance and sends him a casual SMS:

Uraraka Ochako (0455 AM) [image attached]

Uraraka Ochako (0456 AM): this was in Victoria II’s pocket (*✧×✧*)

Director Todoroki (0456 AM): Of course it is. I put it there.

Director Todoroki (0456 AM): Do you like it?

Ochako is surprised for a couple of reasons--one is that he’s up super early, and another is that what, it wasn’t a mistake! Why would the Director give her something like this after treating her to so many other things last night?

Well… it isn’t always easy to see the Director’s intentions, but Ochako has had a nine-year master’s class on that. The most obvious answer is what he said last night--that is, it is simply something to say goodbye, to show his appreciation. Some bosses are just that generous. She’ll happily ignore all the other weird, confusing, (heartracing) things he said and did in favor of that very reasonable explanation.

Uraraka Ochako (0457 AM): Of course, Director!

Uraraka Ochako (0457 AM): I mean, sure do! (=✪ᆽ✪=) Thank you, I really like it!

Uraraka Ochako (0458 AM): Oh, I’m also leaving for the penthouse in a while. Please wait for me.

Director Todoroki (0458 AM): I’ll be fine. You can come to work at seven.

Uraraka Ochako (0459 AM): Are you sure? I’m awake now, it’ll be easy for me to come to you to assist you.

Director Todoroki (0501 AM): I’m sure. Just be ready with our agenda when I get to work.

Director Todoroki (0501 AM): [image attached]

Director Todoroki (0502 AM): By the way, this Victoria is requiring you to wear that necklace today.

The image he sends her shows the living British Shorthair in all her irate glory. She’s loafed up over a futon and frowning enthusiastically at the camera as if she’s aware that the photo is meant for Ochako. She’d chortle at the ridiculousness of it, but then she sees the Director’s long pajama-clad legs and a portion of his bare torso in the background and suddenly her face feels ridiculously hot.

Stupid Director. Despite that she sends him another thank you message and takes another moment staring at the necklace. It’s so pretty over her fingers, is it really okay to just wear it?

She clasps the delicate chain around her neck and stares at the moonstone hanging near her collarbone. Oh no , it looks nice on her. She can wear this to work everyday, and judging by the angry cat’s grimace she really has to.

Well, orders are orders, she thinks coolly as she tries her darndest not to explode in a giddy mess while getting ready for work.

*

“Ochako-chan?” Mina asks with narrowed eyes as soon as she steps in the office at six thirty in the morning. “You’re late?”

Office hours begin at eight, but the staff of the Office of the Executive Director usually starts their day at six. For Ochako to appear thirty minutes late without the Director is terribly unusual, and immediately everyone’s glaring at her suspiciously.

“Sorry. Traffic. It happens,” Ochako answers, fighting not to avoid everyone’s eyes. “But it’s okay, the Director knows. You guys shouldn’t worry about him being in a bad mood or anything.”

“This is most alarming,” Iida murmurs with a concerned flash of his glasses. “This has only ever happened once in your nine year history with the company! And that was during the big earthquake 5 years ago!”

Kirishima shakes his head. “Nah, she was in the director’s mansion during that one so it doesn’t count. But there was that time when the trains shut down so you had to parkour your way across town to get to work! The Director went Demon-King Mode over that one.”

“Yeah, and then he bought you a car. And then you gave it to Shoji,” Monoma deadpans in sheer, palpable jealousy. “So what, the Director’s gonna buy you another car today? Can you at least drive it once before you give it away?”

Honestly, why does everyone remember every single thing about her work history? “He isn’t going to buy me another car, Monoma.”

“If he does, you lose and I get the car.”

Whatever. “Deal.”

Satisfied, Monoma twirls back to his work and the others follow. All except for Camie, who’s waiting for her at their reception desk outside of the Director’s room. The taller secretary greets her with a coy smile. “Ocha-babes, those stories were cray. Did he really buy you a car?”

Ochako laughs nervously. “Yeah… he didn’t want me to be late ever again, but I can’t just take a car , y’know?”

“Ya. I gotcha,” Camie says with a wink. “That fab necklace tho? Wouldn’t guess that was Directoroki’s style but it’s cute on you so I say, keep that one.”

“Wh-what? No, this isn’t from--”

Maybe the wide-eyed sputtering is more incriminating than anything because Camie’s smile is bordering on shit-eating. So much for her elaborate lie of ordering it online. In any case, it’s too late to defend herself when Director Todoroki himself arrives without warning.

They stand up and bow. “Good morning, Director Todoroki.”

Even though it’s another rare morning where Todoroki had to do all his morning rituals by himself and his tie is a little crooked, Ochako is surprised at just how dapper he looks in a suit and how his hair looks different when it’s styled for work. She wonders why she’s taken aback by him now when Director Todoroki being handsome isn’t really anything new--in fact, it’s a requirement, the product of her hard work on most days. Is it because she didn’t see him at the penthouse today?

There’s an extra split-second his eyes spend searching for the stone over her collarbone, and another for his mouth to quirk upwards in approval. And then she knows exactly why she feels so weird.

“Secretary Utsushimi, confirm our next meeting with Takami-san from the Chairman’s Office. We need to see them before noon today. Don’t take no for an answer.”

“Gotcha, Director.” Camie is on it in a flash, that knowing, dangerous smile never leaving her lips as she dials the number. Ochako tries her best not to shudder.

“Secretary Uraraka.”

“Yes, Director.” After years and years of serving him, that’s all she needs to know what she has to do next. Gathering the day’s schedule, priority documents, and urgent letters, she follows him into the office.

*

Three days pass by them in the usual whirlwind of meetings and gruelling office work. Thankfully Director Todoroki has stopped acting as strange as he did during their private goodbye party, and Ochako has been able to focus on her work as she usually does. With the art center opening looming closer and closer and the day of work they’ll lose tomorrow for the annual mandatory Company Day, lord knows they need it.

There’s lots to be done, but on that particular day, Ochako is working double-time. She even skips lunch in favor of munching on just a couple of strawberry chocolates while she drafted letters at the speed of light. By 5 PM she is 95% done, so it’s worth it.

She lets herself drink her second cup of coffee in the office pantry next to Camie when Mina wobbles in, tired as hell herself. “Move over, ladies. I need coffee and I need it now,” she slurs hoarsely.

“Gurl, here you go. Rest. Relax. Lubricate.” Camie pushes a freshly made cappuccino over to her, which the pink-haired girl takes gratefully.

“Thanks gurl! You the best! Endeavor Secretaries are like, a different breed of human, ” Mina says with a sigh. “I haven’t seen the two of you get up from your desks the entire day, how are you guys still alive? ”

“Nah, I was just trynna keep up with Ocha-babes. She’s like, in beast mode today.”

Ochako laughs awkwardly. “Sorry, Camie-chan! I told you you could take a break anytime. It’s just that I have to leave early today, so…”

Mina makes a blubbering noise over her coffee. “Oh gurl wait. Is that today!?”

Ochako beams. “Yep!”

Camie looks at them one after the other. “Uh. What’s today, fam? Are you winning the lottery or something?”

“No, ~duh~. Well, maybe that’s one way to put it? The Lottery of Love. ” Mina snorts. “Our dear angel secretary here is finally going on a date!”

“Oh. Worm.” Camie’s smile is both coy and intrigued. Ochako can almost hear her thoughts ( I thought you and Directoroki was bonin’, but okay ) but all she says is, “That’s lit, fam~get it, gurl, I’m rootin’ for ya~”

Ochako shakes her head. “Nah, it’s just a blind date. I don’t even know if we’re gonna get along, so...”

Suddenly more energized than the half-dead state she was in when she walked in, Mina vibrates in excitement. “Oh my god, Ochako--I know the guy, okay, and like, I won’t spoil anything but I’m super sure that the next time we talk about it is the two of you inviting us to your wedding. So you better not be late, because--”

A shattering noise interrupts them from behind.

“--Bakugou’s as impatient as the Demon-- aaaaah, Director, you’re bleeding, what happened?!?! ”

“Ah.” Director Todoroki was, for one reason or another, looming behind them and holding a designer cup from Hermes. Was. Now it’s just shards of 100,000 yen ceramic along with blood and steaming green tea, which he regards with cold nonchalance.

“I broke my cup,” he replies blankly.

Ochako is the first to jump to his aid. She zooms past the other girls so she can take all the broken pieces off his hand and examine all the cuts up close. “I can see that! Director, what were you thinking?! Be careful! Oh my gosh you’re really bleeding!”

There are exactly four cuts, the longest of which is less than 1 cm, nothing deep, nothing that can leave a scar. Good, good. The tea hasn’t burned his right hand, which is a miracle. “Director, you’ll be fine. We just need to disinfect this quickly. I’ll bring you to the infirmary right now.”

Out of nowhere, her hands feel warm. Not from the tea or anything, but from something intense starts to make her skin tingle. When she looks up, Director Todoroki is staring at the point of contact of their hands, his gaze unreadable.

“... sweet,” Camie mumbles behind them.

The moment breaks. Ochako (and judging from the chill behind her, Director Todoroki as well) glare at her, while Mina gives her a sharp, meaningful nudge to the ribs.

“The cappuccino, I mean. It’s super sweet. The power of stevia, amirite,” the other secretary explains, smiling away the pain at her side. “Ocha-babes, the infirmary’s too far away. You can take care of Directoroki in the office, right? We gots a first-aid kit there.”

Ochako doesn’t appreciate the way her eyebrows raise, but Director Todoroki does not seem opposed to the idea. She leads the way back into the office, pulls out the first-aid kit, and treats his wounds over his plush office sofa. “Director, I know you’re clumsy sometimes but how did this even happen?! Should we return this set of tea cups? They might be defective...”

“No, this was an accident. There’s absolutely. No. Problem,” the Director grits out. He seems annoyed for an entirely different unspoken reason, but if he isn’t going to say anything, Ochako isn’t going to pry.

A few gentle dabs of disinfectant and a few bandaids later, the Director’s hand is looking better. If he needs to be in a photoshoot within the next 24 hours she’ll just have to tell the photographer to hide his right hand somehow. “There. Good as new. Well… almost.”

Todoroki flexes his hand experimentally. “It is. You can get back to work now.”

“Oh, about that…” Ochako straightens up and tries to keep her face from being too excited. “I’m almost done for the day, Director. All I need is your signature for this letter here…”

She shows him the English-language letter she drafted for him earlier. He looks through it with a scowl, taking longer than usual to search for any errors. She’s confident that there are none, though, and it is almost begrudging how he picks up his fountain pen to scrawl the characters of his name at the bottom.

“Thank you, Director,” she says with a bow. “Now… since all my work is done, I wanted to ask if I can leave early.”

Todoroki regards her with another fresh, cold scowl. “All of it?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I don’t think I’ve seen that report from General Affairs yet.”

“You gave that assignment to Secretary Utsushimi. But, Shinsou from General Affairs submitted it this morning. You already replied to them.”

Todoroki hums. “How about that meeting with the Belgium group?”

“Monoma-kun and I have sent you and all the other division heads the agenda,” she answers confidently. “You also replied to us already.”

“And the marketing report for--”

“--there are corrections to be done over at Chief Midoriya’s office. Asui-san is taking care of it.”

“... Victoria.”

She blinks. “She’s admitted overnight at Dr. Koda’s clinic for an executive check-up, isn’t she?”

Todoroki huffs. “... well. It seems that you’re truly done for the day.”

Ochako raises her eyebrows expectantly. “... so…”

He stares at her for a few, strange moments. She feels his eyes scan hers, and then the necklace around her neck. He obviously isn’t happy for some reason, but his mood shifts a little seeing the stone over her collarbone.

“All right,” he says. Ochako wonders if she imagined him mumbling, you win. “You are dismissed.”

Ochako smiles and bows as she leaves the office. “Thank you, Director. I’ll see you tomorrow morning.”

Oh my god. I pulled it off. Feeling adequately victorious, she takes her phone out and sends someone a message. I’m on my way. See you in twenty minutes!

*

She makes it to the Dagobah Seaside Park in eighteen minutes. Normally she’d be wary to appear so eager, but Kirishima-kun and Mina-chan were pretty pushy about her not being late, so she rushed there as quickly as she could. She only had time to fix her hair a little as she stood near the bench where she’s supposed to meet her date. She fishes out her phone just to make sure that she hasn’t missed this guy, but then an abrasive voice calls out to her from behind.

“Oi.”

Turning swiftly, she looks to the source of the rasp. “Oh… Bakugou Katsuki-san?” she asks cautiously.

“Yeah. Who else?”

He’s got the most intense pair of red eyes she’s ever seen on a person, and the fluffiest blonde hair. The scowl on his face looks as angry as it does in all the photos that Kirishima has shown her. Even the rasp of his voice is exactly the same as it sounds in all his Youtube videos. It’s impossible for her to mistake the guy for anyone else, and he knows it.

“Yeah, who else?” she agrees with a laugh that she hopes doesn’t sound too uncomfortable. “Nice to meet you! I’m Uraraka Ochako.”

“I figured. You’re the only roundface in this shithole,” he says with a shrug.

“ Roundface?! ” she repeats, after an affronted pause.

“Yeah.” Bakugou has no reservations at all to peer in closer to her face, as if examining an alien life form. “Shit. I thought Shitty-Hair was shittin’ me when he showed me that picture of you stuffing your face with beef ribs. I didn’t think anyone’s face would be this round. What the fuck. You’re like a fuckin’ hamster.”

“Hahaha, oookay.” Ochako steps back away from his fingers which definitely has ill intentions against her cheeks. “Well, I dunno what to tell you, I was born with ‘em. How about you, were you born with Pomeranian fur on your head?”

She definitely doesn’t want to be rude, but he’s managed to say so many curse words and vague insults within the first five seconds of meeting her, and it’s weird.

