#its a very strange. awkward. somewhat self aware place to be

[silverskye13]

Random question you don’t have to answer, but how far ahead in chapters are you in terms of writing vs what’s posted on AO3? Are you posting the minute you fully finish a chapter, or are you writing chapters in chunks and posting when you can?

Currently posted up to date. I previously had a "buffer" [tried to stay 3 chapters ahead, and post on a weekly/tenday basis] but most recently I had to dismantle my backlog to fix a plot hole, so it's instant posting.

I would like to get a little bit of a buffer again in the future, but the problem with buffers is they give me the chance to go, "Wait this isn't perfect. I should fix this." As opposed to what I usually do, which is, "Oh that could've been cooler. That's fine! I will find a way to integrate this later and/or I will find a way to write around this problem."

[Or alternatively, force myself to let it go, because it's a fanfic and if it isn't perfect, who cares? No one.]

So I don't think I can have more than 1 or 2 chapters written ahead now. Know thy limits and all that.

[carisi-dreams]

From your prompt list, maybe 24 from fluff list with Sonny? 🥹

set in the mc!au because that's where I camp out these days! takes place around the time they first got together in HS since that's way less angsty than adult life.

You heard your name being called and you whirled around as you tightened your grip on the backpack strap slung across your shoulder. Sonny was jogging to catch up with you and that sight alone had you halting in the middle of the hallway, impeding the end of school day traffic. A few people shot you glares and grumbles as they dodged to avoid your abruptness. With a hasty apology and what you hoped was a matching apologetic expression on your face you moved to the side out of the stream of teenagers clamoring to get home.

“Hey,” Sonny huffed slightly out of breath when he finally caught up to you.

“Hey,” you replied as you regarded him curiously. You don’t think you’d ever even seen Sonny rush before. Between him and Nick, trying to get anywhere on time with them in tow required careful plotting and padding of timelines. 

“Walk you home?” Sonny offered with a somewhat sheepish expression on his face. He jerked his head towards the door and you fell into step as you both started moving again.

“I have a car…” your voice trailed off and you were caught between amusement and bewilderment. Sonny seemed flustered and you hid a privately pleased smile in your shoulder as you readjusted your backpack again.

It had been a week since your mom had caught you and Sonny cuddled up in your bed. You’d just cuddled and accidentally fallen asleep, but no one believe you. Nick was acting strange, hard to reach and rushed when you did manage to track him down, so you knew you’d have to sit him down properly to explain soon. Explain what, you weren’t quite sure. At the very least, that just because you and Sonny were doing…whatever you and Sonny were doing, didn’t mean that he had to disappear. It didn’t mean you were planning to disappear either. As much as you were thrilled that Sonny finally seemed to notice that you had a thing for him, you weren’t willing to sacrifice your friendship with Nick.

“Right,” Sonny finally said faintly. “I could…” he trailed off and you took pity on him.

“Want a ride?” you offered with an easy smile. “Nick has practice today, so it’ll be just you and me. And no fighting to run shotgun.”

“You had me at ‘it’ll be just you and me’.” Sonny crooked a smile down at you and you nearly bumped into a trashcan in distraction. 

The rest of the walk to your car was quiet. Well, as quiet as the end of the day at a high school could be. You and Sonny wordlessly dodged groups of people rushing to catch the bus.It wasn’t uncomfortable, but it was weighted—this thing between you two seemed to have a mass and gravity of its own. Sound receded as the two of you ducked into the car and closed the doors. Now, it was almost quiet and you became unexpectedly attuned to your own breathing. You felt awkward. Was this awkward? Had you two ruined things by starting…whatever this was?

Sonny reached over to grab your hand and you stilled the foot that had been tapping with a mind of its own. His hand was warm and calloused with strong fingers and a strong grip. Maybe the two of you had switched places along the short walk from the hall to the car. Now Sonny seemed to have more self-possession. Or, at the very least, he didn’t look like he was about too aware of his own breathing like you were.

“I—“ whatever you had been about to say got cut off by Sonny leaning over and kissing you. It was measured like your first kiss had been. He was taking his time and he sank into you and you leaned into his grip and relaxed slightly. A hand came up to cup the side of your face briefly before he pulled away, kissed your forehead, and bumped his nose against yours.

“What were you going to say?” he rasped.

“Nothing important,” you replied faintly.

“Do you want to go out sometime…?” 

“Like a date?” Jesus, was your brain always this slow? Obviously, he was talking about a date.

“Y-yeah, like a date.” Sonny stumbled and then recovered and ended more firmly than he begun. “A proper date.”

You struggled to contain your smile, but you were quickly losing the battle. It bloomed across your face like sun emerging after a storm.

“Yes, Sonny Carisi,” you said. “I want to go on a proper date with you.”

[mylittlemystery]

Odd and Even

Summary: Korekiyo’s a bit of an odd guy, to say the least. Then again, Shuichi could use a little diversion from the norm in his life.

A/N: oh yeah, it’s ‘lee Kork hours. Takes place in an AU where they attend Hope’s Peak Academy the way they expected to. Can be considered a fulfillment to an anonymous prompt (don’t send any in expecting them to be completed - we all know how terrible I am at that).

The sun was particularly extroverted today, considering it was still the middle of March, and the gentle warmth made Shuichi ponder on taking off his jacket for a moment. The field just behind Hope’s Peak was largely abandoned during this time of the day, what with most of his fellow students attending their afternoon classes, so it posed an ample opportunity to get away from all the hustle and bustle congregating in the halls.

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Korekiyo observed from his seat a few paces away. “The weather we’ve been having has been quite mild, all things considered…”

Shuichi nodded in agreement. “Yeah, it really has been…”

“I sometimes forget how lucky we are to live on a planet surrounded by such bountiful foliage,” Korekiyo continued on as he wrapped his arms around his raised calves. “So many of our customs and traditions have stemmed from the very existence of nature itself, you know.”

Shuichi was about to respond, but the feeling of something becoming entangled in his hair ultimately put a stop to this. “Ah, what the-?”

“No need to panic,” Korekiyo reassured as he crawled behind the other man, “a leaf just blew onto your head. Here, I’ll take care of it.” Remaining wary of the pain he might cause the other’s scalp, he delicately unraveled the leaf with his lengthy fingers.

A sharp gasp escaped Shuichi’s lips before he could stop it at the sudden shock of the other’s long strands of ocean green hair brushing against his jaw. “K-kiyo!” he spluttered indignantly.

Having thankfully managed to free the leaf before this outburst, Korekiyo quickly scooted over to face the frontside of his fellow classmate. “I apologize,” he spoke with a glimmer of gentle sympathy in his eyes. “I did not mean to hurt you.”

“N-no, you didn’t hurt me!” Shuichi hurried to correct said statement, but he found a gentle simmer of heat traveling to his face at the prospect of having to reveal the truth. “It’s just...your hair was tickling me, is all,” he muttered as he rubbed his forearm sheepishly.

“Ah, I see.” Korekiyo’s gaze softened noticeably at this conclusion. “Tickling is quite a strange phenomenon, isn’t it? The sensation it provokes can be so overpowering that it’s even been used as a method of torture in some areas...were you aware of that?” He almost sounded...amused…

Shuichi forced his body to suppress the gentle shudder it threatened to undertake at the mere thought of being tickled in such a manner, and he instead furrowed his brow in reply. “Are you making fun of me?”

Korekiyo hummed a little at this, eyelids fluttering closed in a dramatic expression of naiveté. “I only wish to educate you, Shuichi,” he insisted, but the gentle smirk he was wearing made its presence known through his voice.

The detective rolled his eyes in exasperation, letting out a huff as he adjusted himself to face the other completely. “Well, if you really want to educate me, answer me this,” he countered in a rare display of annoyance, “are you ticklish?”

