#is it obvious i just discovered people made dividers on tumblr

[angel-zophiel]

Hi, could you write something about Jean Paul Valley again? I have an idea this time, but you can do a freestyle, I don't mind. What JPV's daily life is like with his partner (who is a homo magi or just a regular magic user) and his cat (I need George in this). You know, sometimes I like to think about what his life is like when he doesn't have to run around Gotham as Azrael. As always, I wish you a good day/evening and lots of ideas, take care!! ☺️🌷

"God it smells so good!" You groaned under your breath as the gentle fragrance of dinner wafted into your room. You quickly abandoned the work you had been attending to and followed the scent towards the kitchen, and that was where you found Jean-Paul in his most natural state. He was leaned slightly over the counter with his hair pulled up. "What are you cooking?" He whipped his head back, having embarrassingly been caught by surprise.

He smiled upon seeing you there and nodded, "Why, does it smell good?"

You scoffed and nodded before hopping up onto the counter, letting your legs dangle off the side.

"Had I known you could cook I would've put a ring on you when we met." He laughed this time and turned back towards the stove.

"Had I known you were so fond of food, I would've brought you meals instead of flowers." He turned the burner up and walked towards the fridge, rummaging around for whatever else it was he felt he needed.

As if being summoned by the glorious concoction Jean was cooking as well, George, Jean's kitten wandered into the room, meowing loudly as he did so. Since he had been found on the street, George had always been a screamer. You liked to joke that he just had a lot to say, but the jokes would become less funny at 4am when the kitten would interrupt your oh-so-beloved rest. "Yes, pumpkin?" Jean called, closing the fridge with the butter in hand, "Are you hungry?" Instead, George ignored him and walked over to the counter you were sitting on, rubbing against your dangling legs. "Oh, now he has favorites." Jean feigned. "Of course he does. Look at me." Jean rolled his eyes and turned back towards the stove. "You know George, I brought you here." To which the kitten yelled in reply.

You barked out a laugh before waving your hand in a circular motion, causing the kitten to levitate into the air. He slowly drifted upwards until he landed softly in your lap.

"Tada!" You exclaimed to the kitten, giving him playful little jazz hands. Jean smiled at your childish display. "George told me that he thought it was great." "Wasn't it?" You cooed, sliding your hand slowly past the side of your head cockily. Jean shrugged, doubling back on his compliment.

"Well, I think it was a little basic but, you know, good enough for the cat I guess." "Don't try to humble me." You quipped. George curled into your lap as you gently stroked his fur, combing behind his ears and down to his tail. The room and ambiance were far too comfortable for you to return back to your work, so you decided to forgo it and just watch Jean finish cooking the rest of the meal, "Oh also," You said, the memory of a previous conversation popping back into your mind, "How is Kevin?" You asked, eyes glued onto the now-purring kitten in your lap. "Kevin?" I dont know any...kevins..." His looked shifted to one of recognition,"Oh! At the hospice." He let out a short sigh. "Oh, that doesn't sound like it's anything good." You grabbed one of the bananas that rested on the counter beside you and began to peel it.

"Its not." He lowered the heat and put a lid on the pot before turning to face you, arms crossed in resignation. "I cant be that upset though, I mean-" He shook his head as he remembered just how upset he had been over the loss of one of his patients, "Its a hospice. People are sent there to die, and yet I feel as if I- if I were to just- I don't know, do better? I could save them. Everyone that comes in there is just so..." Jean's grip loosened and his hands dropped, grabbing onto the counter behind him, "resigned to dying."

He sighed before tilting his head to the side, his glasses sliding down the bridge of his nose. "So yeah. Kevin's gone." "That just sounds hard doll." You said heartfully, your attention now given to him fully. "You know this, probably better than most others, but you can't save everyone." You comforted. His entire life, day and night was essentially dedicated to saving others. Be it as Azrael or Jean Paul, and yet at times it seemed he struggled more with the people at the Hospice than he did when the countless goons of the city shot round after round at him. Because when he was with the goons, it was Azrael who had to handle everything. But at the hospice, it was just Jean-Paul. And it was just Jean-Paul that had to watch as soul after soul was brought there, waiting to die. Losing someone as Azrael never hurt as much as they did, because when it was Azrael he could justify to himself that he did his best. But the Hospice was out of his control. He couldn't help them, only try to make them as comfortable as possible.

"I don't know.." He trailed off. Shaking his head slightly he looked back up at you grinning, "But if you're looking for good news, foods ready."

[amazingbananabread]

HAII, WELCOME TO MY BLOG!! :3

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ABOUT THE BLOG:

Here in this blog consist of arts from Ibispaint X (secretly Ibispaint in some if i post) that mostly is O.C or F.C arts. But i usually do F.C (fan character) more to be exact.

MY TAGS:

☆ #MelsSpotlights.lol (RANFREN) => Asks, facts and lore about my self insert Ranfren fc, Melissa Tumbozert. (Other fandom self insert fcs will made later.)

• #FCasks.lol => Asks about my F.C . (O.C tag ver will be make if there's an ask on one of my O.Cs)

☆ #Rambling.lol => just pure rambling and yapping.

• #OldArtz.lol => old arts that i've just posted here with soem informations behind it.

That's all ! (for now.)

ABOUT ME:

I'm Melissa, i'm from Vietnamese, is a minor. I'm also an artist (but i mostly draw in digital if i'm gonna be honest), an Aromantic, a Fictoromantic/Fictosexual and a selfshipper. I'm also mentally ill (if the fictoromantic and selfshipper didn't make it obvious) and has hypersexuality. (which sucks-....uh I hate it) I'm a simp for the fictional characters, 2D FOREVER RAHHHHH

I'm in quite a lot of fandoms such as Metal Family, Law of Talos, Endzone, Castle of Nations, Epic Battle Fantasy 5, Welcome Home, One Piece, Keroro Gunsou/Sgt. Frog, Homestuck, MarikinOnline, Ranfren, Gravity Falls, FNaF, Just Kill Me. (the game, yk yk), Omori, OFF, JJBA, Alfred's Playhouse, Psycho cuties, Mouthwashing, Parappa The Rapper, Vocaloid, UTAUs, Naruto (that and Shippuden too), Pizza Tower, Splatoon, Homestar Runner, Gorillaz, JSAB, ..

I'm a girl (she/her), so..yeah.

Btw, I'm like, very gray on neopronouns and xenogenders, so you could follow me but just don't interact with me a lot cuz I might get pronouns here and there mixed up. I'm not an anti, just not to keen on the idea but will try my best. :^[[

Currently, i'm in:

...Ngl, not really sure which fandom i am rn..

DO NOT INTERACT ME OR MY BLOGS IF YOU'RE:

× A PROSHIPPER. (Just don't interact this blog or me, heck, block me!)

× A PEDO. (no explanation, i will never call you sick people MAPS because you a disgrace to the society, the fact you trying to hide your disgusting fantasies as a pride flag is already frustrates me. And the fact the other MAP is now associated with you kind of people...just don't interact with this blog.)

× A SELFSHIP HATER. (look, you can literally block me if you don't like selfship content or me but don't harass me, ok?)

× A RCTA. (i'm sorry but changing your race is literally like disrespecting both your ancestors and the country you want to chane race. Don't ask me any further questions relating to this cause i see people like this and it frustrates me that they are this dumb and delusional, and even i'm delusional too, just for another reason.)

× A TERF. (no, just no.)

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[icaruskey]

Damn I missed a lot. I came back into tumblr recently and refound your blog; tf happened to morg?? (Don’t feel the need to explain everything if you don’t have the mental energy, of course)

I'll try to keep it simple.

Basically -- around the middle/end of March Morg went from targeting ND and mentally ill people derailing his posts or coming into his askbox to ND and mentally ill people in general. I unfollowed, made an untagged post talking about how dividing physical and mental disability is a lot like dividing trans men and trans women and that got pulled into this whole cripplepunk, cripple, physical vs. mental illness thing.

I blocked Morg because I mean. We know how he reacts when people don't agree with him and paid him no further attention until he sent Spider a sui bait ask that immediately pinged in me memories of when I pulled similar shit. And since I'd been following him through his last suicide attempt, I knew what to expect when I checked his blog.

I made a post about the situation and he ended up reblogging a screenshot with his pills. Afterwards, it came out he survived and was back online.

Recently, Spider received a series of fetish pictures, presumably in response to Spider posting about their donation of all cripplepunk related merch profits. Because Morg has erased Spider's physical disability to make it sound like they're profiting off a movement they're not a part of. By all definitions, Spider is a member of cripplepunk so he's being incredibly obvious in his hate.

Spider assumed it was from Morg, so I went to his blog and made a post about how he was up to his old bullshit. Someone asked who Morg is and I made a post talking about the March experience, including a link to a video I had made after knowing he had survived his suicide attempt about the situation and how it affected me and all that. And here's where I made a mistake.

Because he had screengrabbed my blog before, I unblocked him and told him if he liked looking at my blog so much he can just talk to me directly. He saw the post and video and reblogged it to his own blog and started a cycle of block, unblock, reblog, block on some of my posts. He also started saying the my video doxxed him and released private medical information to a series of right wing conservatives. That he was going to sue me, send a DMCA takedown, etc etc.

I need to stop to point out that until he reblogged the post there were 39 views. Total. I posted the video 20 days ago. Everything in the video? Publicly posted information. The name he uses online. Nothing from any password protections or anything.

I end up unlisting it because someone pointed out I used his blog name, and I agreed that was a bit too far. I also stop talking about him outside of asks. In return, he continues to spread lies about myself, everything from erasing my own disabilities, lying about things I've been saying or have said, etc. Usual bullshit.

Except he's also encouraged a harassment campaign against me as well as people sending me sexually explicit art. And he's continuing to lie, saying that I'm claiming that he's sending the messages and send my followers after him, falsely attributing this influx of hate to him, again, the usual.

I'm getting fed up because I've discovered he's also poking apart some posts I made referencing a romance movie about autoimmune disorders vs my mom and sister's scoliosis or saying that I've been harassing him "for months" and now throwing shit said by fucking transandrophobes. And this is a pattern for him. He's harassed people before.

[unforth]

Are there issues with svsss and consent (Just things I’ve heard I wanna know before I read it invade it’s rly not my thing lmfao) or are they more “issues” like in mdzs?

Hmm...okay, so I read SVSSS a bit ago, and pretty quickly, but the answer is basically...yes there are consent issues but I honestly think they’re actually more mild than in MDZS? But it’s also a little complicated, and some of them are different issues...

(spoilers under the read more)

Okay. So, on an overarching plot level, I can think of three potential things that might lead people to say there are consent issues related to the main ship, Shen Qingqiu and Luo Binghe. Note that I haven’t really seen any posts on this topic so I don’t, like, know what issues people single out? I’m pretty much just guessing.

1. Shen Qingqiu is an advanced cultivator and a teacher. Luo Binghe is considerably younger, and his student. This, obviously, could be seen as problematic. However, I personally didn’t feel it was (even though I’m personally sensitive to this dynamic and generally uncomfortable with it) for a few reasons:

a. Shen Qingqiu has absolutely no idea that Luo Binghe is crushing on him when they’re young. He’s as clueless as can be. (I’ll explain why when I get to “thing two that might make people think it’s problematic”). Like, to a reader who knows where things are going, it’s pretty darn obvious, but Shen Qingqiu is entirely fixated on a belief that Luo Binghe is developing a relationship with another disciple named Ning Yingying, and while he’s occasionally confused, like, “huh why did that happen?” he really is absolutely clueless. 

b. Then, for plot reasons, they’re separated for five years...and when Luo Binghe returns, Shen Qingqiu thinks Luo Binghe hates him (for  plot reasons), and then they’re separated AGAIN for another five years (or maybe it was 3? something like that) and only then does Shen Qingqiu finally realize he’s massively misunderstood literally everything. So...they haven’t had a student/teacher dynamic for about a decade by the time they actually start having a relationship.

c. While their apparent age difference is pretty big, their actual age difference isn’t, because...

2. Alright, so the basic premise of SVSSS is that a young man named Shen Yuan dies after reading a stag/harem novel, and then wakes up and discovers that he’s been transplanted into the novel he was reading...in the role of one of the villains. From that point forward, the older man “Shen Qingqiu” is actually Shen Yuan. Shen Yuan is still older than Luo Binghe, but less so...Luo Binghe is roughly 14 or 15 when the book starts, and Shen Yuan is probably 20 or 21. Now, that might be an awkward age difference if they started a relationship right away, but as I say above - years and years pass before anything happens. First, the story advances by about 4 years (give or take, it might be more even) before their first separation, and then ten more years pass before they get together. So at the point when Luo Binghe and Shen Yuan (in the body of Shen Qingqiu) actually get together, Luo Binghe is probably around 30 and Shen Yuan is probably around 36, which...that age difference is not significant between two adults, imo. 

Further, because Shen Yuan “knows” what happens in the novel, he also knows - it was a stag harem novel. So instead of seeing Luo Binghe’s behavior toward him and thinking, “oh no my student has a crush on me,” he spends ALL the time before the separation being like, “oh, Ning Yingying - she’s in his harem! Oh, that other character - also in his harem! Aw look, first meeting with a member of the harem! Oh oh look he’s talking to a harem member.” He has absolutely no fucking clue and it’s ridiculous.

However, all that said...Luo Binghe never actually finds out that Shen Yuan isn’t the same person as Shen Qingqiu, or that Shen Yuan is even in there. It’s clear in the extras that basically everyone who knew Shen Qingqiu figured out that something had changed and collectively decided... “well the change was for the better so uh let’s just not do anything about it okay?” Luo Binghe isn’t part of that conversation, so it could be argued that while Luo Binghe consented to be in a relationship with Shen Qingqiu, he never consented to be with Shen Yuan. It’s a weak argument, though, since Shen Yuan’s arrival is what derails the original harem plot of the “novel” and causes Luo Binghe to fall in love with Shen Qingqiu - so Luo Binghe never loved the original Shen Qingqiu, he always loved the Shen Yuan version of Shen Qingqiu. So...there is a minor consent issue here since Luo Binghe doesn’t know but it’s small.

3. Now, the third point also relates to the Shen Qingqiu/Shen Yuan divide. Shen Qingqiu BEFORE he becomes Shen Yuan is a nasty piece of work, and is highly abusive toward Luo Binghe. Early on, Shen Yuan is kinda...forced...to continue being abusive? Like, there’s this computer System that’s forcing Shen Yuan to “stay in character,” and he’ll literally die (again, for real and permanently this time) if he doesn’t do things at least somewhat like Shen Qingqiu would. But as soon as he “levels up” high enough that he is “allowed” to behave out of character compared to Shen Qingqiu, he stops being abusive and goes out of his way to help and support Luo Binghe. Now, despite that, I could see a case being made that the weird combination of “highly abusive toward” and then “nice” could be seen as manipulative and gaslighty, so that would open up another potential avenue for consent issues.

Now, on a specific “things that happen” event, all of the ACTUAL consent issues are in the other direction - Luo Binghe toward Shen Qingqiu. Cause Luo Binghe is...kinda a whiny bitch...and he is not very good at taking no for an answer. Like, at one point he literally kidnaps Shen Qingqiu and holds him prisoner. Actually wait, he does that at two separate points. And he always kinda...bullies...Shen Qingqiu in a way that pushes into Shen Qingqiu’s comfort zone.

Further, their first time is flat-out fuck or die (Luo Binghe is the top in the book and Shen Qingqiu is the bottom). That’s explicit, it’s not played as romantic, and Shen Qingqiu doesn’t enjoy it and doesn’t pretend to enjoy it. That’s not to say he’s unwilling - by that point it’s fairly clear he’d like to have sex with Luo Binghe in other circumstances, but it’s very rough and injures him pretty badly, there’s no prep, etc., so it’s not a good experience and it’s not treated as one, but Shen Qingqiu does volunteer because it’s important to him to prevent the “die” part. Luo Binghe feels bad afterwards. Reading it actually gave me more appreciation of MDZS because the scene made it clear that MXTX really does understand consent in ways that hadn’t been clear to me when I read the translation of MDZS.

In general...these two communicate for shit, and so things are never as clear cut as they should be. Also, at least for me personally, I never really fully “bought” that Shen Qingqiu was in love with Luo Binghe. Like, he’s affectionate and indulgent, but in romantic love? I dunno. So in that regard their being a thing always left me a little...unsure...maybe? But that’s a personal preference, and I’m sure there are others who felt differently, and it also might read differently in a different translation or in the original Chinese.

As an aside, there is a side ship which isn’t featured prominently in the novel but is significantly developed in the extras (like, a lot of the extras are literally about them, instead of the main ship). ngl...I wasn’t very interested in them so I didn’t read all their extras? So I couldn’t say for sure? But certainly, those two have some huge power level differences that I could see leading to consent issues, and also, one of them is also from “the real world” and transported in the “novel” (he’s the author) so that also adds a layer of complication.

Sorry if this is confusing...it’s not the easiest book to explain to someone unfamiliar with it. 

tl:dr, I personally didn’t think the consent issues were severe; the structural ones (ie, age difference and teacher/student) might LOOK severe on the surface but aren’t as the story is executed, and the “actual” consent issues (ie the fuck or die) are handled, at least in my opinion, better and more clearly than the ones in MDZS were.

Everyone else reading this...did I miss anything? I can’t think of anything else but my memory is so fucking shot that I can’t say I trust me as much as I’d like to.

Overall, I think it’s my least favorite of the three novels, not because it’s bad but because it just doesn’t quite feel...finished. Like, it’s such an interesting idea, and MXTX does a masterful job of twisting tropes throughout it, and more than either of the other books, it improved my opinion of her as a writer, but it feels a little incomplete, like maybe it was more story than she was actually ready to write? Like...she had this idea and she wasn’t quite a good enough writer to see it through to it’s logical conclusion yet, but all the pieces were there, so the potential is through the rough but the execution is a little lacking. Especially, the ending felt a bit rushed/abrupt to me. Then again, I feel that way constantly so some of that was probably me, I like a lot of denouement at the end of a story. (My favorite is TGCF, with MDZS in second and SVSSS in a close third...purely as a novel I didn’t like MDZS all that much but some of that was probably a translation issue.)

ANYWAY.

I’ll stop now.

If, after all that, you’re interested in reading it, I read two translations:

1. This translation, hosted on Tumblr, is really good but still a work in progress (they’ve released like four chapters since I read it in October.) I thought it was excellent and really enjoyed it.

2. Since that one wasn’t finished, I read the rest and the extras here. It was also good, but not quite as good in my opinion.

Hope this helps!

[ollieofthebeholder]

leaves too high to touch (roots too strong to fall): a TMA fanfic

Tumblr tag || Also on AO3

Chapter 22: Sasha

Basira brings the first tape before the week is out, and Sasha is apparently the only one surprised that Jon doesn’t seem happier about it. As a matter of fact, he seems downright distressed.

The assistants normally stagger their lunch breaks so there are at least two people in the Archives at any given time, something they’ve done almost since the beginning, but Jon comes out of his office and suggests all three of them go together, and Tim and Martin hustle Sasha out before she can ask questions. It’s Tim who points out, sotto voce while they’re standing in line at the cafe, that Basira probably called to say she was dropping by and Jon wants them out of there to preserve the fiction that he’s not telling them what’s going on. Sure enough, they pretend to ignore Basira in the parking lot on their way back to the Archives and re-enter to find Jon sitting on the edge of Tim’s desk, turning a tape over and over in his hands.

“That was quick,” Martin comments. “Thought it’d be harder for her to get them to you.”

“I did, too. I wasn’t—anticipating anything before next week at the earliest. And since I don’t know how soon she’ll be back with another one—or come back for this one, for that matter—I kind of have to listen to it as soon as possible.” Jon looks up at them with a pained expression.

Sasha frowns. “Am I missing something? Why’s that a bad thing?”

“Because I don’t…the real statements take a lot out of me. Live ones are worse. According to the Primes, doing more than one a week is going to be a drain. At least until I…build up my tolerance, I guess.” Jon sighs. “Which I’m not altogether sure I want to do.”

“We could record any real statements you get for you,” Sasha offers. “Then you can just listen to the tapes.”

“I wouldn’t do that to you all,” Jon says, looking shocked. “I wouldn’t wish this on anyone.”

“Yeah, but you’re the Head Archivist. Why would it affect us like that?”

“It’s the statements, not the position,” Martin says. “Each one is a thread that binds you closer to the Eye. Regardless of who takes it.” When they all stare at him, he blushes and adds, “I talked about it with Martin Prime while I was recovering. He told me he read more than a few statements over the last year and a half he was at the Institute.”

Jon rubs his forehead. “All the more reason I should keep doing this. I just…I don’t want to lose myself, either.”

Tim hesitantly reaches out and puts a hand on Jon’s shoulder. “You won’t. I mean, Jon Prime hasn’t lost himself, has he?”

“Only because he has Martin Prime to keep him grounded.”

“Well, you’ve got us.”

Jon smiles, but says, “I don’t want to put the burden of my humanity on you.”

Martin tilts his head. “Even if we offer?”

“Even then. I just…it’s not fair to you.” Jon sighs, obviously frustrated. “And I’m curious. There’s no denying that. Especially about…this. Gertrude actually seems to have labeled it properly. And—well, I only met her once or twice, and I-I was very new at the time.” He looks at the three of them. “Did any of you?”

Tim shakes his head. “Apparently I’d remember if I did,” he says, shooting a look at Sasha.

Sasha shrugs. “You would. We talked a fair amount. She—she said I ought to apply for the position of Archivist if it ever came up vacant.”

Jon flinches, but doesn’t say anything. Martin swallows. “I think she avoided me, actually. Never could figure out why, but any time she sent up to the library for something, Diana made a point of sending anyone but me with it. Which was weird, since usually she took any excuse to get me out of the way for a few minutes.”

Tim drapes an arm over Martin’s shoulders. Jon looks embarrassed, but stares at the tape in his hands. “I suppose I’d just like any insight to her time here. And, well, even with—” He glances up at the ceiling. “Even with what we know, there’s so much we don’t. And I understand that, there are some things we need to discover on our own, and other things we won’t believe until we have proof. Still.” He sighs. “And on top of that, I find myself wondering if the Eye is going to have any influence over the tapes Basira brings or if it’s going to be random.”

“What’s this one?” Sasha asks.

Instead of answering, Jon hands her the tape. Sasha peers at the label—a case number, a name, and the words Algasovo, central Russia. “Well, I doubt Basira picked it at anything but random if she wasn’t being influenced somehow.”

She passes the tape over to Tim and Martin, who study it before handing it back to Jon. “Does that mean anything to you? Algasovo?”

“No. I’m not sure it means anything to Basira, either.”

“Hang on.” Sasha sits at her desk and flips open her laptop. A few keystrokes later and all four of them are peering over her shoulder at a list of search results. All of them are generic, or else written in Russian—basic information about the town, the weather, and the surrounding area. “It’s a nothing village in the middle of nowhere. But Gertrude obviously thought this was important enough to put on tape.”

Martin nods. “And if it’s something we need to know about…”

“I suppose I’ll have to listen to it,” Jon says with a sigh. He stares at the tape again, and there’s something in his eyes Sasha recognizes—something hungry. He wants to listen to it. But there’s also something in his eyes that she sees reflected in Martin and Tim’s—fear. He’s afraid of what he’ll become as much as he desperately wants, needs to know.