Bakugou scowls at first, which she expected, but then he laughs--a rough, barking sound. “Damn, talking shit off the bat? To me?! I underestimated you, cheeks, you’re tougher than you look.”

Ochako scrunches up her face. “Not used to it?”

“Nah.” Bakugou smirks. “That means you can keep up with me. Let’s go. Wasting fuckin’ daylight here.”

Ochako follows him along the boardwalk and into a small, hip restaurant at the beachfront. Kirishima must have told him about her fear of fire, because he tells her that he would have brought her to this grill he liked that served ‘good spicy shit on skewers.’ He assures her however that ‘this dump isn’t that bad and there’s no fire.’

“Oi, Soysauce-Face! Get us a table,” Bakugou barks as soon as they step in the establishment.

A tall, plain guy whom he addressed as ‘Soysauce-Face’ turns to him with an exasperated look that turns into a smile when he sees Ochako cowering behind her handbag. “Oi, Bakugou! Date night, huh? I didn’t think you had the balls to go through with it.”

”Go die,” Bakugou grumbles. He doesn’t even wait for the guy to take them to their seats and just picks the nicest booth with a view of the ocean, tossing out the little reserved signage on it without remorse. Meanwhile the guy, whose name is Sero according to his nameplate, follows her with a menu.

“So… Uraraka, huh?” Sero grins after she introduces herself. “You’re Kirishima’s friend from the office. Well, it’s been ten minutes and you haven’t run away screaming from Bakugou yet, so I guess it means the date’s going well.”

“Shut up, Soy Boy,” Bakugou grumbles. “Get us some fuckin’ ramen already. Roundface is starving.”

So, from the first few moments of the date, Ochako can already pick out things about Bakugou that definitely leave much to be desired. The most obvious of them is his potty mouth and his staunch refusal to call anyone by their actual names. Even though ‘Roundface’ and ‘Angelface’ are better than the names he called his friends (apart from the rude names he called Kirishima and Sero, he called Mina ‘Raccoon-Eyes,’ and there were two others in the group called ‘Pikashit’ and ‘Ears’), it’s definitely putting a damper on the entire dating experience.

Okay, so that’s the biggest problem with Bakugou. The other things, she admits, might just be her being picky. Like Bakugou ordering for them without asking her what she liked. Bakugou scowling at everything. Bakugou’s tendency to scream when he’s calling for Sero’s attention. Bakugou picking a place that’s super crowded and not at all private and intimate. Bakugou only being kinda tall but not really that tall, unlike Director Todoroki--

--He drapes his coat around her easily. He’s much taller than her and has wider shoulders, so naturally she’s--

Wait, Ochako thinks in alarm, Where did that come from?

“Oi. What’s eatin’ you, Cheeks?” he grumbles as she literally shakes her head free of any invasive thoughts about the Director.

“Nothing,” she laughs awkwardly. “Just that, um, this ramen’s really spicy, huh?”

“Hah? That shit is not spicy.” To demonstrate his point, he dumps another handful of ghost peppers in his. “Mine’s better. Try it.”

Ochako rolls her eyes. “Thanks, but I’m not interested in getting hemorrhoids.”

“Roundface, what the fuck. Don’t talk about that kinda shit in front of food.”

Okay, so maybe she’s just picky. If she ignores all those things, this date is actually pretty fun. Despite all the profanities, Bakugou is an interesting person to talk to. He has a lot of stories as extreme investigative journalists tend to have, but to her surprise he asks her things about herself and almost seems (begrudgingly) interested. Ochako can’t imagine why--she’s just an average secretary of some hotshot executive downtown--but somehow she’s telling him about her interest in astrophysics and judo classes at the Gunhead Dojo, and suddenly she seems pretty interesting herself.

“Huh. And here I thought you were some fragile chick,” he says with a smirk. “You know you gotta prove it now, right? On our second date, we should try to beat each other’s asses or something.”

“You got weird kinks, mister,” she says with a playful look of disgust.

“What, you gonna say no?”

“Well… you look like you could use a good ass-kicking. Let me think about it.”

He laughs gruffly again, and is it weird how comfortable she feels? He doesn’t seem to mind when she acts like herself.

And he really is handsome, the way bad boys are handsome--rough, headstrong, the exact polar opposite of the quiet, refined grace that Director Todo--

“Seriously cheeks, if you got hemorrhoids I’ll take your ass to a CVS or something.”

Ochako puffs her cheeks. Dammit, she’s finally spending time with a guy who isn’t the Director, she has to be better than this! “Let’s stop talking about hemorrhoids. Don’t talk about that kinda shit in front of food.”

Bakugou grins. “Weirdo. What kinda office lady talks like that?”

… It’ll take a lot of getting used to, but she guesses that the two of them can get along, after all.

Oh, although there is another thing to be concerned about--all the looks they’re getting in the restaurant. She should have expected this since she is with Bakugou Katsuki, the infamous independent journalist who’s known for exposing corruption and organized crime and living to scream about it. She’s still surprised when the first set of fans come up to their table asking for an autograph, though.

“B-Bakugou Katsuki-san?” a timid college kid asks, shaking in his boots. “I don’t mean to bother you, but I’m a big fan of Ground Zero , and that expose you did on Detnerat Corp was--”

He clicks his tongue. “Piss off, nerd. Go die.”

“Bakugou-kun!”

“What?”

Ochako is about to defend the poor fan, who is shaking even more in his boots. But then the kid bows, looking happier than a lark. “Th… thank you for the words, Bakushinchi! Oh my god, dude, did you see that? Bakugou-fuckin’-Katsuki cussed me out like I’m trash!!! Did you get it on video?!”

Dumbfounded, Ochako watches as the fan gushes about the experience to his other friends. She looks at Bakugou oddly. “Okay, that was weird.”

“Tch. Yeah. All fuckin’ nerds is the same.” He dumps his chopsticks on the table, followed by a few crisp bills from his wallet. “Let’s get the fuck outta here.”

Ochako doesn’t argue. It’s about time they left anyway--has it really been three hours since they started talking? Sero waves at them with a smile that’s all too exasperated as they leave his restaurant.

They move on to a cafe that’s definitely quieter and less crowded than Sero’s. There are very few people giving them interested looks, but no-one looks like they’re going to bother them. Ochako gets a giant strawberry parfait while Bakugou frowns at her over his espresso.

“Tch. You’re gonna get diabetes,” the irate blonde grumbles.

“I’ll live,” she says with a happy sigh. “Gosh, strawberries are the best. And look how pretty it is! You don’t know…”

With the taste of strawberries lingering in her mouth, she follows him... Flowers of all colors surround their feet, glowing ethereally under the moonlight. The city below, the stars above. It’s a beautiful night.

“... what you’re missing,” she finishes lamely. Suddenly, the parfait doesn’t taste that good anymore, and she only has Director Todoroki in her mind. As she has intermittently, for most of the night.

She sucks at dates, doesn't she.

“I’ll live,” he says with a scowl. “Anyways, you told me that you had something to ask me.”

Oh, right. Her lackluster dating history aside, there’s another important reason why she agreed to this blind date at all--the fact that Bakugou Katsuki is a brilliant investigator.

Suddenly pensive, Ochako puts her dessert spoon down and takes a deep breath for courage. “Right. Um, so I know that we just met and I shouldn’t ask any big favors, but--”

Bakugou clicks his tongue so sharply he could have cut her bangs. “Just spit it out, Pink-Cheeks!”

“Okay, geez.” Again, Ochako takes a deep breath. It isn’t easy telling anybody this, because the hazy memories have an alarming tendency to make her hands shake. “There’s an incident that I’ve been trying to get information on, but over the years I’ve come up empty. Since you’re good at this stuff, I wonder if you can help me find it. Oh, but it might be impossible--”

“Unless you’re makin’ shit up, I’ll get that, no problem. What, you think I can’t? ” With an insulted grunt, he says, “What incident are you talkin’ about?”

“I’m not making it up,” she says, although there’s a tiny sliver of doubt at the center of her heart. Who knows how much of that did or didn’t happen when her memories are so bad? “There used to be a neighborhood near MightyLand in the nineties that’s demolished now. Back in 1995, a fire broke out from one of the houses there.”

“... a fire, huh.”

Ochako nods. “A big one, too. I… don’t remember why, but I was sure it was... arson. I’ve looked for articles about arson or accidental fires or anything at all in that year, but apart from records of Endeavor buying out that land years later, there’s nothing that comes out.”

She had considered that no-one would care about fires in a neighborhood filled with poor people, but it’s frustrating that there’s absolutely zero evidence of it happening.

Bakugou, unexpectedly, has her rapt attention. “Endeavor bought out that land, huh.”

“Yes,” she answers carefully. “But years after that incident. From what I know, they eventually gave that land to the Might Group, which they used to expand the amusement park. It’s all legitimate.”

He rubs his stubbled chin thoughtfully. “Ya got a clue about the people in that fire?”

Ochako is hesitant to say anything about that. But she relents, “I’m sure there was… a woman there. And a boy. Probably five years old at the time. Um, I’m not sure about the others.”

“Huh.” The interested glint in the blonde’s eyes intensifies like ember. “Were they mother and son?”

“Um.” Come to think of it, even if her instincts told her they were mother and son, suddenly she’s not so sure. She can’t even remember what they looked like anymore. “I… don’t remember--I mean, I don’t know who they are, so it’s hard to tell.”

“So I take it you didn’t check for records on kidnapping or anything like that.”

“... no.”

She can hear his thoughts racing a mile a minute. “Yeah, sure. I’ll get you that story, Roundface. Fuckin’ easy.”

She exhales in relief. “Thanks so much! It’s been on my mind for so long, it’s driving me crazy.”

It’s also a relief for her that Bakugou doesn’t ask her any questions as to why she’s interested in the incident, although that’s a little strange in itself. Either he’s figured out things on his own, or he expects to know as the investigation goes on. But if he asked, she’s going to give him an honest answer. Anything, as long as she gets some clarity after twenty-four years of wondering.

“... oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t even offer you any compensation or anything.”

Bakugou shrugs. “Ain’t interested in your dirty corporation money. But there is somethin’ you can do for me.”

She should have known. The mischievous smile on his face and the menacing twitch of his hand going for her face is all bad news. “You are not pinching my cheeks on the first date, Bakugou Katsuki.”

“No?” he snickers. “Newsflash, Angelface. I do whatever the fuck I want.”

*

Outside that particular cafe, Hagakure Tooru, the overworked secretary of Marketing Division Chief Midoriya Izuku, is grumbling all the way home. “Tsuyu-chan, I’m so tired! How have we lasted in Marketing for this long?!”

Tsuyu makes a sound that sounds exactly like a frog’s croak. It’s a weird mannerism that gets her a lot of weird looks, but Tooru reckons that all brilliant people had weird mannerisms and that’s probably the price to pay. Anyways, Tsuyu-chan is cute when she does it. “It’s super tough, Tooru-chan, but we get by. Besides, Midoriya-chan is a good boss who always knows what to do, so that makes it a lot easier.”

“Oof… he’s good all right. Too good,” Tooru huffs in exasperation. “I mess up at least once a day! And he’s always so nice about it. Sometimes I wish he’d just tell me off, y’know? I’m starting to get embarrassed!”

Tsuyu chuckles. “Just keep doing your best, Tooru-chan.”

“I aaam! But I know he’d like a secretary like Ochako-chan. Too bad that she’s the demon Director’s--”

Oh, speak of the devil?? Or, the angel, in this case. “Isn’t that Ochako-chan in that cafe over there?!”

On a table near the glass windows of a trendy cafe, Uraraka Ochako sits across a blonde guy with nice arm muscles. She seems to be smiling at him. “Oh. You’re right, ribbit. ”

“And on a date?!”

Tsuyu nods. “It’s nice that she finally has some free time since she’s resigning. Anyways, we should…”

Click.

Tsuyu looks at her with wide, unbelieving eyes. “Did you just take a picture of her and her date?”

“Uh, yeah?? I mean, look at how sweet they are! That guy’s touching her face so tenderly~”

“I wouldn’t call that touching,” the green-haired girl comments, pointing to the picture. The blonde guy’s obviously pinching her cheeks like dough. “And I think you should delete that photo. We should respect their privacy.”

She chuckles as she presses send. “Too late~! I’ve sent it to our group chat with Ochako-chan! Aw, Tsuyu-chan, don’t look so worried, I promise that this is just for the three of us!”

Tsuyu croaks. “That would be okay… except you sent it to Midoriya-chan, ribbit .”

Tooru does a double take on her phone screen. Oh, shit! “Wait, I can delete this--” she cries, just as a little checkmark at the bottom of the photo appears with the word read. “Oh noooooo! Not again!”

“Ribbit,” Tsuyu sighs in exasperation.

*

At around the same time, Shouto is drinking with Midoriya at his penthouse. They have their usual glasses of whisky between them. Sato comes by with a plate of zarusoba for him and katsudon for his green-haired friend. Shoji comes back from Dr. Koda’s to tell him that Victoria is doing splendidly. It’s a pleasant, stress free night and there’s absolutely nothing in Shouto’s mind that’s bothering him.

“You’re awfully relaxed,” Midoriya observes with a curious smile.

He sips his whiskey with sheer ease. “I am. All our projects are going along well, and Victoria’s healthy. Why wouldn’t I be relaxed?”

He laughs. “Uraraka-san’s blind date’s going on right now, isn’t it? I’d have thought you’d be, um, curious about it by now.”

“Why would you assume that?”