Korekiyo raised an eyebrow at the bold inquiry, but he didn’t hesitate in delivering his response. “Yes,” he confirmed matter-of-factly, as if it were the most ordinary question there was, “I am.”

As much as Shuichi didn’t want to admit it, he was left utterly gobsmacked at such a calm reply. He had expected the other to protest at least somewhat, but once again it felt like the Ultimate Anthropologist was always two stops ahead of his train of thought. Was this...a lie? A quick way to make a fool out of him? He didn’t peg Kiyo as the type, but-

“Well now, what are you going to do, Shuichi?” A sly voice queried, unknowingly breaking the shorter boy out of his rambling head. Korekiyo hummed once again, golden eyes half lidded with an unmistakable sense of impishness. “Let me guess: you’re going to try and tickle me, aren’t you?” A gentle huff of a laugh escaped his lips. “Want to have me begging and squirming beneath your fingertips, hm~?”

While Shuichi may have been unable to see his face, he was almost positive it had turned a shade of cherry red. Despite the other being in such a compromising situation, he was the one that was getting flustered...God, what the hell were they doing?! “N-no, I-”

“Then go ahead - I won’t stop you.” With that, Korekiyo lay flat on his back with his arms draped across his stomach. His coy gaze followed the other like a hawk, and he once again cocked an eyebrow when there was no immediate followthrough. “Oh? Lost your nerve, perhaps?” Apparently, he had foregone listening to any answer that wasn’t an acceptance of this challenge.

For a few moments, Shuichi gazed at the figure of his friend laying in the grass. A great sense of embarrassment still boiled within the pit of his stomach, but another emotion was gradually emerging alongside it...competitiveness. Perhaps Kaito’s influence really was starting to rub off on him, but something about the other’s laidback nature was starting to rile him up. “I would be lying if I said I wasn’t curious,” he murmured as he pulled himself closer to the taller boy. “I suppose I can entertain you for a little while…”

Korekiyo’s eyes merely closed in an apparently content expression. “It would be my pleasure.”

Like the shot let off by a starting gun at the head of a race, Shuichi took these words as his cue to begin. He started off rather timidly, fingernails idly tracing across the other’s prominent collarbones through the cloth of the jacket.

True to his word, Korekiyo dissolved into giggles almost instantaneously. His laugh was breathy and bright, said sounds slightly muffled by the face mask covering his mouth, and his arms wrapped around his torso just a little tighter. “Ehe...ehehehehehe…”

Shuichi couldn’t help but blink in surprise at this sudden reaction. The gentle laughter that was drifting along the breeze could only be described as...endearing. “Wow, you really are ticklish,” he whispered to himself. “I hardly touched you…”

It was so faint that you could’ve easily missed it if you weren’t a very observant person, but a definite flush rose to Korekiyo’s face. His typically composed features crinkled with a hint of surprise, however said expression was gone in the blink of an eye.

Unfortunately for the taller boy, Shuichi was anything but unobservant. That rare display of humility...it was this that truly rendered him speechless. As it slowly occurred to him how out of character it was to see the other one caught off guard, a delicate warmth began to brew just behind his ribcage.

Mischief.

“I mean, it’s not even like I touched your bare skin,” he continued nonchalantly as he situated himself on top of the other’s waistline, former apprehension completely washed away by this sudden burst of power. His fingers walked themselves down lower, lingering over the curves of the anthropologist’s lithe sides. “You must be pretty sensitive if you can feel something as soft as this through your school uniform…”

“Shu-shuichi!” Korekiyo gasped out before his voice was lost to his own steadily increasing titters of mirth. While his arms may have been wrapped around his torso, they did little to protect himself from the detective’s prying hands. What was once a mere dusting of color along the cheeks had now turned into something that was nearly opaque, giving him a rather adorable look of embarrassment. “Ehehehehehehe!”

Despite himself, Shuichi couldn’t stop the small smile from creeping across his face at the sight and sounds laid out before him. He almost wished he could catch a glimpse of the other’s supposed grin, but he knew better than to try and tamper with that mask. “Hmm…” Carefully, he slipped his spidering fingertips underneath the jacket and undershirt that were in their way. “Now, if my hypothesis is correct, your laughter should grow in some noticeable fashion once I actually get to your skin - let’s see if I’m right.”

Indeed, Korekiyo devolved into a rather strained sort of cackle once those nails so much as grazed his lower abdomen. The dangerously fleeting contact made his entire body erupt with goosebumps, his muscles quiver helplessly, and his head unconsciously start to bury itself in one of his shoulders. “Shuhuhuicheeheehee!” he nearly whined. “Ihit t-tihickles…”

“Ah, just as I thought,” Shuichi noted aloud, evidently deciding to ignore the other’s meek complaints. “You’re definitely more susceptible to tickling once someone gets past your shirt, but I would expect that of almost anybody. What I’m really curious about is whether or not you have a sweet spot…” He allowed himself to come to a standstill as to let the weight of his words hang in the air. “Well, Kiyo? Do you have one?”

Korekiyo didn’t allow this opportunity to catch his breath go to waste, heaving in quiet gasp after gasp as he lay trapped by his offender’s slim figure. For once, it appeared that he had found himself at a loss for words.

“Then again, if you’re having too much fun, I suppose I could go searching for it myself. After all, I-”

“My sides!” the anthropologist suddenly spat out. He felt the temperature behind his cheeks rise to a boiling point at the atypical waver in his voice, and he cleared his throat in a vain attempt to collect at least some of his bearings. “M-my sides are most likely the worst place…”

It took every ounce of Shuichi’s self control to not scamper away right then and there. Suffice to say that this flustered admission had gotten under his own skin, and his imagination began to run wild with just how he would react being in the other’s shoes. Still...it would have been just as awkward to abruptly cut things off where they were, so, after taking a moment to solidify his resolve, he dug his fingernails into the specified area with a tender ferocity.

The results were instantaneous: Korekiyo let out a rather girlish squeal before utterly melting into a puddle of hysterical wheezing and disoriented wriggling. He dug the toes of his boots into the earth beneath them, arms still clinging to himself in a reflexive stance of protection. “Keeheeheeheeheeheeee!”

It almost felt like he had been lured into some sort of trance - the detective could feel his mind going blank as he stared down at the red faced student. It was adorable, it was enchanting, and it must have been so...torturous. He could keep the other boy here for hours if he so desired, playing those nerves like a fiddle, and nobody would be able to stop him. All the other would be able to do was laugh, and laugh, and laugh…

“Sh-shuichi, Shuichi!” Korekiyo finally cried out, evidently at his limit. Bandaged fingers came to wrap around attacking wrists desperately, applying enough pressure to leave a mark in their wake. “Ihi cahahaHAHAN’T! N-noho more, pleeheeheeheeheeheeease!”

Reminded of his surroundings thanks to the sharp pain that was abruptly thrust upon him, Shuichi nearly tripped over his own limbs with how quickly he clambered off the panting man. “I-I’m sorry!” he rushed to say, completely and utterly mortified by his own actions. “I don’t know what came over me, I just-”

“There is no need to apologize,” Korekiyo cut his panicking companion off between the last of his labored breaths. After a few more moments passed, with him having sufficiently calmed himself, he propped himself up into a sitting position once more. “Though, I must admit, I didn’t expect you to be quite so...ferocious,” he spoke gently as he brushed a few stubborn blades of grass off of his uniform. “You were aware that my sides were supposedly my worst spot, yet you lingered there for quite a while…”

“I...I must have lost track of time,” Shuichi mumbled sheepishly as he pretended to draw a striking interest in the legs of his pants. “I haven’t heard you laugh like that before, you know?”