She thinks about what Martin said, about how the statements will affect all of them no matter who reads them. She thinks about Martin Prime quietly telling Jon Prime that you being here might help him. She thinks about all of them listening to everybody’s statements all at once and not getting half so wiped as Jon looked on Monday when Basira left after making her statement.

“What if we listen together?” she blurts.

Jon looks up, obviously startled. “What?”

Sasha taps a fingernail on her desk. It’s getting ragged, she really needs to make an appointment for a manicure—maybe this weekend, she thinks. “If it’s going to affect anyone who records it, or reads it or listens to it or whatever…there’s probably a finite amount of energy to it, right? It’s not like we’ll all absorb the full amount of fear, it’ll most likely be more…it’ll get siphoned out and divided between the four of us. If we all listen to this tape together, maybe we can stop you from becoming…like that. Or at least slow it down. Maybe it won’t take so much energy from you.”

Jon hesitates and looks at Tim and Martin. Tim shrugs. “Worth a shot.”

“I’m up for it if you’re willing,” Martin agrees.

Jon swallows, then nods. “All right. Let me go get the tape recorder.”

Martin blinks. “What, you want to do it here? In the open?”

“I don’t believe there’s any point in hiding in my office to do it. Or Document Storage or whatever. Nobody’s likely to come down and interrupt us. It—it should be fine.” Jon leaves the tape on the desk and heads into his office.

“I’ll make us some tea. We’ll probably need it.” Martin fishes four mugs out of his desk drawer and disappears in the direction of the break room.

Sasha watches him go. “We really ought to just set up a tea station here in the Archives. Save wear and tear on the carpets.”

“I know you’re being sarcastic, but that’s not half a bad idea,” Tim says. “Bet Jon would agree.”

“Agree to what?” Jon comes over with the tape recorder in hand. “Where’s Martin?”

“Getting tea. Sasha suggested setting up a tea station here.”

Jon pauses. “Actually, why haven’t we done that before now?”

Tim’s right—Sasha was being sarcastic, but she enters into the discussion anyway and they’ve got a list of things to pick up after work almost fully written by the time Martin returns with the same cups he always uses for them. They rope Martin into the discussion, since he’s the one who knows the tea procedure inside and out, and they’re all a lot more relaxed by the time they settle down to listen to the tape.

Sasha’s attention is immediately piqued by the statement. Gertrude’s familiar dry, reedy voice sounds much more intense than she remembers from their conversations. It’s obvious the statement is real—it comes across in the texture of Gertrude’s voice—but she reads it calmly, no hesitation or upset. Something about the scenario draws Sasha in as much as it frightens her. Maybe it’s knowing that it killed her in the Primes’ timeline, or maybe it’s just that it’s the antithesis of the entity she’s essentially bound to, but the Stranger scares her the most out of all the entities. It fascinates her, too, which she supposes isn’t the greatest sign in the world, but too much of her mind is focused on the statement to really care.

At last, the statement ends. Gertrude gives a short summing-up that makes it clear, at least to Sasha, that she never intended for these tapes to be used by anyone outside the Institute, or indeed outside the Archives; her supplemental makes reference to things she obviously already knew and speculates in a limited sense about the nature of the younger brother of the statement-giver, and then the tape clicks off.

The scrape of a chair breaks the spell, and Sasha blinks up in time to see Martin, his face creased with empathy, wrap Tim in a hug. Tim doesn’t even bother to stand up from his chair, just clings to Martin like he’s drowning. Sasha can see the tears rolling down his face. Shit.

“Tim?” Jon slides off the desk, looking a bit shaky, and puts a hand on Tim’s shoulder. Tim reaches out blindly and pulls Jon into the hug, too.

Guilt rises in Sasha’s throat. She should have guessed. Out of everyone in the room, she’s the only one who knows why Tim came to work for the Institute in the first place, and it really should have occurred to her as soon as Gertrude uttered the word circus that this one would hit Tim hard. Add in the younger brother in peril and her dry comment about them being lucky to escape with only significant mental trauma, and it’s no wonder he’s crying. But she was too wrapped up in the statement to even think about him, let alone notice what Martin evidently picked up on immediately.

God, some best friend she is.

“Oh, Tim,” she whispers, penitent. She gets up from her seat and joins the group hug, hesitantly, not sure if she’s welcome. She doesn’t want to wedge herself in the middle of things, so she just squeezes Jon and Martin closer to Tim and prays that’s enough.

Someone is murmuring something, over and over, and it takes Sasha a second to realize that it’s I’m sorry and a second longer to realize it’s Jon, apologizing repeatedly into Tim’s hair. Christ, he’s starting to tear up, too, and he doesn’t even know why Tim’s so upset. Unless he’s figured out the whole mind-reading thing already. She doesn’t think so, though.

Finally, Tim takes a deep, shuddering breath and pulls back. The others ease off, with varying degrees of reluctance, and Martin fishes a tissue from somewhere on the desk and offers it silently. Tim takes it and wipes his face. “S-sorry,” he says hoarsely.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Jon says, obviously trying to be brusque, but it’s as obvious a lie as when he was trying to be brusque with Martin the night of the attack. “You have nothing to apologize for. I—I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have made you listen to that.”

“You couldn’t have known.” Tim closes his eyes and breathes deeply for a moment, then looks up. “My—I still owe you a statement, I think. Not today,” he adds quickly, evidently seeing the slight panic that crosses Jon’s face. “You can’t take that, and neither can I. Just…whenever you think you’re up to it. But—short version, I lost my brother to a Russian circus. It’s why I joined the Institute.”

Sasha actually knows precious few details beyond that—Tim may have told her the whole story, but they were both drunk at the time and she’s blurred out a lot, although she remembers the salient points. Jon looks stricken. “Tim, I—I didn’t know.”

“No reason you should have. I never told you.” Tim finishes off his tea in one long swallow, then pushes back from his desk. “I—I need some air.”

“Take your phone.” Jon’s voice is soft. “Call if you need us.”

“I will. I will.” Tim pockets his phone and heads out.

Jon watches him, then turns to the other two. He still looks shaken and visibly distressed. “Did you know?”

“I had no idea.” Martin touches his shoulder gently. “Jon, sit down. I’ll—I’ll get you another cup of tea.”

“Not right now. I’m fine.” Jon does sit, though, and he squeezes Martin’s hand briefly before looking up at Sasha. “Did you…?”

“He told me once,” Sasha admits. “I don’t remember most of the details, honestly, but I knew about Danny. I just didn’t make the connection while we were listening to the statement.”

Jon rubs a hand over his face. “I didn’t even notice—God, I was so focused on—I’d have stopped it if I’d known.”

“I don’t think you could have,” Martin tells him. “I—he started turning grey right after Gertrude mentioned the circus, and by the time they realized the brother was missing he was starting to hyperventilate. I wanted to tell you to stop the tape, o-or try to intervene, or something, but I—until the tape stopped, I couldn’t move. It was like sitting there listening to Martin Prime rattle off that chamber of horrors all over again.” He sounds frustrated and upset. “Like I was bound there. I don’t get it. It’s not like I’ve never interrupted you doing a recording before.”

“Only once,” Jon says. “And you—” He freezes, suddenly stiffening, and looks back and forth from Martin to Sasha. “Oh, God. You’ve both interrupted me, but that’s the point, you came in in the middle of the recording. You’ve never been there from the beginning.”

Sasha gets it, all of a sudden. “Because we were there from the start, we got caught in the—the threads of the statement. I wonder if anyone ever interrupted Jon Prime if they’d been there from the start?”

“I—I don’t know. I suppose I can ask.” Jon rubs his forehead again. “Not right now, though.”

“No, not right now,” Martin says firmly. He stands up from his desk and moves towards the shelves.

“What are you doing?” Jon asks.

“Getting Leanne Denikin’s case file,” Martin answers over his shoulder. “There’s just a couple things I want to look at.”

Sasha looks at Jon and shrugs. “While he’s doing that, let me see what I can pull up about our statement-giver. Gertrude said she recorded this in ‘97?”

“Y-yes,” Jon says, looking a bit shaken.

“That was almost twenty years ago. The Internet’s come a long way since then. Bet I can find things she could have only dreamed of.” Sasha cracks her knuckles and opens up her laptop again.

Jon raises an eyebrow at her. “Do you read Russian?”

“No, but there’s this nifty thing browsers do now where they’ll translate whole pages for you. It’s not perfect, but it’s good enough. Mostly.” Sasha offers Jon a cheeky grin. “More technology Gertrude didn’t have access to. And I have no idea if she read Russian.”

Jon’s eyes go slightly unfocused for a moment. “She didn’t. The Eye might have occasionally led her to read or understand a language she didn’t know, but only if doing so would give her the knowledge the Eye craved.” He closes his eyes and winces, shaking his head as if to clear it, and it’s only then Sasha feels the faint buzz of static receding. Before she can say anything, though, he adds, “The Roger Rabbit principle, I suppose.”

“The what?” Sasha and Martin, who’s just returning with a file in hand, say in unison.

“Did you ever see that old movie, Who Framed Roger Rabbit? It’s a blend of animation and live action—it takes place in a world where cartoon characters are real people and live alongside actual humans, although they live in a-a suburb of Los Angeles, I suppose, called Toon Town. The eponymous Roger Rabbit gets accused of murdering a man and turns to a human detective for assistance. There’s a segment in the film where the detective—Eddie Valiant—and Roger are handcuffed together, and Eddie is attempting to cut the cuffs off, but the box he’s using is wobbling, so Roger slips his hand out of the cuff and steadies it. When Eddie realizes what he’s done, he demands to know if Roger could have done that at any time, and Roger replies, ‘Not at any time. Only when it was funny.’”

“I think I get it,” Sasha says, glancing at Martin.

Martin nods. “You’re saying the Eye only lets the Archivist access languages otherwise unknown if it gets something out of it in return. Like extra fear.”

“Something like that.”

Martin sits down and drops two files on his desk. Sasha cocks her head. “What’s that second one?”

“Oh—since Gertrude listed the case number, I figured I’d see if I could find the paper file somewhere in the shelves.” Martin waves one of them at her. “It was in the back corner. I think it’s one of the ones Martin Prime said he was gathering, that he could sense were real.”

“What makes you say that?” Jon asks.

“You won’t like my answer.”

“Try me.”

Martin looks up at him. “The shelf was almost packed solid with cobwebs.”

Jon bites his lip. “You’re right. I don’t like that answer at all.”

Sasha tries to disguise her laugh as a cough as she goes back to her search.

She gets absorbed in the work—a totality of focus she’s only noticed a few times before—and is therefore caught off-guard when a mug of tea suddenly appears at her elbow. She looks up, startled, just in time to see Jon surprise Martin with his own mug. Sheepishly, Jon says, “I was starting to feel a bit useless, but I—I don’t know that I want to be alone in my office right now.”

“It’s fine. Thanks.” Martin offers Jon a warm smile, which Jon tentatively returns. Sasha wonders if they’re moving towards a romantic relationship. She also wonders how much faster they’re moving than the Primes did and if she’s going to have to shoot Tim before he uses the two of them being together as an excuse for why they should give it a go, even though she’s fairly certain he’s mostly joking about their “will they-won’t they” storyline.

“Either of you found anything yet?” Jon asks.

Sasha shakes her head. “Well, I was able to verify that Ivan Utkin did die in 1984, just like Gertrude said—it’s not that I doubted her necessarily, just that I wanted to be sure. That’s young, though. He was only forty-eight. His obituary doesn’t list cause of death, and, well, that was the height of the Cold War, so I’m not sure if the records exist anymore. I’ll keep trying, though. Yuri Utkin died in…” She swallows. “May of last year.”

“Around the time Gertrude Robinson died.”

“A bit after,” Sasha specifies. “The twenty-fifth.”

“Ah, the Glorious Twenty-Fifth of May,” Martin murmurs, not quite under his breath. When Sasha gives him a funny look, he adds, “Discworld reference.”

Jon shifts his attention to Martin. “Anything interesting in there?”

“It’s definitely the same circus. I mean, we knew that, Gertrude specifically called out Nikolai Denikin in her summing-up, but I’m guessing that the steam organ Utkin mentions in his statement is the one up in Artifact Storage, which…isn’t great.”

“No,” Jon agrees. Something suddenly seems to occur to him. “Sasha, how long have you been with the Magnus Institute?”

“Six years,” Sasha answers. She’s been in academia for ten years—well, eleven now—but the first few years after graduating she worked for the EPCC, until the project she was on shut down and she needed to come to London anyway. “Since August of 2010.”

Jon seems to deflate a bit. “So you weren’t here when the Calliophone came in.”

“No, but—Martin, you were here, weren’t you?”

Martin nods absently. “Yeah, I—kind of remember it getting delivered? Not surprised nobody can find the paperwork, though.”

Sasha looks over the top of her computer. “Why do you say that?”

Martin looks up, too. “There was some staff turnover in Artifact Storage about that time. There were a lot of injuries over the month, and at least six people quit. Then the head at the time—um, Henry Winchester—died and…I heard it was kind of messy.”

Sasha’s interest is caught. “Messy how?”

“Christ, Sasha, I don’t know. It didn’t happen on Institute grounds, so it’s not like I saw it. I just remember a couple people muttering about crime scene photos and peri- versus postmortem injuries and whether it was something that would end up in the Archives at some point.”

Sasha bites the inside of her cheek and stares at her computer for a second, wondering if she can dig up the police report and see what happened. Then she shakes her head slightly. It’s not relevant to anything they’re working on right now and she doesn’t need to be using Institute resources—including time—on personal projects.

“Actually, Sasha, do you think you can see what you can dig up on that?” Jon asks, and Sasha looks up sharply, wondering if he really is reading her mind. “If it’s…if Henry Winchester’s death was ‘messy,’ it’s possible that whatever killed him was…well, whatever killed Leanne Denikin’s ex. And, ah, being able to connect the death of the previous department head to an artifact from one of our statements might give us a bit of clout wh—if we have to tell them to leave another artifact alone.”

“I’ve got to admit,” Sasha says, backing out of the network of old Soviet record sites and tapping into the series of back doors she normally uses to access police records, “even knowing what we know, it still seems hard to believe that someone could be killed by an evil clown doll.”

“It’s probably not actually the doll,” Martin says absently. “Probably just a manifestation of the Stranger. There were clowns in the circus, after all, it’s not without the realm of possibility that the doll in Denikin’s steamer trunk was just an effigy of a real clown.”

Jon gives him a look of mingled amusement and amazement. “You’ve really got the hang of this side of things, haven’t you? The rest of us are fumbling in the dark and you’re marching in front with a spotlight.”

Martin’s cheeks turn pink, but he shrugs. “It just…makes sense, I guess. It’s like—like I’ve had this bag of puzzle pieces my whole life, only they’re a photomosaic and they aren’t really distinct enough to put together easily and there aren’t any distinct corners or edges to it. But now someone’s finally given me the box, so I can see what the whole picture is supposed to look like. Makes it easier to put together the right way.”

“We’re lucky to have you,” Jon says with a smile.

If Martin blushes any harder, the heat is going to set off Sasha’s computer fan. He mumbles something and goes back to work comparing the two statements.

Sasha hits a wall in researching the police records. No, not a wall—a black hole. There’s simply an empty space where the records ought to be. She backs out and tries again and again. Still nothing.

“We may have to get Tim to work his magic on this,” she tells Jon. “I think this might go past hacking files and into seducing file clerks.”

“Are you saying you don’t think you’re capable of seducing a file clerk on your own, Miss James?” Jon asks with a lift of his eyebrow. Sasha makes a rude noise in his direction and he smirks.

Martin looks up. “Where is Tim, anyway? Shouldn’t he be back by now?”

The smile melts off of Jon’s face. Sasha glances at the clock at the bottom corner of her screen and is astonished to realize it’s nearly four in the afternoon. “I’m not letting any of you boys go off on your own in the middle of the day anymore. Every time I do, you disappear for hours on end.”

Before Jon or Martin can answer, Jon’s phone rings. He fishes it out of his pocket and answers with a crisp greeting. Instantly, his expression shifts. “Tim! Are you all right? We were just—what?” A frown puckers his forehead. “You’re where? How did you…never mind. I know where that is. Stay there. I’m on my way.” He hangs up and slides to his feet, then opens Tim’s desk drawer and fishes out his keys.

“Is everything all right?” Martin asks, a little anxiously.

“It’s fine. Tim got himself turned around and needs a rescue.” Jon flips through the keys and mutters under his breath, “I never pegged him for the damsel in distress type.” Straightening, he adds in a normal tone of voice, “I’ll be right back. Martin, if you can, go through the Hector Silvana file and see what we still need to follow up on…Sasha, have you had a chance to look into those incidents in Jason North’s statements?”

“Not yet, but I will.”

“Thank you. I’ll be back soon.” Jon turns on his heel and strides out of the Archives.

Sasha waits until she hears the door close, then tilts her laptop slightly closed and looks over at Martin. “So, while the Helicopter Parents are out of the Archives, how’s the search for a new place to live going?”

From the way Martin’s ears go pink again, she knows she’s right; he’s been avoiding the topic. Tim is still weirdly persistent about them staying at his house, and while Jon puts up halfhearted protests, Sasha doesn’t think he’s actually all that keen to go back to his own flat. Sasha’s been crashing in Tim’s bed since the Primes moved out, mostly because the others keep protesting the idea of sleeping in there and she’s just tired of arguing and also slightly tired of Tim’s living room, but she’s ready to go home. As much as she loves her boys, she looks forward to having her own space again.

“I’ve been looking,” Martin says, a bit reluctantly. “There are a few…Martin Prime told me where he ended up in his timeline, and it’s—it’s not bad, really, but it’s a bit out of my price range. He didn’t have a choice, he had to get somewhere in a hurry and it was the only place he could even come close to affording. I know Tim’s going to eventually want me off his sofa, so I’m looking, but…”

“Well, if you need someone to put in a good word for you, let me know,” Sasha says. “I don’t think there are any units open in my building, but my landlord runs a few different ones. Might be able to get you a good rate.”

“Th-thanks. I’ll let you know.”

Sasha re-opens her laptop and goes back to work. She somehow doesn’t think Martin’s going to ask her for a recommendation. As a matter of fact, she’s already mentally betting with herself against him asking Tim how much he’d charge to rent out his spare bedroom. They might all live alone, normally, but she’s noticed over the last couple of months that the boys seem much more relaxed sharing a space than they did before. And besides, living alone in the Archives for weeks on end probably isn’t good for anyone’s sanity. No wonder Martin wants to be around people these days.

She’s managed to verify an apparent lack of supernatural involvement in two of the incidents involving Jason North when she hears footsteps and Martin looks up from his work. The look of relief that spreads over his face tells her without looking around that it’s Jon and Tim returning, none the worse for the wear.

“Thanks for the lift,” Tim says, sliding into his seat and bumping his shoulder against Martin’s companionably. “Seriously, I didn’t realize I’d wandered so far, I just—”

“Tim, it’s fine. No real harm done,” Jon says, in a tone that indicates they’ve been having this argument for several minutes. “It’s been a long day and you needed to clear your head. Nothing’s actively trying to kill us at the moment, so far as we know. It’s fine.”

“Yeah.” Tim opens his laptop. “Still. Next time I need space, I’ll go…I don’t know, reorganize a shelf or something. Feels more productive.”

“At least it’s a nice day,” Martin says, but there’s an element of uncertainty in his voice as he glances at one of the high-set windows in the Archive. They’re technically underground, and while it was nice enough when the three of them went to lunch earlier, that’s no guarantee it still is.

“Yeah, it is. Oh, and, ah, I found something kind of interesting.” Tim reaches into his back pocket and pulls out a folded piece of paper, which he waves at the other three with a slight teasing grin.

Sasha can see in his eyes, though, that whatever it is, he’s very, very serious about it. “Oh? Do tell.”

Tim unfolds the paper and spreads it out on his desk. Sasha, Jon, and Martin all crane their heads over to see. It’s one of those flyers that real estate agents set out sometimes in front of houses for sale or rent, which is when Sasha remembers that Tim technically rents the little semidetached house they’ve all been crashing in lately. This one is terraced, but looks bigger, and appears to be in a halfway decent neighborhood. The price at the bottom is surprisingly reasonable for a house in London proper.

“Are you thinking of moving?” Sasha asks, surprised.

“Well, yeah. I-I mean, I wasn’t before, necessarily, but…well, I’ve been thinking. I’ve been living in that same house since, well, before Danny died,” Tim says softly. Martin looks up, eyes filled with sympathy. “It might not be a bad idea to start over somewhere new, you know? And it might be nice to own something, to start putting down roots. Plus, this one’s bigger—three bedrooms, it says. A-and I thought, well, I mean, if all of us went in together, it might…” He trails off.

Jon looks more startled than he has all day. “Wait. You thought—you wanted all of us to—”

“Well, it’s just—” Tim looks at Martin. “You need a place still, and I know—I thought it might be easier to share expenses on a place than to go full out on your own. And I’ve—I’ve kind of got used to having all of you around. I like it.” He looks from Martin to Jon to Sasha and back, his eyes almost pleading. “It’s just an idea, but—I mean, I thought I’d see if you guys were interested.”

Sasha is touched, but she’s also a little worried. Tim can be impulsive and tends to throw his whole heart into something, and he’s also been known to pin all his hopes on a single course of action. If he’s had the idea of all of them living together permanently in his head for more than a few minutes, it might not be easy for her to extract herself and go back to her own flat. It has to happen, though. She’s got just enough of a life outside the Institute that it’s important for her to get away.

Martin picks up the flyer and studies it more closely. “Says there’s an open house on Saturday afternoon,” he says, handing it over to Jon. “Might be worth taking a look, anyway.”

Tim brightens visibly. Jon examines the flyer, then nods slowly. “I think that would be an excellent idea.”

He offers it to Sasha, who smiles and shakes her head. “You boys have fun. I’ve got an appointment Saturday afternoon.”

It’s not exactly untrue. Second and fourth Saturdays are visiting days, and Sasha hasn’t been by in a while, so she probably ought to go. Plus she really does need to get her nails done. But it’s also a convenient excuse to avoid going and not have to pretend she’s going to be splitting the mortgage with them. Because Sasha knows herself well enough to know she’s not going in with the other three if they decide to do this. She values her independence, she values her privacy, and she does not want Tim to entertain any hopes that they might actually get together at some point. Besides, she picked her building for a reason, one she’s still not ready to share with the boys. She should probably feel guilty for keeping secrets, but she doesn’t.

“We’ll let you know what it’s like,” Tim promises.

Sasha smiles and nods and goes back to work and tries not to think about the fact that she’s basically going to break Tim’s heart.

[shinahbee]

Premonition of future events

Hello!

so I wasn’t going to post anything this week since i’m currently working on something for next week, but this has something to do with what I’m planning to post next week so i thought I would share my thoughts.

so as you may be aware if you have read my monthly favorites posts for a while that I have been delving into BL- yaoi manhwa/manga and have been recommending some in those favorites. one of which I have not discussed yet, mainly because I have been saving it for Feb favorites so look forward to that when it comes out!

and I have been following some of the manhwa creators twitter just to see upcoming projects and updates on the current manhwa I am reading, I follow the creator of this manhwa called “ pearl boy” on twitter and she drew something today that really interested me and I decided to break down the symbolism within the art piece. If you have not read this manhwa, none of this will make any sense to you, but i’ll explain it in detail next week when I finish my art.