A muscle visibly twitches under Midoriya’s eye. “Well, you know, ‘cause you’ve been so dead set on wooing her so she’d marry you? And you made me do all those crazy things to help you? Not that I’m complaining about how crazy stressful it was or anything, but…”

Shouto cuts him off with a look of nonchalance. “Even so, I’m not worried about Secretary Uraraka going out on a single date with an unremarkable person. Objectively speaking, there’s no way that an ordinary person will interest her after our date.”

“Well, you may be right. But she wants ordinary, so I mean, I’d be a little worried.”

Midoriya is always expecting the worst. Shouto, however, is completely confident in this one. No ordinary man can do all the ordinary things she wants the way Shouto did them for her. “This date will end earlier than either of them planned. I’m sure of it.”

“Well, okay.” Midoriya’s phone vibrates on the table at that exact moment. He makes a surprised sound as he sees the screen. “Oh. Secretary Hagakure sent me a picture… huh, hottie alert, three bomb emojis…?”

“... you allow your secretary to speak to you that way?” Shouto asks, genuinely curious.

Midoriya laughs awkwardly. “N… no, she must have sent this by accident again. I mean, it’s fine, one time she sent me a video of Kirishima-kun doing push-ups at the helipad at Endeavor Tower… oh wait, I shouldn’t have told you that--”

Shouto shows him a face that just does not care, and Midoriya’s relieved for that. “Anyway, just gimme a sec to delete this… wait. This is Uraraka-san and--”

Shouto watches all the blood drain from Midoriya’s face, which happens in an impressive span of 0.75 milliseconds. “Is this… Kacchan?! ”

Shouto takes the phone from Midoriya’s grasp before either of them realize it. On the screen, Secretary Uraraka sits at a nondescript cafe. She’s wearing the same outfit she wore in his office hours ago, with the moonstone gleaming blue over her pale collarbone.

Across from her, an ordinary blonde man--no, an ordinary blonde punk --is reaching over and pinching her cheeks. The guy is smiling. Uraraka’s got an uncomfortable grimace that can easily be mistaken as a smile.

What the hell is this.

“T… Todoroki-kun, my phone, you’re destroying my phone--” Midoriya pleads from somewhere next to him.

How dare this… whatever the hell this guy is. Pinching his secretary’s cheeks familiarly and making her uncomfortable. Unforgivable. “What the hell is a Kacchan?”

Midoriya yelps as the world rumbles around him. “Th-that’s a guy I knew from childhood! Kacchan--I mean, Bakugou-kun… he’s that reporter who does those exposes! Remember, he did that one about Detnerat a couple years back?”

Ah, that one. He and his team exposed that the company used their technology to spy on their consumers for all sorts of delicate data. They were involved in a lot of unsavory things--organized crime, graft, bribery, cults. It was big news that led to their downfall and indirectly helped Endeavor Inc. prosper. Shouto thought it was impressive before, but now...

“That is not an ordinary man. Why would Uraraka be with him?”

Now, he feels threatened. Another person is out to get someone that belongs to him . And for once, he isn’t sure about the outcome.

“I… I don’t know,” Midoriya yelps. “Wh… where are you going, Todoroki-kun?”

Before he realizes it, the quiet Shouji and the alarmed Midoriya are chasing him as he’s on the way out of the door. He clicks his tongue and rushes out of the penthouse in irritated silence.

*

Ochako massages her cheeks in irritation. “You really went overboard there, Bakugou-kun,” she grumbles.

He sneers at her. “Your fuckin’ fault for having marshmallow cheeks.”

Bakugou doesn’t have a car, just a motorbike. He offered to take Ochako home on it, but it’s too scary. If she got in an accident, she wouldn’t be able to participate in Company Day, and Director Todoroki wouldn’t be happy about his office starting the games with a big disadvantage.

They’re waiting for the Uber to come pick her up. Bakugou clicks his tongue in distaste. “Tch. That icyhot bastard. Shitty Hair and Raccoon Eyes told me all about how he got you dangling on a string.”

She laughs lightly. “No, he’s not as bad as it sounds.”

He scowls. “Yeah he is. I get it if you’re just a chickenshit who’s scared to die on a motorbike, but you don’t wanna ride with me ‘cause you’re afraid of disappointing that half-and-half for fuckin’ Company Day. Your shitty boss has got you fuckin’ whipped .”

That almost sounds like a valid point. Puffing her cheeks in annoyance, she mumbles, “I’m also scared that you’ll kill us both. Don’t get me wrong.”

“Whatever.” Bakugou mindlessly fishes out a cigarette from his pocket. “That Uber’s taking his time. I’m gonna give that bastard a piece of--”

When the lighter comes out of his pocket, Ochako’s heart stops. She watches, frozen, as his thumb grazes the wheel of the lighter, threatening to form sparks. The fire’s already starting in her head even before it does in reality. She wants to stop him, but all she can manage is a squeak.

He hears her frightened noise and looks at her with alarmed red eyes. “Shit, I forgot.” He raises both his hands in the air. “I’m not lighting anything up, okay, calm your--”

It happens very fast: one moment Bakugou is talking, the next a hand decorated with bandaids appears out of nowhere and shoves him right in the face. He manages a swear word in before he attacks the person by pulling on his tie and swinging a fist.

The fist misses--barely. The other person steps backward, fist drawn back and mismatched eyes absolutely livid. Ochako finally processes what’s going on.

“Director Todoroki?!”

True enough, Todoroki Shouto is there on the sidewalk, eyes glowing and aura so threatening she swears she sees a mountain of ice looming behind him. He’s got a hand on Bakugou’s collar, while Bakugou has one hand on his. They both burn with obvious murderous intent.

“Half-and-half bastard!” Bakugou grits out, struggling against his grasp. “The fuck was that for?! You wanna die?!”

With a cold, cold voice, Todoroki answers, “You were about to send my secretary into a panic attack. I merely did what I had to do.”

She knew about the Director’s temper intimately. He’s calm like a bomb hiding in the lull of the ocean--cold, controlled, and terrifying in that way. But this… this is different. It only lasted for a few seconds when his hand landed over Bakugou, but Ochako saw it: unfiltered, uncontrollable rage.

For a moment, Ochako thought she was looking at Todoroki Enji.

Her instincts scream at her to stop him before it’s too late. “Director, I’m fine! Please don’t hurt him!”

“Tch, who’s hurting who? I’ll kick his ass!”

Thankfully, despite Bakugou’s rant, the Director listens to her and lets Bakugou go. The frightening chill in his eyes gradually ebbs, slowly, slowly. It takes a few moments before it’s completely gone, leaving a mildly confused look in his eyes that tells her he isn’t sure how he got there either.

“Secretary Uraraka--”

“--Kacchan! Todoroki-kun! Stop!!!”

Chief Midoriya comes running out from a car somewhere, followed by an alarmed Shouji. Ochako is left wondering what a Kacchan is, until she sees how the blonde’s face sours instantly.

“Shit, here we go,” Bakugou mutters, rubbing his face violently with one hand.

“Ohmygod I was so worried that both of you were hurt I didn’t know what was going on Kacchan I swear but we found out you were with Uraraka-san by accident and Todoroki-kun got worried and I swear I tried to stop him but--”

Ochako can hardly process a single word Chief Midoriya is saying. The other men are also starting to appear pretty overwhelmed about the word vomit accompanied by an onslaught of tears. Bakugou, in particular, is beginning to tick like a dynamite about to blow.

“--and if you were going to fight in the street Shouji-kun and I were ready to punch you guys just so you calm down but I’m glad you didn’t and--”

“Shut the fuck up, shitty Deku!”

This time, Bakugou launches himself toward the murmuring Chief, who gasps and flinches away. Luckily, the stoic Shouji successfully separates the two of them. Amidst the curses of the angry blonde, he turns questioningly to Director Todoroki. “Sir.”

The Director merely shakes his head. “We’re done. Secretary Uraraka, you’re coming with me.”

Before she can stop him, the Director’s grip is already on her wrist and she’s being dragged to his car. “Wait, Director--”

“Oi, asshole.” Bakugou’s stare is dark and unforgiving when he regards Todoroki again. “You think you can just walk away from me after trying to beat the shit outta me? I can charge you for assault, y’know.”

Director Todoroki gives him a look that’s just as dark. “Are you threatening me? Is this the part where you’re going to blackmail me for money?”

“Don’t insult me,” he growls. “Fuckin’ rich boy, you think throwing your dirty money around makes your problems go away? You think people can be bought and treated like property?”

He’s staring at the point where Todoroki’s got a hold on Ochako’s wrist. The Director notices and pulls Ochako even closer to him, far from Bakugou’s reach.

Midoriya turns to Bakugou. “Kacchan… please. Director Todoroki isn’t going to do it again,” he whispers fearfully.

Bakugou rubs his face with his hand. “Shut up, Deku. I’m not gonna ruin your shitty boss. But remember that I can if I want to.” He doesn’t hide the look of disgust in his eyes seeing Ochako behind the Director, but he still calls out to her as if he wasn’t there: “Uraraka, I’ll call you. I’m outta here.”

“A… all right, Bakugou-kun. Thank you,” she manages to say as he leaves, even when her wrist starts to feel like it’s freezing.

There’s a look in Bakugou’s eyes that tells her that he plans to come back for her soon. For her not to worry, he’ll get her out of there too, because suddenly he needs to do it for her. It doesn’t last long, though, as he shoves his helmet on and rides off on his motorcycle, not looking back once.

Todoroki Shouto’s grip on her suddenly feels like a ball and chain. As they walk to his car, he doesn’t let her go.

[bygosscarmine]

The Regrets of Park Soo Bong, Manhwa Assistant

a Soo Bong one-shot set in the W: Worlds Apart continuity

Set between Ch. 61 & 62, at the end of Volume II: Worlds Away

(1646 words) 

In which Soo Bong tries to patch things up with Ms. Editor, and things go as poorly as usual.  (ft. Kim Seul Gi’s character from Flower Boy Next Door)

Park Soo Bong was not sure what he had done in a past life to deserve his lot in this one, but lately he was adding several layers to his past-self's sins in his imagination.

"Hello, Editor Kim," he said, as he picked up her call with fear and trembling.

"YAAAAA" she exclaimed, the volume only slightly cut by the complex wireless relay system between them.

"Yes, see, I can explain," he said, glancing around the cafe where he was working, wondering if she'd been heard by the room in general.

"We had agreed," she said, now in an eerily quiet tone, "that there was going to be a little after-matter. A note from the author. I get an e-mail from you with a proposal to add a bit of an epilogue. Some scenes. Sure, I think, I'll consider it. Then this morning my alerts--because I've had to get a feed for alerts, so I know when anything is happening around here--tells me, Hello! Good morning! THERE HAS BEEN A NEW CHAPTER POSTED IN W BY OH SEUNG MOO."

"Yes. That is true. See, he was supposed to send me the draft. But he wanted to just be finished with it. He just posted it."

"He's not supposed to post it," she said, sounding baffled. "He's not supposed to have access to post it. How in the world does this keep happening?"

Soo Bong sighed.

There was silence on the line for a moment.

"Ms. Editor," Soo Bong ventured, "can I buy you a drink?"

The cackling laughter the emanated from his phone's speaker made him wince, but not because of its volume. He was afraid for a moment he had finally broken her.

"Oh boy. How wonderful. My most troublesome comrade wants to get me a drink. When do you think I will have time to go out for a drink? Maybe somewhere between talking my most unpopular author off the ledge and persuading my most money-making author he doesn't want to do a zombie romance? See, I'm sure I've said this before. I repeat myself a lot because I am so sleep-deprived it is mentally decapacitating. Decapitating?"

"Incapacitating," Soo Bong offered.

"Yes, thank you. I DO NOT SLEEP. I HAVE TOO MUCH WORK. EVERY MOMENT WE SPEAK I AM GETTING MORE LATE WITH THAT WORK. Goodbye."

The call blooped to a close.

Soo Bong stared at the phone. Then he had a terrible idea.

A few hours later, he stood in front of the publishing house's highrise building holding a bag containing fried chicken, jjajangmyun, and kimbap--just to be sure. It was a beautiful afternoon, the sun just dipping toward the river so the day grew golden. He had to leave this beauty behind to face his worst fear. Well, one of them. His worst fear was probably actually being eaten to death by beetles from the feet up, but humiliating himself in front of a superior was definitely up there.

The publishing house spread over four floors, midway up the building, and for a moment when he got in the elevator Soo Bong panicked, sure he had forgotten which floor her office was on. But when he stepped off at the 11thfloor, there was a reassuring sign that listed the departments housed here, including "Webtoon/Internet Media".

He steeled himself with a giant, sheepish grin and walked in.

Nodding and smiling, he made his way through the labyrinth of offices with furtive sidelong glances for the right department sign. When he finally made his way to the back he remembered it was in the corner, and turned left. He almost, but not quite, missed the correct cubicle because the chair was empty.

He was, however narrowly saved by a muttered expletive in a familiar tone. So he timidly said, "Editor Kim?" and poked his head in.

Editor Kim was struggling over the top of her large monitor, doing something with the wires in the back.

"Can I help you?" he asked, recognizing the signs of distress in the face of technology.

She whipped up, squinted at him, then laughed unpleasantly.

"What are you doing here? You brought me food? Bless you, what a little brown-noser. My keyboard has been going out for weeks now. The IT guy says I have beaten it to death, and it should be replaced, but this model is discontinued. If I jiggle the connector usually it comes back. It's fine."

It was disconcerting, the difference it made to catch her off-guard, struggling in the glaring fluorescent light. It gave her a very different aspect from business meetings set in the conference rooms or over the phone, at the mercy of the power of her voice. She was small in stature, with a wide, stubbornly dimpled face. The glare on it had no less ferocity for her diminutive size, but something about the moment made Soo Bong remember that her tirades came from a place not only of exhaustion, but fear of failure, too.

"Yes, I brought you food. I figured I couldn't do much else, but I know we've given you trouble. And I'm really sorry about it, but there's not a ton I can do."