A faint twinkle of amusement made itself known in Korekiyo’s gaze. He hummed thoughtfully as he cocked his head to one side, hands idly rising upwards to toy with the medallion that lay across his chest. “Well, that much is to be expected - one can truly lose themselves when participating in activities such as these. It’s only natural that you would do the same, Shuichi.”

Said man couldn’t help the small sigh of relief that escaped through his clenched teeth, and his posture sagged ever so slightly compared to its former rigid stance. “So...you’re not angry with me?” he asked with an unmistakable lilt of hope in his tone.

“Of course not,” Korekiyo reassured as he laid a hand on top of the other’s. “I gave you permission, after all.”

Had it been left at that, Shuichi would have been rather grateful. Unfortunately for him, that vice of a grip returning to his right forearm left no room for misinterpretations.

“However, I am most curious about one thing,” Kiyo murmured close to the detective’s ear, eyes narrowing with devious glee when it earned him a preemptive shiver. “Would you happen to have one of these so-called sweet spots?”

Shuichi could only manage a dry gulp in response.

[bbnibini]

PSISLY: An Obey Me!CYOA – sixty-three🔖

{ OPEN STATUS : YES

> approved

> displaying capture targets

Mammon : 85♡/100♡

Satan : 95♡/100♡

Barbatos: 0♡/100♡

Lucifer : 5♡/100♡

@#&)(@)���RR0Я : ∞??!@????♡/10000000000♡

CLOSE STATUS : YES

>approved }

[ Wake him up ]

(Satan’s affection +5)

Satan was unbelievably adorable when he's half-asleep. The hand you reached out to him is currently being nuzzled. If he purred right there, you were quite sure that you would lose it.

"Wake up, Satan!"

He didn't budge. It took consecutive pokes on his cheek for his eyes to open, green eyes peeking and demanding sleep.

"I would love to let you sleep some more, but we'll be locked out if we stay here any longer."

He nodded in his half-asleep state and reached out for your hand to hold it and to stand back up properly. Rubbing his eyes, he let out the cutest yawn that made your heart melt.

"Why are you smiling like that?" You heard him stutter out, knowing the reason completely. The tinge of pink on his cheeks was telling.

"Nothing~"

…and the mischievousness of your replies were also telling of your intent. He pinched your cheeks to avenge his past self. He frowned when he saw you were unfazed.

“Oh! There’s the janitor!” You beamed, bright and cheeky compared to the dark and dreary sky blanketing the ambiguous beginnings of the evening. Satan was more annoyed at you than indignant, truthfully not having the strength nor the will to get angry at you because of the cursed feeling called love that seemed to make you his every exception. You seemed to know this very fact, he couldn't help but surmise, for you seemed to always be testing the extents of those feelings. Whether it was intentional or not did not matter. It wouldn't change the feelings that you stir in his heart.

“Show me your phone!”

See? Even his shouting was more levelled than he wanted. You were a hard person to hate.

"How about no? MY. WALLPAPER. NOW~”

You saw the surly janitor’s lips twitch at your antics--well look at that, he can actually smile! And all it took was a stolen picture of your sleeping cat boy!

The “chase” continued even as you exited RAD, out of breath and laughing all the way home. You were hugged from behind as soon as you stopped to catch your breath. There was annoyance in his face as you looked up, which you returned with a toothy grin that vanished immediately on your face as he closed the distance between you. By the time he was satisfied, your lips were sore and red. Not that you mind—

“!!!”

The alarming noise you both heard however, did. You looked at each other with confused expressions, and you were the first person to ask him,

“Did you hear that?”

Satan signalled you to keep your voice down as he nodded. “It came from your room.”

Weird. You were sure you locked your room. But as you strained your ears to hear more, you did hear something. Whoever it was definitely didn’t have discretion as their priority. You were sure they knocked down the stack of books you just organised that morning, for you heard them curse as if they were buried in its sheer amount. Satan had been hanging around you lately, so some of his items were still there.

“I think I have an idea on who it is.”

Oh? You didn’t want to believe it, but it seems that he was the only possibility. As Satan opened the door, you had mixed feelings when you and your thief locked eyes. Books were strewn on the floor, and he too was somewhat caught in all the clutter, holding Satan’s beloved gift to you in utmost care. You heard Mammon curse when he looked up to see both of you. His deep blue eyes were laced with surprise.

“I-I can explain!” He struggled to get out from the stack of books burying him underneath. “It ain’t what it looks like--!”

“Really?” Satan bent down and plucked a singular flower from the bouquet, twisting its stem with his fingers. “This particular breed of carnations costs a lot of money if you sell it on Akuzon. Even a single flower can give you a small fortune.”

If he was aware of how extravagant his gift was, then why must he let you carry it in public? It was embarrassing!

“Tell me, Mammon.” Satan barred the only exit to your room with cold eyes. “How did you get in here?” You can feel Satan’s murderous aura from your side. If you won’t stop him now, you weren’t sure what will happen. So you did what any desperate not-lover would…and held his hand.

!!!

Satan looked surprised and turned to you with flushed cheeks. “Must you do this at a time like this?” He stuttered, ultimately betraying his words as he squeezed your hand back. His anger had finally subsided, his tone more subdued that you couldn’t help but sigh in relief.

“We need to hear him out.” You reasoned, pleading him with your eyes.

“Even if the evidence is glaring?” Satan frowned further, so you pacified him again with a squeeze to his hand.

“Anger wouldn’t solve this.” He looked hurt at your words so you had to clarify your meaning. “Mammon has a right to explain himself. I knew him long enough to be sure that he wouldn’t steal from me without reason.” And looking back on it...despite his not-so-sterling reputation, Mammon never did steal things from you. It was incredibly strange of him to sneak around your room like this in the first place. You looked up at Satan and smiled reassuringly. “Thank you for getting angry for my sake.”

Satan sighed heavily in relent. “You’re way too lenient on him. But you’re right. Thank you too for calming me down.”

Your beloved Avatar of Wrath had a lot of complicated feelings with regards to his representative sin—and while you couldn’t grasp it in its entirety yet, you were hopeful that you would understand him deeper as your relationship progressed. What you only knew now was that you didn’t want him to feel saddened by being branded only for his anger when you can see how painfully he struggled to set himself apart from it. The Satan you knew was awkward, yet thoughtful and gentle and kind.

“Anytime.” You kissed his knuckles as you let go, bending down to help Mammon get out from the book pile.

You...couldn't read Mammon's expression (as weird as it was). He usually had his heart on his sleeve, but somehow...it felt like he was trying desperately to hide something.

“Thanks…” Mammon’s words were almost a whisper as he clutched the bouquet to his chest.

“So—“

“I—!” Mammon interrupted, but stopped his words prematurely, looking at Satan, then at you, then at Satan again.

“…I didn’t steal nothin’!”

“Then, may I ask why you were here?”

“!!!”

He looked uncomfortable, but you pressed on. You didn’t want to be suspicious of him, but Satan had a point too.

“…Maybe.”

“Maybe?”

“Yes, Mammon. What do you mean by maybe?” (Satan)

Sataaaaaaaan! Oh, of course he didn’t look angry. He was definitely holding back for your sake, but you can still feel the venom in his words.

Oh, there it was. Your beloved, transparent, exasperating yet endearing old friend. You felt relieved to see him back again. It was odd seeing Mammon so solemn.

“MAYBE I WAS ACTUALLY GONNA SELL IT! HAPPY?!” That exasperating yet endearing old friend said, clutching the flowers tighter to his person. His admittance however, only worsened the situation.

.

.

.

.

The smile on Satan’s face was unsettling. It reminded you of that one old school movie that coined a certain term in a certain website.

“You heard him.” He turned to you with that same, plastic smile.