I love symbolism and foreshadowing within a story and this picture she drew is just that, given the events leading up to this point and I really wanted to take this apart and see what I can come up with.

if you have read this than please bare with me, these are my thoughts only and how i interpret the art from the creator and has nothing to do with how she portrayed her art work, so just a disclaimer. I'm just doing this for fun.

i’ll link her twitter post here: 

https://twitter.com/inking_zoy/status/1363278273476579329

 and i’ll post the picture here, this is from her twitter so all rights belong to inking_zoy, the author/ artist of pearl boy

like i mentioned above, if you have not read the story then this will not make sense to any of you,but basically the guy in the left is named doshik, the guy in the middle is thier boss...i forgot his name..they both call him boss so we will keep it a that, the guy on the right is named Juha, so i’ll refer to them with these names. It is a little hard interpret this picture without knowing details about the story which is still not revealed yet, we see glimpses of the events through juha’s flash backs, so before that, the story starts off with doshik apparently running away from people looking for him cause he stole someones money and fled to the country side, he ended up having spent all his money and didn't even have any to buy food, he then stumbled across a seafood hot pot place and wanted to try eating and running, there in the shop was the owner “ boss” and juha who is working as a server and cook. the boss noticed him being weird and told juha to keep an eye on doshik cause he might bail from paying for his food, and that honestly was going to happen until juha confronted him and asked to payback with labor, it wasn't addressed as to what doshik did as a living before fleding to the country side but he did work at pub so i believe he was a host / sex worker or just a host that does sexual favors, so when juha told him to pay back the money he owed with his “ body” he thought he meant sex. There was a series of events both very terrible and unfortunate to serendipitous that happened between juha and dooshik in their entanglement with each other and with the “ boss “ as well. 

so it goes Boss ----> sexual abuse juha by making him work as a sex toy for old ugly bastards -----> juha has ability to produce pearls from his body...guess how. lol. i’m sorry this seems so absurd, but it is how the story goes, which the boss monopolizes him -----> juha can’t run away because he is scared and owes boss money ----> juha was about to be assaulted by the ugly bastards ---> doshik shows up and saves him a couple times and ends up working at the shop as a co worker---->  juha and doshik get to know each other after doshik saves him a couple times -----> juha asks doshik to have sex with him ( in order to produce pearls for debt payment) ----> doshik discovers juha’s ability but thought it was beads coming out of his body...LOL. he actually thought he had kidney stones and was genuinely concerned ----->  doshik had a pearl that he found at the beach earlier on and used it to compare to the bead that came out of juha and found out it as an actual pearl after getting it appraised by the bank person ----> juha met up with doshik and wanted to tell him he wanted to be sex partners cause he liked doing it with him ----> juha and boss confront each other and boss is angry he didn't show up meet his business partners that night that juha and doshik were together -----> juha says that he’s only going to pay it off by himself with his one partner, he didn't tell boss it was doshik, but i think he found out later. 

alright that seems good enough as to where we are right now, i hope my summary made sense for the most part. Now getting back to the drawing let’s take it apart, so there is a body of water that divides juha and doshik, with the boss being in the middle. The boss is holding juha tight and some people may interpret this as him having feelings for juha. I don’t think that is the case, the reason why i believe he is holding him and not letting go is because he wants to monopolize him for his self gain, not for the sake of feelings, but to make sure that he is the only person he will be able to turn to.  juha can produce pearls and he owes him money and he is using that to gain profit, that’s honestly all i see since his interactions with people strictly revolves around business deals, so once he found out that doshik might know of juha’s ability he began to come up with ways to remove them from each other, because he thinks if doshik knows the money that can come from the pearls he will use it to profit himself.

of course us as readers knows doshik is not like that and that he genuinely cares for juha. so Juha is separated by the boss holding on to him and it is symbolic to the events of his past being forced into a situation he can’t get out of. if you have watched any anime or drama , there is usually a scene where a person drowns, what do you think  happens then when you drown? the obvious, you can’t breathe, you get light headed, your consciousnesses slips away, you feel cold, your surrounded by nothing but silence and darkness the deeper you sink. The boss is like a rock pushing juha further down the abyss and drowning him essentially, he made a comment in the newest chapter saying that “ you can never get away from me no matter how hard you try”. which says a lot about his obsession towards juha. This probably made juha feel like he will always be alone and everything he did will always be hopeless. 🤬

But as we all know there’s always a person who comes and rescues a drowning person at the last second before they become unconscious, which is why in the drawing juha is not completely submerged in water and his face is still on the surface of the water. And as we see doshik is on the other side of that division and is symbolic of life and living, where as when you drown only death awaits you. Doshik is also affectionately kissing and holding juha’s hand as if to say “ i’m here for you, we will get through this together” and is the only thing that is keeping juha from letting everything go and drown in his situation. This can also be interpreted as doshik giving air to juha as well which makes sense in the context of drowning. You can also use light and darkness as symbolism to this piece as well, the light being the surface and doshik who appears on the other side and in contrast the boss being in darkness beneath the water. Need less to say there’s so much symbolism in this one picture and it made me want write how i interpret this from what i’ve read so far and how it relates to how this is portrayed. I also find it ironic that in the early chapters doshik did actually almost drown and it was juha that chased after him and got him out when he fell unconscious in the water...and this picture here makes me believe that doshik will in turn save juha from drowning in his sorrows in the upcoming continuation of the story.

well that’s all that I wanted to say, I hope what I wrote made sense and that you understood for the most part why i believe this is a premonition of whats to come. Most people who don’t know this story will just think its a picture of three dudes having a threesome and that is not it.lol. I’m curious as to how other people interpret this, i’ve read one so far and she had a similar analogy to how i interpreted the art, so i guess i’m not too far off. 

hopefully you all enjoyed reading this, it was fun for me, since I’m currently bleeding out of my ass and procrastinating doing other things and a little pissy from having certain stupid memes flooding my Instagram.  I hope you all are interested in reading pearl boy after this if you have not...obviously be over the age of 18 since it does deal with mature themes!

hope you enjoyed reading! give this a like if you want to see my fan art for this series next week!

see you all then.

sheena

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social media:

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Deviantart: she-be.deviantart.com

Instagram: shinb_art

Tumblr: shinahbee

[thebmatt]

Headcanons

I’ve spent a good portion of the past two days looking for ask memes here in tumblr that I could address some of these things with (thank you @autumnslance for the reply) but then I realized “wait, I can just TALK about these things if I want, it’s my own tumblr, there’s no rules about it”

Anxiety is a bitch yo.

So I’m gonna start a little series about my own headcanons I have about my characters. And we’re gonna start of with....

The Multiverse

This is The Big One, the massive thread that more or less holds together all of my headcanons I’ve developed about/within any fandom I’ve considered myself a part of, ever. 

I have a lot of inspiration to draw from here, Marvel and DC’s multiverses are obvious but also a tremendous amount of @magicturtle‘s work with building the world of the Void Saga of the Critical Hit podcast.

The basics of the idea is that for every world, every universe, there exists other versions of this universe, which has the same general structure (worlds, continents, locations, even a vast majority of people), but with at least one Major Difference. A Major Difference could be specifically important people being entirely different, certain historical events happened differently and thus an alternate history emerges, or even something as big as events happening in a different age of civilization. As an example, the Hydaelyn of my own Warriors of Light would be a different universe of Lashen and Blanfyr. Their universes are identical, with the Major Difference being that Lash, Blanfyr, and their ally Azrael are the Warriors of Light, not my crew. Versions of them may exist in each others universe, but they would have different histories. 

It’s important to note that the Shards aren’t different universes either, they’re what are known as Demiplanes, a different plane of existence tied to the primary plane of their own universe. Every version of the universe known colloquially as Hydaelyn, as an example, has its own versions of the shards, which may or may not have their own histories. In Toragana and Veilette’s universe, the shards are either numbered differently or were subjected to the Ascian’s machinations in a different order, for example.

My own WoL/Ds are now aware of the existence of other versions of their universe. Franks, in particular, is exploring the theoretical physics and mathematics with a renewed gusto now that he has some confirmation of this. Well, he has MORE confirmation of it, but we’ll get to that. He knows of at least two other versions of their universe now, and as he’s mentioned, the math the Arcanist’s Guild has managed to work through supports the idea of no more than 15 versions of their universe, but he’s not quite willing to put that in stone yet. He’s got some revisions to do.

Other universes

Hydaelyn’s not all there is that’s out there, however.

There are also other worlds out there, other universes, which are ENTIRELY different. Different worlds with different kinds of life on them, landmasses that would be unrecognizable to the people who live on the Source and no versions of the people who live on it. They even have their own demiplanes, different in number and purpose

Franks knowns of one of these, because he comes from it. His original world is called Azeroth. On that world, he spent a majority of his life as a creature known as a human, but a large number of recent years as a walking corpse. 

These universes which are entirely different from one another all share one trait, they each have their own set of universes which are similar to themselves save for at least one or more Major Differences. 

You can probably see where this is going. Every fictional world or setting I’ve ever been interested in potentially could have its own representation in this multiversal structure.

The Structure of the Multiverse

So who knowns about the whole of the multiverse? Who knows about its structure?

There is an organization who has taken it upon themselves to watch the whole of the multiverse with one goal in mind, their own Prime Directive, if you will, and it is simply thus: Do NOT allow knowledge of the multiverse to become widely known to any universe at large and prevent unauthorized travel between them. 

The founders of this organization were an extremely advanced race from a universe that had learned of their “universal neighbors”, developed the technology to cross the barriers between them, and had over millennia formed diplomatic relations with each other. Vast citadels existed in each version of their universe with permanently open gateways between them, allowing politicians, diplomats, and scientists to consult with their counterparts in the different universes. 

Periodically, their scientists would determine the planar coordinates of another universe, and an expedition to this new neighbor would be formed. “Opening Day”, the day a new portal was brought online, had become a cultural milestone for them, and it had evolved into a major celebration. People would gather near the citadels holding massive parties. Different versions of the same being would gather, sharing knowledge and celebrating accomplishments. 

Unfortunately, this race had made a major assumption. Every other universe they’d discovered had Major Differences that were ultimately benign, ultimately leading them to the same current point, an age of enlightenment and reason. They expected something similar in this newly discovered universe.

What they found instead was a world dominated by a predatory insectoid species that had been destroyed in every other universe early in the history of the race. In this universe, however, these insectoids had destroyed them instead. And now they had evolved into a massive hivemind swarm that had consumed almost all other forms of life in their world. And they were hungry. 

What followed was a cataclysm. The insects poured through the portal in uncountable numbers, devouring and consuming everyone in their path. They quickly discovered the other portals, centralized as they were in the citadels of every version of their universe, and expanded into them all. Their prey was a race of civilized thinkers, they had all long discarded any forms of a military, and they could not stand up against the insectoids single unifying mind and the viciousness of their forms. 

It took only a few months before they were all but wiped from existence. A few members of each universe had been working on a form of transport capable of independent travel between universes and also the “in-between” space that divided them. Before the insectoids could eat them as well, they boarded their experimental craft and activated it, blindly jumping away from their universe. 

It worked. The survivors, less than two dozen in number, ended up in the In-Between, out of reach of the insectoids. Their “ship” boasted a large variety of experimental sensor devices for exploration, and so they were able to monitor, in near-realtime, the destruction of all versions of their civilization and culture, consumed by their own failure to account for all potential possibilities. Their were no other versions of their universe remaining, the version where the insectoids had won was the last one in existence. 

For the next century (age being another thing they’d managed to defeat) they simply explored, mapping as much of the multiverse and it’s various forms of life as they could. Ultimately they decided it was their duty to prevent what had happened to any other universes, and so they set out establishing their organization to accomplish this.

The Organization

I don’t have a name for this organization, nor the race that established it. Everything i call them in my head is directly pilfered from one or more of my inspirations, and I don’t want to canonize any of them by writing it down here.

The organization is responsible for cataloging and organizing the multiverse as well as monitoring its inhabitants for the development of any methodology which could enable discovery of the multiverse or cross-universal travel. To this extent, they recruit agents, beings from across the multiverse who must forsake any ties to their home universe or any versions of it to monitor others. These agents are given a ship capable of monitoring all universes under their purview, as well as opening a doorway to any point in their assigned sector. 

The organization groups universes thus: all universes which are identical save for Major Differences are grouped together in what is known as a universal cluster. These clusters are named (generally for the primary world of importance that all universes share) and numbered in order of creation (if they can determine it) or discovery. The first universe created is named Prime or One, all others receive a sequential number. These grouped universes are known as parallel universes when discussed in comparison to each other. Likewise, Universes in different clusters are known as alternate universes. 

The organization has a very strict non-interference policy in the affairs of any universe not related to their mandate of cross-universal travel. This includes in the combatting of threats. While agents do carry a variety of weaponry suited to the different universes under their purview, the policy of the organization is to minimize knowledge of their existence. To this end, Agents are to recruit assets from the variety of worlds under their watch, and provide them whatever resources they need to deal with cross-planar incursions (or potential ones). These assets are, as a rule, not made aware of the greater structure of the organization or the scope of the multiverse, only that it exists and the extent of whatever knowledge they need to defeat the threat. Assets are carefully cultivated for capability and trustworthiness before they are recruited. 

Agents of this organization also carry are provided with the means to acquire whatever clothing they need to “blend in” but the structure of the multiverse provides their best disguise in itself. Should a being cross from one universal cluster into the next, the multiverse itself will change your form into something that most closely matches something within the universe you’re going to.

This is why Franks, when he found a strange portal within Azeroth and ended up on Hydaelyn, which does not have widespread sentient undead, his form became similar to what he used to be. 

Thus far the agent responsible for monitoring both the Azeroth and Hydaelyn universal clusters has not seen fit to interfere in this planar jump, as Franks has taken great pains to conceal the connection between them on both ends and has thus far dedicated himself to opposing the machinations of the Ascians, who are known to the organization as an potentially extremely dangerous threat to the multiverse should any universe’s version of them manage to free their primal and rejoin all of the shards. He’s monitoring the situation there extremely closely. 

[unearthitaly]

[Italian Culture in Quarantine: 1/~]: Remake of  René Magritte's "The Lovers" by Blub (Naples)

[EN] As I was looking through the pictures I took in Naples last year, I found this one I made about Blub's remake of The Lovers by Magritte. As I told you some time ago, Blub's art is focused on putting diver's masks on characters portrayed in famous art pieces. Blub's motto is "the art can swim" and it is inspired by an Italian idiom which is "essere con l'acqua alla gola" meaning "to be with water at throat's level". It is used in periods of crises to underline a situation in which one is "almost" in danger. According to Blub, art can swim even if people don't care about it and there's danger. I would like to picture in my mind a diver's mask on the face of every Italian and say: "We can swim! We can do it!💪" (Of course we can!) . Other than this, this picture made me stop on my tracks while scrolling, because of the meaning behind the Magritte's opera, which is about the lack of communication. There are two lovers who are kissing, but that are divided by a cloth that doesn't allow them to see each other and have a real contact. This isn't really different from what we are experiencing right now: no touch allowed, we have just to keep our distance from our loved ones. I can't explain how weird it feels, communicating without touches, hugs or gentle kisses, especially for us, a really touchy-feely people 😩 But as our PM said: "Let's keep a distance now, so that we can hug tighter later!" 💑

*******

[ITA] Mentre stavo scorrendo le foto scattate l'anno scorso a Napoli, ho trovato questa riguardante il "remake" di Blub de Gli Amanti di Magritte. Come ho raccontato un po' di tempo fa, Blub mette maschere da sub ai personaggi di importanti opere d'arte. Il suo motto è "l'arte sa nuotare" e si ispira al famoso modo di dire "stare con l'acqua alla gola". Secondo Blub, l'arte può nuotare anche se ce ne freghiamo o si è in un periodo di crisi. Mi piacerebbe immaginare una maschera da sub sulla faccia di ogni italiano e dire "Possiamo nuotare! Ce la possiamo fare!" (Certo che ce la faremo!) Oltre a cio', questa immagine mi ha fatto riflettere sul messaggio trasmesso da Magritte che riguarda la non comunicazione. Due amanti si baciano, ma sono divisi da un telo che impedisce loro di guardarsi ed avere un vero e proprio contatto. Non è poi così diverso da ciò che stiamo provando ora: il contatto è di fatto "proibito", dobbiamo tenere una certa distanza dai nostri cari. Quanto è strano non poter comunicare tramite baci, abbracci, carezze, specialmente per un popolo con una cultura come la nostra?😩 Come ha detto Conte: "Teniamo la distanza ora, così da poterci abbracciare più forte dopo!"

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Hi! I’m Sara, unearthitaly on tumblr! I like to help Italophiles discover Italy beyond the obvious. I share tips on travel, culture, lifestyle and language.

You can find me also on my blog, on twitter, on instagram and in my new telegram channel.

[terresdebrumestories]

Clark Kent, of Krypton - 1/4: Kal-El

FANDOM: DC’s cinematic universe. RATING: Mature. WORDCOUNT: 20 404 (Fic total: ~98k words) PAIRING(S): Clark Kent/Bruce Wayne (main focus is on Clark, though). CHARACTER(S): Kal-El | Clark Kent, Bruce Wayne, Jor-El, Lara Lor-Van, Kara Zor-El, Zor-El, Martha Kent, Alfred Pennyworth, Diana Prince, Barry Allen, Arthur Curry, Victor Stone, John Stewart, J’onn J’onn, plus a quick cameo by Lois Lane. GENRE: Alternate Universe (canon divergence), transition fic with romance. TRIGGER WARNING(S): A great deal of anxiety and self loathing, especially in parts one and two. Some descriptions are heavily inspired by my experience of dysphoria-induced dissociation. SUMMARY: Batman crashes on Krypton a few days before the Turn of the Year celebrations and Kal-El's life takes a sharp turn to the left, on a path that will ultimately lead him to becoming Clark Kent.

OTHER CHAPTERS: [II. Shadow] [III. Superman] [IV. Clark Kent] ALSO AVAILABLE: [On AO3] [On Dreamwidth]

AUTHOR’S NOTES AND THANKS: Seven months of work and nearly a hundred thousand words! How's that for a first foray in a fandom, uh? I'm actually pretty proud of myself on that one, and I hope you all will enjoy reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it! But before we start, there's a number of people I need to thank:

@susiecarter​, for getting me into this pairing (seriously, go read her stories!), cheerleading me through the writing process, and then betaing the whole monster in absolute record time!

@stuvyx​ for the AMAZING comic pages which you can find here and here, and for the banners used in the official @superbatbigbang masterpost. Go shower her with praise for her work! :D

The Mod Squad @superbatbigbang, whose instructions and work were impeccable and easy to understand even for me and my silly brain

The OfficialMovieSoundtrack channel on YouTube, for compiling the complete Wonder Woman score: I listened to this more than any other music while writing CKoK.

The jewish nerds of tumblr, who’ve been (and still are) spreading the word about Superman’s origins and the character’s original meanings and principles, which in turn had a rather large influence on Clark’s personality in this fic. I hope the bits with Martha will come off as respectful as I tried to make them.

And lastly, a tiny thanks to DC and Mr. Snyder, for deciding to cast Henry Cavill and his jawline as Clark Kent but also making him just not-how-I-wanted enough (and in the right way) to spark me into telling this story.

“Oh, you haven’t heard?” Lord Bel-Lor exclaims in lilting Council, with a hiccup of delighted surprise. “I would have expected the whole of El to know of this by now.”

 Kal-El, strategically stationed close to one of the potted plants meant to shelter the refreshments table from the dancing area, presses his lips together while the young Zod dignitary tries very hard not to sound too eager about incoming gossip. Kal swallows around a lump in his throat, but remains silent. His aunt and uncle’s Turn of the Year ball is one of the most important events of the year, and it wouldn’t do for him to cause a fuss.

 He stands in place, fingers tightening around his drink, and darts a quick look around. Lady Ona-Set has found her customary seat a few feet to his right, advanced age and a rather poor sense of rhythm having long ago banded together to keep her from the dance floor. Further to the left, close to one of five internal balconies, Lady Ra-Ny and her spouse have gathered a small but agitated-looking group of Worker dignitaries from Lot and Zod’s delegations. They seem to be engaged in a rather heated debate, hushed as it is. But the rest of the guests have, for the most part, elected to dance or make good use of the balconies allowing them to gaze over the minuscule shapes of their lavish homes, several thousand feet below.

 There was a time when El’s elite lived closer to their rulers. A long time ago, the Citadel of El was filled with habitations floor to mountain-high ceiling: the royal family lived in the last few city-wide floors, the lords and ladies shared the following quarter of the space, and the common people divided themselves between the Citadel grounds and the Outside. Then the Lords and Ladies of the Principality rebelled against King Hyr-El, who resolved the situation with a bloodbath first, and the destruction of a solid third of the Citadel’s inner buildings second.

 Ever since then, the Stateroom of Peace has floated, alone, in the vast emptiness left by the old families’ houses; the new Citadel Lords and Ladies made new homes on the Citadel Grounds, and pushed former merchants to become Mountain Lords and Ladies in city-domes of their own. The Stateroom—which, as its name implies, is used for every Guild Council meeting and many other official occasions—also serves as a ballroom for religious occasions such as the Turn of the Year, during which all of Krypton celebrates yet another cycle of close collaboration between Rao, the Helping God, and his brother-husband Vohc, the Builder. These are, at least, the Stateroom’s official uses.

 There is, however, a third—and chiefly preferred—activity that takes place here: gossiping. Kal has been privy to much of it throughout his near-thirty years of life, and he is largely unsurprised to find his family once again at the center of attention as Citadel Lord Bel-Lor proceeds to share the latest news of the Citadel Princes and Princesses of El.

 It goes like this: two days before this very ball, a mysterious spacecraft crashed on Lady Mon-Ka’s property. The precise patch of land in question, bordering the Citadel, had been deemed unfit for cultivation and left in disuse for quite some time, rarely visited and even more rarely monitored. Perhaps that was why no one raised the alarm—or perhaps, as Lady Kam-Leang remarks, Lady Mon-Ka was simply suffering from the effects of the energy depletion afflicting all of Krypton, and could not afford to keep her sophisticated surveillance system in a functioning state. Whatever the reason, no one at the time thought to investigate the craft.

 “No one, that is, but the Shadow of El,” Lord Bel-Lor says with a storyteller’s instinct for dramatics.

 Kal drains his flute of liquor in one go while the Zod dignitary dutifully asks about the Shadow of El. Lord Bel-Lor declines to delve into much detail, aware as he is that extensive knowledge of the Shadow won’t garner him any favor at court, but there is more than enough there to earn several exclamations of surprise and one shocked ‘No!’. The Shadow of El, he explains, is a disturbance to the peace, a master criminal helping other criminals escape well-earned justice...but alas, the people of the Citadel have taken a shine to them.

 “Something to do with old legends,” Lady Lin-Na says in a disdainful tone. “You must have heard of the Dark Sun.”

 “Only in passing,” the Zodian admits. “I hear they are causing some trouble.”

 “Inconsequential,” Lady Lin-Na dismisses, several other voices humming in approval, including her husband's. “But they did find their name in one of our old legends, in which Rao must go through a magical sleep, and a darker version of him—Rao’s dream self, if you will—takes it upon themselves to help protect the world during the sun’s long absence... Because the Gods may not interfere in the affairs of mortals in person, the Dark Sun casts a Shadow of themselves on Krypton, so that it may fight the monsters trying to take over the world.”

 Several voices try to be the first to express their disapproval and disdain towards the very idea, Council and Ellon overlapping in the conversation until Lord Bel-Lor clicks his tongue to reestablish silence. Kal-El picks up another drink—his third this evening—and ignores Lady Ona-Set’s judgmental glare as he sips at it, knuckles white around the stem.