Editor Kim flopped onto her chair, then clasped her hands over her lap and scrutinized him.

"You are worried," she pronounced. "The career of Oh Seung Moo is going sideways and you are going to have to find a new job. You're trying to make nice because you're running out of luck."

"Of course I'm worried," said Soo Bong, stung. "But even if I'm worried about the future I'm still neck-deep in work to do for Oh Seung Moo. And I'm trying to make that work go easier for both of us. Including taking care of you."

"Please don't, that's mypleasure to have," said a pleasantly deep male voice from behind Soo Bong.

It was Soo Bong's turn to whip around.

He looked up into the face of a fair-skinned, tall young man with irrepressible dimples set in a square, winsome face. He was carrying two steaming to-go cups, and shouldered past Soo Bong to say, "Here's that tea. Why haven't you fixed your keyboard yet? I told you Oh Jin Rok has a box of old keyboards you can use until we can replace or repair it. I'll bring one tomorrow."

There was a gentle mother-hen aspect to the fellow, swooping in on Editor Kim like a brooding bird. Soo Bong, who had been the recipient of tirades on the state of working singleness in South Korea, was a little disturbed to realize that she apparently had a boyfriend now. She sat, clutching her tea, and let the young man lean much more easily over her monitor to wriggle the connection until she gasped.

"It's back on!"

Then she took a sip of her tea and made an exaggerated face of delight at the taste.

It occurred to Soo Bong he was seriously intruding now.

"I'm glad," he said, hurriedly. "I will just leave this for you, give it to co-workers if you like. I just hope you can understand that we're all trying our best. And I'm sorry it's stressing you out."

"Well," she said, in a totally different voice than he had ever heard her use, with an affectionate gaze on her handsome young man, "I do understand your position. And I know that you have worked hard to make everything go on smoothly despite the catastrophes we've been beset by. I'm annoyed because the direction the manhwa went in was not what we'd planned together, but I also understand sometimes reality interferes with the vision in publishing. Sometimes its my job to make those bad decisions. I won't do you a bad turn just because of the difficulties. And honestly, once you're through helping Writer Oh with all this final contract closure and so on, you should change your resume to something like agent or liaison. You've seen more nuts and bolts than any assistant I know. no offense, Honey."

"I like it that way," her boyfriend averred. "I'm more a vision-and-execution guy."

Soo Bong thought it was pretty visionary to be helping Yeon Joo to learn to draw and execute the epilogue to W so they could shut down the portal between worlds, but he could hardly say that. So he did what he always did when authority figures had said the final word. He apologized for the intrusion, and fled.

Outside it was still a beautiful afternoon. He drove his car down to the river and tried to ignore the pinging of his phone with alerts for the reviews of W, the e-mails from the publishing house. He tried to envision himself in Editor Kim's position, as the thing he did all day every day, and shuddered. Then he frowned, thinking of her boyfriend. That man could definitely have come out of a manhwa, just like Chul. What was a comics assistant doing looking that handsome? Did he moonlight as an escort or a model or something?

When the alert he'd set up flashed activity on the W page, though, he opened it in dread. "She is going to kill me," he said without any doubt whatsoever, as he scrolled down the pages. "She's going to think I was there just to soften this blow."

He glared at the new "story" that unfolded before his eyes. It was so awkward to know that somewhere, these two were actually up to whatever it was they were doing in front of the whole internet.

"At least Yeon Joo is living the dream for the moment," he said to himself. "Just what the Chul fangirl in her always wanted, really. I'm surprised it took her this long."

He sighed, and restarted his engine to get back somewhere he could set up his laptop and get back to crisis management.

[your-art-is-gay]

Meet The Writer

1. What’s your oldest WIP, and how old is it? What inspired you to start it?

My oldest WIP that’s still currently in motion is my main one, The Academy. It turned two years old September 22 (ahh!!)

I got the idea when my dad (also a writer) suggested a school with a bunch of magical creatures living in tandem, instead of a magic school specifically for like wizards or whatever. I thought it sounded very interesting, so I took a couple of character’s I’d made before and started writing!

(Fun fact, a few of the main characters in the Academy were originally from a Percy Jackson fanfiction about demigods with fears that greatly contradicted their powers! Paris was a son of Aphrodite who was terrified of falling in love, and Kieran was a son of Hecate who despised magic! Early drafts of the Academy had very heavy influence from Greek Mythology as well, up until I decided that I really didn’t want it to be so similar to Percy Jackson and created my own mythos instead.)

2. What’s your biggest pet peeve when it comes to writing?

I tend to overanalyze, well, everything in my writing. One of the worst feelings is when I think of something really clever and then I discover that it opens up a plot hole in an earlier portion. Oh well, that’s what revisions are for, right? *gross sobbing*

3. What scene did you enjoy writing the most out of all your WIPs? What scene did you enjoy writing the least?

Ooohhh, that’s a good question. Frankly, I’m not entirely sure. I definitely really like the quiet, romantic scenes, because I’m a total sap and I don’t get to write many of those.

As for the one I liked the least, well… One of my main characters has been through some pretty traumatic shit in their past, and partway through the book they have a nightmare and completely break down, and gods I hated writing that. It hurts me so much to put them through that.

4. What’s your favorite trope?

Well, I have a lot of them. I really like characters who are done with everything and everyone and only go along with the crazy shit that happens to them because they have to. Like, they’ll let the plot drag them around but by the gods they’re kicking and dragging their heels along the way. I also really like casual fourth-wall breaking, Gilligan cuts, and the *thing happens and two characters in the background exchange money* tropes.

5. Which of your protagonists do you relate to the most?

Well, I have a character that’s very heavily based off of me―and who also shares my name. Although, while they were written with the intention of being somewhat of a self-insert, they’ve grown and changed as a character so much now that we really aren’t alike anymore. Frankly, I’m not entirely sure. I’d probably say Nick just for simplicity’s sake, but I don’t really know.

6. What is the worst writing experience you’ve ever had with another writer, anywhere, since you’ve started writing?

I don’t really talk to people in general. I don’t think I can recall a negative experience with another writer, actually.

7. What character from a famous story, book/movie/comic/game, or otherwise, do you despise the most? Why?

Severus motherfucking Snape. I have so many reasons for hating him.

He was an abusive, racist prick who got pissed when his female friend wasn’t romantically interested in him, called her a racist name when she tried to help him, and fucked off to join the wizard Nazis.

He only defected over to the good side because he was still obsessed with Lily and was afraid of her being murdered.

He literally asked Voldemort to spare Lily so he could be with her―sure, kill the year-old infant and the man she actually loves, but no, keep her alive so I can force my love on her.

Despite being a supposedly “good” guy, he mentally abused his students for years, so much so that he even became Neville Longbottom’s worst fear.

Neville Longbottom, who frequently goes to see his essentially braindead parents and is alluded to being able to remember when they were tortured so badly that they became that way, was tormented so badly by Snape that he became Neville’s worst fear.

Upon finding the Potter house after the were killed, he completely breezes past James’ body, ignored the wailing and bleeding child in the crib, just to hold Lily’s body and weep over how he never got to sleep with her.

He has an unreasonable hatred for Harry just because Harry looks like James.

He was so salty about something that happened when they were children (that wasn’t even Lupin’s fault, by the way) that he outed Lupin as a werewolf and forced him to resign, depriving Hogwarts of the only good DADA teacher it ever had.

And yet, despite all of this, he is given a redemption arc. He is considered a redeemable character, when Draco Malfoy, a literal child who was tortured and abused for a good portion of his life and had very little of a say in most of his awful choices, “doesn’t have a heart of gold.”

Snape is seen as a romantic, selfless guy by a good portion of the fandom because…he was obsessed with a girl who wanted nothing to do with him? Because of a throwaway line where he proclaimed he would always be obsessed with a girl who wanted nothing to do with him?

It’s bad enough that the fans think this, but the books treat it like this as well!! SNAPE, of all people, gets a redemption arc―if you can even call those bullshit excuses that. I, for one, am thoroughly sick of abusive characters getting redeemed.

(Sorry for ranting, I have a lot of feelings about this.)

8. What’s your favorite line of dialogue you’ve ever written?

Most of my characters are sarcastic little shits, so that’s really hard to say.

9. Who’s the worst character you’ve ever written, in terms of morality?

Well….hm….  The thing about my characters, particularly my antagonists, is that I do my very best to make them something other than just evil. In their eyes, their bad actions are justified. So, it’s really hard to choose.

My main villain is a very self-righteous, ambitious sort of guy. He’s kinda racist (a lot of older magi in my story just….really don’t like the fae), and thinks that the magi (magical folk) are superior. BUT, instead of wanting to take over the world or anything, he just wants to leave. Long story short, the magi are originally from another dimension, and it’s there that he wants to return them. Unfortunately, this other dimension is presumed to have been destroyed, and even if it is there, opening a rift to go there could potentially completely destroy our world. He doesn’t care about that, though―after all, it’s only humans and dirty fae that would die.

The only other character I can think of is the one I just really hate. Like, she just oozes evil and I kind of love to write her, because I don’t really have any other characters that have that slick evil personality. But she’s a pretty terrible person too. Her twin brother was taken by the fae as an infant, a changling left in his place. The changeling doesn’t know that yet―but she does.

Their entire life, she’s blamed him for why she doesn’t have her actual brother. She pretends like she loves him, but the entire time she’s been emotionally abusing him and making him constantly feel like crap about himself. She’s even physically abused him, by taking iron and burning him whenever she can get away with it.

I think she’d probably be the worst.

10. Do you prefer happy endings or bad endings? Or do you prefer the middle ground?

Definitely good endings. I can appreciate well-written bad endings, but only after I get over my initial emotional response to it. Sometimes, that takes me a while―like Swarm by Scott Westerfeld. I read that almost a year ago and I’m still fucking pissed. I’m just not really a fan of endings that leave a bad taste in my mouth. (One of the reasons I chose to reread Huck Finn for English instead of doing Of Mice And Men, despite the fact that I kind of loath Huck Finn.)

I’m also aware that not all stories can have feel-good endings, and in many of them, those types of endings just don’t make sense. *squints at the end of Mockingjay*

But, in general, I greatly prefer good endings.

[okimargarvez]

UNDER PRESSURE

Original title: Sotto pressione.

Prompt: post 13x15.

Warning : none. Genre: angst, romantic, family.

Characters: Penelope Garcia, Luke Alvez.

Pairing: Garvez.

Note: oneshot 25 in Garvez collection.

Legend: 💏😘🔦.

Song mentioned: La tua vita non passerà, Tiziano Ferro.

MY OTHER GARVEZ STORIES

UNDER PRESSURE

 They talk, they talk, they talk, they say that I dream, but they lie, they lie...

The woman drives away the frustration while her eye burns them terribly. She throws the contact lens into the appropriate container and finally wears the old and beloved glasses again. Forced to be who she is not, for almost ten hours a day. Yes, it's true that she always had to put a good face on it, but not with them, not with her team.

No, she doesn't have to think about it. It was the initial mistake, that of wanting... everything... everything...

This is her life now. Probably it will be until she takes her last breath. She rinses her face with cold water, remove any layer of makeup. She looks in the mirror and doesn't recognize herself. Those short hair don't belong to her.

I resemble the world in many aspects and in its most evident faults...

She sits on the bed. She removes the shoes, only five centimeters high heel, black paint color. She throws them into one side of the room. She also removes the suit. Beige. It's the only nuance that is not good for her, it is unshakable, it has no personality. She is depriving her of her way of being, as if it were the wedding garment that Medea has given to her Jason's bride, to take revenge. Or the robe worn by Heracles, soaked with the ointment that the centaur Nessus gave to Deianira, succeeding in this way to kill one of the greatest demigods of ancient mythology... ok, she reads too much, in the evening. She has too much free time available.

I made too many things wrong, roads, I entered a few churches so rarely, tomorrow I will leave even if you don't want to...

She also removes the bra, while she laughs alone. Her laughter spreads across the room, bounces off the walls and comes back. The emptiness surrounds her and soon, will be able to incorporate her, make her disappear. She will become one of the many who work without passion, without knowing why she do it. She will repeat the same gestures indefinitely, until she becomes not even more aware. Soon there will not be much difference between her and whatever piece of furniture in her office.

Your life will not pass, it will not pass, it will not pass, I will not give up your life at every failure ...

She wears a pink nightgown, decorated with various images of unicorns. She closes her eyes and tries to feel that scent, something, anything that she remembers who it is. But she doesn't hear anything.

The vibration of the cell phone on the bedside table makes her jump. She grabs it by praying that there is no case. Once (and yet it has been two months since that day, it seems 2 or 20 years) she would have been happy to have to run to work. Because here she would find...

She reads the name in the sender. Cool Hand Luke.

Another giggle escapes from her, then she wonders why he texts her. Will he have a wrong number? Something will not happen to JJ or Matt or... She opens it holding her breath. I entrust your life to the wind, which changes the terms and derails them, takes people and dazzles them because often the world makes mistakes...

Hey, Garcia, how are you? I hope I'm not bothering you. I wanted to ask you if you want to get some tea. I should talk to you about something. She smiles, her lips bent gently upwards. Only he could be so careful to detail. Not a coffee, but a tea. Damn Newbie. She sighs and stares the screen until it turns off.

Hey, obviously she omits answering his first question, ok, is it something serious? When would you like to go? She deletes the last sentence. In this way it seems like a date, while it's simply about... it's definitely about work. She sees no other reason why he should contact her. Damn, they have not seen each other for two months. Two months. No one in the new workplace has ever looked at her like him, in this time frame. No one called her chica, nor even flirted just for fun with her. Nobody ever told her she did a great job. She deletes the entire message.