You did hear him. There was definitely a reason behind it—a reason he didn’t seem to be comfortable sharing with his brother, but you still couldn’t help your disappointment. Perhaps you were lenient on him as Satan said, but you justified your leniency by telling yourself that that was just him being him, and you cared for him as a friend so you should let it pass. But now that you were finally on the receiving end of his stealing agenda, a sense of clarity only brought by experience started to dawn on you: there were no heroes nor villains in this situation. Mammon’s brothers had every right to get angry at Mammon for his stealing habits, and Mammon had every right to find their treatment of him despite it all unfair. So where should you, a neutral party, stand? Do you chime in at their (oftentimes) harsh criticisms of Mammon’s character, or must you call out their unfair prejudice?

“I understand,” You found yourself saying despite not understanding your almost instinctual replies entirely; only filtered out by your desire for objectivity. You looked up at Mammon and decided to be honest with him.

“I’m disappointed in you.” You saw him shrink from where he stood, yet the firmness of his hold on the bouquet indicated that he didn’t regret his actions. “But, I want to understand why you were desperate enough to do this. You’ve never done this before, after all.”

Mammon’s eyes looked almost watery as he bit his lip and nodded. “I’m sorry.”

“I accept your apology.” You said your next sentence a lot softer: words only meant for Mammon to hear. “You have your reasons, don’t you?”

Mammon gulped as he locked eyes with a still-smiling Satan, whose sinister look already foretold his doom. Your attempts to negotiate with his blond harbinger of death ended in failure.

“I’m afraid I can’t just let this pass. He deserves to be punished for this and you can’t tell me otherwise.”

Ah. Mammon already gave up. You saw the light in his eyes fade as he smiled at you in defeat.

“Satan!”

“Fine. I’ll consider giving him a lighter punishment for your sake.”

“Sataaaan.”

“I promise to give him a lighter punishment for your sake.”

Well, that was the best you can do. At least that brought back a bit of colour on Mammon’s face. You could only hope for the best now.

stn

I’ll be late. Don’t wait for me.

Texting Lucifer about your worries only made the situation worse.

Lucifer

Frankly, I think it’s about time you would stop coddling him. He would be punished accordingly.

You

its not that i dont understand. i just think satan is going too far. mammon never did this to me before

Lucifer

Never means eventually in Mammon’s vocabulary and you know that.

You

i don’t. i believe in mammon. he’s the guardian demon you assigned for me, after all.

You  

don’t get me wrong. im definitely disappointed. in fact, im very upset right now. im beginning to understand your perspective now. it doesn’t change the fact that i still care for mammon though.

Lucifer

…fine. I’ll see to it that any punishment he receives would be…fair in human standards.

You  

thank you! oh! satan is with you right now, isn’t he?

Lucifer

Yes. Do you want to relay a message?

You

yea. he isn’t answering my texts so could you please ask him what he meant by “confiscating my bouquet?”

Lucifer  

…

You

Lucifer?

Lucifer

...you will know soon.

You  

???

Lucifer

Get some rest. Good night.

END

Weeeeiiiiiiiiiiiiiird. Even the twins who whisked you away from your room were also acting strange.

Any questions about the meaning behind their surreptitious glances and conspiratorial remarks were answered with seemingly oblivious offers of playing several rounds of Devilkart with you in Levi’s room.

“NO! THEY CAN’T GO IN!”

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

If you would ever be allowed to enter, that is. He was still angry over what happened with your pop-up café plans(which he had every right to do so). You weren’t expecting to be forgiven, so you shouldn’t really feel too disappointed and hurt that he was acting so distantly with you again. You deserved it, after all.

“I’m sorry, Levi—“

…the door was slammed at your face once the twins were let in. It didn’t hurt you as you were able to back away before the impact, but a portion of your heart seemed to have taken some damage. With bitten lips, you let your palms rest against the door, hoping your words were getting through him.

“I’m really sorry…” Somewhere along the way, you found that you stopped trying to make up with him. You had been so comfortable with each other that the fact that he was acting distant with you again never seemed to dawn on your mind until now. You thought he just needed more time, more space…but perhaps you should have tried harder.

“Sorry, Beel. Belphie. I’ll just get some sleep for tonight.”

You heard someone shout. A strong force pulled you inside—enough to make you lose your balance and stumble upon the closest person on your vicinity. He was still holding your hand, his eyes wincing at the pain of the impact. He looked like he hadn’t slept for days.

“Levi! Are you okay?”

You hurriedly got off him and offered your hand. He looked at it for a while before reluctantly taking it to stand, eyes glued on the floor.

“Lucifer told us you can stay here for tonight.”

“Oh…” You sounded disappointed.

“He’s really worried about you.” Beel suddenly chimed in, handing you your usual Devilkart controller. “Maybe he’s just embarrassed to make up with you.”

“Can’t we just start already? I’m getting sleepy.” Belphie added, yawning to prove his point.

“You’re worried? For what?”

“!!!” Levi’s face suddenly turned really red. Any attempt to cover his flushed face was futile.

“Is it because you heard I was stumped with so much work?”

“!!!”

“Are you the one who gave me snacks in the break room?”

Ah, he wasn’t looking anymore. His face was now completely covered by his hands. The tip of his ears were also dyed in that lovely colour.

You felt warm all over. Something was stinging your eyes and causing them to close. Before you knew it, you were tackling him on the ground again, relieved. Happy—the last thing you’d ever want to happen is to lose such an important friend.

“I’m so sorry, Levi! So much just happened and—!”

“I know.” His hand hovered over your back, reluctant for contact. “But next time, tell me in advance. I don’t want to read through those text walls of apologies again!”

“Sorry…”

Where would you even begin to tell him? So much had happened since your fight. Perhaps you can start with a round of Devilkart? Sometimes, games and hobbies were the best form of communication after all. And you knew for sure that you weren’t the only one who missed gaming nights together.

“Get off. Your snot is getting all over me.”

“Okayyyy.”

“Matchups are decided with rock, paper scissors. We’ll start after you wash your face.”

“Okayyyyyy.”

You heard him complain about his back as he returned to his seat and looked over you. It was such a relief to see his face again.

“Hey Henry?”

“Yeah?”

“It’s nice to see you back.”

Smiling, you told him, “Me too.”

💌tag requests @lilliansstuff, @krussyfed, @cupsof-tea

💌 continue to next scenario

[thatlongspringnight]

Effortlessly Alone (Chapter 1) (Jin x Namjoon)

Pairing: Namjoon x Seokjin 

Genre: fluff, soft angst, fantasy

Rating: T for teen 

Length: 3.5 k 

Warnings: Feeding fish food they shouldn’t eat, sad boys

Summary: Jin is an ancient river god, cursed to be trapped in his fish form for his heartless transgressions. Namjoon is a lonely twenty-something who takes to feeding him cheese crackers and telling him about his life. Together this unlikely pair may just find the answers to the loneliness in their hearts are closer than they think.

This is for the Spring Sprouts collab, which has honestly been the highlight of my March, I had no idea how much this idea would spring out of control, enough for me to make this a chapter fic. Tune in next time for more of Jin’s past, and Namjoon taking a date to the river. <3 

The first time Namjoon visits the river, it's to clear his head. Odd, considering the vast emptiness that had seemed to take over in the last few weeks, a sort of dullness that not even reading could banish. He’s new to this small town, and he knows that in part...that’s the problem. He’s new and he’s lonely. Lonely and bored, a job transfer from busy Seoul that had upped his pay, but left him stranded in what seemed like the wilderness. 

It’s different, so different from the fast paced life he’d left behind, and some days...some days its maddening. Maddening enough to force him up onto his feet, jogging through winding roads, rarely paved, taking in his new home, hoping to burn off the anxious energy he’d yet to find a healthy outlet for. 