 There is no true way to tell what exactly transpired in that disused field. What is known, however, is that by the time Lady Mon-Ka was made aware of the smoking ruins on her property, the Shadow of El had scooped the spacecraft’s pilot out of the wreckage and taken them to the Citadel. They appeared on the main external balcony with an alien in their arms and the light of the sun behind them, striking Lara Lor-Van and Jor-El almost dumb with awe. And the Shadow of El commanded them to take care of the alien, for the spacecraft had reached Krypton on the day of Vohc’s comet, and its pilot might therefore be an envoy of the God.

 Jor-El and Lara Lor-Van, known throughout El for their piety, took the alien in. By the time Kal-El emerged from his labs six or seven hours after dawn, groggy and sporting wrinkle marks from his pillow all over his face, the entire household was scrambling to accommodate both this badly-injured and unexpected new responsibility of theirs, and the ire of Zor-El, Citadel King of El and rather exasperated older brother, who had no patience for his younger sibling and sister-in-law’s latest religious fancy.

 “I fail to understand,” the Zodri dignitary says in hushed tones while Kal braces himself for the inevitable turn of the conversation from this point on, “why Citadel royals would comply with a criminal’s instructions.”

 “I forget sometimes,” Lord Dar Ran-No says with a smile painfully obvious in his tone, “how little of our internal politics is understood outside of El.”

 Kal listens to the giggles that follow the word ‘politics’ and resists the urge to mime gagging into his glass. It isn’t so much Lady Ona-Set he worries about—she has little affection for Bel-Lor, or any of the Citadel Lords for that matter—but rather the foreign delegations taking part in the celebrations. What the Zodri envoy is about to discover will make its way into every available ear before the end of the night; no two ways about that. Kal can almost hear General Dru-Zod teasing Zor-El about it already. At the very least, however, he does have the power to avoid bringing even more attention to himself with an untimely departure. With a deep breath, Kal forces himself not to empty his Ulian liquor in one go, choosing instead to soothe the tense ache in his neck with a slow overview of the room.

 The dancing is slow tonight, even by court standards, and most of the guests are still busy digesting the vast array of refined dishes they spent the better part of three hours sampling over the luxurious buffet. The light, as red as El’s famed sunsets, sparkles over jewelry and shining fabric. Lady Ra-Ny, her spouse and their group have retreated to one of the internal balconies, Warrior-looking men scattered in close proximity while Zor-El stands in the middle of the group. All over the dance floor, people laugh, voices loud and smiles sharp with the delight of mostly harmless gossip.

 Behind Kal, the chuckles have faded, and as Dar Ran-No feigns reluctance to share his knowledge, Kal prays in vain for the ground to open up and swallow him.

 “Something you must know,” the Citadel Lord says in a delighted tone that makes Kal slouch even further than he usually does, “is that Their Majesties have never been the sort to resist...scientific curiosity.”

 More giggles, and Kal overhears two voices sharing the title of a certain book in hushed Ellon.

 “A very specific sort of scientific curiosity,” Lord Bel-Lor chimes in, improper meaning exactly as clear now as it always is.

 More laughter. Kal doesn’t quite screw his eyes shut, but he does look down at the ground, feeling redder than the sun. In his armpit and in his ears, blood pulses with the sharp painfulness of shame, and he forces himself to relax his grip on his flute of liquor or risk breaking it. It takes everything he has to use a polite tone to send away the servant offering him a drink, instead of begging them to leave him alone.

 “I must admit,” the Zodri dignitary says with what sounds like genuine curiosity, “I am quite incapable of guessing what you are driving at.”

 “Do you truly not know?”

 “To be fair, Lord Bel-Lor,” Lady Kam-Leang says in an indulgent tone, “the young man doesn’t look much older than the Prince himself.”

 “Prince Kal-El? What does he have to do with his parents’ scientific endeavors?”

 At least two people snort at that, loud and undignified, and Kal’s face heats up even further, stomach sinking fast and low in his belly. Dar Ran-No’s voice sounds tight when he explains, in the usual embarrassing amount of detail, what exactly Kal has to do with his parents’ scientific endeavors.

 “That is revolting!” the Zodri dignitary exclaims, in a strained hiss that sends cold shivers down Kal’s spine. “Who would even conceive of something so—so—”

 “I believe it has been called primitive.”

 Kal somehow restrains himself from muttering unflattering things into his drink, but only just. To his left, Lady Ona-Set sits with her eyes closed, head tilted toward Kal, mouth hanging slightly open; but the lady shows no sign of drooling. Old she may be, but the gene for degenerative hearing has been eliminated from the collective gene pool for almost seven centuries, and she has always had a reputation for gossiping. No need to encourage that particular trait with entertaining dramatics on his part, especially when she can’t possibly be having any trouble hearing when Dan Ran-No continues:

 “Primitive or no, it was in direct keeping with their previous endeavors...and neither of Their Majesties has ever made a secret of it. When the—what was the word they used for it? I forget.”

 “The birthing,” Kam-Leang supplies, voice curling with a sort of fascinated distaste around the archaic word. “That was what they called it.”

 “Right,” Bel-Lor acquiesces with a scoff, “the birthing. Both Prince Jor-El and Princess Lara Lor-Van had been religious before, you must understand, but after the—uh—the birthing, they became quite convinced the child was a miracle of the Gods. A gift from Rao himself.”

 “Surely they didn’t—”

 “Oh, yes, they did,” Bel-Lor all but squeaks; Lady Kam-Leang and her husband both hush him.

 Kal winces at the sound, fully aware that this particular piece of gossip has lost none of its power in the twenty-nine years since his birth. He doesn’t even need to put any particular effort into picturing the looks on the Ellon nobles’ faces: wide eyes and delighted grins, vaguely hidden behind fluttering fans and flutes of sparkling Nyen wine. They have sported it at regular intervals throughout Kal’s life, and he can only assume the Zodri envoy likewise looks very much the same as every other dignitary ever has: as enraptured as his predecessors were by the scandalous yet fascinating story of the last natural birth of Krypton. There is, however, more to this story, and this time Kal does down what is left of his liquor before they speak again, wishing for all the world he’d thought to grab some of the fermented torquats Dru-Zod brought along as a gift. At least he would have had something good to chew on while waiting out the night’s agony.

 “They tried to have the child blessed by the priests of Rao—”

 “They were, of course, refused,” Lady Kam-Leang states with piercing finality. “The official reason was that to give the child such a name was an affront to the Gods no priest could ever be tempted to forgive—”

 “Truly?” the dignitary asks, genuinely puzzled. “I fail to see the problem with it.”

 “Because you are unfamiliar with Ellon,” Dar Ran-No says, “or you would know ‘Kal-El’ is the light of the sun.”

 “Although,” Lady Kam-Leang remarks, “things would perhaps not have been so bad if they hadn’t gone further still. For years afterwards, Their Majesties and their followers—yes, they do still have a handful of them—insisted on calling their offspring a miracle. A herald of great things to come.”

 Kal is...acutely familiar with that line. It is old habit, by now, to swallow the bitter shame that comes with it.

 “I heard rumors,” Lord Bel-Lor continues, “that Their Majesties wished to attempt birthing a second child, but it seems the Gods intended for the prince to be a one-time phenomenon.”

 “Some people in the Guild of Believers have whispered that this must be a divine punishment for the Els’ arrogance. I do not know that I agree,” Dar Ran-No says in a slightly pinched tone, “but the lack of a second ‘miracle’ did certainly temper Jor-El’s dreams of having a messiah for a son.”

 “But of course,” Bel-Lor adds, picking up where his fellow Citadel Lord left off, “if the other rumors are true, and Their Majesties are being plagued with a much more biological problem….”

 At least one person chokes on a drink. Another one, perhaps two, coughs. Kal assumes the high-pitched, quickly-aborted laughter belongs to the Zodri dignitary, although he wouldn’t be able to swear to it. Face burning even as the rest of him turns to ice, he makes a tremendous effort to keep his gaze on the ground and take deep breaths until the corners of his eyes stop stinging. Inside his chest, his heart throws itself against his ribs like a wild animal trying to escape a cage, and Kal has to blink several times before he can bring the patterns on the floor back into focus.

 The balconies are overcrowded, the object of too many mocking eyes and surrounded by the imposing silhouettes of Nyen Warriors. But they are the only place where Kal can hope to find a little fresh air—and peace, if he can be allowed to make use of the one occupied by his uncle and his friends, rather than any of the other four—until he has remained here for the full four hours required of him, and is allowed to retreat to the safety of his labs.

 He braces himself and, carefully avoiding Lady Ona-Set’s suddenly alert gaze, begins to make his way around the ballroom.

“Good morning, Kal-El,” Krypto says when Kal emerges from his labs, with no sleep under his belt and Kryo on his heels. “Their Majesties wished me to remind you of the king’s visit tonight.”

 Kal nods, always more tongue-tied than he’d like in presence of his mother’s hunit. Krypto has always been pleasant to him, programming far too stringent to allow even for the impression of disrespect in its tone; but it is an extension of Lara Lor-Van, and that is enough to keep Kal on his toes.

 “I remember,” he tells the hunit, “thank you. In fact, I was on my way to wash up and rest. I should like to be fit for polite company tonight.”

 “Good,” Krypto says the same way it always has, the one that makes Kal feel like he’s still a little boy. “Lady Lara also wishes you to know the doctors have officially released our guest from bed rest.”

 “Oh,” Kal says, heart rate picking up. “I suppose that is good news.”

 It will mean one more person to keep in mind, one more presence to navigate around in the palace, and Kal’s head aches just thinking of it—but it is still good that the alien didn’t die. They cannot, after all, be held responsible for Kal’s issues.

 “Quite,” Krypto replies in its usual toneless voice. “Their Majesties ask that you remember the name of House El must not be tarnished. Dinner should be served at the customary hour.”

 Stomach sinking to somewhere in the vicinity of his knees, Kal nods around the lump in his throat, head lowering almost of its own volition. He stands still as Krypto, ever unaffected by displays of emotion, extends him bland wishes for satisfactory repose and floats away towards the main rooms of his family’s apartments. The Lesser House of El may have lost much of the respect they once enjoyed, after Kal’s birth, but their living quarters do still occupy a solid third of the Citadel’s upper dome. Even living here his whole life, Kal has gone numerous stretches of several days—once as much as two weeks—without encountering his parents. The sight of Krypto leaving him to go and report their conversation to his mother is as familiar an image as Kal has ever known.

 He stands alone in the corridor for a moment, breathing in and out at consciously regular intervals while Kryo asks if he’d like a massage to be added to his personal agenda for the night. He nods, of course: a little help relaxing can’t hurt, after all, and he is going to need every ounce of confidence he can get today. That, and his sore arms will definitely thank him.

 “Your heart rate is elevated,” Kryo says after a short silence.

 “I know,” Kal says, heart picking up its speed again as he tenses in anticipation of Kryo’s predictable remark:

 “I am compelled to let you know your current readings are quite far above average.”

 “I know,” Kal says again, and breathes in deep to avoid snapping at it.

 It isn’t the hunit’s fault, after all, that these reminders were programmed into it. Some things, Kal has changed over the years; but he never did figure out how to make the hunit less judgmental without messing up its programming beyond repair, and so the tone has stayed. It's proven useful in the long run, in that Kryo's unaltered demeanor hides all the things that aren’t the way Kal’s parents wanted them to be, but it doesn’t mean the hunit is never annoying. Kal has practice with this, though, and so it is simple—if not effortless—to keep his tone in check when he says:

 “Don’t worry, Kryo, I’ll be fine tonight.”

 “You are a prince of El,” Kryo says, automatically beginning one of the most irritating conversational routines in his repertoire. “You are—”

 “Bound to interact with strangers from time to time,” Kal cuts in, “yes, I realize.”

 “Irrational behaviors due to feelings of inadequacy—”

 “Kryo. You are well aware I dislike it when you talk about me like this.”

 Kryo goes quiet, but doesn’t apologize. Contrition is not a state hunit were ever designed to emulate. They are far too matter-of-fact for that. Kal, for his part, breathes in deep again, and forces his shoulders to unwind as he finally walks away from the access stairs to his labs and strides toward his rooms. He has Kryo perform a general scan to locate the rest in the household—only in the part of the Citadel assigned to Kal’s parents, however—and is all but scolded for it. The other hunits of the palace are complaining, it seems, about the frequency of pings of that nature they tend to receive.

 “It is never a good thing to render house hunits dissatisfied.”

 Hunits are devoid of emotion, incapable of satisfaction or dissatisfaction by design. What Kryo is truly saying is that Kal’s use of household scans is above average and will therefore be reported; but the emotional vocabulary makes the whole thing sound just a tad less pathetic, and so Kal sighs and nods rather than correct the hunit. Besides, his higher reasoning functions are begging further out of this conversation with every step he takes toward his bed. No point in trying to argue in these conditions. He is in the middle of a jaw-cracking yawn, his entire being crying out for sleep, when the black-and-gray silhouette of his parents’ guest stops him.

 The alien, standing by the guests’ library, is tall by Ellon standards, though the people of Zod might find them of average size. Their anatomical model is familiar enough to be reassuring: four limbs with hands and feet, shoulders on the broader side but still within the limits of what Kal would call normal. The muscles seem too well-defined to be natural, although Kryo maintains that all staff accounts state the alien looks perfectly Ellon-like under their clothes. Kal has never seen them out of their clothes, though, and so the impressive shape of the alien’s body retains all its power as far as he is concerned.

 The main difference between him and the alien lies in the head. Where Kal’s is somewhat round at the top—though perhaps a little squarer than average around the jaw—with the ordinary short round ears of Kryptonians, the alien’s has two protruding appendages at the top, aligned approximately above where ears would be. They jut out of the alien’s cowl in menacing straight lines and narrow to frighteningly sharp-looking points. Kal...believes Kryo when it says the alien doesn’t actually possess ears—or horns—that look like this. The hunit is, after all, unable to lie to him. But that knowledge doesn’t quell the eerie feeling of strangeness that tightens Kal’s chest every time he looks at them.

 The alien’s most noticeable feature, however, is not so much their silhouette as their stance. There is no hint of groveling in it, none of the wary tension displayed by visiting envoys from neighboring planets. Not that those envoys cower, exactly, but they are always clearly conscious of the galaxy’s painful history with Krypton, and therefore never fully at ease. This alien—Vohc’s alien, as Kal has heard some call them—carries themselves with the easy authority of a Citadel Lord in the king’s confidence. Back straight, head high; no hint of doubt in their own worth, their own place, their own right to remain.

 The sight of it shrivels something already small and wrinkled in Kal’s soul, makes him want to shrink back in the darkness and hide from the alien’s presence...for, sent by Vohc or not, this alien certainly does seem capable of things Kal couldn’t even dream of; and the thought of being found wanting compared to someone who, according to the court, does not even have the decency to be from the known universe, let alone Krypton, is… distressing.

 It is, therefore, unfortunate that acting on that self-effacing impulse would bring more shame to Kal’s house than his continued failure to prove himself worthy of attention.

 “Good evening,” Kal manages after a deep, steadying breath, pulse hammering away so hard he can feel it in his clasped palms. “May I help you?”

 In front of him, the alien’s head tilts to the right in what must be—might be; hopefully is—a sign of incomprehension, and Kal almost gives into the impulse to slap himself in the forehead. The alien is not from any recognizable planet, let alone a known species. They did not respond to any of the local languages stored in the House’s courtesy translators, never mind Council or Ellon. Why, then, Kal would be silly enough to assume they would understand is certainly a mystery for the ages. Not the first of its kind, it is true, but painful nonetheless.

 Swallowing a sigh, Kal draws on his vague memories of learning Council as a child and starts again:

 “I am Kal-El,” he says in Ellon.

 He waits for a few seconds, taps his fingers to the middle of his forehead, and repeats: “Kal-El.”

 “I am Batman,” the alien says.

 The words are clearly unpracticed on their tongue, the gesture all wrong. No one in El would tap their chest to indicate personhood, after all. Still, these things can be forgiven; it is the alien’s grammar that poses a significant problem. None of the politeness markers fit their position: a nobody—for all anyone knows, at any rate—addressing...well, essentially another nobody, but of royal blood. Many at court would have had Batman’s hide for that sort of an affront, accidental though it may be.

 Batman is lucky, though: Kal has dealt with much worse than people addressing him as if he were a lower-ranked but still respected guest. It is easy, then, to quell the sliver of pleased surprise—and the subsequent shame at how readily swayed Kal is—rising in his chest; to muster a stiff smile and a nod and, when Batman does not seem willing to communicate any further, flee toward his quarters.

It takes Kal a long while before he can fall into a nap, and then it takes an even longer time for him to wake up properly once the evening comes. It isn’t that El’s simple tunics of straight lines and slashed sleeves take all that long to put on, really. It’s just...well, frankly, it’s just that Kal is somewhat clumsier than average. He tends to bang into furniture and trip on his own feet more than other people do, and existing in a near-constant state of sleep-deprived grogginess does not help. Science is worth it, he knows. It doesn’t make it any less awkward to step into the Fire dining room almost three minutes late and watch six pairs of eyes turn to him.

 Kal’s uncle, King Zor-El, is a proud man, taller and bulkier even than his brother Jor—a rare build, for Thinkers. He sits in state at the head of the table with an ease Kal knows he would never be able to replicate, gaze a strange mixture of fondness and disappointment. Force of habit, perhaps. Either way, Zor-El does not say anything about Kal’s tardiness. A simple raise of his eyebrow; the pinched look on Kal’s parents’ faces, the amused gaze that passes between Sol Ka-Zod—Kal’s aunt—and her stepdaughter...all of these are familiar enough to be set aside. Not easily, not quite. But they are set aside, and that means Kal is free to look around the rest of the room, and marvel.

 The Fire dining room is one of the smaller, cozier rooms of similar function in the Lesser House of El’s apartments. At the back, a fire burns year-round, for the rooms closest to the center of the dome tend to be colder, and fire has always been Rao’s way of welcoming guests. In front of the fire sits the table, around which Kal’s family has arranged itself amidst the flowing lines of curved columns, floral motifs carved into the very bones of the building.

There, to the right of Kal’s usual chair, sits Batman. Their back is still as impeccably straight as it was this morning, their shoulders just as steady, their jaw just as strong. This time, however, the slant of their lips, below their cowl, curls into something...well. Perhaps not quite a smile. Not a smirk, either. But there is the seed of an expression there, Kal is fairly sure, that could become either of those things; and it is such a novelty compared to the usual reactions he garners that as he seats himself Kal can’t help but blush, looking down at his hands until he feels in control of himself again.

 The meal is well underway by the time Kal comes back to himself, silten salads half-eaten and roasted keltar being rolled into the room. To Kal’s right, Batman has taken their gloves off to eat, and their hands look very much like Kal’s hands—a little bigger, maybe, in keeping with their owner’s size, but nothing strange. Nothing that would be out of proportion for a Kryptonian, at the very least. They catch the eye somehow, at least as far as Kal is concerned. Batman’s silhouette was so imposing this morning, so surprisingly regal for someone people have barely hesitated to classify as a barbarian; it is hard not to be surprised when it turns out they eat like a regular person.

 It wouldn’t do to stare, however, and striking up a conversation right now would mean talking over the main guests, an ill-advised course of action.

 “I don’t think the Melokariel Proposition will ever be accepted,” Kal’s father is saying when Kal finally dares to raise his eyes away from his plate. “Nor do I think it should.”

 Kal darts a glance over the table, unsurprised to find his cousin raising her eyebrows quite high into her glass of Ulian liquor. The reaction is, Kal supposes, understandable. As the first in line to take over the throne of El, Kara has been invited to every single one of her father and uncle’s twice-weekly dinners since the tender age of twelve, and is therefore even more familiar with Jor-El’s way of gearing up for a fight. Or, well. A debate, as he calls it.

 Notorious for his incompetence and disinterest in politics, Kal returns Kara’s gesture nonetheless. He might not know the ins and outs of this Proposition as well as she does, but he does know his parents, and the thought of another family argument beginning is about as annoying as it is stressful by now. At least he knows he won’t be asked to participate. Kal’s horrendous lack of social acuity, cultural refinement, or specialization has been exposed, discussed, debated, and condemned more than enough for a lifetime; he isn’t keen on sparking that particular conversation again by asking about the Proposition or, Rao forbid, trying to change the topic. He will get through this in silence, like he always has, and count himself lucky for it.

 “Ever the retrograde, brother,” Zor-El says while a servant takes his empty plate and replaces it with the largest keltar of the lot. “If I were to listen to you, we would be working our way back to the days of primitive savagery.”

 There is no need to look up to know Zor-El has nodded in Kal’s direction, the circumstances of his birth ever a sore point for the family. He dares a glance to the right instead, and blinks when he finds Batman looking down at the table coil they were handed along with their meat. There is nothing strange about the tool that Kal can see, though accidents do happen, so he turns back to the left when his father, having most likely run through his usual defenses of Kal’s conception—helped along by his wife, of course—snaps:

 “In any case, the fact that Krypton does not possess the necessary resources to—”

 “We have talked about this before, Jor,” Zor says in a warning tone. “Krypton will not debase itself by going around begging colonies for their scraps.”

 “Ex colonies,” Kara points out, mild but clear. “The Green Lanterns saw to that.”

 Queen Sol Ka-Zod elbows her stepdaughter in the side, but Kal has never seen his cousin heed that particular warning before. His aunt cannot be faulted for the gesture, as it is unseemly for an heir to the throne to dissociate herself from the ruling monarch so openly—even if only at the family table; but then again the only thing worse than that would be for Kara to have no opinion at all. As it is, the jab passes, and the conversation returns to its topic of choice for the past nine months or so: the Melokariel Proposition.

 Kal, knowing no one will think to ask for his opinion on the topic, takes a look to his right again, and freezes. Batman, despite maintaining as dignified a posture as can be, is making an unimaginable mess of their food. Bits of it have strayed from their plate; the rest stains both their hands and their forks...and that is when Kal realizes this should have been an entirely predictable outcome. What were the chances, after all, that Batman learned to use proper cutlery on whatever backwater planet they came from? The cost of forgetting your manners—and therefore, your place—is high on Krypton, however, and Kal is too well-aware of this to sit there and do nothing. He reaches over, ready to take action, when Zor raises his voice:

 “Mining the core is the only way to survive,” he says in a tone full of rebuke, catching Batman’s attention without effort.

 “So say Peacekeepers,” Jor retorts—too loud, too fast. “They have always been quick to demand and slow to think, but—”

 “Jor!” Kal’s mother exclaims, half reproof and half horror, at the same time as Zor warns:

 “It would do you good to remember which Guild your queen came from, brother.”

 Despite the fire, the atmosphere of the room grows chilly, and Kal has to force his fingers to relax as he closes them around his fork and table coil. He tilts his head to the side when the alien looks at him, left hand extended palm up toward Batman, coil hanging between his thumb and forefinger, and asks, “May I help you?”

 Batman looks at Kal for a few moments—or at least, they keep still, with their optical lenses pointed in the appropriate direction—before they nod. Kal nods in return and, in a practiced gesture, lifts the keltar’s nearest limb with his own fork, loops the coil around it, and slices it off the animal’s body by spreading his fingers. Batman makes no sound, and does not give any indication that they watched Kal's actions particularly closely, but when Kal outfits them with a coil of their own, Batman imitates the gesture almost perfectly, and then repeats it with diligence. There is something surprisingly circumspect in the way they move, as if trying to master the gesture in as little time as possible. It seems strange, to Kal, who tends to observe things for far too long before he makes a move, but it works in Batman’s favor, and they are eating cleanly in no time. Just in time, in fact, to hear Kal’s father snap:

 “If Tsiahm-Lo does vote in favor of the Proposition, he will truly lose the right to call himself the Wise King of anything, let alone Laborers!”