Has something bad happened? Don't make me worry, Alvez. She presses send before changing her mind again. As if she were on a precipice waiting for the right moment to throw herself. What a bad image.

No, not really. Are you free, then? Tomorrow night? The man' response arrives very quickly. As if he were in front of the screen, as if he were waiting... she is going too many mental journeys. This haven't stopped, at least some things don't change.

Yes, if I don't have a case. Same goes for you, I guess. I'll let you know at the time. This time at least one-minute passes before the screen lights up again.

Ok. From O'Keef at eight? Reading that name destabilizes her much more than everything else. It's a happy place, full of good memories, carefree evenings...

No, please, let's choose another place. Any one, but not that. I'm not ready. Now, that she doesn't see him every day, it's useless to keep showing herself cold and indifferent, not allowing him to glimpse not even a small part of her weakness.

Of course, Penelope, there is no problem. I know a nice place, very colorful and noisy. I'll send you the address tomorrow. Good night. He manages to snatch almost a moan from her. How the heck does he is so sweet and so smart to guess always? Why can he understand that what she needed was noise, confusion, something that didn't make her feel the weight of the loneliness she brought with her from that blessed day?

Thank you. Night.

 They talk, they talk, they talk, and they say that I dream, however, they lie, they lie...

The man opens the door of his apartment and enters. The sheepdog runs towards him, showing him how much she missed him. -Hello, girl, I know, I missed you too.- he kneels, crouching to sink the face in the thick fur of the animal and inhales her scent strongly. This gesture has always calmed him, ever since he came back from Iraq and he never stopped doing it, every time he found himself in crisis, he risked to relapse... for example after seeing Penelope in tears for Reid and having had two small talk with Shawn. Or after seeing Scratch falling without doing anything. And surely when he found out that a bastard had shot Garcia during a date. And from that day, when Linda Barnes had decided to destroy everything... well, it had become increasingly necessary.

I'll go back, when I want, because you know, who doesn't have a life... dreams...

The jet landed at six in Quantico. He has all the time in the world to get ready. She has already assured him that the coast is clear, nothing fish to fry. She tried to show the usual Garcia, but she didn't succeed very well. He understood that there is something different, that she is forced, yes, even by the way she wrote those texts. Not that before (as it sounds, even in his head, this adverb of time, as if it were about centuries ago) had exchanged who knows how many messages. But those few times she didn't miss an opportunity to prick him, just a little. To provoke him. And he certainly didn't pull back. Yesterday evening, instead...

Yesterday she has sounded shut off. She even showed herself to be weak, telling him she didn't want to go to O'Keef. It was obvious that she would not like it, he had to guess it. What a fool!

I mistook day and night by dreaming and I can't sleep ...

He pulls himself up and prepares Roxy's dinner quickly. Another gesture that calms him, because so habitual, so reassuring in its repeating smoothly. Here it can't happen that a Linda (Spencer was right, Linda was a problem) suddenly arrives and destroys everything in her path. Two years of hard work wiped away in a second, to be able to integrate himself, to trust others...

He goes to the bathroom and gets naked, getting rid of anxiety alongside sweaty clothes. First, he removes the boots, putting them on the side, then the shirt, the red one amaranth, the dark trousers, the underwear and the white socks. He opens the water and slips under the jet of hot water, the steam rises, enveloping his body. He grabs the shampoo bottle and puts some liquid in one hand, rubs his hair, long as when he had known her, he closes his eyes and tries not to tremble at the thought that, in less than an hour, he'll see her again.

Two months, sixty days without a misplaced joke, a zinger, eyes turned to the sky, unbecoming nicknames... even if the last time she had called him cool guy. Yeah, he had made progress. Finally, she realized that he wasn't the playboy she wanted so much... and Barnes had to intrude herself by sending everything to hell. Thank you very much. But perhaps something positive could sprout from this mess.

While passing the sponge on the back and chest he remembers the dialogue with JJ. She had told him that she hadn't talk to Penelope for a century. She was practically gone. The same was true of Tara and Emily; the girls had tried to invite her to one of their women' nights, but nothing, she hadn't even answered, if not the next day with I’m sorry, I was overworked. Overworked. Not a term she would use. Obsolete and weird, yes, but not in the sense in which she usually expressed herself. Not even Reid, who found the experience of teaching rather formative (more humanly than unprofessionally), or Rossi, engaged in the drafting of a novel where the supreme head of a team, a bureaucrat without the slightest training on the field, she went to a lot of trouble... but even Matt was no longer able to contact her.

He had been thinking about it for a while. All this mysterious situation had made him definitively worry. They were in the same damn building and they had never even crossed their streets. Not in the parking lot, not in the elevator, nothing. He knew in which unit she had been transferred. He had heard about it. And just he couldn't imagine her among those people, each interested exclusively in their careers, to add a plaque on the desk.

That's why he was surprised, yesterday, when she answered him. Why he and not the others? Maybe he just caught her at the right time, for once. He decided he wanted to believe this.

It's made of prohibitions and all of our things, life is always beautiful because life doesn't rest...

All the foam flows in to the drain. He closes the tap and goes out, grabs a towel and puts it around his waist. He threads a pair of terry slippers, walking towards the bedroom. He opens the wardrobe and pulls out a shirt. Blue. This time he doesn't need to ask for a second opinion, that of Roxy, of course. He knows (without knowing why) that this is the right choice. When he thinks he is dry enough, he puts on a tight white shirt. It's not too hot outside. But not even inside (inside him). Another pair of trousers, not jeans, without front pockets, clear, which stand out the muscles of his calves. And casual shoes but not completely elegant.

Back in the bathroom, he looks in the mirror. He passes a hand through his hair, already dry. He combs them quickly, glances at the clock nearby. He has still just five minutes. He puts on his wrist the bracelet that Phil gave him. Spray deodorant and even a scent, but delicate and almost imperceptible.

He grabs the jacket, then changes his mind to the last and opt for the denim jacket. Better.

He sighs, takes wallet, house keys, car keys and cell phone. The bare minimum.

I'm leaving home now. Are you already there? He is afraid of receiving in reply that she will not be there, that in the end some unforeseen will prevent her from reaching him, that he has only deluded himself... instead, quite the contrary.

No, but I'm almost there. It's not even from her, to be on time. There is definitely something wrong. He turns to Roxy. -Hey, girl, now I have to go. But if all goes well, I will not go back alone.- the dog almost seems to nod. -I bring Penelope back home, I promise.-

 He enters in the bar and looks around. He immediately meets the gaze of a blonde woman, as confused as he is. He approaches frowning. -Garcia?- now it is certain, it is her. The hair is short, very short, smooth, cut into an almost military bowl haircut that leaves uncovered a good part of her neck. She wears a strange, dark suit that makes her look like a lawyer. The make-up is light, no eyeliner, not even lipstick. And no colorful glasses; probably she wears contact lenses. He had never noticed before how big her eyes were.

-Luke.- she doesn't move, doesn't stand up to greet him, she just looks at him. It is however strange and significant that she decided to call him by name. He takes off his jacket, leans it on the chair and positions himself in front of her. -I'm sorry for the clothes, but I just got out of work. A colleague of mine left early and I also had to finish his part. I didn't have time to change. I hope you don't mind.- the really Garcia, two months ago, would have known how to make some good joke from a situation like that. The woman who is before him now, however, limited to expose her justification with a flat and aseptic tone. She, who cared so much to every detail, who personally chose every accessory to wear combined with the clothes...

-No, it's just that... You're... you're so... weird.- the truth escapes from him, he just can't hold it. His upheaval certainly doesn't go unnoticed. The woman finds herself giggling and shaking her head, as if he had made a joke.

-I'm with you from a second, and I already seem to be back home.- here, this looks even more like the original Garcia. But still, her eyes are definitely less bright and lively, less mischievous. -So... what did you want to talk to me, cool guy?- she had say it again. She used that nickname. Penelope bites her tongue, cursing herself. But the impact wasn't strong just for him. Luke is beautiful, as always. But there's something strange about him too. He didn't shave perfectly, he cut his own cheek, if she'll put her finger on his skin, she could follow all the way...

-Nothing, it's just that... you're disappeared.- he decides to go slowly, to not did further pressure to her. After all, she is the one who was thrown in the middle of the sharks without life preservers. She is alone, but she has to continue to do what she did before, without being herself. -We work in the same building but never see each other.- he is aware of what may seem, what truly is, but he doesn't want her to know and he's hurry to continue -I mean, also with JJ and Matt.- he can't prevent his cheeks from turning red. -It's not strange? I know that you don't even be in touch with others.- at the end he says everything, without filters. It seems as if he is blaming her, that he is accusing her of something. At least it is in this sense that she perceives it.

-Well, I've been very busy.- she justifies herself by crossing her arms over her chest. It is certainly the first time that not even a small part of her breast is exposed to sight. He gives himself to the maniac, but that thought doesn't leave him free anyway. The woman notices the insistence of his gaze, but the war is temporarily interrupted by a very attractive waitress who takes their orders. Luke ignores her almost completely.

-Do you like what you do? How are you?- he asks as soon as they are alone again. He was right, the place is very welcoming, there is a strange atmosphere, as if time were suspended; the tables are all wooden, the walls covered with posters that date back to the late 1980s, a persistent music fills every empty space. And then there is the cheerful voice of other people. As he speaks, he approaches her a little.

For a while, she seems not to have heard the two questions. -Oh, Newbie, I missed your interrogation!- she is happy that he didn't ask her why she clearly avoided talking to others. And once again she wonders why she has answered him affirmatively, why she is here. Should not. This goes against the pact that she was forced to sign. She lets the nickname slip on her tongue as if she couldn't avoid it in any way. She smiles almost maliciously. -Anyway... it's not that bad. It's not the first time that I collaborate with a different team.- she adds in a professional tone, not without some uncertainty that leads man to understand that she is lying, or at least omitting part of the truth.

-I missed being called in this way.- he says this purposefully. In another situation, if they were in their offices, miles away, one in a country and one in another, this could also seem like a joke, a flirtation to ease the accumulated tension in trying to save as many human lives as possible.

But she deliberately decides to ignore these implications. -What do you really want, Alvez?- the waitress returns and settles their drinks on the table. -You can't have called me just for a chat.- she decrees, raising an eyebrow. -Do you feel lonely? Lisa is not enough for you?- here, he seems to feel a tiny pinch of jealousy. Luke chuckles, because he doesn't see Dr. Douglas from that date when they have play at the foosball table a century ago. Yet, she didn't seem particularly worried when she broke their first date. Of course, she had begun to deliriously as usual... but this is not all that significant.

He sighs and leans a hand towards the mug of beer. Look at the yellow liquid, similar to the color of the hair of his ex-colleague. -It didn't work. But basically, it's better this way.- the pure truth, nothing more and nothing less. The tone of man is not displeased, it shows no shade of sadness, although this implies exactly what Garcia has asked him, only to provoke him: solitude.

-Oh, I'm sorry.- she's honest too, and he believes her easily. The lips, so clear in their natural color, bend slightly downwards and a wrinkle appears on her forehead. But he can't stop staring at those brown eyes. Yes, they are definitely big, huge. -How is Phil?- apparently the interrogation has turned over. Now she is the one who asks the questions. -And Roxy?- hearing the name of his dog he can't help but smile gently.

-Phil is fine, he's making some progress...- he says before taking a sip of his beer. Bitter. But perhaps it is he who perceives everything in that perspective, since the hag had cast her spell. -And Roxy...- he hesitates a moment, but then he remembers the promise made to his girl. -...why don't you come see her? I'm sure she'd like it...- using his dog has always been the best way to get positive attention from the blonde. A bit 'sneaky and even incorrect, but he cares little.

Garcia takes an eternity before opening her mouth again. He watches her drink her drink, turning the little colored umbrella, pulls it out to use it as a toothpick and sticks the lemon slice, then she brings it to the mouth and suck the liquid, without producing any vulgar or annoying noise. He remains as enchanted by these simple gestures. -No.- she finally says. -I don't think it's the case.- her lips are wet from a few drops of lemon.

Who knows what flavor they have, if they would have had a bitter taste too. -Is that all you had to tell me?- he is silent. She finishes drinking and puts the empty glass on the table. -Then, I have to go.- she stands up and turns to take the jacket. At that moment Luke notices two things at the same time: first the shoes, black and without heel, well, only a few centimeters, practically slippers for the computer technician's standards; and then he notices how much she looks smaller, in those clothes so unusual for her, she also lost weight. Stress, definitely.

In a second, he is standing next to her and his fingers wrapped like coils, like handcuffs, albeit gently, around the woman's wrist. -Hey, wait.- Garcia looks at him but without protesting. -The unit needs you, Penelope.- this is only the easy half of the matter. -I, I need you.- he finally exclaims, emphasizing the personal pronoun. She almost abandons herself on the chair. He too returns to settle in front of her. The mug is still half full. He feels like freed from a burden. BAU needed Penelope Garcia because no one had her abilities, her speed in identifying the right information. About this no one would have nothing to say.

-You?- her huge brown eyes, doe eyes (he must have read this in some novel, such kind of expression, but he had never happened to apply it in the real world) are opened, exactly as when this wild animal at night is on a dangerous road and the headlights of a car illuminate it before the possible impact. -Why?- Penelope falters, her head spinning and the whole room becomes blurred. Damn contact lenses, she hates them. If at least she was able to remove...

Luke decides that by now he did the first important step, he can't hide his hand after throwing the stone. So, he reaches out and grabs her hand, without even looking. His body automatically moves in the right direction, almost guided by a superior force. -This job is empty, without your jokes that have nothing to do with the case.- well, it was just this. Newbie lacked someone to joke with, someone who could smile despite everything, nothing more. This, she was for him: a fool who made a clown.