And today - that takes him to the river, plopping to the ground as he makes it there, the grass soft and cool against sweaty thighs. There is a little sitting area his eyes trail, and a pagoda that looks far too old for his comfort. Like a relic from another time. A cherry blossom tree, not yet blooming, that looked just as old. Out of respect, or maybe fear of spiders, he chooses to avoid them both, instead finding himself lounging at the water’s edge, basking in the warmth of the day...the sound of the water moving by.

“Its not so bad.” He speaks out loud, but only to himself, he’s alone here after all. Nature has rarely comforted him in his short life, but this place...well, he wonders if the water is too cold...or if it would be nice enough to dip his feet in. He wonders what the stars look like at night from here, gazing above the river. “I mean, I have all this free time.” It’s a musing, punctuated by him sliding off his shoes, socks shoved inside them. 

There is no harm in it right? He shifts, a jolt as his feet hit the water, current smooth and soothing and very cold. But he doesn’t move. 

It is grounding and liberating all at once...at least until he feels something nip at his ankle. 

“Ahhk!” He tumbles back, feet yanked out of the water. “What - “ He can’t help himself, scrambling to look over the edge of the water, to find out what - And it is a what, Joon thinks, eyes widening. A beautiful what. 

A beautiful fish. Long flowing fins in elegant shades of ivory fading to soft pink. Big too - like a koi who has gotten comfortable in a well sized pond. Is it a koi fish? Namjoon thinks to himself, his situation forgotten as he stares at the way its fins fan and move, making waves of their own in the current. 

It has to be a koi fish. “You bit me.” The man complains, shifting so he’s staring down into the water, feet safely on the bank, “are you hungry?” He gives the fish benefit of the doubt, surprised to find its gaze on him. 

There is...something there - something behind the fish’s eyes, it gives Namjoon pause - because its an all around human look. A sort of awareness that breeds curiosity in the man. He finds himself reaching for his fanny pack, grabbing the snacks he brought. “I know these can’t be good for you.” he speaks as he breaks a cheez-it in half, tossing it to the surface. “But as a treat, I don’t think its that bad.” 

The fish devours them, and circles after, clearly wanting more. Namjoon settles himself on the bank, happy enough to feed the pretty creature and soak up the sun. 

He goes to speak, then pauses. Would it be completely unhinged if he talked to the fish?

“What’s your name?” 

The voice is a whisper, a sweet sound against Namjoon’s ear, he shudders, glancing around in the darkness, searching for the sound. There it is again, he doesn’t understand what’s being said, but its so close, he reaches out, he can’t help it, he just wants to know…

Who the voice belongs to, what the voice is saying. 

“.....Name…?” 

“Namjoon - My name is Namjoon, Kim Namjoon.” He finally answers, and suddenly there is color, bursting everywhere, and...and a man, beautiful, ethereal, like staring at the moon in reflection over the river. 

He’s sitting, and there is a divide, something Namjoon can’t see - and they’re touching, fingertips brushing each other - How does the man look like that? Namjoon can feel the confusion. Beautiful and fragile like glass, but with a piercing gaze.

He can’t remember ever meeting someone who looks like him, with those full lips, tousled hair, and almost petulant look.

“You - who are you?” “My name….not important.” The man answers, staring up towards the cloudless sky and too-close moon. “You - you are lonely.” its a simple pronouncement. “I’m lonely too.”

“I - “

His alarm is blaring, and he groans, its time for work. He sits up, nearly toppling over as he rubs his eyes. The river, the silver moon, a man - its disappearing as quickly as it was there the memories of his strange encounter already fading to the background 

For the fish, however, it’s not so easy. Centuries of loneliness, trapped in this disgraced form, culminating in this human boy feeding him something that made him want to be alive again...what had he called them...cheese things? Cheese rounds? He wasn’t sure, but what he was sure of is that the moment those flavored breads hit his mouth, he felt alive again….for the first time in over a hundred years. 

Alive, and ravenous for more. For too long he had dined on the refuse of the lake floor, smaller fish and wilted water weeds, when once upon a time he had feasted in banquet halls lined in gold, on bread dripping in honey, wine soaked lips demanding more.

And yet these delectable cheese rounds trumped them all. Made his belly storm and growl, demanding more of them. 

But those are memories that just bitter his heart, move him further and further from freedom from breaking the curse that bound him here. Here trapped in this forgotten land, in the body of a fish - a once great god brought low for his pride, Seokjin, the fish thinks wryly - god of rock and river, whose tears overflowed these banks as a child, lonely and lost. 

Whose only friend in the world was himself, his reflection along the water’s edge keeping him company. It is no surprise how easy it was to fall in love with his own features. 

Jin, of comely face, on his lonely rock in the middle of the river - attracting suitors both human and divine, temples raised in his honor as his power and beauty grew. Jin, with an indolent smirl, laughing merrily, taking a new lover every night, discarding them come morning, no consequences for the divine. Relishing in life because life relished in him, blessed with beauty and an insatiable spirit, a whole where his heart should be.

All lost overnight, cursed for his own hubris - for his own inability to love. 

The fish glances up, risking the dangers of the surface to stare at the moon, at the reason he was cursed in the first place. 

To linger on the huge, ancient cherry blossom tree that shielded the pagoda, the temple erected in his name so many years ago. So beautiful, the springtime blossoms nearly ready to burst. His first real friend, even if he didn’t know it then. 

But its now, not then, and he’s lonely, and hungry for life - and something about that boy’s unhurried, somewhat awkward smile touches that part of him, the part that longed to live again - even in this very changed world, this future that had forgotten him. 

If anything then just to get those crackers again. 

And that’s why he visits his dreams. The only place Jin can show himself, his true self, unable to voice that ancient curse to the boy - but able to be seen, truly seen, to speak those words...loneliness - 

Its...its a trick, to coax him back, with more snacks, Jin justifies, unwilling to admit that he reached out for any other reason, that he took the time under the light of that damned, too-bright moon to expend thousands year old energy on a boy who nearly kicked him in the face that day at the river for any other reason.

That he wasn’t lying when he said he was lonely. That the empty spot where his heart should be ached for something, a friend, a confidant - how he ached for a voice, to speak in more than just dreams.

But he can’t. 

Either way, it works - and he learns his name. 

Namjoon. Kim Namjoon. 

It takes effort that first time, tendrils of magic that he used to control with barely a glance, still - 

Namjoon makes a habit of visiting the river after that first time, Jin wonders if he feels that pull. That same pull he can’t deny every time the man sets himself down on the river bank. 

Jin wonders if its the magic, if he’s grown that unused to the feeling...or...or if its something else. 

“You’re really ridiculous, you know.” Namjoon scolds the water lightly, looking down at the white and pink fish that is floating close to surface,

Mouth opening and closing in an ill concealed attempt to get snacks. “I shouldn’t be feeding you, I’m sure it’s bad for you.” Namjoon drops a broken cracker in the water anyway, watching how the beautiful fish is quick to eat, thrashing a powerful tail. 

Today Namjoon has his camera, a Polaroid he bought to document his new home, a collection of photos of nature and old stone piling up on his desk. He snaps a picture of the fish, knowing full well the film couldn’t capture the beauty. “...I took your picture.” He explains, noticing the way the fish swirls his tail in discontent. “Nothing bad, see?” He’s shaking the developing Polaroid, knowing that’s not effective. “I’ll show you.” 

He truly wonders if he’s that lonely, lonely enough to become friends with a fish. 

But the fish is the easiest creature to talk to, in this town full of ancient history and even older families, well established and not looking to accept a stranger...or all too eager too, to pry into his personal life, there was none of that here, at the quiet little bend in the river.

Maybe the fish judged him, but that was easy to ignore, and he always hung around to listen - sentient fish - Namjoon was growing confident of that.