 “Jor-El!” Sol exclaims, obviously shocked.

 Even Kal’s mother doesn’t dare speak in support of her husband after that sort of claim, and it is easy for Kal to feel the assembly tense—even down to Batman—as Zor leans forward and says in a low voice:

 “I would guard my words if I were you, Jor. There are those who would consider such a statement dangerously close to treason.”

 The table is grimly silent for a moment, fragile balance poised on the edge of a knife, as Kal watches his father reconsider his words, swallow, and say:

 “Forgive me, everyone. I don’t know what came over me. Obviously, I misspoke.”

 On the opposite side of the table Lara, Sol and Kara all look distinctly relieved, though Kal can’t quite manage to relax his shoulders. He hunches in on himself a little closer instead, ignoring the way Batman’s attention seems to have moved away from their food and toward the conversation on the more interesting side of the table.

 Kara is the first to speak again.

 “If nothing else,” she says in a firm tone, “I don’t believe anyone should consider the Proposition without also considering its alternative.”

 The rest of the table mumbles their assent, until Sol and Lara join in and, soon enough, the debate veers away from the Melokariel Proposition itself and onto the merits of Krypton’s old colonial programs. Kal, who has little interest in joining that discussion either, presses his lips together and turns back to his food for the rest of the meal. Batman requires almost no further help, except when dessert comes and they seem more than a little perplexed by the singing flowers set atop the cakes.

 “You can eat them,” Kal says when Batman clears their throat and tilts their head toward their plate.

 “You?” Batman repeats, head tilted, while gesturing with their hand like they’re bringing something to their mouth.

 It isn’t the gesture Kal would use to signify eating, but context makes it easy to interpret. Kal repeats the verb for Batman’s benefit, rectifiescorrections their pronunciation to something more understandable than their first attempt, and starts thinking.

 There is no telling when—or if—Batman will leave Krypton. The Shadow of El passed along no word of anyone else in the alien’s spacecraft, and no one has reached out to El looking for a lost companion since the day before yesterday. There is a possibility—how much of one is impossible to tell, but the chance is real nonetheless—that no one is coming to rescue them. If so, they will need to integrate. They cannot possibly be expected to remain incapable of communication forever, and the odds of anyone volunteering to take them to a neighboring planet are minimal at best. As for waiting for his parents to think of Batman’s well-being...Kal would frankly rather not. And yet Batman will need to adapt and find a place in Ellon society.

 They will need to speak, Kal realizes. To learn the things they don’t know, to figure out the rules and customs of this place—for otherwise they leave themselves open to ridicule, contempt, or worse. As a man with experience dealing with two of these things, Kal finds himself loath to leave Batman to deal with them alone. Not when he knows he can, perhaps, do something about it.

 Kal is no expert linguist. In point of fact, he isn’t even a teacher. He is willing to help, though, and willing to spend some time trying to figure out the best way to help Batman around...which, he guesses, makes him the only choice available. It might be a bad idea. He has other things to do, after all. Responsibilities he cannot shirk. He is a Citadel Prince of El, though, and those responsibilities do extend to taking care of guests.

 He might not be the best choice for this, but if no one else will make time for the task, he will.

Raising his head at breakfast the next morning only to find Batman standing in front of him with the same serious expression they have always displayed is a surprise for Kal. He would say that he hadn’t expected the alien to seek him out quite that fast, but the truth is he hadn’t expected Batman to seek him out at all. Besides, it is long past breakfast time. Kal is still there, it is true, but that is only because he tends to work all night and barely emerges from his labs in time to ingest something before he collapses on his bed and sleeps most of the day away. Batman can’t possibly have missed that fact. Can they?

 Whatever the reason, the alien does not seem ready to stop looking at Kal in a way that makes him feel as though his use of his table coil is being assessed and found wanting. This is not, it is true, an uncommon sentiment for Kal. Most of his life has been spent in self-conscious discomfort. But the familiarity of the sensation does nothing to prevent a blush from rising into Kal’s ears until he feels like they are about to catch on fire.

 “Excuse me,” he tells the alien in an attempt to relieve some of the tension, “may I help you?”

 Batman remains stock still for a moment. Nothing in their expression shifts exactly, except perhaps for a certain sense of...looking for something. ‘Hesitation’ seems like too strong a sentiment, somehow, though it comes closest to what Kal perceives. Deliberation, then. Batman indulges in a few more seconds of it before they nod and take a seat in front of Kal. Behind him, Kal feels Kryo hover closer, perhaps out of a sense of misplaced protection, but the hunit does not do anything else.

 Meanwhile Batman has extended a hand and is pointing at Kal’s table coil, saying something in what Kal assumes is their birth language. He blinks, still a little too groggy to process this in a timely manner, and he is fairly sure he sees Batman’s lips tighten—a sure sign of exasperation on a Kryptonian—before they point at Kal:

 “I am Kal-El,” they say. Then, pointing at themselves: “I am Batman.”

 They point at the coil again then, and Kal blushes harder when he realizes the question was actually quite simple, and he should have understood it right away. He pushes past it, however, and answers with flaming cheeks:

 “This is a table coil.”

 “This is a table coil,” Batman repeats, pronunciation quite close to Kal’s.

 “Table coil,” Kal repeats nonetheless, just to make sure the alien will understand that only these two words designate the object they are asking about.

 That, and to make sure Batman won’t mispronounce it and accidentally refer to a very intimate part of the anatomy by accident.

 Batman, as has been the case so far, proves themselves a diligent learner, and manages a perfect rendition on the second try. Kal beams. He doesn’t stop to think, then, that Batman may not have been asking for a full vocabulary lesson when he points at his fork and says:

 “This is a fork .”

 “This is a fork,” Batman repeats, eyes fixed down on the table.

 Kal nods, grin widening despite himself, a thin bubble of pride growing in his chest.

 “This is a glass .”

 “This is a glass.”

 Kal walks Batman through several other eating implements—a plate, a spoon, a napkin—ever more pleased when Batman keeps getting the pronunciation right in two, sometimes three attempts at the most. They name all the items set on the table, eventually, and Kal imagines things will stop there for a moment, but then Batman points at the table itself and says, “This is….” with a tilt of their head.

 “This is a table,” Kal informs them. Then, because he can’t think of a better way to explain the question, he seizes his glass again and, with a tilt of his head similar to Batman’s, asks: “What is this?”

 Batman nods at that, mouth slanting...well, not into a smile, maybe, but a more relaxed angle, at least. Something that seems to hint Batman has finally found something worth considering in Kal, and, well. It would be a lie to say it does not affect him. There is something—giddy, almost, but also rewarding about this. About knowing he is useful here and that what he is doing right now will be—perhaps ‘appreciated' is the wrong word. Batman would be well within their rights to consider teaching them the language a demonstration of basic courtesy on the part of their hosts. Even so, whatever Batman learns and remembers this morning will be useful to them in the future. The sentiment is exhilarating. It loosens Kal’s shoulders, make him more willing to smile as he tries to mime the concept of a room in order to explain the word ‘parlor’.

 By the time they stop, almost an hour later—and then only because Kryo reminds Kal today is the day of his annual health examination—Kal has had time to fill his chest with so much satisfaction at a job well done he feels almost no self-consciousness at the gesticulating he has to engage in to explain that he needs to leave. Batman nods, somewhat less stiff than they usually seem to be, and then says two words—at least it sounds like two distinct words—in their language.

 Kal, caught off guard, nods back, close-lipped and tenser than he would like to be, and doesn’t look back as he leaves the room at an appropriately sedate pace, Kryo hovering at his elbow. He is in the process of trying to breathe his heartbeat into something more acceptable when the questions—the sudden uncertainty—become too much to handle, and he asks, “That probably meant thank you, didn’t it? No reason for them to—”

 To what, exactly? Mock Kal? Judge him? Insult him? None of these possibilities make any rational sense. Context, and Batman’s attitude, both point towards the alien’s words being some form of thanks but—but what if it wasn’t? Kal is familiar with his mind's tendencies. Its ability to twist even the most innocuous things into catastrophes has been a part of his existence for as long as he remembers, and he knows better than to listen to it without reserve.

 But still, a persistent part of him asks, what if he made a fool of himself this morning and did not realize it? What if Batman was only indulging him and could not hold it back any longer? What if they found Kal the dullest, most profoundly boring creature they have met in their entire existence, and are now determined to avoid him at any cost? The chances are slim—very slim, even—but….

 “You are panicking again,” Kryo says in its usual dispassionate tone.

 Kal does not hush it, but he does think about it. These concerns of his are...irrational, most of the time. He knows this. Not always, though. Kal has made a mess of things without meaning to before, has been found wanting in many and varied respects—numerous times, even—and Batman...well. It did seem, for a moment there, like Batman didn’t completely despise spending an extended period of time in Kal’s company. That is a good sign. But others have pretended as much before, and Kal should have remembered that; should have paid more attention to what he was doing, put more care into remaining—unobtrusive. Yes, that would be the right word. He knows how dull he is after all, should keep it in mind lest he keep making the same mistakes he made today—too solicitous, he’s sure, treating Batman like an imbecile or...or whatever else he did, really. It will come to him, he knows.

 “Kal,” Kryo points out again as they round a corridor towards the palace doctors’ offices, “you are panicking again. Calm down.”

 Never has that particular command been of any help in the past, but Kal has long since given up on trying to get it out of Kryo’s programming. He bites down on his instinctive rejection of the advice and breathes in deep instead. Then he asks, “Would you calculate the probability of what Batman said meaning ‘thank you’, please?”

 “Situational elements suggest an 85% chance that that would be an appropriate translation of their words,” Kryo replies. “The scarcity of available data means linguistic calculations might take as long as four weeks to process. Do you wish me to proceed?”

 “No, thank you,” Kal says.

 Eighty-five percent, he tells himself even as he knocks on the door to the doctor’s office. That doesn’t sound so bad. Granted, there is still a fifteen percent chance he misread the situation entirely. A fifteen percent chance Batman was seeking him for very different reasons—although he cannot fathom what those reasons might have been—and he only managed to annoy them beyond belief. Fifteen percent chances are more than enough to send his heart racing; more than enough to half convince him he should, perhaps, consider shutting himself off from the world for good, if only it would ensure he never made that sort of mistake again.

 “Good morning, Your Majesty,” the head physician says when she opens the door.

 She gives Kal a familiar once over, takes his expression in—and this time, Kal knows he is not imagining the exasperation. Sighing, he follow her lead and tries to steel himself for the upcoming assessment and the myriad of little embarrassments that come with it.

  The examination goes well enough, except for a few awkward bruises and wounds Kal has to admit he got from lugging heavy objects around in his labs—“If you’ll beg my pardon, Your Majesty, I know people lighter than these plants of yours,” the doctor says. Kal gives her an awkward smile and changes the topic; something new to be needlessly embarrassed about. The plants are nothing big, truly, nothing anyone would find really remarkable. Kal is known for being chiefly interested in botany, though, and most people do not associate this with sprained ankles or bruised ribs; so every instance of someone finding out must be followed by an uneasy reminder that Kal does not live a dangerous life at all but is, rather, ridiculously clumsy...and getting clumsier as the years go by.

 Still, he does escape the doctor’s office eventually, relief more than palpable in every single one of his veins. Then he gets to his laboratories, settles down behind the floor-to-ceiling, one-way window, and proceeds to lose himself in work.

 He is in the middle of a—lengthening—break several hours later, when Kara’s voice rings from the top of the stairs and bounces against the spherical ceiling of the comparatively minuscule room:

 “I might wish to update your security protocols,” she says, her footsteps gradually losing themselves in Kal’s small forest of growing plants. “They barely reacted when I approached the door.”

 “Of course they did,” Kal says without looking away from his current notes, “they know you. Besides, it wouldn’t do to give anyone the impression I’m trying to hide something in here, would it?”

 Kara hums from where, if the rustling is to be trusted, she is poking at Kal’s morose-looking keva vines. Not that he takes poor care of them—he hardly does anything else with his days, after all. But Krypton’s atmosphere has been profoundly changed by the ever-more-intensive mining projects grinding away at its soil, filling the air with more dust than many plants find it possible to survive. Some biomes have been able to adapt on their own in the northern parts of the planet, where mining activity has been subdued by the lack of remaining material worth the effort. But El is one of the least-affected Principalities. The worst of the work is yet to come, here, and while the king—in his wisdom—has remained steadfastly convinced no problem could arise from an intensification of industrial production, Kal has always been more...anxious.

 It was easy to combine this with his scientific curiosity and indulge in the sort of pet project none of his family members could truly disapprove of, despite his lack of formal education on the topic. Kara, for her part, has never quite seemed to understand Kal’s enthusiasm for his test subjects, and barely bothers to feign an apology when she accidentally snaps a leaf off a luat bush.

 “They seem to be doing better,” she says with a polite smile even as she places the broken leaf back into the luat’s force-field, the atmosphere set to mimic a seventy percent air pollution rate. She wipes her hand clean with a nearby rag before she continues: “Perhaps you are finally succeeding.”

 “We did move from a five percent survival rate to ten,” Kal replies without mirth.

 “Ah. Well...at least there is progress?”

 Kal tilts his head in concession, and then stiffens when Kara finally walks up to his desk and leans over his shoulder. The working lights, brighter than any other in the lab, must obstruct her view: she reaches for Kal’s papers, and although his first instinct is to grab after them, he knows better than to attempt it. Kara has, after all, been training all her life never to take no for an answer. Not at face value, in any case. Kal hesitates. Fidgets. At last, when he is sure Kara must have completed at least her second reading of what notes he has, he can’t help but ignore the skepticism in her expression and ask:

 “What do you think?”

 Kara’s lips purse into a doubtful expression, and she chews on her tongue for a second. Curbing her answer to sound more diplomatic, then. Perhaps Kal should warn her to get rid of the tell.

 “I can’t say that I have much expertise in linguistics,” Kara says at last.

 Biting down on a sigh, Kal reaches for his notes again, and meets no resistance from his cousin. He eyes his teaching plan for what must be the hundredth time today, and thinks.

Batman’s species is unknown on Krypton. Taking care of them has worked out all right so far, but nothing says they won’t be confronted with unexpected problems later on. They must be able to satisfy their basic needs on their own, which means they must be able to obtain food, drinks, sleeping accommodations and hygiene products. This implies naming said items, and learning how to ask lower-ranked individuals for services and thank them appropriately afterwards. Other things will come, such as asking for and understanding directions to various places, greeting individuals of various ranks and, of course, learning to make some form of conversation with the royal family without provoking an incident.

Kal is in the process of revising what he should focus on first and which verbal form to prioritize—desperately trying to remember his first lessons in any language in the process—when Kara sighs, sits on his desk next to him and asks:

 “How long do you believe this will take?”

 “A few months, I suppose?” Kal hazards. “They seem to be a fast learner, and they have more pressing motivation to learn Ellon than I did to learn La’u—”

 “I never understood why you even chose to learn La’u when you didn’t have to,” Kara interjects with a wink.

 Being ten years Kal’s senior means Kara was well into her La’u lessons by the time Kal started grasping the basics of Council, but he did hear his tutors rejoice about his prowess enough to imagine the sort of pains it must have caused Kara to learn it. Frequency-based languages are a struggle for anyone more used to words, but the fact that La’u uses deeper frequencies for more polite speech can hardly have helped Kara and her light voice. In any case, Kal himself struggled enough with the language that he cannot fully blame his cousin for her surprise.

 Still, the specifics of La’u are not the point, and Kal continues:

 “Hopefully they at least know what conjugations are, but we cannot be sure, and if they do not, it could add months of teaching in order for them to grasp the basics. And after that—”

 “After that?” Kara exclaims, but Kal is surveying his teaching plan again and only half paying attention to his cousin when he says:

 “Do not worry, I only intend to teach them Court Member forms, at first. That should serve them well enough until—”

 “Kal, I wasn’t—don’t you think you are taking on quite a lot of responsibility with this?”

 Something shrivels in Kal’s chest, a hopeful seed squashed to the ground by a distracted boot, and he hunches in on himself before he even realizes it. He does attempt to deflect the question with a shrug, but Kara would not be Kara if she could be satisfied with a non-answer of that sort.

 “Kal. You are a Citadel Prince. You are a busy man—”

 “I do believe you are confusing our timetables,” Kal mutters, unable to keep the bitterness from his voice.

 “Even so,” Kara insists, after clearing her throat, “your plants take up quite a lot of time and work, especially the nocturnal ones.”

 “I am well aware,” Kal tells the piece of paper he wrote Batman’s lesson plan on, “but even so, I am not half as busy as you are. I think I should be able to handle this.”

 With a shake of her head, Kara clicks her tongue and rises from the desk, walking to the disused elevator shaft that crosses Kal’s lab and knocking on it with her knuckles. “You know I believe in this project of yours, Kal. There is a reason I wanted to get involved. I know you will continue to give it your best effort—but I also worry you might be taking on responsibilities that are not yours.”

 “Batman is a guest under my family’s roof,” Kal points out, trying to keep his tone mild despite the sudden spike of irritation in his chest. “I do have responsibilities—”

 “There are plenty of tutors in our service—”

 “I’m quite aware,” Kal replies with more bitterness than he thought he had in store for the memory of his old teachers. “I remember my time with them, and I would rather spare Batman that.”

 “I know you did not enjoy your basic studies,” Kara starts, “but perhaps if you hadn’t been so difficult, things wouldn’t have been so hard for you.”

 Kal gapes for a moment, breath stolen by the sharp stab of pain in his chest at Kara’s words. She means well, he knows. And perhaps...perhaps, in some ways, she is right. It is possible—not probable, but possible—that Kal caving in to his teachers’ demands to specialize in the learnings of one Guild would have made his youth easier. It isn’t the done thing, after all, to ignore traditional limits the way Kal does. To defy genetic marking and engage in activities best left to those who were engineered for them. Still, what was he supposed to do?

 The very source of his fame is that Kal does not have any Guild markers in his genome. That he is, in fact, the only Kryptonian to have lived without them in centuries and, if the way his life has gone so far is to be taken as an example, for centuries to come. Why Vohc allowed him to be created—why Rao did not do him the mercy of never allowing his mother’s pregnancy to come to term at all—is a mystery for the ages. Still, the fact remains that he would never have been accepted in any Guild, no matter how well he studied. Believers, Workers, Thinkers…none of them would have wanted him. Why else would Kal’s teachers have scoffed when he asked if he would ever be allowed to learn any of the Guilds’ languages?

 It is most likely that Kara believes what she is saying. She has always been kind to Kal, and treated him as an equal, if something of an incomprehensible one. But the truth is that Kal’s tutors were ever unprepared for him—and he was a son of Krypton. How they would react to an alien, Kal would rather not find out. Not, in any case, if it means taking the risk of making Batman feel the way Kal did during his training.

 Taking a deep breath, Kal forces himself to straighten his shoulders as much as he can and, sidestepping the ever-delicate subject of his former tutors’ treatment of him, says, “Perhaps you are right. Even so, I have already invested time and effort in this project. I should very much like to bring it to fruition. I have talked with Batman—”

 “Is that his name?”

 “It is. Though we cannot know for sure whether they are a he—or if this concept even exists where they come from.”

 Kara concedes the point with a nod.

 “They seem to be an interesting person,” Kal continues. “I would like to get to know them better, but I cannot do that unless they learn to communicate with us and I spend some time with them. Teaching them Ellon seems like the ideal way to accomplish both of these things.

 Silence falls around them, and Kara fixes her gaze on Kal for a long time, a skeptical moue firmly set on her lips.

 “Very well,” she says at last, sighing in defeat the way she would never allow herself to if Kal were anyone else. It fills his answering sigh with gratitude. “Although I fail to understand what makes him—them—more interesting than any of the other aliens you have met and failed to befriend before.”

 She kisses Kal’s forehead before she goes, not noticing how still he has gone. He has to be still. He would cry if he weren’t, the shame of his own inadequacy catching up with him with the force of a laser blast. He tries to explain it later, only to himself—only in the privacy of his own head—but he can’t quite put it into words without finally breaking down into sobs: the way it felt to have Batman see him as a simple stranger, rather than a well-established failure .

 It is, sadly enough, a practiced routine to ignore Kryo’s bland inquiries about his health.

  It takes Kal some time, after his and Kara’s non-fight in his lab, to realize she must not have come to see him so they could discuss his newfound interest for the art of teaching. In fact, it takes him a full night of reflection—earning him several bruises and possibly a cracked rib that could otherwise have been easily avoided. Kara is busy all of the next morning, and Kal uses that time to sleep like the dead for a while longer, before he goes to visit her in the upper levels of the royal palace.

 “I understand,” she says when Kal is done apologizing, eyes on the floor as if he were still a little boy of ten trying to live up to his adult cousin’s expectations. “I suppose I wasn’t at my best myself.”

 Kal nods, struck mute now that he has said his piece, and waits for Kara to set what she was working on aside and add:

 “I wanted to ask what you thought of the Turn of the Year Ball. You did not dance much.”

 “You know I mislike it,” Kal says with an embarrassed shrug. “It accomplishes nothing save providing the court more fodder for gossip.”

 He glances up just in time to catch Kara’s knowing look, and feels himself blush. It shouldn’t be an embarrassment, for her to know what the court has to say about Kal. He has been a source of gossip for longer than he can remember, after all, and she must have been aware of this long before he ever began to suspect there was something wrong with him. Still, discussing a source of humiliation is not the same as being aware of its existence, and for a moment Kal finds himself quite unable to speak.

 “I understand,” Kara says with the same soft tone she always uses in these conversations of theirs. “I imagine you wanted some fresh air after that.”

 “I tried, but the main balcony was rather occupied,” Kal remarks, forcing himself to take his hands out from behind his back, only to twist them together again at his front. “Lady Ra-Ny was there.”

 “Well,” Kara says, her tone as mild as her eyes are sharp, “she does like her space. Did you see who else was there?”

 “Lord Ko Li-Van of Ul, Lord Nej Tar-Plak from Po—along with his lady wife—”

 “Ce-Qod? I thought she was too sickly to travel.”

 Kal gives a nonchalant shrug, dragging his eyes back down to the ground, heart hammering in his chest.

 “So did several others in their assembly,” he says. “One must assume she made an effort for the sake of the opportunity to meet your father.”

 “Indeed,” Kara replies, thoughtful.

 Kal glances up and finds her looking down at her work, though her pen hand is not moving.

 “It seems quite a lot of Worker Princes and Princesses were hoping for the honor of meeting our king, this week. One can only wonder why.”

 She looks up then, straight into Kal’s eyes, and he shrugs.

 “Perhaps they were simply hoping to present him with well-wishing gifts for the Turn of the Year. I did hear some of them trade ideas among themselves. I believe Shadow’s limbs were invoked more than once; or, failing that, some form of garment patterned with Dark Suns.”

 “Well, thank you, Kal,” Kara tells him after a long silence, features and shoulders as stiff as stone. “You always do pick up the best gossip.”

 Kal, who knows the way his cousin looks when she needs to think on something, nods, and makes his way back to his family’s level of the palace.