Penelope feels anger increasing and clenching her throat, tears sting her eyes and wet her eyelashes. She can't cry, not only because Luke is in front of her, but mostly because the damned lenses get dirty, if she does. -BAU also need Reid's intelligence, Rossi's experience, Emily's loyalty, Tara's insights. Not just my jokes.- she growls, listing the other members of the team. It's immediately obvious to the man that she misinterpreted his sentence. She felt diminished, while his goal is to make her understand how important she is, but not just for the team.

Luke shakes his head, annoyed. -It's not just that, you know what I meant...- he looks at her directly in the way he has always looked at her, his hand still on hers, even the partially intertwined fingers, although she tried to get rid of it, but he is too strong, or the woman's attempts have been weak. -However, you're right.- he doesn't made any effort to admit it. Garcia doesn't smile in a victorious gesture. -But I, I only need you.- again that underlining. -Before, I was a loner, I thought it was better this way, it was simpler, nobody worried about me, but now I love this group, we are a family, I love everyone, but I love you a little bit more.- he's never let himself go with her so much on such a subject. She had sensed something when she had met Phil. From behind the column she had heard him explain to his friend how hard it was to start a normal life again, after returning from Iraq and how much Roxy had helped him. Because he needed a reason for wanting to live. Before this, she had never really thought, that Luke could have such pains within himself. Her ingenuity and her security system prevented her from getting there. She couldn't really imagine him, in a context like war. She had wondered what kind of thoughts could ever crossing his head in such a period. And how much lonely he was felt. And now he is clearly saying it, he is writing black and white that, apart from Lisa's parenthesis, he has neither wanted no one for a long time. And that now he is ready to have it. And he wants her.

The clarity of this thought strikes her like an invisible fist in her stomach, stealing the air from her. She nods and grabs the man's glass, taking a sip, before Luke's uncertain gaze. She's not a beer-type, but she needed to swallow that lump in her throat. -Why are you telling me these things? Why exactly now?- one question after another, to silence the thousand voices in her head. Her voice sounds like that of a child. Finally, she manages to free her hand and carried it on her ribs, as in the period shortly after she had been shot. -The team is gone, Luke. It's over.- she almost hears a crack as she says it.

Your life will not pass, it will not pass, it will not pass... your life will be stronger, of what they sometimes told you... -No, look at me, Penelope, please.- when she executes that simple request she realizes that even the Luke's eyes are shiny. The last time she saw him like that, it was at Walker's funeral. -Do you remember what I told you when Reid was in trouble?- he asks in a caressing, delicate, low, and extremely deep voice. And sexy. Damn it, how can he be so exciting in such a dramatic moment? Such an intense gaze like his should be forbidden. -that we will get Reid through this, we will have managed it, and so it has been.- he answers by himself, then he observes the mug and end its contents in a single sip. He stands up, wears his jacket and is imitated by a completely distraught Penelope. When she's ok he takes her by the arm and heads for the bar to pay.

Only when they are out in the cool evening air, she seems able to talk again. -It was different, he was innocent, while we...- she silences, shakes her head and looks around, as if she were looking for someone or something. An escape route.

-What is it that you don't want to say?- Garcia doesn't answer. -There's something you didn't tell me, I see it.- he reads in her big eyes how much she hates the fact that he's a profiler. But work has nothing to do with it.

Finally, like a dormant volcano that has managed to convince everyone that it's non-dangerous, she suddenly erupts. -Ok, all right!- she shouts loudly. -If you really want to know... Barnes made me promise to close relations with all of you. Well, it's not that she really made me promise, let's say she has "warmly" recommended me...- for a moment she loses herself in trifling matters, like her usual did, before that day. -If I hadn't, she would have sent me to prison. And she would have forced all of you to leave...- she didn't want that he discover this part, but she didn't make it. She can't keep secrets or things of this kind only for herself. They also made fun of her for this. But she doesn't want to be a martyr. She absolutely doesn't want his compassion and even worse his pity.

-In prison?- finally he is the one seriously upset. She enjoys the triumph in silence. -What?- man can't conceive of such a possibility. Or the reasons why a person like Penelope can end up behind bars. For excess of sweetness? Behavior too uninhibited? Illegal distribution of tea? And then, late, the other consideration also hits him. She sacrificed herself for them. She couldn't talk to them, with any one of her old team, she was forced into exile. And this is not absolutely right.

Penelope emits a bitter laugh. -I'm a hacker, Luke.- she decides to be magnanimous and not wait that him arrives on his own to the right conclusion. He could very well do it, she knows how clever and perceptive he is, more than she wanted to admit. But for certain things, he seems almost as naive as she is. All the pieces find their place in the man head. -How do you believe I know certain tricks? Why do you think I ended up working for the BAU?- this was really a too loud bomb and she shot him straight in the face. Despite the jacket, the woman getting cold. She shudders only a little.

-Penelope, you can't carry this weight alone.- a third question enlightens his mind. Why had she decided to break that sort of contract and see him, why him, the one who had known her for less time, and not the others? A slight flame is re-ignited. But she is quick to turn it off.

-Never mind.- she shrugs like if it were nothing. She has always done so, grin and bear it. When Reid was arrested she and JJ carred about his mother's, she worried that she always had a hot meal, to cite just one example. - Now I have to go.- again that phrase, which breaks into his thoughts.

-No.- he stops her only with that monosyllable, without needing to grasp her physically or add more. -Are you dating anyone?- now that this threshold has passed, he can afford to be jealous of the idea that she, in these two months, has found someone else. And maybe right at work. Perhaps one who didn't limit himself to sraring her as if she was a miracle on this earth, but has found the courage to ask her a date, without fear of ending up incinerated like Anchise with Aphrodite.

-This argument has never been your business.- she defends herself as she can, but she no longer has any strength. She's about to give in, it's obvious now. Luke approaches her a step. She hears the slight rustling of his shoes, it's still early but few cars pass by the street. She has her eyes closed. She can't cry.

-Unfortunately you're right, could you answer however?- she feels his breath create like a cloud of steam that comes directly into her face. The heat is too much, the last straw. When she tries to lift her eyelids, she realizes that he is much closer than she believed. She never got the chance to observe his dark eyes at such a distance. She takes advantage of it to capture a thousand details, nuances. She is so close to that scratch on his cheek... just a caress, just one...

-No, I'm not dating anyone.- she responds without being able to look away from the male. She's like hypnotized, in a trance. -My life is work, Luke. It will always be like that.- she explains. But the words don't agree with the subdued tone. She sees the great hands of him rise and reach her cheeks and she knows in advance what he is about to do. She literally abandons herself, allowing him to grasp her lips with his own, to slightly bite the lower one, to the point of shaking her along the spine, to make her mouth open to intrude his tongue in and start a wild fight with hers.

Yet she is conscious of every action of her own, she doesn't lose the sense of reality. She feels her own arms moving, a hand resting on the man's back, on his shoulder blade and bringing him closer to her, as if she needs more heat. The other instead ends right on the cheek of the man, she feels the roughness of the shaved beard hairs and she identify the scratch, following the path.

When he detaches her lips from the female ones, exclusively for lack of oxygen, he still can't stay too far from her. He lays his forehead against hers. Since Garcia doesn't wear her usual stilts, the difference in height between them is even more noticeable. -If I managed to do this, all together we can save the team, don't you think?- he tries a joke, but he is extremely serious.

-Starting a clandestine relationship that goes against the regulation, is not v the best of the ideas you've had, Newbie.- and she seems to understand it, because she responds in the same way. As if Luke's lips had been able to restore her true essence, what she was beginning to forget. He wiped out all the beige with a single gesture.

-That means that you liked the others?- that grimace, that crooked smile, all leaning to the left, the white teeth partially visible. How much did she miss it, without realizing it? She also had the courage to wonder why he and not the others.

-You always twist my words against me!- but it's a protest for play, to see how far he can get, to pretend that the BAU is still together, that she shouldn't return in the cold, cold and impersonal apartment that they had gave to her. Where cats aren't allowed. It was the last time she saw Emily, when she gave Sergio gave back to her. Heck, how much she misses everyone.

-That's why you like me so much, don't you?- he satisfies her, answering her jokingly and as their noses touch, before a second kiss, Penelope realizes that even if they were to get married, this thing will not change between them. They will continue to prick each other even when he has to help himself with the stick and she will be almost completely blind and maybe even deaf as a post.

It was absolutely not a rational thought. They aren't even together, and she already imagines their eternity? The man realizes that one of the moans is too much like a sob. -Luke...- she is crying. Her whole body is shaken by unstoppable sobs.

Luke puts a hand on the woman's back and pushes her against his chest. She puts her head in but doesn't stop sobbing. -Sorry, I didn't want to make you cry, I'm so stupid.- he believes it's his fault. She enjoys those caresses on the hair, behind the ear (how the hell does he know it's one of her sensitive spots?) and on her back.

-It's not for you, it's ... this whole situation.- finally she manages to calm down enough to formulate some coherent and meaningful sentence. -I kept the pain inside for these two months, I didn't allow myself to cry even a tear, because then I would have admitted that it was really over. I missed all of you, so much, yes, you too.- they laugh together. A few drops also fall down from man's face, until the scratch, then on the neck, left naked by those too short hair.

Even when they shout to you, run, bastard, run, your life stays in here, I defend it, I defend it...

-You missed me too, Penelope. I can't imagine you in another team, all alone. Dressed like that... I guess they don't even allow you to make your own jokes.- she doesn't detach herself from that embrace that they both pursued at least from the trial for the detention of Reid, certainly since he had found her in tears in her office. She wraps her arms around Luke's mighty back.

-The paragon of professionalism.- words that seem to come from another timing. -Luke, you have no idea. She forced me to wear civilian clothes because... because I also have to take care of the support of the victims' relatives. I can't do everything, I can't do it.- he's about to open his mouth but she raises her head in his direction making him understand that she hasn't finished yet. -She also forced me to put these damned contact lenses, which my eyes deeply dislike. And... I live in a tiny apartment, in a complex, very close to the office, because at least in that way I can't be late.- another sob, though no more salty drops growing in her eyes. She sinks her face into Luke's jacket and inhales his scent. -I had to give up Sergio.- a phrase that corresponds to a long groan.

-Oh, baby, we'll get through this.- he takes her face in his hands and she gets up on the tips to reach his lips in a kiss less passionate than the first two, but decidedly more intense and full of responsibility. Both linger one suspended on the other's mouth. -You will not have to endure this situation for a long time. Do you believe me? - the mind rationally should suggest her to respond negatively.

Instead for the first time it agrees with the heart. -Yes.- he smiles, still holding her in his arms. They need both external and internal heat.

-What would you like to do now? Do you prefer to see others or...- there has never been a quicker and simpler answer to give. Of course, as they both said, it's not just him who needs her back in the BAU, but the whole team, who they consider as a family. This is absolutely true. But then there are only them and they can't see beyond their noses.

- Well, you don’t told me that Roxy misses me...?-

TAGS: @theshamelessmanatee @itsdawnashlie @talesoffairies @janiedreams88 @kiki-krakatoa @yessenia993 @teyamarra @c00lhandsluke  @gcchic @arses21434 @orangesickle @entireoranges @jarmin @kathy5654 @martinab26 @thisonekid @thenibblets @perfectly-penelope @ambrosiaswhispers @maziikeen92 @lovelukealvez @reidskitty13 @jenf42 @gracieeelizabeth27 @silviajajaja @smalliemichelle99 @charchampagne14 @ichooseno  @ megs2219 @rkt3357 @franklintrixie @thinitta @chewwy123 @skisun @maba84 @saisnarry @myhollyhanna23 @thenorthernlytes

[ill-be-bold]

Hello! My name is Talac, nice to meet you! I am a yearling stud colt out of BLM Mustang Chief Wildfire and a Percheron/Quarter Horse mare named Thunder.

My dad Chief used to be a wild Mustang out in South Steens, Oregon until he was about 2 to 4 years old - there is some question on how old he was, as photos showed him seemingly with his own mares when he was taken in and put up for adoption. Now, he is around 20-22 years old (but shhh, we don’t like to talk about his age) and he is truly a rare find.

Dad isn’t what most people imagine when they think of stallions. He is one of the safest horses his mom owns and he has taken many a rider for their first time swimming. He even does this really cool haunted trail every year where he gets to jump out of the forest and chase people between the spooky sets! He’s had people run around him, punch him (terrible, right?!), scream in his face, and even shove their children under him before running away. Dad takes it all in stride and keeps his cool through all of it. He is also the only stallion allowed in to compete in our drill association and he solidly competes among mares and geldings alike without issue! I hope I can be as cool as he is when I grow up!

My mom is Thunder and she’s pretty great, too! Mom is Search and Rescue certified and will take you anywhere you need to go without batting a lash. She has a strange tendency to walk on the least convenient edge of trails, which sometimes means she walks on the edge of a cliff rather than on the flat ground on the other side of the trail. Mom was a maiden mare when she was pregnant with me, which means she had never had a baby before and no one knew how it would go.

Mom pushed the limits of everyone’s patience and sleep deprivation by taking me more than three months overdue! They started calling her “cow” and “heifer” a lot. In the end, she opted to have me in the rain, in the mud because she refused to lay anywhere clean or dry! Our people had to lay horse blankets out for her to have me on. I was a big boy then and am a big boy now!

Life stayed interesting for me. When it was time to wean, I was taken to a neighbor’s house to separate me from Mom. This was routine in the past but for some reason, the neighbor’s draft took issue with me being there. He broke through the fence and attacked me! He chased me all over the property, through fences, and I ended up severing my extensor tendon on my left hind leg. It was really scary!