“I wish you could tell me more about you.” Namjoon offers the fish, showing him the photo, watching it reflect in the water. He watches the way the fish eyes it, mouth moving to blow bubbles at the surface. Does he like it? Does it matter? “Like first of all, why do i only ever see one of you? Are you all alone?” He’d started to develop some theories, and it mostly just ended in someone dumping the fish in the river when they were tired of taking care of it.

He couldn’t think of any other reason, no amount of internet browsing found him a koi that looked exactly like him, certainly not in the wild.

Which meant he was probably home bred, maybe even tossed out for looking like that, and…and that made Namjoon sad.

Sad, to go from having a family to none at all. It makes him empathize with the creature, who was once new to this place too, who found a home...but was still alone. “You don’t have to be alone if I’m here.” He’s tucking the picture into his wallet. “And I’ll keep visiting you.”

Seokjin does not understand the human boy. He comes back, usually every other day - with Jin finding himself more and more longing for every day - but he does not understand, just the same. Does not understand why the boy bothers, time and time again,

To visit, to sit by the river with him, to talk to him. Especially when Jin cannot talk back, relegated to bubbles and splashes, to lingering glances that he hopes the boy processes as listening. He’s lonely, Jin does recognize that - but why….why seek company with a fish?

Namjoon is in that haze again. That landscape he’s started to recognize as a dream, he thinks - it feels familiar, like he’s felt so many mornings lately, comforted, though he doesn’t know why.

“You’re back.” Oh, right, memories of dreams come rushing back, of the beautiful man - who won’t give him his name. His voice is sweet, wistful. “It took you a while to fall asleep tonight.” The man, he can see him so much more clearly than before, resting on the bank of the river, hair as pink as the heavy laden cherry blossoms behind him. “I’ve been waiting.” 

“Waiting…?” Namjoon questions, watching the way the man beckons him forward. “For me?” “Always.” Jin answer, a sort of soft purr to his voice, one that has Namjoon joining him on the river bank. So familiar, Namjoon thinks to himself, wondering if thinking in dreams is even possible, this riverbank - this man with the soft pink hair and lonely gaze. 

“Who are you?” It could be the first or hundredth time he’s asked, judging by the look on Jin’s face. 

“I’m someone not worth knowing.” Jin answers, looking up at the stars, the full moon, a grimace dancing on his lips.

He’s always being watched, even here, in the dreams of a boy who thinks to know him, in his own way. 

There are a thousand years between him and freedom and still that damn moon watches. 

“I think i’d like to know you more.” Namjoon answers. “Or at least your name, I always read you dream only about the people you’ve met, or seen before, and I’ve never seen you.” “Oh but you have.” Jin corrects, often even, though he doesn’t add that part.

“Untrue.” Namjoon is simple about it. “I’d remember meeting someone like you.” “Like me?” “You have the saddest eyes of anyone i’ve ever met.” 

This time when Namjoon wakes up, he’s got tears dripping down his cheeks, and he doesn’t know why. 

Many years ago, someone said something so similar. Jin is trapped, trapped in this form but that does not mean he doesn’t feel as a man, think as a man. That he doesn’t - he doesn’t remember. 

Many years ago when he was beautiful, young, powerful...and so foolish, there was one who said something so - so similar.

A beautiful creature, a human like Namjoon - come to give him praise, to worship at his temple, at its height. He could remember him now - clear as day. Beauty then, like now, was not rare, but what was rare were his words. 

He was quiet, shy even in his splendor, a boxy smile that alighted warm on Seokjin, and often. There were many, many pretty humans who came to see Jin, but he stayed, he became an acolyte, a worshipper - and he never left.

Taehyung. 

Taehyung stayed at his side from the moment their eyes met, from the moment he told him those words “You’re very lonely...you smile, but your eyes tell me what you won’t say.” Seokjin could remember how he felt then, cold water tossed on him, like a rolling sea. 

He had looked away, away towards another pretty thing, a playful woman come to bathe in his waters - and he vowed to not look upon Taehyung again. 

But Taehyung stayed, and it was hard not to look - especially on those nights when he was alone, utterly alone, when it was just him, Taehyung...and the moon. 

“You should worship him instead.” Jin remembers forming the words, Taehyung settling beside him on the river bank. “The moon, he gazes at you every night, I can feel it.” 

“No.” Taehyung shakes his head. “When i saw you, Seokjin, I saw the world in a way I had never had before.

Taehyung - the memory fades, gone before Jin could get to parts he doesn’t want to remember. Too good for him, Taehyung. He looks up at the cherry blossom tree, weighed down with blossoms. Beautiful, quiet Taehyung, who had asked for so little and gotten even less.

Lessons that it was too late for him to learn now, Jin thinks to himself. He couldn’t go back in time and change the way things were, and maybe that was the true curse of it all.

Namjoon is starting to remember, and they both realize it about the same time, the man sitting on the river bank, lounging in the feel of mid-spring. Wondering just how long the blossoms would stay on the trees here. 

“I’m having weird dreams.” Namjoon confesses. “Of a man.” Jin is far too concerned, far too quickly, not even complaining at the lack of snack. “A...beautiful man.” He adds on, cheeks heating in a way that Jin knows all too well. If he could smirk, he would smirk - the familiar thrill of the chase not lost on him, even now. “And I don’t think i’ve ever seen him before.” Namjoon is frowning lightly at the water, well - at the fish.

“He reminds me of someone - but at the same time, no one I know.” He confesses, knowing full well that even to the fish he must sound ridiculous. “And he says I’ve seen him before, or - or met him before.” Namjoon is frustrated, even Seokjin can tell, he bubbles a little, trying to sooth the man. “I just want to know why - “ He sighs. “I know why, its because - its because I need to get laid.” The confession makes the fish freeze, literally, all movement stopping. 

“I am trying so hard, you know I went on a date last night?” The confession makes Jin lap anxiously around his legs. “it didn’t go as well as I hoped.” Namjoon sighs, enjoying the coolness of the river water against his skin. It is suddenly hot, too hot. “But...a date is a date - and - well, i’m not getting any younger.” 

A date. Jin might be old, far older than any other being he would be talking to, certainly older than a foolish mortal boy, but he knew the word date. Had seen many along the banks of the river he called home. 

He could feel himself frown, bubbles rising to the surface of the water as he glared at Namjoon, tail thrashing behind him. The other man was in no way required to entertain men for the sake of his age. It made Jin - well it upset him. 

Namjoon watches, sees how the fish seems to disagree with this notion. Bubbles gathering at the water’s edge as he sways his tail. Namjoon is struck by how disapproving he seems. Can….can fish feel that emotion? Disapproval? 

“Don’t look at me like that, I feel judged!” Nothing, his expression doesn’t change, and Namjoon grimaces. The last thing he wants after the day he’s had is even the fish judging him. “What if I give you the sharp cheddar cheez-its this time? I know they’re your favorite.” 

They ARE his favorite, and Namjoon is the only one of the human crowd who still thinks to bring him offerings that brings the strange and delightful crackers. The tail thrashing ceases, though his eyes still hold that frown. He wishes he could speak to Namjoon then, tell him that as a priest of his - he do not need to - to date. Jin will take care of his every need and more - but he cannot, not yet at least. 

And so he just waits until Namjoon is sighing, muttering something about a conscious spirit in the fish, pulling out the bag, breaking the pieces up as he feed them to him

“Sometimes I think you don’t really love me, or my company.” Namjoon stares at him, an amused, albeit sad look on his face. “You just come here for my cheez-its.” 

No, Jin thinks to himself. Its Namjoon that comes to him, time and time again, and he doesn’t want it to stop - something that his statements only put into perspective. Namjoon had gone on a date, had met with a mortal, and he had not...had not known.

The emotion that Seokjin feels is...Jealousy, and he doesn’t like it one bit.

[cozycryptidcorner]

Fiore the Genderfluid Kelpie

Notes: this is a commission from a user who wishes to remain anonymous, about a curly-haired musician meeting her monster match for the first time. 