  Once he is back in his family’s dwellings, Kal decides it would be best not to put off his teaching project. The prospect of approaching Batman might be mildly terrifying—though the memory of their willingness to tolerate Kal helps—but it is a necessary step for anything to happen. Besides, teaching or no teaching, it would not do to leave Batman to their own devices like an inconvenient visitor one tries to get rid of, having been followed home.

 He finds Batman, after some searching, in one of the smaller libraries of the palace, not too far from the guests’ quarters. Neither the apartments nor the library have seen much use in many years, and the silence around them is enough to set Kal’s nerves on alert, but Batman looks unbothered by it. They've taken a seat by one of the curved windows, relaxed pose incongruous in contrast to the stiffness of their clothes—perhaps Kal should see about having something else made for them—with a book on their lap and something close to a scowl on their mouth.

 Kal steps closer, and recognizes the cover of The Adventures of Flamebird . The character is a rather popular hero in El legend: a servant of Rao who went around the world helping those they could—for their gender was never revealed, if indeed they had even had one—and did so well on their quest that the Sun God himself gave them a home atop the highest mountain of the world and allowed them to call themselves Xen-El: Xen of the light, under the protection of the Helper God himself. The story itself was nothing truly original, merely a collection of legends that had lived in El for millennia before Kal’s great grandparents were even conceived...but Kal spent many a solitary hour poring over this book, devouring Flamebird’s adventures, their discovery, and their friendship with Nightwing, who rose in service of Vohc and became the first true Thinker of Krypton.

 The book itself, in fact, shows the wear of such a love. It is creased and bent where multiple sets of hands were cajoled into holding it open for Kal...and later on, from many instances of bringing it along on official travels or solitary explorations, until the order was finally given to find it a home in the guests’ library. Kal’s lips twist with the memories. There are entire sentences of the work still carved into his mind. They are not, unfortunately, the ones his parents wanted him to learn—these were lost to time, but Kal retains the vague impression of certitude coming from them, the edge of despair creeping into their voices until they could no longer cling to the hope that Kal would, one day, reveal himself as Rao’s heir and lead El back to its former glory. Nonetheless, some parts of this book Kal could recite without looking at them, and he cannot help but smile when he sees such a beloved item in the hands of someone he hopes to come to know and respect in the future.

 Batman must be attempting to teach themselves Ellon with this book. It is a commendable effort, and something Kal might have attempted in their situation, but if the alien’s face is anything to go by the experiment is not quite yielding the expected results. Then again, as far as Kal knows, Krypton’s alphabet is quite unique in the galaxy, so unless Batman is somehow familiar with something similar, it is hardly a surprise that they are finding it hard to make sense of.

 Stepping closer, Kal clears his throat and says, “I might be able to help with that.”

 It is unclear whether Batman was already aware of Kal’s presence or if they simply have commendable control of their body’s reactions. Either way, they give no sign of surprise that Kal can see. The window does offer quite the vantage point over the library, it is true. Its round frame dominates a circular room, covered floor to ceiling with the yields of thousands of years of book collecting. The truly rare editions, made of organic fibers rather than the synthetic paper everyone uses nowadays, are of course stored in the master library. Still, this particular collection is nothing to blush at, and Kal inhales the dusty smell of many books collected together with a form of reverence, even as he waits for Batman’s response.

 The alien, for their part, hasn’t moved at all since Kal entered, as if waiting to see what might happen next. The image puts Kal in mind of a predator surveying its hunting ground...although, perhaps, with more benevolence than most. It would seem...unlikely, to most, for a royal guest to keep track of people’s comings and goings around here. Then again, those same people would also deem it impossible for Kal to notice half as much as he does, and so he does not entirely dismiss the possibility.

 He endures Batman’s scrutiny instead, resisting the urge to flush and hunch in on himself even further than he already does. Thankfully, after a long moment of contemplation, Batman says something in their own language—Kal could slap himself for expecting anything more, really. Of course, Batman wouldn’t be able to answer. That is the entire point of this conversation, isn’t it? Rao, Kal. Keep up.

 “I would,” Kal starts, and winces again. Simple words, in this situation, must be best. He tries again: “I want to help you speak Ellon.”

 Batman stays silent again, the cowl obscuring their expression in a way that leaves Kal at a complete loss. He does not have the strength to wait as long as he did the first time around, though, and so he steps forward, points at The Adventures of Flamebird and its colorful pages, and says, “This is a book.”

 He might, possibly, have imagined the way Batman’s lips quirk into the not-quite-smile Kal is beginning to suspect is their best approximation of an encouraging expression. Regardless, no rebuttal or rejection comes, and Kal allows himself to sigh in relief when Batman dutifully repeats the word. Then, Batman gestures for Kal to sit down next to them and Kal takes a place on the windowsill with rather more giddy enthusiasm than he’d expected to feel.

 “May I?” he asks, hand hovering over the book.

 He waits for Batman to push the collection into his hand and flips through the pages to the beginning of Flamebird and the Secret Lake . There, he points at the illustration and says:

 “This is water.”

 “Water,” Batman repeats with a small nod.

 Kal beams at them before he can think better of it, then flips through a few more pages to the part where Flamebird serves one of the old Lords of Krypton to prevent a servant from losing their place in the palace; points at the picture of a glass, and asks:

 “What is this?”

 “This is a glass,” Batman says.

 Kal grins again, and goes through several more illustrations, naming objects and checking back on Batman’s memory at regular intervals. It is easy to find the material he needs, the book so beloved it feels like he might be able to find specific pages without even looking. At some point, he drops it in his excitement, and thanks Batman when they pick it up for him, but otherwise a solid half hour is spent on nothing but new vocabulary. Until, that is, Kal realizes he cannot possibly expect Batman to memorize all of this without any sort of support.

 He manages to refrain from apologizing—although only because knows Batman would not understand the words—as he rises from his seat and goes to fetch Batman something to write on. He is not, technically, supposed to use the blank books stored at the bottom of the shelves, but then no one ever does, and he does not think they have been counted even once since he was born. He finds one with a black cover and the El coat of arms in silver embossing on the front, the lined pages inside ideal for a long list of vocabulary, and brings it back up to the windowsill.

 “Thank you,” Batman says, and Kal gasps and blanches.

 “Oh Rao, no, no! You can’t address me this way, you have no idea how much trouble—”

 Kal cuts himself off, face and neck heated enough to cook on them. Of course Batman has no idea what they've done. Kal should have anticipated this, even: they did run into this particular problem before. Kal...well, he does not mind what is technically disrespect. Quite the contrary, in fact. But others? Oh, others definitely will mind, quick though they are to forget Kal is a Citadel Prince when their lust for gossip overtakes them. Batman, of course, is unaware of the problem, and does not have enough understanding of Ellon for Kal to explain it to them as of yet, not without running the risk of confusing them for a long time to come—which means the situation calls for some social gymnastics.

 So, Batman is an alien. In theory, this would make them lower-ranked than any Kryptonian, let alone an Ellon in their own Principality. They are, however, also a guest of the royal family, however reluctant their hosts. This, in turn, will protect them from quite a lot of negative reactions, despite Jor-El and Lara Lor-Van’s disgrace. Servants’ modes of speaking are, of course, quite out of the question; but Batman cannot be allowed to address Citadel Lords and Ladies like equals either, or they will end up in a world of trouble. Which means they probably ought to talk like a Mountain Lord then, or at least as if close to them in status. It is, after all, unlikely that they will run into anyone ranking any lower than that while they are staying in the palace, and if they are to visit other parts of El...well, hopefully, they will wait until they can communicate better before they attempt it.

 “Let’s try again,” Kal offers, once his grammar is decided. “’Thank you’.”

 “Thank you,” Batman repeats, something in the way they move making Kal wonder if they have picked up on some of the social cues involved.

 Regardless, they do not seem eager to question the new, quite different version of the phrase, and Kal beams again, hard enough to push the embarrassment of his earlier mistake almost out of his mind. He ignores the lingering traces of it for the time being in order to pull Batman’s notebook open, pen a rapid sketch of a glass in the left hand margin, and label the drawing in his most careful schoolboy handwriting. He hands Batman the pen when they tap his wrist, and repeats the word when asked, impressed when Batman adds notes in what looks like two different alphabets of their home world.

 They archive the rest of what Batman has learned so far in the same manner, Kal flipping through the pages of The Adventures of Flamebird between words, finding his favorite illustrations without much effort, even though it has been years. After the words come sentences, and Batman puts them through the same process as the rest, writing down both the way they are to be pronounced and what Kal assumes is a translation below the Kryptonian letters. Then, after a while, Batman speaks again, in that strange language of theirs.

 Kal turns back to them, only for them to point down at the book and repeat whatever they were saying. The words, obviously, are entirely opaque, but the sentiment behind them seems easy to interpret, and Kal decides to go out on a limb in order to answer.

 “This is one of my favorite books.”

 He clutches the book to his chest with a wider smile than he remembers sporting in years, excited to meet someone whose reaction to the stories does not range from fond amusement to open disinterest for a collection of children’s tales.

 “Favorite books,” Batman repeats, and Kal beams again, closing the book to point at the cover.

 “They are Flamebird,” he tells Batman. “The legends say they were the very first El of Krypton.”

 Batman looks—not invested in the topic, perhaps, but mildly interested, if their mouth is any indication. No more disinterested than before, at any rate. And Kal—Kal has had few occasions to discuss a book he is passionate about in his life, his family not much for fiction. This, most likely, explains how he manages to spend over three hours talking Batman’s ears off about the book and why, in the end, even the mortifying certitude he must have bored the alien almost to tears isn’t quite enough to prevent him from seeking their company the next day.

  Batman progresses much faster than Kal expected. It takes them only two weeks to remember the numerous words Kal plied them with during their first lesson—something of a mistake, perhaps, to throw so many words at them and expect they would remember them all so soon—and then only about a week after that to grow quite at ease in asking for what they need at the dining table. Where before Kal used to remain silent while his parents or the rest of his family discussed one topic or another, he is now able to put this time to good use helping Batman improve their mastery of Ellon with an enthusiasm he does not remember feeling for the rest of his work before.

 He does not neglect his studies, of course, and Kara eventually stops feeling the need to ask if he is still fit to take care of his nocturnal plants. He does, however, spend most of his afternoons in the guests’ library with Batman, learning bits and pieces of Batman’s language through their alphabet of sound, and engaging in more and more complex discussions about Flamebird and the various legends surrounding them.

 He convinces Batman to let themselves be measured—with their uniform on—during the second week, and presents them with a black and cowled variation on the latest fads in Ellon fashion, the slashed sleeves of their new tunic opening up to reveal lighter gray underneath, and the strange motif of Batman’s original outfit embossed on a breastplate similar to what even Kal has taken to wearing on a regular basis.

 “Thank you,” Batman says when they receive the gift, although Kal is rather unsurprised to find their expression as mild as ever.

 “You are quite welcome,” he says. “I know the old one is cleaned every night, but I also know how uncomfortable it can be to wear the same thing every day.”

 He cannot be sure Batman truly glances up at him at the words, covered as their face is, but he does get the impression of it nonetheless. They have, after all, been spending almost all their time together these days—save for the one evening his uncle received a small group of Worker Princes and Princesses in the Stateroom of Peace, and Kal put his family’s absence to good use, excusing himself early to work on his nocturnal specimens. Such proximity makes it easier to understand someone’s expression, limited though their shared vocabulary may be, and so Kal is, perhaps, not caught as wholly off guard as he could have been when Batman asks, “Is this Nightwing?”

 Despite having anticipated the question, Kal blushes. It is one thing to draw inspiration from a legendary hero for a friend’s outfit, it is quite another to have them pick up on it. Not that Kal is too concerned about anyone else understanding the reference, seeing as Nightwing had fallen into disrepute long before he was born.

 “Perhaps,” he hedges, though it does not feel like Batman believes him.

 Nightwing was once as popular a legendary character as Flamebird, at least in El. He was, after all, the very first Thinker, and Thinkers are El’s favored Guild. Many Els have been engineered to be Thinkers in the past, and Kal’s family members are no exception. Why, his father even married into his own Guild, a rather unusual choice for royals. But where Nightwing, and his patron God Vohc, was once revered and respected as a leader of the people and a Builder of great things, later centuries turned him from ambitious to proud, from charismatic to authoritarian, from an instigator of beneficial change to an agent of chaos.

 In El, at least, it is Rao who now presides over the Gods, guiding them with his light to follow the rituals set thousands of years before by early Ellons. Flamebird, too timid and too tangled in the story of Nightwing, has also been largely relegated to the role of fairytale character, following in Rao’s footsteps with unwavering loyalty and teaching the young how to make their parents proud. A worthy goal, Jor-El used to say when Kal was little; and Kal’s destiny, his mother would add. To make them proud. Not that it did them—or Kal—any good but then the future is a hard thing to predict, and Kal did not turn out to resemble Rao in the slightest.

It was, perhaps, quite inevitable that Kal would never meet anyone who shared his preference for the older versions of the tales.

 “I like it,” Batman says at last.

 The tears catching in Kal’s throat are a surprise but he does, thankfully, manage to keep them from falling.

  Weeks turn into a month, and then another beyond that. Batman continues to progress in Ellon at astonishing speed, his—not their, as he tells Kal at the end of his first month on Krypton—ability to pick up on a word’s meaning and the complex grammatical structures of Ellon beyond anything Kal has ever heard of. Not, of course, that many people are willing to discuss much of their lives with him, language learning included, but still. He did read a few books on the theory of language acquisition, after all, and from what he sees either Batman comes from an especially quick-witted species, or he is even more exceptional than Kal suspected.

 Eventually, Kal’s parents start talking to him a little. Nothing more than idle conversation in between more important errands, but it is still progress, and an occasion for Batman to practice his skills with someone other than Kal. It...worries Kal, in the beginning. A selfish reaction, he knows—but Batman is smart, with a dry sense of humor Kal can’t help but grin at, and prone to engage in the sort of verbal sparring that makes Kal feel more alive, somehow. Talking to him—existing next to him—is a breath of fresh air. It is the very first time Kal has met someone who doesn't merely tolerate him, but rather, for some reason, seems to appreciate him.

 So it is...understandable, perhaps, if not honorable, that he fears losing this once Jor and Lara start addressing Batman over the dining table. He won’t do anything to stop it, of course. Knows better than to keep someone he has come to care for more than he ever planned to from making new friends and building himself a life on Krypton and in El...but there is still a part of him that sighs in relief once it becomes obvious something about the Prince and Princess of El’s conversation displeases Batman. Not much. Not enough for him to shun them entirely. Just—just enough for Kal to pick up on it and feel selfishly, shamefully glad.

 Kal is, in all honesty, not as good a person as he wishes he could be.

 Nevertheless, Batman does not desert Kal, and when the time comes for him to be invited to one of King Jor’s minor receptions, he appears on Kal’s doorstep long before they are to join the rest of the palace’s occupants for the descent into the Stateroom.

 He looks—well, Kal has always known Batman looked good, even in the strange, almost goofy outfit he brought from this Earth of his. Shoulders like his cannot be disguised by what is clearly thought of as a set of armor. The softer fabrics of El’s ceremonial outfits, however, the elegant work of the decorative breastplate and the geometrical embroideries—all of these combine to reveal a body no one would have to blush at. A body Kal may well be thinking of a tad more often than he is supposed to, hidden as it is behind its layers of clothes.

 “I would offer my assistance,” Kal says when he has made sure he isn’t staring, “but it seems to me like you have everything under control.”

 “Contrary to what everyone seems to think, there are things I am quite able to handle on this planet.”

 Kal chuckles despite himself, and hides the smile that lingers on his face by busying himself with the fastenings of his tunic. It has only been a week since Batman started talking to him as an equal and while Kal should, by all accounts, maintain a proper distance between him and someone so insignificant in Kryptonian society, he finds he does not want to. What does it matter, that Batman is a nobody from nowhere, if he is Kal’s friend?

 “Well, the outfit suits you well,” Kal tells Batman as he finishes putting his breastplate in place.

 “Black does seem to be my color,” Batman agrees, a dry blankness to his tone that makes Kal smile again, “even when everyone else satisfies themselves with the darkest khaki s I’ve ever seen.”

 It takes a bit of time for Kal to understand what khaki means and provide a decent translation. When that is done, though, he cannot help but agree with Batman as to the rather monochromatic state of Kryptonian fashion. Most fabrics that Kal is familiar with are dark and muted, as if the light had been leached out of them, so that the solid black and gray of Batman’s outfits seem almost bright by comparison. It is a good look on his friend, though, and Kal finds himself toying with the idea of saying so as they move to join the rest of his family at the entrance to the Way Down.

 “It is a fancier name than it needs,” Kal admits, rubbing at his neck in embarrassment, once Batman asks about it. “But it is the only way to reach the Stateroom of Peace from here, so….”

 “The only way?”

 “There are the service elevators, I suppose,” Kal says with a shrug.

 There used to be five of those, actually, disseminated at various points around the palace, until the lower botany labs were built and one of the shafts had to be closed; one of Kal’s ancestors disliked the coming and going of servants so close to them. Nowadays the serving staff use the four remaining—small and uncomfortable—service shafts, deliveries are made through a specific balcony, and Kal’s family uses the Way Down, voices echoing against the room-wide walls of polished metal. The feeling of it is rather like sitting in an egg meant to welcome forty adult Kryptonians, and Kal cannot help but wonder how much of his discomfort every time he goes down rests on that particular architectural choice and how much is simply due to what he knows he will have to face downstairs.

 “You live in a fortress,” Batman says after a pause.

 His gaze is still firmly set forward, his shoulders unmoved. Yet there is something in his tone that squeezes at Kal’s heart, a sort of tightness he isn’t sure he can figure out on his own. It leaves him nervous and tense, more hunched than he would like as he fiddles with the hems of his sleeves.

 His father, when he notices it, pulls Kal's hands apart without a word.

 “It is unbecoming,” Kal’s mother says with a shake of her head. “You must rid yourself of this habit, Kal.”

 Kal leaves his cuffs alone and mumbles an apology, though he can’t help but try and explain himself.

 “No one is as fond of these occasions as they would like to appear,” Jor-El replies as the seven of them step into the elevator, “but you cannot shame our House with that sort of ridiculous behavior.”

 Resisting the urge to wrap his arms around his midsection—a much bigger embarrassment than simple fiddling—Kal nods at the ground. It is, in all honesty, a good thing that Batman is here. Kal has no desire for his friend to realize how pathetic he can be just yet—or perhaps ever—and so it is easier to keep his shoulders straight than it would usually be. Besides, while Kal has no illusion about the interest people may find in him—very little, if any—Batman still hasn’t tired of him. In fact, the alien has treated him with something not unlike a form of fondness, like tolerating a faulty but well-worn hunit. It isn’t much. Kal knows it isn’t much. It is, however, better than he remembers ever knowing elsewhere, and it helps him keep his self-consciousness at bay as he takes a small step away from his family and toward Batman.

 They both stay quiet during the ride down, Batman having learned by now not to expect too much conversation from Kal’s parents. Brilliant scientists they may both be, but they are not teachers, nor very patient. And so, despite the keenness of Batman’s mind, behind that strange cowl of his, he has been forced to content with Kal as his only company...until, that is, rumors of his progress reached the Citadel Lord and Ladies, and he was invited to this latest function.

 “Are you always this nervous?” Batman asks just before they exit the elevator.

 Kal would like to have the conversational skill and the confidence to answer ‘often enough’, but in truth it is not that much of an exaggeration to say, “Yes.”

 Batman, thankfully, is not prone to clicking his tongue, shaking his head or, indeed, acknowledging his emotions or opinions in any voluntary way at all. This is good, because while Kal is slowly learning to read the alien—the man, he should probably call him—it makes it easier to pretend Batman doesn’t think he is being ridiculous for this. Kal squares his shoulders instead, breathing in and bracing himself just as the doors to the Stateroom open and the members of the royal family are introduced by order of importance.

 The Stateroom, far too vast for this fairly intimate assembly, has been divided in two for the night. At the front, closest to the exit of the Way Down, stands the royal table, at which Batman, Kal, and the rest of the family will sit on display for all the court to see for the duration of dinner. Then the assembly will move to the back of the room for the evening’s first dance—a mandatory exercise, Kal has been informed—and the other points of interest. There are professional dancers, two magicians, three jugglers, and one woman whose business is in fire; Kal would rather spend the evening admiring them all than dance for even a few minutes, but that is, unfortunately, not an option.

 By Kal’s side, Batman seems decidedly unperturbed by the crowd, the noise, and the myriad of occasions one has to embarrass themselves in this sort of public setting. He moves the way he has always done, head held high as a king’s, back unbowed, step unafraid. He behaves, in fact, more like a prince than Kal knows how to.

 As soon as the first nobles have paid their respects to the king and come to engage the mysterious resident of the palace, Batman slips into an almost liquid version of himself. His mouth stretches into a smile, the set of his shoulders mellows, and even his voice softens enough to become almost unrecognizable. It is like watching the man become another part of himself entirely, and Kal would gape if he were not as aware of their audience as he is.

��He follows Batman at a distance instead, watching him charm Citadel Lord after Citadel Lady, easy and practiced despite the still-obvious gaps in his vocabulary. It is a talent Kal could never cultivate, and a deep sense of shame settles in his chest, almost obscuring the pride he feels in his friend’s talent. The assembly, predictably enough, pays him little mind. Kal is used to that treatment, however, and while it is never pleasant it is easier, with Batman here, to push past the stopping power of indifferent disdain and listen to the gossip circulating in the room.

 If, that is, multiple talks of financial transactions can be considered gossip. Kal is...too well-known as an incompetent to join any of the conversation, but mining projects seem to be all the rage in El, and more than one Lord or Lady is already considering what to do for the king’s birthday, in six months’ time.

 Slowly, Kal trails Batman through the dining half of the Stateroom, wondering if this was how Kara felt when she was first allowed in polite society twenty-five years ago. They make small talk with many people, Batman coming up with a new way of calling Krypton grandiose for each pair of ears that would not accept anything less, and answering countless variations of the question: “What is your favorite thing in El?”

 No one, Kal notices, asks whether Batman misses his home planet at all. Not that he would answer—in Kal's experience, attempts to make the man open up about his emotions go about as well as punching the wall of the Citadel and expecting a door to open. Still, Kal cannot help but think the asking of that question matters, perhaps even as much as the answer. He might be biased, of course. Trying to bolster his own importance. Even so, he is glad he had the mind to ask this, at least once.

 They make their way back to the front of the room, where the dining bell will soon call them and the rest of the royals. Cold golden light shines over the room in waves, like a winter sun filtered through water. It gives the whole scene an eerie look, as if seen in a dream, though Kal does not remember it feeling like this before. Eventually, he and this mellowed version of Batman catch up to a small group composed of Kal’s family, all caught in conversation with General Dru-Zod.

 “You don’t like him?” Batman asks, tone flat enough to almost turn it into an affirmation.

 “I don’t believe he is very fond of me either,” Kal mutters in return, trying and failing to sidestep the question.

 He is under no illusion that Batman missed the evasion, of course. Still, the man has the kindness not to laugh at the childish sentiment, though Kal can’t help but feel like he wants to. Batman approaches the conversational circle, but Kal knows where his own place in this particular configuration is and stands by a nearby table instead, just far enough behind his parents to affect ignorance should any courtly eye wander his way. He can’t be sure Batman glancing at him through the lenses of his cowl is anything more than a figment of his imagination, but he does give a little shrug just the same. Just in case. It is good, after all, for Batman to have more interesting things to do than content himself with Kal’s company all day. This evening will do him good, and if it means he makes better friends than Kal in the process, well, it will have—it will be alright. Perfectly fine.