That day, I was loaded in a trailer for the first time ever. They took Dad with to keep me calm on the ride to the emergency vet. Would you believe that I hopped right in?! I was a bit of a lightweight when the vet drugged me but they waited a good amount of time before putting me back in the trailer. Unfortunately, I passed out for unknown reasons when we were almost back home and when we got home, another neighbor and his dad had to help drag me out of the trailer. Of course, I stood right up as soon as I was on the ground!

My days after that were spent in a stall. I had my bandaged changed daily, which was MISERABLE, let me tell you. They were afraid to drug me much because of what had happened at the vet and in the trailer and I wouldn’t let them do my leg standing up (it hurt and I was scared!) Thankfully, my people had taught me to lie down on cue already so they had me lay down and they laid on top of me to hold me down while they treated my leg every day.

It was a really difficult period of recovery. It was expensive, exhausting, and stressful but my grandma is amazing and she did all the right things for me! In fact, usually the vet would not have sent me home as early as they did but they know my grandma and they know how awesome she is, so they were comfortable letting her handle everything.

The biggest concern wasn’t actually my tendon because those can reattach over time and because I’m young, I have a great healing capacity! The big concern was the possibility that my bone could have been damaged and that could result in dead bone. Depending on how much dead bone there was, it was possible that they would not have been able to save me.

So a few months after my injury, my friend Luca and I both went to the vet for check-ups. I got right in the trailer and out of the trailer at the vet, no problem! At the recheck, they did X-Rays...and discovered I had NO dead bone at all, not even a little! My people were shocked and amazed.

Going home, I got back in the trailer just fine. When we got home...well, I can’t really explain why but I could not bring myself to leave the trailer! It took my people around an hour to get me out. And wouldn’t you know that the only reason I got out was because I got tired and laid down...so they dragged me out again! Looking back on it now, I’m a little embarrassed that I was so scared of leaving the trailer that not even Dad could coax me out. I swear I’m a lot braver now!

Anyway, that’s some of my story and I’m just here to share my life as I continue growing! I turned a year old on June 24, 2017 and I’m already a big, big boy (thanks, Mom’s genes!) so I’ve got lots of growing to do and lots of learning to do!

See you later!

[thecounterplan]

What the United 3411 Incident is Really About

by Brice Ezell

If you've followed the news at all in the past week, a recap of the events of United Express flight 3411 is unnecessary. For those who limit their news intake or even avoid the news – in this political climate, not an unreasonable move as far as stress and mental health are concerned – here's a recap: 3411, a plane leaving Chicago's O'Hare Airport for a short-haul flight to Louisville, Kentucky, was overbooked the day of its departure, Sunday 9 April. Overbooking is problem enough for paying customers, but in the case of 3411 there was an additional complication. United had several employees that needed to be on the plane, as they had to work on a flight in Louisville the next day.

With the flight being overbooked, United offered to give a night's stay in a hotel plus $400 USD to any customer willing to give up their seat. When no one took that offer, United upped the offer to $800. No one was enticed by that, a clearly considerable sum that likely outweighed the cost of the original plane ticket. According to some reports, United ended up offering $1000. When no one accepted these cash incentives, United randomly selected four passengers to be removed from the plane to accommodate the United staffers that needed to be in Louisville the next day. Three left the plane, undoubtedly frustrated, but without making much of a scene. The fourth, one Dr. David Dao, a practicing physician, refused to leave on the grounds that (a) he paid for his seat and (b) he needed to be at the hospital the next day to tend to patients. Despite the reasonability of those claims, United called the airport police on Dao, who was physically yanked out of his seat and dragged off the plane, leaving him bloodied.

Since then, United has faced a hailstorm of media criticism, and with good reason. As it turns out, using state-sanctioned violence to take from someone a service he had paid for makes for bad PR. It didn't help that the official Twitter statement by Oscar Munoz, the CEO of United, sounded like it was drafted by a corporate jargon bot, like horse_ebooks attempting to give an apology. United presumably compensated Dao and the other individuals removed from the plane, and in a surprisingly classy move, the airline did later refund all passengers on the plane the price of their ticket. Yet in examining how this thoroughly terrible event came to pass, it doesn't take long to figure out that this is but a single manifestation of a much larger problem, and that United could have saved itself a lot of grief by acting sensibly.

Before getting to the crux of what 3411 represents, there is one particularly bad argument that is worth addressing right out of the gate. I've seen it crop up across social media, but one grating iteration of it appears in the post called "I Know You're Mad at United but… (Thoughts from a Pilot Life about Flight 3411)", by Angelia J. Griffin. An early paragraph in Griffin's post features this confession, "If a federal law enforcement officer asks me to exit a plane, no matter how royally pissed off I am, I’m going to do it and then seek other means of legal reimbursement. True story."

This kind of argument is popular any time there is an instance of accused (or even likely) abuse of power by a law enforcement officer. "If only that unarmed black man who wasn't doing anything wrong at all simply did exactly what the officer told him, he would still be alive today!" This mindset is a curious thing to exist in America, a country founded on rebellion from the government that’s also home to the most guns per capita by a long shot – almost one gun per American (skip to page 47 of that PDF). Thee "if an officer says, you do" mentality is a whisper away from total fascism, if not an outright capitulation to it. I know that in the era of Donald Trump it's popular to bandy the word "fascism" about the minute something bad happens, but I do not use the term lightly here.

Just so it is crystal clear: a badge and a gun do not prima facie put an officer in the right. The presence of a badge does not mean that everything an officer says or does is correct. Asserting the high standing of the law does not negate the fact that many officers of the law fail to uphold their obligations to the law, and in some cases even abuse the law. Respectfully questioning an officer, or standing your ground when you know you are within your rights, does not make you a criminal or a degenerate. It makes you a human being, one that does not let the mere presence of power take away your dignity. Griffin's tone in her piece turns her seemingly "I don't want to cause any trouble" point into something closer to, "Shut up and obey orders when you're told." I and I don't think most Americans want to live in a society where that is the default response to authority figures.

Dao was not in the wrong for insisting that he needed to tend to patients the next day. I'm willing to bet that his reason for needing to be in Louisville the was better than most of the others' on board.

While the initial response to Dao's injuries was widespread sympathy and outrage, it wasn't long before a certain disingenuous brand of argumentation reared its head in opposition to the outrage. Basically, it boils down to this: "But the rules!" United Airlines, like all airlines, has each passenger sign a contract of carriage with each ticket – though, of course, most passengers click "I accept" on this contract without ever actually reading it. One stipulation of most if not all contracts of carriage is that airlines can in fact deny boarding to paying customers, given a particular set of circumstances. This brief primer by USA Today illustrates some of the myriad reasons why one might be denied entrance to a plane even after she has bought a ticket. (The article also notes that a contract of carriage runs up to 37,000 words.)

Descriptively, the "play by the rules" argument is valuable, for it reminds airport passengers of just how much legal scaffolding exists for the process of air travel. United and the other major airline carriers have their asses covered, and the minute you cry foul, they will let you know of that. Given that most customers don't have time to parse through 37,000+ words of text every time they need to buy a plane ticket, it is good to know what stipulations come in the contract of carriage.

As a claim against Dao's sympathizers, however, the "play by the rules" argument – espoused by Griffin and many others – is nothing more than pedantry. Yes, it is true that airlines have contracts of carriage that come with certain rules. Yes, it is true that people should be better informed about these things. But the fact that rules exist isn't the substance of the matter for those angry about what happened on 3411. In the battle of Single Paying Customer versus Giant Corporate Airline With Its Army of Lawyers and Whatnot, everyone knows that the latter will always win out, even if slight concessions are granted. The outrage isn't that rules exist at all; it's that the rules set by the airlines are fundamentally unjust and result in pernicious outcomes like 3411's.

It is first of all worth noting that the "rules are rules" line of reasoning might not even exonerate United in the case of 3411. As many have already observed, there is a distinction in contracts of carriage between being denied boarding and being refused transport. The former is what the "rules are rules" crowd is leaning on: if a plane is overbooked or there are airline employees in need of transportation, it is true that passengers can be denied boarding. However, being denied transport – that is, an airline's refusal to fly a customer to his destination after she has boarded the airline – is a different situation. Were Dao denied boarding prior to getting on the plane, legally United would have been in the clear, but since Dao was violently removed from the plane having already been boarded and seated, United's legal footing is a lot less sure. There is ambiguity in the contract of carriage on the line between "denied boarding" and "refusal of transport," but in contract law, ambiguity in a contract stipulation works against whoever drafted the contract – in this case, United.

United also promised federal regulators in 2014 that all ticketed passengers were guaranteed seats, but unsurprisingly a "promise" from a large corporation without any legal apparatus behind holds as much water as the notion of Southwest Airlines being a budget carrier.

Furthermore, there is a practical consideration in the case of 3411. Given that the flight was full of paying customers and the airline did have a need to send employees to Louisville for work the next day, the easy solution would have been to rent a car for the four employees and have them drive to Louisville, a four and a half hour trip which would have put them in Louisville with time enough for sleep. Airline employee's unions do require certain standards of accommodation for employees, and considering that I am unaware of them I might be speaking out of turn here. But on the surface, at least, this solution would have met the airline's need of getting its employees to their next work location without depriving paying customers of their seats.

But suppose United was legally in the clear, and that at best Dao would get a tiny settlement in going after the airline through legal means. I'm not one to elevate late night talk show hosts as beacons of reason, Jimmy Kimmel made an excellent point in his televised remarks on 3411: in no other industry would customers tolerate the policy of overbooking. Imagine, Kimmel suggests, going to an Applebee's and after having ordered your food, you are removed for other paying customers who wanted to sit down. Applebee's would be out of business in a heartbeat. (That is, unless people really love riblets.) Yet for some reason, with airlines overbooking comes with the cost of soaring through the skies. No federal or state law prohibits overbooking.

In the first instance, it makes sense why airlines overbook flights. Air travel, even when an airline has economies of scale, is an expensive enterprise, and all airlines have the financial prerogative to ensure that every seat is filled. Any unfilled seat represents wasted space and lost revenue. Hedging on the possibility that some travelers won't make the flight for which they've bought a ticket – which given the expense of a plane ticket strikes me as a low possibility – air carriers overbook flights such that if a seat becomes empty, a passenger on the wait list can board, and the airline is then ensured of its revenue. I am thinking in the aside of that last sentence that most travelers wouldn't outright skip a flight; I am aware there are other reasons to miss flights, including the not insubstantial number of people who miss flights due to TSA security delays. However, I have yet to see compelling statistical data that shows that missed flights pose such a profit problem for airlines that the practice of overbooking becomes necessary.

It is incumbent upon airlines to prove the financial need for overbooking. Even with the practice of overbooking in place, airlines remain almost systemically unprofitable, and it is implausible that missed flights by some customers would constitute absolute financial ruin for air carriers, above and beyond the harms caused by the already problematic standard operating procedures in the industry. But logical scrutiny and good business are not correlated, so for the time being it appears that the outrage over 3411 will fizzle out in the short term, and airlines will go back to doing whatever they want in the long term because they know air travel is a necessity in a globalized business world.

The fact that airlines know that necessity has in large part enabled the industry to become anything but the free market many would like to think it is. Alex Pareene puts it directly and astutely in the title of his article “Airlines Can Treat You Like Garbage Because They are an Oligopoly.” An oligopoly (think “oligarch”) is a market controlled by a few core players, in this case the “Big Four” of commercial American aviation: American, United, Delta, and Southwest. 

Central to an oligopoly is the limitation of competition, and in the aviation game, there is little of it. If you go on Kayak or any airfare aggregator like it, you’ll find that with few exceptions, most airlines stay within a predictable cost range for their flights. For example, I can fly to New York City from Austin round-trip -- if I buy well in advance -- for around $200-$250, and in most cases I can have my choice of American, United, or Delta. (As for Southwest: see my previous comment about it being definitely not cheap.) I could go to a budget airline like Spirit (or Frontier if I was heading west), but those airlines are only deceptively cheap. The budget flights on those airlines usually only exist for select airports, and even for those fares that are comparatively lower than those of the Big Four there is a well-known nickel-and-diming that occurs after the initial ticket purchase. (For reasons that remain opaque to me, it costs more on Frontier and Spirit to bring a carry-on bag -- which the major carriers don’t charge for -- than it is to check a bag.) This may seem odd on face: wouldn’t each member of the Big Four want to stake out the most competitive rates, thereby ensuring that they draw more customers?

Well, as it turns out, no. The Big Four appear quite happy with the sky oligopoly. (Skoligopoly?) As Pareene puts it,

This is called oligopoly, and, for airline shareholders, this is great! It truly is a new golden age of aviation, for people who fly in private jets but own stock in airlines. For the rest of us, this is most of why flying sucks now (the rest of it is the ever-expanding and largely incompetent security state), and also why United is not that worried about you sharing that video of a man being brutally dragged off their plane. They are not embarrassed, and you will not embarrass them. Airlines feel no need to perform the dance of corporate penitence. If you’ve chosen to fly somewhere, it’s probably because you don’t have a good alternative to flying...

What does United care if the internet is mad at it? The airlines divvied up the sky between themselves, and if you live or work in United territory, at some point you’ll face the real “choice” offered to consumers in a post-consolidation industry: flying with them, flying a more time-consuming and circuitous route with some other, probably equally horrible airline (if such a route is available), or not flying anywhere. Do you need to get from Fargo to Denver in a hurry? Congratulations, you are now a United customer.

So long as each airline can generate profit and earn regional advantage in certain places, these companies have no incentive to compete for the purpose of lowering prices. The utter hilarity of the “trickle-down” notion of profit-seeking is also illustrated by the airline oligopoly. Writing for Vox, Alex Abad-Santos points out,

Flights are still expensive, even though the cost of jet fuel, a reason commonly cited by airlines for raising prices and adding fees, has gone down — in 2016, jet fuel prices were a third of what they were in 2014, but ticket prices didn’t decrease in kind. It’s cheaper for airlines to operate now than it was a few years ago, but they haven’t passed any savings on to customers.