If your roommates weren’t such absolute twats about the noise, then you really wouldn’t have much of a reason to practice your violin in the outdoors like some kind of lonely vagabond. The day is bright, only a few clouds in the sky, but not specifically warm enough to make you melt into the little dirt path. Nor do you feel much strain in your lungs as you hike around the dirt path. It’s the kind of day that hints of summer, with all the warm, soft sunlight of the day without the same, stifling heat that comes in the deeper throes of those months.

Hauling everything- the violin, the stand, and the sheet music should be more complicated than it seems, but you’re so used to it by now that you don’t really notice the effort. All the better, then, because having an explosive argument with your roommate over staying indoors would be more trouble than it’s worth. The smaller university also locks its practice doors during the summer, so you can’t go there.

So, again, outdoors, it is.

Google maps is very helpful for seeing the dirt trail that weaves its way around the nearby lake, though it doesn’t register it as a viable pathway. You have to eyeball it, which is okay, because you think it would be reasonably simple to make your way back to the high rises of the city, as you can see them once you stand on a hill, right on your tiptoes. There’s a gorgeous, large, and ancient weeping willow that google’s satellites have captured, one that’s large enough to provide shade and shelter from any unruly breeze. Already, you spot it on the other side of the water, so you tuck your phone into your pocket and head in that direction.

Setting everything up is easy, the collapsable stand simple enough to build, the ground flat enough to allow it to stay upright. You trap your sheet music to it with clothing pins, just as a precaution despite the breeze isn’t quite strong enough to blow them to kingdom come, and turn on your metronome app on your phone as you set it right next to the paper. Once everything is set up, albeit with your violin still in its case, you allow yourself to go investigate the edge of the lake itself, just for the sake of looking around.

The lake is large, extensive, and a shimmering, crystalline blue. You remember that a few years ago, some environmentalist people in town managed to get a large clean-up production in order, clearing out the trash and filtering the muddied water until it stopped shining with grease. There’s an ancient, dilapidated dock, the old, rotting wood half-submerged in the reeds and water, though you think that the very center might be able to hold your weight.

Wanting only to get a better look at the lake as a whole, you step onto the dock, wincing as it creaks under a portion of your weight, but it seems to take it well enough. Carefully, you place your other foot down, too, then carefully tiptoe over the part of the wood that looks the most stable, getting about halfway down the dock. The lake itself is supposed to be ridiculously deep, there’s a river that provides freshwater from the melting snow on the nearby mountains, so it also must be rather cold.

Funnily enough, as soon as you think that, there is a violent crack sound from beneath your shoes, and you find out for yourself exactly how cold the water really is. It’s freezing, just as expected, a biting, icy feeling running through your nerves, and you barely even have time to shut your mouth tight to avoid getting a mouthful of water. Your arm smarts as it hits a plank wrong, and there’s a snap that you aren’t sure is from the wood or your arm.

You struggle, arms flailing limply as you try to surface. There’s something on your foot, though, it’s somehow pinned or stuck in a stray part of the dock, and you don’t think you even have the air to deal with it. Letting out a breath of bubbles to help ease the tension in your chest, you bend your knee a bit, dragging yourself down further, and try to feel out what you’re stuck in.

Wood, definitely another part of the dock, and it feels like you just punched your foot clean through, right up to your ankle. You wriggle, trying to shimmy your way out, but there seems to be absolutely no way for you to get out without at least dislocating something. Before you can even process true, absolute panic at the thought of drowning, a pair of arms wrapping around your chest and pulls. A shock of pain runs through your leg, and your struggle, harder, jabbing your elbow against something… rubbery, you think.

The water is too murky for you to see beyond the blob figure that swims gracefully down to your ankle. After just a moment, two arms reach forward, snapping the plank with such ease that you wonder why you weren’t able to pop out of it yourself, but suddenly you’re being pulled up again, though this time, you actually feel the air.

You splutter and gasp, your face probably cherry pink with the violent effort your body makes to resupply oxygen. Once you manage to take in a few, choking gasps, you spin around to see your rescuer, a bit taken back when you notice the lack of clothing on her pale, freckled body. She’s slim in frame, not at all looking anywhere near strong enough to be able to snap a slab of wood like it was nothing more than a twig even if it had been rotting in the water for god knows how long.

“Um, thank you,” you say awkwardly, unsure of what else to do, “for helping me, I mean.”

She eyes you up and down, her eyes glittering in the reflection of the sunlight dancing up from the water. There’s something that’s oddly absent from her gaze, like a slab of blankness beneath the blue irises, and you find yourself unconsciously crossing your arms across your chest in a sort of protective gesture of yourself.

“Of course,” she says finally, after a long, awkward pause, “you were drowning.”

The way she says it makes it sound like she wasn’t entirely sure if that was what really was happening or not, so you wonder if maybe she’s teetering on embarrassment? That might explain her strange behavior.

“My foot was stuck, yeah,” you say. “If you hadn’t freed me, I probably would have.”

“Hm,” she nods sagely, as though that were an answer to another unasked question, “you cannot breathe in the water.”

“No, I can’t.” You are suddenly very aware of your wet socks as you shift your weight, the thick layer of silt squishing down and over the soles of your tennis shoes. “That’s the thing about humans, we can’t breathe underwater.”

“Fascinating,” she mulls the idea over, as though she couldn’t possibly relate.

“Um,” you’re trying very hard not to stare at any other part of her body but her face, “yes, so I was here to practice my violin, but um, I didn’t realize that anyone else was here.”

“Practice the violin?” She echoes.

“My instrument,” you gesture vaguely in the direction of where you set up your temporary haven of music, “I was going to practice out here because my roommates get annoyed by the noise. I didn’t realize that someone was out here, though, I thought I’d be alone.”

She waits for you to elaborate, but when you don’t, she suggests, “if you are worried I might mind a little music while I lounge and swim, you should not. I will somehow survive.”

It takes you a moment to process that she must be joking, so you let out a brief laugh. “I’m sorry for crashing your lounging and swimming. Um, do you happen to have a name?”

“Of course,” she says.

When she doesn’t embellish, you ask, “what is it, if you don’t mind me asking?”

She has to think about it for a moment, you can see her eyes fade as she wanders through the depths of her mind to drudge it up. You wonder how long she might have gone without hearing it because the long silence that follows seems a little too meticulous to be her looking for a fake one to give. “Fiore.”

“Fiore?” You shift again, wincing at the feeling of slime absorbing into your shoes still. “That’s a pretty name.”

“Thank you; it is, isn’t it.”

Slowly but steadily, you manage to get yourself out of the muck, kicking off your shoes and socks once you’re free from the reeds. Bare feet on a dirt path, you think, is preferable to the soggy, squishing feeling of muddied and wet shoes, and when you turn around, you don’t spot your savior anywhere. Shrugging that off, you head back over to your little setup, checking over your phone, thankful that you had the foresight to pull it out of your pocket before you took an impromptu dunk in the lake.

Popping your violin case open, you begin on your scales, just as a brief exercise to warm your fingers up before moving onto more complicated pieces. Pressing against the strings, you quickly draw your bow out to make the notes. C major, then minor, then D major, then minor, and so on until you moved halfway through the scales before glancing self-consciously over to where you last saw Fiore, but there isn’t any sign of her slim figure.

Thinking that she might have just left while you were paying attention to your finger’s positions over the strings, you go back to practicing, finishing your scales, and choosing from your bags which piece to begin working on.

You would say that this is the most peaceful practice session that you’ve had since this whole worldwide ugly situation has started. No roommates come banging on your door to tell you to quiet it down, no angry stomping protests from the neighbors in the above apartments. Just you, the violin, and your music, and you find yourself improving somewhat on one of the more difficult passages in a piece that’s had you stuck for a long while.