 As it is, though, none of the speakers pay Batman much attention, and Kal watches General Dru-Zod as he clinks his glass against Zor-El’s first, and Kara’s second.

 “To a most excellent deal,” he says.

 The small circle sips on what Kal assumes is one of the Zodri wines the general is so fond of, unbothered by Batman’s empty hands. The silence settles around them as they savor the taste, Kal’s uncle swishing the wine around his mouth before declaring it absolutely delicious. Kara sways after her second sip, closing her eyes and saying, “Forgive me, this is perhaps a little strong,” as if Kal hadn’t seen her drink men twice her size under a table.

 “Strong wine for a strong future,” Dru-Zod replies, self-assured. “This proposition is a boon from the Gods!”

 “This proposition hasn’t been signed yet,” Kal’s mother counters in a quiet, yet firm voice.

 Around her, the air tenses. Batman, caught between her and Dru-Zod’s piercing gaze, remains unmoved, while Kal’s shoulders bunch together even as he looks away. He knows these people’s faces well enough by now: there is no need for him to look at them to imagine the pursing of his cousin’s lips, the frown on his aunt’s face. The tightness of his uncle’s jaw when he hisses, “Sister.”

 “I am but speaking the truth,” Lara replies, still in an undertone. “You and all your Laborer friends may rejoice all you want, but none of your pretty gifts will amount to anything if Tsiahm-Lo changes his mind at the last second.”

 “Gifts have nothing to do with his decision,” Kal’s aunt replies in a mild, somewhat miffed tone. “His Majesty is perfectly capable of making his own choices, and no one here has any close contact with him.”

 “Not directly,” Kara remarks.

 Kal almost hears the air grow tense after her words. He cannot fathom Batman’s expression has changed much...nor that anyone else looks very pleased. Not with the heaviness of the silence around them. Still, he keeps his eyes turned away from his family, sweeping in wide arcs over the Stateroom and its crowd of milling nobility, the performers entertaining the crowd until the royal family finally feels the need to eat. Lady Ona-Set, robes swishing around her, wanders between tables, no doubt lamenting the excessively modern arrangements of cutlery.

 “Nevertheless,” Jor says with a tone of finality, “it would do Tsiahm-Lo good, rethinking his position. The Melokariel Proposition is pure folly, and my father—”

 Lady Ona-Set must have stirred some dust: something tickles at Kal’s nose and he finds himself sneezing three times in rapid succession.

 “Perhaps we should not speak of this where a foreigner can hear,” Kara interrupts Jor, switching to Council.

 “Perhaps you are right,” Dru-Zod replies, “although there is nothing much more to be discussed. Krypton has been stagnating for far too long, and this project will serve to revive it.”

 “You are a fool if you believe that,” Jor retorts with enough feeling to turn Kal’s head towards him, “and so are the Wise—”

 “Jor!” Zor and Lara hiss at the same time.

 On his chair, Kal stiffens. It is not done, to openly disagree with the Wise Council. Their hearing is quite keen and their new militia, specifically trained in Kandor to help unify the planet under one rule, has lengthened the reach of their arm. El holds some power in Krypton’s politics and retains its own police force, still—as does Zod and the distant Principality of Quod—but even Kal has heard whispers of how briefly prisoners taken by the Council’s militia remain in Ellon prisons. When, that is, they visit them at all. Even for royals, it is not done, to openly disagree with the Wise Council.

 For a moment, Kal thinks his family members will attempt to resurrect the topic and keep the conversation going. They spend a long time looking pensively at their glasses instead and then, without a word, the king leads his entourage up to the main table.

 The meal starts quietly enough, but the conversation on Kal’s right picks up again by the time the first dishes are brought out. To his left, Batman eyes the various foods with a tight pinch to his lips, and Kal smiles, even as he points out his favorites as well as one thing he is not very fond of but believes Batman might enjoy. They are well into the meal—in silence, for Batman is not one for idle chatter—when Batman asks, “What does your grandfather have to do with the Melokariel Proposition?”

 Kal almost chokes on his glass of water, and has to reach for a napkin with some urgency to cover the blunder. He is flushing, he knows it, and his heart is pounding hard when he answers with a question of his own.

 “Whatever do you mean?”

 “Your grandfather,” Batman repeats without looking away from his food, perfect profile insufficient for Kal to figure out what he is thinking. “Your family was talking about the Melokariel Proposition earlier. Your grandfather was mentioned, but I fail to understand how he is related to it.”

 For the barest moment, Kal gapes. He is, after all, widely known for his disinterest in the Melokariel Proposition, and his utter inability to change that fact. That Batman would have questions about it had never crossed his mind, let alone that he would come to Kal of all people for answers.

 “I’m afraid,” he says with some difficulty, cheeks burning with too-familiar shame, “you misunderstand me. I meant I don’t know what the Melokariel Proposition is.”

 Batman’s head turns toward him. The man’s eyes are invisible, and yet Kal still wishes he could squirm away from them.

 “The Melokariel Proposition,” Batman repeats. “I have been here more than two and a half months, and I’ve heard it discussed at least twice a week since then.”

 “Then,” Kal admits, shoulders drooping almost of their own accord, “you have a better mind for these sorts of things than I do.”

 There is no change in Batman’s posture, no indication in his expression or on his face that what he has just heard displeased him. This does not in any way prevent Kal from feeling like a great divide has suddenly opened up between them.

  Kal collapses at the door to the elevator shaft in his labs with a grunt of relief, and takes a couple of minutes to get his breathing back under control. His outfit rearranges into more palace-appropriate garments with a tickle, the slick feeling of dirty water and blood sending his stomach reeling. He wishes sometimes that he could just use one of the regular elevators for these outings of his. The scrutiny that would bring him, however...it would be ill advised, at best. And an unnecessary complication besides. So, abandoned shaft it is, though the necessity of the scheme does not prevent Kal from snorting, from time to time, as he tries to picture his parents’ expressions should they learn of this habit of his.

 “Avoiding servants?” Kryo asks when Kal slowly pushes himself to his feet.

 “Always a success,” Kal replies, and does not watch Kryo bob up and down in acknowledgment.

 His entire body is sorer than it has been a while, bruises growing on top of bruises. Tonight was not a good night. Multiple incidents; he’ll have to tell his family tomorrow. A dozen plants dead. Significant structural damage—well, no, that he can’t share. They would want to see it if he did, and it isn’t as though Kal could show them. In any case, it will be at least three days until Kal can afford to leave his work again.

 Three days might be pushing his luck a little, Kal knows. Two would arouse less suspicion. But the truth is, this is not an effort Kal is willing to expend, not when his only wish is to lie down and sleep for an entire week undisturbed. He may have to, at some point—Batman still has questions about the workings of El in particular and Krypton in general, and Kal is still the only one willing to answer him. Even that, though, has lost quite a lot of its appeal.

 Teaching Batman about his surroundings used to be a breath of fresh air, a dream of spring in the middle of winter. Ever since the ball, though, Batman has been—it feels like something broke. And—it makes sense. Somewhat. Kal was—he has never been an interesting person to begin with. A subject of morbid fascination, maybe. A specimen for the study of Krypton’s society. A cautionary tale for those foolish enough to dream of following into Jor-El and Lara Lor-Van’s hubris-filled footsteps, reminding them that wishing for Krypton’s next great leader will only get them someone like Kal.

 An interesting person, though? Not really.

 The thought twists at Kal’s gut, but he swallows the hard truth nonetheless. Tears won’t change things that are, and so he gulps them down and makes himself face the facts while he walks to the showers at the back of the labs. He is uninteresting. That, he knew. But at the very least, Batman used to find him—useful. Tolerable, maybe. A companion of limited worth, but still preferable to complete solitude and then...well, then, Kal did not see Batman for almost two weeks.

 Three weeks in, and they have finally resumed their usual study sessions, but it is easy to see the tone of them has shifted. There are as many questions as there have ever been, as many topics to touch upon. Batman still teaches whatever English Kal is willing to learn. But where before these moments flowed like long exchanges between friends, it seems to Kal Batman is now merely perusing a list of references, gathering information to examine it at a later date. Seeking pointers to guide his solitary studies rather than answers from someone he trusts. It is—it makes sense. Kal should have known it would happen. Batman has figured him out and moved on. He should have known. He should have. He should.

 But he did not, and tonight more than ever the thought twists inside him, clawing at his throat and the corners of his eyes in a way it hasn’t in the three months and some weeks since Batman crash-landed on Krypton.

 It is no use, spending so much time thinking of this. Kal knows this, and tries to push the thoughts out of his mind as he steps under the shower. Clearly, Batman was unwilling to bother with someone uninterested by the topic of the Melokariel Proposition. That is that; no more to say on the subject.

 Although it does, of course, beg the question of why Batman has become so invested in that project in the first place. What does an alien who did not even come from this galaxy care about a strictly Kryptonian affair? Everyone, after all, keeps repeating the truth that no neighboring planet will be affected, let alone Batman’s distant and unknown solar system. Why, then, has the man developed such curiosity about it? That he did not know of Krypton’s existence even while passing by it close enough to crash on it after an accident, Kal can believe. Light-speed spacecrafts are all equipped with automated pilots, and Batman did say he was traveling on business, attempting to reach friends who had required his help. The lack of help, too, is unsurprising. Batman did not have any way to communicate for a long time, and no one—not even Kal, he realizes, wincing—thought to offer help in getting him back home.

 But why would he grow so passionate about the Melokariel Proposition as to reject Kal on the sole basis of his lack of interest in it?

 “Would you like me to order some breakfast to be brought up?” Kryo asks when Kal emerges from his shower in a hurry and immediately shoves himself into his now-anthracite tunic.

 “In two hours, please,” Kal replies. “I have something to do, first.”

 It must be the space making him paranoid. It must be. There is too much of an echo, down there, too much darkness, like a cave of insanely regular proportions. Still, the doubt clings to Kal’s skin as he strides across the space, drooping leaves brushing at his face and arms as he goes on, wishing desperately for answers—or, failing that, for some way to stop thinking altogether...two things he might, in fact, be able to find in the same place.

 The Adventures of Flamebird has always been a source of comfort to him, well-worn pages and cover a soothing sight of their own by now. It would do him good to hold it, to lose himself in the myriad of tales it contains and the distant, unknowable lands of Krypton in its earliest days. It would ease his mind; soothe him enough, perhaps, to let him sleep and forget the night’s casualties, at least long enough to survive. And since the book has been residing in Batman’s bedchamber for several weeks now, perhaps Kal will manage to seize whatever feeble courage he has and ask some of the questions that, he can tell, will not leave him alone otherwise.

 He has no desire to do it. Kal is many things, but brave is not one of them, and the fear of losing whatever shreds of Batman’s friendship he still has stops him in his tracks at the bifurcation between the guests’ quarters and the royal apartments. He is, however, a Prince of El. Not the most glorious of them, and not a particularly good one, either; but if he suspects something strange is going on in the palace, it is his duty to examine it. He must do this, and he must do this fairly—he cannot let his desire for friendship blind him to whatever reasons Batman might have to research a planet-wide project involving so much energy...and if those reasons come with ill intent, then Kal will have to stop the man. Friend or no.

 Kal knows his duty, he truly does, but he cannot deny that relief washes over him, a few minutes later, when Batman does not answer the knock on his door. For a brief moment, the urge to forget about all of this seizes him, and he almost turns back. But tonight has been a bad night, and a dozen pe—plants have been lost by his fault. Four of them only saplings. He should have—done many things. He did not, and now they are lost, and that knowledge is what spurs him on to push Batman’s door open. The book can wait, though Kal will miss its presence tonight; his questions cannot.

 Making no noise across the carpeted floor is an easy feat, with shoes as light and supple as socks. Even then Kal is wary. Batman, he has learned, sleeps lightly. And, these days, most likely in short stretches. The first, Batman has admitted to him directly. The second, Kal is forced to assume from what he has seen of the man. He naps at random times, and is irritated and bad-tempered when left to sleep longer than he meant to. He has the uncanny ability to fall asleep anywhere, without needing to adopt an even vaguely horizontal position. All of these are symptoms Kal recognizes from his own poor sleeping habits, ways to get some rest between his nightly work and the demands of a princely life. It is neither healthy nor agreeable, but Kal has grown used to it, and he is at least capable of recognizing the signs of it in another, when faced with them.

 All of this, of course, can mean only one thing: something has come to disrupt Batman’s sleeping patterns since he distanced himself from Kal. Something that probably can’t  be the fault of any other Kryptonian, for Kal is still the only one to speak to Batman with any regularity, and he knows perfectly well no work was given to the man besides making sure he does not accidentally insult his hosts, or his hosts’ guests. The question now is to find out what, exactly, that something is.

 Kal, stomach heavy as a stone, crosses from Batman’s living quarters into his bedchamber without a sound, relieved to find the man asleep with his back to the door. He is snoring, too, soft and regular, and Kal allows himself a relieved breath before he creeps closer, knowing Batman well enough by now to realize nothing of importance in his Kryptonian life will be kept out of his reach.

 Batman’s Earth outfit rests on a dummy by the bedside, mended torso, yellow belt and all. To the right of that, immediately left of the bed, the crimson glow of the moon washes over a pile of books—some Kal recognizes, some he doesn’t—with some kind of sharp-looking weapon and, at the top, a bracelet of some kind sporting the all-too-familiar symbol of the Green Lanterns. Kal can’t help but stare at it for far longer than he should before he grabs it, shoves it into a brand-new inside pocket of his tunic, and has to put all his focus into exiting as quietly as he came in.

 He stops outside of Batman’s quarters for a moment, grateful for Kryo and its never ending watch as he tries to sort through his thoughts. A Green Lantern! In the palace! If anyone knew this—no. Better not think of it. Not, at any rate, until Kal has decided what to do about this information. He is not thinking clearly, he knows. Cannot possibly handle this information with the amount of care and objectivity it requires on his own, not without several days to ponder it, and he does not have that kind of time. This in turn can mean but one thing: he needs counsel, and not from Kryo, which does not know the meaning of affection. No, he needs someone whom he can trust, and someone who will understand, at least in part, the dilemma he finds himself in.

 With a clear path in mind at last, Kal sighs, braces himself, and sets off toward the upper levels of the royal palace.

  Kara’s pillow slaps him in the face with enough force to disorient him for a moment, and Kal only owes the lack of a second blow to the sharpness of her reflexes. She hisses imprecations at him for a while, until he pulls out Batman’s bracelet and cuts her short. Without a word, Kara reaches for the item, scowling when Kal pulls it out of her reach on reflex. She sits up straighter and asks:

 “Where did you get this? I swear to the Gods, Kal, if you contacted the Green Lanterns—”

 “Do you truly think I would be so foolish?” Kal hisses back.

 There are those on Krypton who have managed to get in touch with the Green Lanterns and remained on the planet, but Kal has never contacted any of them directly, though he is working with them after a fashion. The Green Lanterns’ name may only serve as a curse in the higher circles of Krypton, but the general population is hardly fond of them either.

 “Then where in Vohc’s name did you find this?”

 “Batman’s room, as a matter of fact,” Kal admits.

 Kara mutters something that sounds a lot like ‘Rao help us’ with the deepest scowl Kal has ever seen on her face. He supposes he cannot blame her for it. She looks him straight in the eyes then, still frowning, and Kal has to force himself to hold her gaze, to show her without words that he is not entirely careless but merely out of his depth.

 Eventually, Kara’s face goes through a complicated movement and, with the twist of her mouth that signals questions too delicate to be dealt with immediately, she asks, “Are you sure no one else knows?”

 Kal nods with a sigh of relief. He can’t know for sure what Kara’s advice will be, but whatever happens next, at least he can have some control over the situation, and maybe—hopefully—spare Batman the worst outcomes. Colluding with the Green Lanterns would send him to jail, at best—and not an Ellon one, at that. Kal may not be an expert on the topic, but he knows his uncle: there are not many things in this world that tighten Zor-El’s jaw with a mere mention, and the people who leave El for Kandorian cells tend not to come back.

 “Good,” Kara says.

 “Do you think the Lanterns could have sent him here on purpose?” Kal asks, heart in his throat. “I don’t think so, but I—I don’t know that I can tell what I wish to be the truth apart from what really is.”

 Kara clicks her tongue as she scoots to the edge of her bed and crushes Kal into a brusque hug.

 “They would have to be stupid to do that,” she says after she releases him. “Much though Krypton’s power may be….”

 “Diminished?”

 For once, Kara’s distinctly unimpressed look leaves Kal mostly unaffected. Krypton has been steadily declining for several centuries now, and the Wise Council’s reach has only grown upon Krypton these past decades, not beyond it.

 “Let’s call it that,” Kara begrudges after a beat. “Nevertheless, we are still a force to be reckoned with. It would be foolish of them to come look for trouble our way when we have respected the terms of the Treaty. Especially with Leaark and Axor at each other’s throats, at any rate.”

 Kal does not know what is going on between those two planets exactly, although he understands some kind of blood feud is involved. Still, it does not take a genius to grasp why the Green Lanterns would be keeping an eye on that rather than spying on a long-dormant enemy who has made no effort to communicate with the rest of the galaxy since the Independence Wars. The thought releases something in Kal’s chest, but only for a short while.

 Just because Kara sees things this way, after all, does not mean her father would agree, to say nothing of the Wise Council. Kal wouldn’t expect them to care whether a friend of the Lanterns came to Krypton by design or by accident. And Batman...well, even assuming he was lying when he said he knew nothing of Krypton when he landed there, his species, his planet, and even his solar system have no presence in Krypton’s database. There is nothing, intergalactic law or otherwise, to forbid Batman from associating with the Lanterns from Earth, so why should he be punished for it?

 But then, of course, there is also the matter of his latest activities.

 “I think,” Kal says with a heavy heart, “we still need to keep an eye on him.”

 Relating his reasoning to Kara only takes a few minutes, but Kal still feels like he has been speaking forever by the end of it. It is the right thing to do, he knows. Even for Batman’s sake—it wouldn’t do to let him involve himself in something as fraught as the Melokariel Proposition without at least a warning. That thought, however, does not do much to ease the feeling that he is betraying a friend, and he knows he has been too obvious in his worry when Kara loops an arm around his shoulders again.

 “Perhaps you should have a conversation with him, and take his version of things into account before we decide what to do about him. If he is planning to do harm to Krypton, we will need to stop him...but I see no need to punish him if he is only an unlucky traveler a little too curious about things he does not understand.”

 Kal nods, too afraid to voice the thought weighing on his mind: Batman seems too smart not to have any notion of what he is doing. Kal is still hoping all of this is an unfortunate misunderstanding, but already his heart sinks with the possibility of tragedy.

 “He hasn’t been friendly toward me since your father’s latest ball,” he admits, glad that he manages to keep the tears clogging his throat out of his voice. “I doubt he would listen to me even if I tried to broach the topic...and it is too risky to have that conversation in the more public places of the palace.”

 “Well,” Kara sighs, settling back under the covers, “the other you, then.”

[barpurplewrites]

Keep an open mind - Chapter 3

Previous chapters (HERE)

-x-x-x-

“Do you believe in ghosts?”

Belle nibbled her bottom lip as she set her pint down squarely on the coaster. She’d been expecting this question, so had given some thought to her answer.

“I used to, in the same way I used to believe in Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy. Ghosts are just another fairy tale.”

She’d been focused on her glass as she spoke, when she’d finished she looked up and caught a sad smile on Gold’s face. Was he judging her? No, it didn’t look like judgement, or pity, it was sadder, more personal. How odd.

Jefferson waved an expressive hand; “I take the role of Mulder in our little troop, but for magic not aliens, although I believe in them to, it would be the height of vanity to assume we are alone in the universe.”

Belle hadn’t expected anything less from Jefferson. She’d known him long enough to have heard his excited babbling about various unexplained phenomena.  

Ariel nudged her shoulder; “I’m a full-on season one Scully. The only things that go bump in the night are dodgy pipes, animals and other humans.”

That surprised Belle; her first impression of Ariel had been of a flighty and fanciful woman. Her skill with sound engineering had shown a strong practical streak, but Belle still would have expected her to believe in all this ghost stuff.

Gold sighed; “Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy are lies we tell children to make the world more magical. Ghosts are lies we tell ourselves to make the world less painful.”

His voice was steady, but the depth of emotion in his eyes was heart-breaking. Belle wanted to reach out and comfort him, but she resisted the instinct. She didn’t not know Gold well enough to know if her actions would be welcome, and she didn’t want to overstep on her first day on the job. There was a story behind his words, one that was clearly personal and painful.

Jefferson cleared his throat and said jovially; “Time for trampoline tennis.”

“What?”

Belle looked around the bar wondering what sort of crazy game that could possibly be. Ariel chuckled; “Don’t worry. It’s what we call bouncing ideas back and forth about the episode. Not sure when we started calling it that, but it’s stuck.”

The other three pulled out notebooks from pockets and bags. Belle felt awkward that she didn’t have anything on her, she’d not been warned about this. She was just about to say she’d run back to the motel when Gold slid a brand-new notebook and pen across the table to her. It was a handsome thing, black fake leather embossed with Bumps in the Night logo.

Gold shrugged; “Should have given you this this morning, to welcome you to the crew, but I forgot it along with my gloves.”

“Thank you.”

Belle was a compulsive notebook buyer. She had some lovely ones at home, far too many still unused to justify buying more, not that that ever stopped her. This one was more of a journal, or project book. The paper was a nice thickness, and lightly lined, ideal for making sketches and for taking notes. Pockets inside the covers allowed for the safekeeping of loose paper and there were dividers that could be repositioned. It was something she would have bought for herself.

Gold smiled at her obvious enjoyment of the notebook. He flipped to the back and showed her the printed pages tucked within the pocket there.

“Our most commonly used resources. We do have a few free lance researchers who help out from time to time, but we’re such a small crew that everyone needs to pitch in. I know the pay doesn’t reflect that, but we normally get a decent end of season ratings bonus.”

Belle nodded as she scanned the list. It wasn’t unusual on small productions for everyone to muck in. The experience was always helpful, and the promise of a bonus was a nice thing to look forward to. The list was a mix of normal web addresses for land registry, archives of old maps and ancestry records, then there were the odder items that she supposed she’d have to get used to in this job; Reddit and Tumblr accounts that focused on ghosts and the supernatural.

“With so much of this being on line I surprised you don’t just give us tablets.”

Ariel and Jefferson laughed. Gold rolled his eyes; “You’re not the first to suggest it. I’m old fashioned, I like writing things down.”

“That and he’s terrible for leaving chargers in motels.”

Gold laughed at Jefferson’s comment; “Aye there is that too.”

 They decided to order food before they got started on the trampoline tennis. There was some friendly bickering about pineapple and its place on pizza. Jefferson was dead against it, while Ariel and Belle were indifferent. Gold was for it, claiming that it was vaguely healthy. Food on the road frequently was deep fried, so getting fruit when you could wasn’t a bad idea. A quick look at the menu proved that salad wasn’t an option. Belle made a note to herself to pick up some apples from a grocery store tomorrow.

After everyone had had a slice or two Gold asked: “So, what do we think of our Hanging Figure?”

Jefferson flicked a piece of pineapple off his slice of pizza and shrugged; “I think this one is going to end up being something mundane.”

Gold wiped his mouth with a napkin; “I think you’re right. No deaths in the property, no missing people, nothing that would suggest a ghostly presence.”