To boil it down to its essence: United, along with the three other members of the Big Four controls the skies. Who cares what passengers want? What power do they have against the airlines?

In response to the outrage following 3411, many in the “rules are rules” crowd also touted the classic “hit ‘em with your wallet!” line of reasoning. “If you don’t like it, don’t give your money to United! That will show them what their customers prioritize, and if enough people do it United will change its behavior.” This argument is predicated on the notion that the airline industry resembles anything like a free market, and that airlines are responsive to customer inputs in the way a market competitor theoretically would be. But since the skies are ruled by just four airlines, corporations like United don’t have to care about customers in the way a business freely competing with others would. Many have touted the heavy airline deregulation instigated under the Carter administration in the late 1970s -- prior to that, airlines were highly regulated by the government -- as an example of giving choice and lower prices to the consumer, thereby making air travel more democratic. In seeing the corporate merger-driven oligopoly that now controls the air, I cannot help but think of the classic line from the film No Country for Old Men, a question I think well applies to more than one stipulation of United’s contract of carriage: “If the rule you followed brought you to this, of what use was the rule?”

This is the heart of the matter when it comes to 3411. The anger following Dao’s horrible mistreatment is not about what the rules are, but rather why the rules are, why the airlines are in such a place that they can treat customers in this way. The airlines are able to implement policies like their overbooking practices because there is no regulation that forbids it -- or, seemingly, even tempers it -- and there is no means by which customers can hold these companies to account. This compounds the initial frustration of 3411 further: it’s not just that airlines behave in a way anathema to good customer relations, but they also have no incentive to change. 

Some will instinctively backpedal at the slightest hint of regulation, suggesting that deregulation led to lower fares and greater choice for consumers when shopping for plane tickets. Given the increasingly non-competitive airline marketplace, one wonders how competition will be fostered by the status quo. But more importantly, knee-jerk anti-regulation relies on a fundamental misunderstanding of coercion. Matt Bruenig writes,

What’s amusing about libertarians and laissez-faire people (and the loose way certain economists talk) is that they will describe my choice to pay rent as non-coerced and voluntary while describing my choice to pay income taxes as coerced and involuntary. But there is no neutral construction of “coercion” that would ever support such a distinction. As [Robert] Hale aptly demonstrates, coercion occurs when there are “background constraints on the universe of socially available choices from which an individual might ‘freely’ choose.”...

...When we talk about the economy, we are not arguing about whether we want coercion. We are arguing about what coercion we’d like.

The same holds true for airlines. There will always be rules for flying on a commercial airliner, and customers should know those rules. But wanting a different set of rules isn’t tantamount to a new imposition of coercion; instead, it’s a question of how coercion ought to function in an airline-to-customer transaction. Looking at how United’s overbooking policies -- which are similar if not the same to the other contracts of carriage in the Big Four -- resulted in Dao being yanked out of his seat and bloodied in the process, I think it’s high time those rules be reconsidered. So long as things stay the same, let’s not pretend that the air is just another competitive marketplace.

In thinking on 3411 and all the follies of American capitalism it represents, I've come up with what I call the Greenspan Rule, the name of which is inspired by this classic observation of Noam Chomsky's, which he delivered in response to one of former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan’s characteristic panegyrics on the free market. The Greenspan principle is simple: if you hear a businessman, CEO, corporation, or pro-corporate politician singing the praises of the free market, you can almost be certain that the market they envision is anything but free. 

Some further reading on Chomsky's response to Greenspan's claims about the virtues of the free market can be found here. See specifically the section "Saint Greenspan and the transistor."

[truly-aninspiration-blog]

Five Letters She Sent (And The One She Never Did)

Summary: A glimpse into Anita and Roger’s friendship over six years through the letters she sent him. 

February 2011: 

On expensive-looking stock card with gold-plated letters-- and a doily:

On a note slipped into the invitation

“Roger-- This invitation is a bit much, I know, but my parents could not be persuaded out of the doilies (nor the theme-- and no, I’m not quite sure what “Magnolia” refers to.) I promise, this party isn’t going to be as stuffy and awful as it seems and I’d love if you could come. We’re good enough friends for you to meet my other friends, yeah? I think so. I’ve talked so much about you and everyone thinks you’re imaginary so-- now we can prove them wrong.

Here’s hoping you show up, piano man.

Yours, always dearly, Anita” 

September 2012

Dear Roger,

London’s really not so far away, and though I could just text you or call you or send you messages on Facebook, my father gave me this little stationery set for my desk and it seemed a shame to only use such pretty paper on my grandmother (no offense to my gran) or for making notes about silly things like coursework and scheduling. I have decided I want to be one of Austen’s heroines instead and write letters then, the old-fashioned way, to all the people who are important to me. You get to be first then, though I admit this is the second draft because I smudged ink on the first.

Anyway: so I’m in uni now.

Cambridge is very much like stepping into those uni catalogues. Everything feels big and impressive and old, the classrooms like old parchment and dust. The professors are, admittedly, also big and impressive and old. They remind me of regal Grecian statues, standing straight at their podiums and never moving, though their eyes following my every fidget.  I can’t slump over in my desk for a second or they’ll notice and every time anyone yawns, my history professor takes it as a personal offense. My favourite class is naturally my art class-- the professor is younger than most with tattoos peeking out of his sleeves. My mission: discover what they are by the end of the semester. He’ll have to roll up his cuffs sometime.

Also everywhere is so COLD. I don’t know if this is some strategy by the university to keep us awake but it’s working. I go to class with a jumper-and-cardigan combination and sometimes fetch my shawl along too. My roommate gives me such looks whenever I’m about to head out the door, but I brave her judgment anyway--

And oh yes, my roommate. Roger, I wonder what you would think.

Her name is Perdita Faye and she’s also one of those girls who you see in catalogues, but for Tatler or Harrods, hair perfectly curled at all times. She wakes up so much later than me but is ready in half the time and looks twice as pretty and I’m not at all hating her for this, I’m just very very envious and more than anything fascinated. Also-- and you’ll love this-- she’s from New York. Manhattan actually, very Breakfast at Tiffany’s. I don’t think she likes me very much because of the jumpers and cardigans and the way I organize my pens, but I’m hoping perhaps she’s just standoffish and we can become chums by Christmas. My other secret mission if you will: win Perdita Faye’s affections.

I wish I had other interesting things to report, stuff worth writing songs about, but it’s just the second week and it’s just been a whirlwind of syllabi and trying not to get lost. I’ll try to regale you with stories of mad parties and socials at a later date, get rip-roaringly drunk and live the full uni experience etc. etc. Feel free to share them with Paul-- oh, and how is Paul, by the way? And your mum and the Spot and your music?

I expect a full report. You’re under no obligation to return such news by letter, though then we’d both be making Austen proud, and isn’t that reason enough?

Yours, always dearly, Anita

December 2013

Dear Roger, No fussing around with this letter now, I’m going to get straight to the point, especially because we must be as covert as we can: Perdita and Paul are meant to be and it’s time we intervened.

My evidence is as follows:

Since when has Paul chased after a girl THIS long? Since they met last spring, his texts to me have increased double-fold and they all eventually end up asking what Perdita is up to. He’s about as subtle as a splinter.

Whenever we go to the Spot, Perdita spends approximately 8 minutes longer picking out an outfit and she changes it at least twice and even asked my opinion a few times and she never does that when we go out here at Cambridge. And yes, I’ve been taking careful notes. 

Last time, when Paul wasn’t at the Spot, Perdita bitched the entire way back. Not about Paul, but just about, well, anything. She nearly gave some poor drunk girl on the tube a heart attack because she coughed on her. She was a terror.

You’re required to make sure Paul is at the Spot when we head down after finals. I don’t care what you have to do, bribe Ambrosia to put him on the schedule, bribe Paul, hook a leash on him and drag him forcefully. Perdita will be flying home to New York soon and I think sleep deprivation from studying + the exciting drama of her last night in London will unarm her long enough to snog Paul behind the scenes. All we have to do is get them alone so I propose you and I bugger off as soon as we can. We’ll make up something (start thinking of excuses, Radcliffe).

Great, I’m so glad you agree.

Yours, always dearly, Anita

July 2014

URGENT-- SOS-- THIS POSTCARD REQUIRES YOUR IMMEDIATE ATTENTION.

Brighton’s so boring Roger, I’m thinking of wiring you enough money to take a train and sneak me away in the middle of the night. My grandparents keep talking to me and Hugh about weddings and kids and Hugh spends the entire day with my father and uncle fishing and sailing (they REFUSE to take me, claiming “male bonding”), leaving me to talk to my grandmother about-- yes-- weddings and kids again! I keep trying to sneak away to paint but my mum says I’m being rude and drags me back, a fish on her hook. And it’s a shame because the only good thing about Brighton is how beautiful it is-- the sunsets, the sunrises, the wild technicolour of the docks and downtown.

It’s required of you, by Article 4, Section 3 of our friendship contract, that you steal a plane, sneak a car or hitchhike down here to save me. And hurry or I might be forced to purchase a spell from the Brighton Witch, turn myself into a fish, and swim all the way back to you.

Yours, always dearly, Anita

July 2015

Dear Roger Radcliffe, you absolute rotten coward,

I’ve called you 24 times, left 11 voicemails, and sent 47 unanswered text messages (some of those I KNOW you read). You’ve elected to ignore all of these methods of communication and thus have forced my hand. We shall do this,Victorian style: pen and paper, envelope and seal. Perhaps some of the ink will sink into that thick skull of yours and persuade you-- no, convince you! GUILT you!-- into writing me back.

It’s been 14 days, 15 hours, and 15 minutes since you punched Hugh in his face.

If you’ve listened to any of my voice mails, you know that I’m not angry at you for this boorish display of brute masculinity (honestly, I’d expect it out of PAUL, but not of you), at least, not so angry that I can’t both 1. Forgive you and 2. Admit that yes, my dickish boyfriend (fiance: tbd) did in fact deserve it.

If you’ve listened to any of my voice mails, then you’ll know that I insisted Hugh apologize to you and told him that if he ever treats you like that again, we are Done, capital-D. You’ll know that I already threw the ring back in his face and I’ve refused to put it on until you ANSWER ME.

If you’ve listened to any of my voicemails, then you know that I’m angry at you because you haven’t.

But I’m not just angry, Roger; it’s not that simple. I miss you. It’s been 14 days, 15 hours and 15 minutes since you punched Hugh in the face and stopped speaking to me. I don’t think we’ve ever gone that long talking before and now more than ever, I want to talk to you. I’ve got this new record that I’d wanted to talk to you about that very night, before all this drama unfolded. I was waiting for the time to pull you aside. And I found this lovely used bookshoppe here at Cambridge that I know you’d like. I bought this copy of Persuasion despite already having two copies, but see, I had to have this one because the previous owner scribbled in the pages, and you know how much I love when they do that.

Also, I have this song in my head and I can’t get it out.

I’m fairly certain you’re to blame. You always are, whenever this happens to me. Either it’s something you hummed under your breath, something that you wrote yourself or something you showed me that I can’t remember. I’ve been humming it for about 10 of those 14 days. I have no idea where it came from. I just woke up, missing you terribly-- with a song in my head.

I’ll be driven to insanity if I don’t figure out what it’s called and if I can’t hear the rest of it. So you see,  Roger? You don’t have a choice. You have to write me back or call me back or text me back. I’ve got a song in my head. You’re the only one who can fix it.

Yours, forever dearly, Anita

November 2016

Dear Roger,

I’ve been a coward.

Since the moment I met you, that’s all I’ve been. A liar and a coward and a tease and, worst of all, a terrible friend. I’ve been trying all night to find a way to explain myself to you, to write the words that will build our bridge back up, one we might cross to each other. But I can’t find those words. I’m so scared I’ve once again run you off and this time it’ll be for good. And that will be my biggest mistake, because you are the brightest parts of me. You always have been.

I think I’ve loved you from the start, Roger. I don’t know what stopped me.

That doesn’t seem good enough. I keep rewriting this letter and it’s never good enough. I go over our days like they’re pages in a book belonging to another girl, but it’s not, it’s mine. It’s ours. See, none of this makes sense. I don’t know how to write about you and make sense.  

I want to write that we should be together and this is the letter that starts it. This is Darcy’s letter to Elizabeth, the one that clears the mist and brings in the sunlight. But it’s not because I can’t write that. I can’t even tell you why because it’s so terrible-- I’ll hurt you even more, and all I do is hurt you. And I want to write that maybe one day I’ll be ready and if you just wait, just a little longer, I promise we’ll find each other again like we did here in Swynlake on an unassuming, perfect summer’s day. But I can’t do that either because I know… that’s so wrong and selfish, and if I’m not ready after six years (even if the reasons have nothing to do with you and everything to do with me and I know that that’s so cliche) then I’ve run out of chances.

So I don’t know what to do and I don’t know what to write and this letter, which is supposed to maybe fix things, is turning into a goodbye.. And I can’t say goodbye to you. I can’t let you go.

I wish I could. I wish I was selfless, brave and true, and I’d write you a beautiful ending to us. I’d tell you that I love you enough to set you free and I’d wish you well and think of you often but only in those quiet moments when I hear a song on the radio or find myself humming under my breath.

I’m so sorry, Roger, for not being the girl you dreamed I was. I’m so sorry that I’ll never send this letter. I’m so sorry that I didn’t see sooner that you were… everything. All the books and music and lyrics.

I will think of you whenever I hum or sing in the shower. I’ll think of you whenever I hear a song on the radio. I’ll look for you wherever I go and hope I’ll see you turning a corner. And I’ll miss you until then.

Love, Anita