“Not even a creepy feeling, just an empty house. Although I wish the owner had left the carpets in place, the echoes we’re getting from footsteps are annoying.”

The heels of Gold’s boots had caused Ariel some major sound problems. Viewers would never know that Gold had done most of the internal shots in his stocking feet. Belle had managed not to giggle at his ghost Pokémon socks, just.

Belle took her camera out of her bag and flicked through some of the photos she’d taken of the window. There was an outline there that looked like a head and torso hanging from a rope. It was visible from all the angles she’d been able to take a photo from, outside and inside. There was nothing on the glass that would rub off, that had been one of the first things Gold had tested. She dipped a pizza crust in the pot of sour cream and jotted down some ideas.

“What are you thinking Belle?”

As was typical of these things Gold asked his question just as Belle had taken a bite of pizza. She chewed and hurriedly swallowed almost choking herself in the process. Gold grimaced and handed her a glass of water.

“Sorry about that.”

She waved his apology away as she glugged the water down.

“No worries, it happens,” – she looked at her notebook, - “If the window hadn’t been replaced twice I’d say that there was a defect in the glass. Is it possible that this is some long running prank and the window fitter has deliberately put the outline there?”

Jefferson thumbed through his own notebook; “Possible, but the replacements were done by two different owners twenty years apart, both used different companies. Nah, I don’t see it. Besides where’s the money?”

Finding out who would profit from potential haunting was the best way to discover the truth. One of the episodes Belle had watched after she’d accepted the job had used this approach to uncover a brother attempting to scam his siblings out of their inheritance by claiming the house was haunted.

Gold tapped his own notebook and shook his head; “There’s nothing like that here. If anything, the previous owners have lost money because of that window, and the current owner is hoping that we find an ordinary explanation, so he can sell up.”

“Okay so that leaves us with damp, or maybe a structural defect in the window frame? Y’know causing the glass to warp?”

Belle felt her suggestions were weak, but everyone else nodded encouragingly.

“We can look into both of those the day after tomorrow, the owner has given us permission to replace the window.”

“I should set up a camera, maybe two, one inside and one out, to film the window over night after it’s replaced. We might see the Hanging Figure reappear.”

She said it with a smile on her face but received serious nods from the others. She was going to need to remember that this gig might feel like a joke to her but two of the people who could fire her believed in this spooky stuff. Just because the content was on the kooky side didn’t mean that she shouldn’t do a thorough job.

While she’d been mental chastising herself Ariel had said something that had made Gold pull a face. Ariel poked in his direction with a pizza crust.

“Look I know you’re not a fan of them Gold, but they’re expected on a spook show, so we will set them up and show that we used them even if we don’t get anything.”

Ah, this was about the EMF and EVP. She was about to ask why Gold didn’t like them, but he spotted the obvious question on her face.

“It’s daft, but those damn machines give me tinnitus, especially the EVP. But Ariel is right they are expected, so we’ll set them up for the overnight, okay?”

Ariel gave him a happy grin; “Good, it’s usually more of a battle than that.”

“To be fair you do normally ask me about it first thing in the morning before I’ve had a cuppa.”

Ariel turned to Belle; “Did Jefferson warn you about that? Gold is a bear with a sore head before he’s had a cup of tea in the mornings. It’s his only diva-like quality.”

Gold gave a over the top gasp and place his hand against his heart; “You wound me Ariel I’m not that bad at all.”

Jefferson and Ariel both cocked an eyebrow and him and nodded. Gold deflated and flapped a hand at them; “Okay maybe I am,” – he smothered a yawn with the back of his hand, - “and I’m going to be much worse if I don’t call it a night and get some sleep.”

It wasn’t late, but it was heading in that direction and they did have an early start the next day. Belle was surprised when Gold collected the receipts for their meal and drinks. That sort of clerical work normally got shunted off on to one of the women. When she mentioned as much to Ariel on the walk back to the motel, she just shrugged; “Gold likes balancing the books, it’s relaxing for him. I suggested he try yoga, but he laughed at me.”

Belle snorted as she tried to picture Gold in various yoga poses. It was all the funnier because her imagination had conjured suit wearing Gold doing yoga. She was still smiling at the idea when she bid everyone good night and headed into her room.

[troubleblurose-blog]

My Dumbass 5SOS Experiance // Part Uno

I know exactly what you’re thinking. I know, because well, I am one of you. The 5SOSFam that is; I made it sound like we’re our own separate alien race. But look at the people we stan... It makes a little too much sense, doesn’t it? Not even a paragraph in, and I’m already unraveling a conspiracy theory like Shane Dawson. You know him- “You look so fucking something, in my underwear while she wearing them! There’s my poop stain, on her butt.” Yeah, that funny motherfucker. 

You’re probably thinking- ‘Oh, just another fan who really wants the same thing I do.’

I’m not gonna pretend, or lie to make my situation seem special. You’re fucking right, that is exactly who I am. We all have our bumps in the road, after all, we’re all human. Or aliens, I don’t really know anymore. It’s not only science that has gone too far at this point, I am now a contributing factor to the random things that make you question what the fuck this world is becoming.

I’m not about to level with you, or give you a sob story. It could seem that way, but every detail I write is a detail I wouldn’t ever erase. Every problem I’ve encountered, or dumb ass decision I’ve written is something that made me the well rounded person I am today. These are past events, though I am currently handling some of the debris of them. I’m still coping with illness, and things like that. When I write these events, just know, while they are awful I am used to them. That sounds bad, but I don’t know any different. They do hurt greatly at times, but that’s just building more character and strength in the end. 

-Trigger/Graphic Event Warning-

Let’s start out simple and #relatable; I struggle(d) with:

Bi-Polar Depression (Mood swings between extremely jolly, and devastatingly upset.) 

Anxiety (Having a hard time staying composed in times of little stress, or in many social situations.) 

Insomnia (Getting little to no sleep/getting no well-rested sleep at night.) 

Self-Harm (Hurting yourself in ways such as eating disorders, or various forms of mutilation.)

Suicide (Trying to end your own life.)

Those are the things this is somewhat covering, but by no means are they the point I’m trying to make. They aren’t what make up me, and they aren’t what make up this letter. 

To understand the substance of the seemingly overused words on your screen, you need to know a bit about who I am first. Otherwise this could seem like every generic fanfiction. You know what I’m talking about. Eyes are always called orbs. Every meeting involves someone spilling something on someone else. Dicks are always refferred to as members. Calum is usually an asshole with a tragic life story. Mikey is usually a bad boy; who gets a soft spot for the main girl for some unknown reason. Ashton is either super sweet in his old dad way, or a complete arrogant prick. Luke, well he always bounces between popular and nerdy often. Have I made my point?

I’m gonna get relatable again when I say, there isn’t a lot I’m good at. When I am good at something, it has no use in my daily life. I can’t divide fractions, but I can hit every note in guitar hero. I can’t socially interact, but I can make bomb-ass Turkey Bacon Cojacks. I don’t know where all the states are, but I can rap Migrane. My skills are only useful to me, basically. My point being, I was practically useless in class. When I was staying home from school on the normal, from avoiding my problems and lack of motivation, I felt so useless. Like as useless as a newspaper is to a teenager. 

We all have some activity that makes us feel important, though. To Donald Trump, it’s putting down anyone who isn’t a straight white male. To Bo Burnham, it’s making people laugh with his odd perspective and unique means of comedy. Me? It’s always been when I’m on stage. I love hearing my voice being amplified to bring together people from all walks of life. When I’m writing lyrics, I feel like every syllable can make a difference in someone’s life. There’s just something thrilling about worrying you’ll sing the wrong lyric, and doing so because you were worrying about it. 

I’m not gonna say this was always my passion; when I was younger I made a very motivational speech about wanting to be a mermaid. “I WILL be a mermaid, and I WILL live under the sea.” If you think that’s odd, I know of a kid who wanted to be a trash compactor. After I discovered I couldn’t grow a tail, and I ended up not being a fan of swimming in a casino, I wanted to preform. That’s been my dream since I can remember. I’ve always been pretty witty, like I’d have to leave my wit behind   before boarding a plane it’s so sharp. I learned I get more happiness when making others smile, than I do by making myself smile.

A stage is the one place I’m not useless, and being a musician is what I was born to do. I will look anyone in the eye and tell them I'm gonna be so famous one day, because that's exactly what I believe. I know I'm not where I want to be, so it's as simple as I'm gonna move. You need to remember that the only way you can fail is if you give up. It's pretty annoying how bad I am at that. I don't only try to achieve my goals, I try to over-achieve them. I live off my intuition, I'm definitely the ride-or-die type of person in EVERYTHING I do. Making a fool of myself? I'll record it so people can hold it against me for the rest of my life. Dissapointing my parents? Well I am going to Uni for music with no back up plan. Meet 5sos? Well... That's where this fiasco begins.

Welcome to the jungle my fellow fam.

Let’s go back to the first weekend of May 2017. Yes, I really did start this journey on a weekend in May. Yes, I really did it just so I can make that reference. Maybe I started a bit before that, but I committed to it on that first Saturday. At that time I had been in the fam for a couple of months, and  I did go through the phase when I couldn’t tell Lucifer and Ashtonio apart. I however didn’t assume Calcium was Asian, I assumed he was Hispanic. I mean have you seen the ‘Hey Everybody!’ video? That was rhetorical, of course you have. He walked dogs, he was practically Ceasar911! 

Well at this time I was still self-harming, I was still suicidal, and music is very influential to me. I tend to form bonds with songs because music tends to be my main comfort. Music has always been there when no one ever was. There's just such an intense bond for me, with listening and creating it. When I write I don't just think about lyrics, I can hear the chord progressions and melodies. Unfortunately I don't have enough experience with intstruments yet to share the finished product of my own music. 

With 5SOS however, that connection was a lot different. I  appreciate the artists always, though I never tend to feel anything more than that. I didn't feel that at all, I felt a boner. I'm kidding, I just really wanted to say that. Usually with musicians, since I am a fellow musican, I tend to idolize the ones who make music I enjoy. Yes, I know I'm stating the obvious. The thing is, after the whole initiation of binging keeks, interviews, funny moments, and the movie- I didn't once feel like they were above me in any way. Not even in a sexual dream  enduced by falling asleep to Aerosmith. No, that wasn't too specific of a scenario.

They just made me feel understood in a way no one has. Not just because I'm so proud about being a gigantic dork. We were in the same boat, we had the same oar, we wanted  to get to the same island that appearantly no one has heard of, we had the same belief that it exists, and the same thing  about not being satisfyed with any of the millions of already existing islands. That was quite the metaphor, hehe. It's chalked down to similar situations, interests, humor, personalities, and  impeccable music taste. It could also be that we are close in age, but then I'd be connected to millions of other people. That doesn't sound possible for me at the moment, but wait a couple years.

So I was chilling, laughing at Calcium crossing the border with his homie Mike, when I had the thought- What if I met them? In my mind, I thought there would be at least a year before they come to Illinois again, so I had time to save money. It became a goal for me, one I was quite sure would never happen. As we discussed, I'm an over achiever with all of my goals. So what did I do? Well it would be so easy to say I wrote each of them a letter. I can't do anything that simple, I'm far too creative for that simplicity. 

From then to now, in almost a years time, so much happened from there. I met one of my closest friends who happens to be an Aussie; all because of a 5sos meme post, and her lack of ability to use Instagram properly. My family fell apart, and I'm not keen on going into detail. Let's just say I've gotten to consider the 5SOSFam as my only real family. I love you guys, you're a wonderful group of humans with a trail mix variety of nuts. Thank you for existing, and for reading this far. 

Over the time I worked, I wrote and drafted maybe 500 different letters? As of late, I actually haven't gotten any letters finished. I made 4 bracelets, not a giant accomplishment. I'm 4/5 the way done with a poster I designed for Calcium. I made Lucas a fetus 5SOS wooden box, and a 5SOS money jar. I wrote Mikey a novel about him as a superhero, with a fan-art for it. That's kind of big actually cause I've never finished writing a longer story before. There's more things, but I don't want to get too technical with it.

I think I have to say the thing that I put most my effort in was a large journal for Ashton. That's because it's filled with art, tumblr posts, and lyrics. I'm a perfectionist when it comes to all of those things. At this point it has some holes because I've drafted the entire 100 or 200 pages over at least 8 different times. Nothing in it is original to the day I started, I made so many mistakes early 2017 for myself and that journal. I was working on the journal when I decided to attempt suicide for the second time.

It's completely crazy, but I've been through a lot with that journal. All of that started with the smallest idea. From the time I started to right now, I've changed so fucking much. I know how to handle my illness, I'm clean of self-harm, I lost a family and gained a new one, I failed at dying and learned how to live, I made an amazing friend, I got closer with my already existing amazing friend, I got a drum-kit, I somehow became a good lyricist, I found my music sound, my singing voice matured unbelievably, I got and lost pets, I got and lost relationships, I'm now in Uni, I'm more independent... I'm finally at the point where I can believe it does in fact get better.

That seems crazy given I've gone through more in 2017-2018 than I did when I came out about my depression, but maybe that's because I know how to spin it. I know how to handle life. Now everytime I'm scared to do something, I do it. Cause that is how you live, that's how you write, that's how you learn. I wouldn't recognize myself. I've gone from broken, bullied, and suicidal to seeing the beauty in my missing pieces, realizing I deserve better, and actually getting out of bed.

I think it might be because of the journal... 

Hear me out, hear me out. I'm not saying it made me who I am, there's a difference between knowing and believing. Just like the difference between reading and comprehending. The difference between seeing and feeling. When I started that I could only talk the talk. Hell, when I started I had a case of putting them on a pedestal. It was never intentional, at the time I didn't even think I was worth anything. Now I see them as equals in most ways, cause when I see them be how they are I feel like I belong somewhere. I mean, I've always strayed from the majority just because I'd rather be myself and be disliked than be liked for being someone I'm not. I never saw the appeal in fitting in other than having someone to sit with at lunch. I didn't need to belong, even though it would have been nice to feel at home somewhere.

That's what I got when I found the dorks. I don't have to play a part to feel like I belong around them. I can be me, and still feel like I fit in. Not conformity, but genuine compatibility. Before them I was made fun of for being weird. I was made fun of for having my own style, for the song references no one understood, for how much I giggle. I was made fun of for my a many ambitious, none of which being realistic. But I still do all of these things. I still sing louder than everyone else. I still air drum and head bang to songs like Careless Whisper because it's really funny in contrast. I still play games, randomly balance objects on my head, dance in public because I don't give a shit about what people think when I'm having fun. 5SOS just helped me realize that girl who I wished I wasn't for most of my life, is actually the only person I'd ever want to be. Unless I could be Will Smith as Deadpool, then I immediately trash my last statement. 

This is gonna get a bit heavy for a moment, but during that last attempt, as I was losing life I was legit thinking about them. How messed up is that? My life was so shitty my dying thoughts were about four idiots from Sydney. But that's how it was, they were my coping skill. I couldn't hold onto life for me after that, so I held on for them. Not because they'd know the difference if I was gone, let's be real, they wouldn't. If they knew of me then maybe, but I was so low on life's food chain at that point. I held onto the idea of making this epic stuff, and handing it to them. 

I'm not even done with the journal!

I had a history of putting too much of myself into things and then being let down and loosing that part of me. So I don't do it, but it became something I did without realizing it. I don't know what I thought would happen. Maybe they'd like who I was, and would want to have a conversation. Maybe I'd be thrown into the fanfic life and get to hang out. Like a beach bonfire filled with laughter, various awesome people, classic rock, teasing, and knowing me, lots of dick jokes accompanying many innuendos. Maybe I'd end up in LA, and get signed to a rock label. I know I'm saying it like it's simple, trust me, I know all too well the effort it takes.

I gained some real maturity, and became even more well rounded. Though I was always the mature one who made a few mistakes here and there. That's one of the reasons I didn't fit in, I was like a 30 year old when I was 13. I'm not gonna say it wouldn't be cool to end up being their home diggle, but now I'm living for me. I saved myself, and they influenced me to. They leant me a helping hand. It would be epic to chill, or to collab on a song. Hell, if I got an opportunity to get signed to Hi or Hey I'd take it in a heartbeat. A small part of it is because I think the dorks are cool in their own odd way, but mostly because the company itself is an awesome fit for me. It produces the same sound I'd like to make, and it sends the same message-

[icharchivist]

Ayy saw friendos today again, we watched a bit more hxh, from ep 118 to 127 - we had to stop this one in the middle tho djkhfkhjfd

So so far, we watched more of the Attack on The Castle stuff, up to Netero’s blowing up.

So as usual, A. = Her, T. = Him

-As Brovoda shoots Ikalgo A: “NOT THE OCTOPUS” T: *to me* “If i learn you lied to us about the survival of the octopus istg I will cook you into an octopus sushi for lying to us”

-T: “I’m not even on tumblr and yet im gonna be known as the Octopus lover”

-T. kept making bad french puns about Ikalgo and the fact he’s an octopus (poulple in french, which lead to him saying Poulpe Fiction)

-T finds Knuckle’s technique as adorable as annoying. When Youpi fakes being angry against it, he said “I wouldn’t have to fake it tbh”. he also said Knuckle could copyright the cute yet annoying concept

-As Knuckle is having his life flashing in front of his eyes before hitting Youpi for Shoot: T: “That’s not the time to fall in love Knuckle”

-As Knuckle says he’ll die, A: “OH NO”

-At Killua coming to save him, A and T were speechless, A’s mouth opened wide with a smile before saying “THAT’S some good stuff!”

-A: “He’s been going through a hard time - No luck, Youpi he’ll put it all on you.”

-A: “Killua, it’s when he’s calm that you have to worry. the issue is that he’s mostly calm, also when he’s angry.”

-A, as Killua covers himself in electricity: “oH I SAW THIS GIF A LOT ON YOUR BLOG”

-They are amazed by Killua’s power, they find it cool af. but i love A’s : “And then they say Kurapika is op???”. i love my friends :’D

-they yelled “oh no” when Shoot’s technique disappeared out of Youpi, thinking he’s dead

-T. squeeed at the way Ikalgo walked ahah

-T. is threatening Brodova by telling ways to cook him, I’m concerned

-As Ikalgo is in trouble, A: “you didn’t lie to us right??? nothing will happen to the octopus?? i don’t care about the others”  Me: “you yelled when Shoot and Knuckle almost died” T: “Sure but it’s okay if they die if octopus survives” A: “i mean I’ll survive people dying. just not him. please”

-T: “[Brodova] doesnt have a face so his acting must come from his antena”

-As Ikalgo cry because he’s too weak to kill someone, T: “noo he’s so pure! It’s not a weakness to not kill someone, it shows humanity. or octopusity.”

-Morel: “could Pouf be tricking me?” A:“I’m always expecting the worst of shaiapouf”

-As Knuckle discovered Shoot disappeared, A. facepalmed

-As Pouf divided himself in multiple mini-him: A: “it’s a nightmare. It must be one. that’s the creepiest power yet”

-The violin keeps playing and it’s inspired by Vivaldi. T: “it’s a shame. i liked Vivaldi. but that was before. or well it’s not really Vivaldi or else i would have destroyed that butterfly.”

-About Pouf, A: “CAN SOMEONE BREAK HIS TEETH ONCE AND FOR ALL” T: “Go crash yourself on a Car’s glass like the fucking butterfly you are”

-About Hina, T: “Aww she’s cute” A: *shakes her head*, T: “Not cute?”

-As Pouf devides himself again: A: “as if one wasn’t annoying enough.”

-Still about Pouf, A: “Kill me if you want but never play violon again”

-They were so glad Knov saved Shoot ahh

-We reached the mistranslation about Killua saying he wanted to die for Gon. when i explained it, A said “so it’s completely canon”

-A: “There’s a lot of word to describe Gon, but “under control” isn’t one of them”

-Gon at Pouf: “Shut up” T: “you’re asking a lot. next you’ll ask his violin, it’s all of his personality”

-When Knuckle released his technique to protect Morel, A. remained with her mouth wide opened in shock when T. said “the fuck”

-they are so hype about the Netero v Meruem fight.

-A: “Netero fucking fight with socks and no shoes”

-T: “We got this far for a ted talk?”

-T as Netero starts using his powers: “It’s so good so pretty! so nice to see omg”

-they yelled when Netero told the King “do you want to know your name?”

-We always skip the opening but T. started dancing on it

-Also he tried to prononce what Potclin keeps saying, adding “me, checking my bank account”

-As Ikalgo gets attacked, they’re worried aldhdk. when he said “I’m not dead!” T. said “Me after writting law essays”

-When Palm comes back in the story: A: “i don’t know who she is but i want her lipstick”

-As Palm arrives, T: “new look for a new life”

-As Killua realizes something is wrong with Palm: T: “I’m just gonna say, he thought about how it would affect Gon first. just saying. it’s sad for her because he doesn’t care for her but… ye”

-A: “you think too much Killua. I’m that close to say that it’s because you think it’s better than handling your emotions”

-As Palm and Killua start talking, A: “She seems calmer…” T: “dunno… I’m scared there’s no music”

-Palm: “No point in keeping those emotions inside or resisting them…” A: “you should listen to her Killua” Palm: “It includes killing you!” A: “...Until that point”

-A: “oh great we needed another problem”

-A: “Palm looks like she’s out of Coraline”

-As Killua broke down, they both were really quiet. A. eventually said : “let it all out Killua” with softness. they both seemed quite sad about Killua’s state

-As Pouf says he wants to rule alone with the King, A: “how many people are doing their coming out this arc?! like, Killua we knew for a while but now it’s canon, but between Knuckle and Pouf now…”

-A., seeing all of that, is curious to see where Leorio and Kurapika’s relationship could go on considering where Killua and Gon’s relationship, and probably from the fact I ship them and they know it. I had to tell them that While I ship them, they have far less content and far less obvious material and that it was up to interpretation, even if to me, they have a relationship i have more interests into. but ye, less material. to which A. replied “at the same time Killua and Gon are completely canon. the only way it would be more canon would be with a kiss and even that we got one! so less content doesnt mean much” it made me laugh, but ye, still told them this is far less obvious and up to interpretation. rip.

-As Pitou is begging for Gon to not be mad at Pouf, A: “she’s making her case worse”

-As Gon restrict Pitou’s time after the Pouf’s incident, showing he’s in controle of the condition regardless of what the enemies would try: A: “It reminds me of a certain person who puts his conditions before anything the enemy has to say. to the point of hanging off the phone.”  i love my friends alhdkd

-A: “Gon lookd like Killua when Killua is about to do something that implies something bad for someone…. like killing…”

-A:“With the two kids being emotionally unstable, i feel like the others hunters are just trying to handle bombs that are about to explode…”

-A. is getting some pleasure to see The King being beaten up ahah

-They find Netero’s technique too amazing. A. wonders whats the point in putting so much nen in the earpierces

-As Netero’s theme starts playing: A: “Did they summon Chrollo for the chorus”

-Apparently this theme is inspired by the requiem of Vivaldi. My friends are amazing and i love them for noticing those stuff.

-They laughed and put hands on their faces at Netero’s heartshape

-T. says his fav characters are Ikalgo, Netero and Nobunaga.

-after the fight, the King still asks for his name. T.: “it’s Asshole. Piss of a Cow”

-They… were speechless suring the explosion. like “whaat”

-A: “I have a question. How are people still alive in this universe?”

That’s about it? About all I noted at least dkjfhdkf a few things were very french jokes rip. Also some IRL stuff were happening so dkfhkjdhf

But ye :D It was a tons of fun!

Next time we should get done with that arc.... :D Hype.