In fact, it was so productive that you find yourself returning in a few days, spurred on by the annoyance of your roommates. The weather is beautiful enough, a gentle breeze cooling any sort of heat that may become stifling in the warming spring. You repeat the actions from when you were last at the lakeside, setting everything up, leaving your phone on the stand, then move to investigate the shore.

You are looking to see if Fiore is here, you’re not ashamed to admit it, but as you scope out the edge of the lake, you see no one around. Not even a telltale sign of rippling to suggest that someone is swimming just below the surface, so you suppose that she just isn’t around. Which, you assume, might as well be expected, because it’s not like you know her whole schedule of when she actually goes for a swim.

So you start practicing again, going through your scales, then beginning on your regular pieces. As you pause, maybe a half-hour into working, to turn on the metronome on your phone, you notice a head of black hair poking up from the water. Which is weird, because you didn’t see anyone in your periphery arrive, you think you might have given the circumstances, but maybe you were just so sucked into the music that you weren’t paying attention to anything else.

Thinking it must be Fiore, you walk over, popping up on your tiptoes so that you can get a better view of her head, you almost stop in your tracks when you realize that the body swimming in the pond is, in fact, very masculine. And just as naked, but you digress. Face so red you think you might look more like a tomato than human, you take a step back, your foot catching on some root or twisted patch of grass, and you fall hard on your ass.

He’s looking at you promptly, eyes sharp and hauntingly familiar. You’re even more embarrassed, now, because you thought that you might have been able to make a quiet and unnoticed retreat. Instead, you’re looking at the face of someone who seems to be debating on whether or not to eat you alive. At least, that’s what it feels like from his predatory glare.

“I- I’m sorry, I thought you were someone else.” It dawns on you now that he might think that you were trying to get a sneak peek of the goods, and just the thought of gaining the reputation of a peeping tom makes your face heat up even more. “There was like this girl who was here last time I practiced, I mean, I saw her when I was practicing violin, too, and you two actually look a lot alike, so I thought- I, um, thought you were her because of the black hair.”

The man regards you with no small amount of suspicion, eyes narrow.

Nervous, you try to dig yourself out of the hole you’ve made. “I was practicing violin, she seemed to like the music- I mean, I think she did. I’m really sorry to bother you, and I’ll just go back to practicing, sorry.”

As you get up to leave, the man cocks his head. “Your hair.”

Mindlessly, as if spurred on only by the word, you reach up and pluck one of the coils, pulling it down to its full length if it were straight. “Y-yeah?”

“It didn’t do that, not when you were here last. How did you make it crumple up?”

Was he there, and you just didn’t see him? “I- I don’t know what you mean.” You release the strand, and it pops back into place, frowning. “It’s just curly?”

“It was straight when you fell into the water.”

“Oh,” feeling sheepish to have your past mistake thrown out like that by another stranger makes you want to bury yourself, “that’s what happens when my hair gets wet. It stops being curly.”

The man regards you like he’s never even heard of such a thing before. Ignoring the weird feeling in your chest, you approach the water, cupping your fingers together, and bring a fistful of water up to a strand. True to your word, it straightens out almost instantly, and you allow him to stare at you like a bug under a microscope, comparing the now damp strand with the rest of your hair.

“See?” You offer, hoping the pinkness in your face might have died down by the attempts to satiate his own curiosity.

“So it was you,” he says, nodding sagely as if he figured it out on his own.

“Yeah, yup, that was me.” You take a significant step back, wiping your hand on your shirt. “I don’t remember seeing you, though, so you must have been swimming out on the far side.”

There’s an awkward pause, and just when you’re about to turn around and retreat back to your music stand, the man speaks, “You don’t remember me?”

Immediately, you try to go through your recollection of that day to see if you somehow wholly blocked the presence of the man, as well, but you don’t think you did. “Did you introduce yourself?”

He looks almost hurt. “I’m Fiore, I told you.”

Now it’s your turn for your eyes to bug out of your skull, because no, that’s not Fiore. Fiore is… admittedly, the same size as this man, tall, slim, with black hair that does fall past her shoulders, but come on. Come on! There’s no way the two are the same person, at least, you don’t think so, because you could have remembered everything wrong. You couldn’t have, though, because this really isn’t something you can just mix up.

“You’re confused,” probably-not-Fiore observes, which is most likely an elementary observation on his part.

“Yes.” You admit, not wanting to outright refuse to believe that what probably-not-Fiore’s saying is false.

“I see.” There’s a faraway look in his face, open enough to give you the feeling that he’s trying to put some kind of explanation in words. “It’s like your hair.”

“My hair,” you repeat, unsure.

“Your hair changes. My body changes. It’s… the same, but different.” Maybe-Fiore places a hand on his chest and drags it downwards to his stomach. “Sometimes, I feel better in this body. Sometimes I feel better in other bodies.”

“Oh,” you say, because that makes perfect fucking sense, of course, why didn’t you think of that earlier, “right.”

“The humans have a term for that, I think,” Maybe-Fiore places a hand on his chin as he thinks, “another visitor to my lake told me, but I cannot remember it.”

“Oh, you’re not human,” you say, not believing him in the slightest, “I didn’t realize.”

“Did I not mention it,” Fiore says in a tone that suggests that he very well knows that he never uttered a word about his species, “interesting. Anyway, I enjoyed the music you played earlier, and I would like to hear it again.”

“Alright,” you hesitate, though you know that you might as well comply. Slowly, you head back to where you left your stand and pick up your violin. Trying your best to focus, you begin practicing again, starting with scales and arpeggios as you did the last time you were here. Out of the corner of your eye, you spot him, lounging, still very naked, on the outer banks of the lake, clearly enthralled in your music.

You’re not sure if you can be flattered over that or not, but you continue practicing nonetheless. When you’ve put in some time- about an hour or two, according to your phone, you begin breaking down your practice area, collapsing your music stand, and packing away your books. Maybe-Fiore is lying leisurely on the side of the dilapidated dock, eyes only opening once the music has ceased.

Sometimes, I feel better in this body. Sometimes I feel better in other bodies, he has said, and you try to digest what that means, the humans have a term for that, I think.

“Did you mean genderfluid?” You ask suddenly, popping your case shut.

He sits up as you stand, trying to formulate a sentence. “What?”

“You said you sometimes feel comfortable in other bodies, and that there was a word for it. Did you mean genderfluid?” You clarify, trying to adjust the straps of your myriad of bags, so the weight is evenly distributed on your shoulders.

“Yes- that.” He smiles, and there’s a weird feeling swimming in your stomach when you see it. “Sometimes, I feel like a male. Sometimes I feel like a female… and I have the advantage of being able to change.”

“Okay,” you nod, wondering for the first time if he actually is Fiore, if Fiore could simply switch their sexes the moment they felt different. Which… you think is a tad bit out there, because changing one’s shape so instantaneously and thoroughly isn’t physically possible. That you know of, though.

“Will you play closer to the lake next time you come?” Maybe-Fiore says, laying back down against the half-rotted wood, closing his eyes.

“If you’d like,” you say, warming up to the idea. You would be directly under the sun, but a lot of sunscreen and plenty of water might keep you from dying.

“I would like,” he nods firmly, rolling back over into the water.

Trying to not look below his waist, you say your goodbyes, and turn to leave.

The weather is already warming up, as though spring was nothing more than a few-day blip on the calendar. The humidity doesn’t help matters, either, because your hair has decided to do something very unique with itself, poking out in oddly placed tufts that don’t want to conform to any other look but insane person. When you come back to the lake, you have a water bottle filled to the brim with mostly ice to melt and sip on while you practice.

You hear the horse before you see it, the tromping of hooves against the earth, a loud, resounding whinny as it sees you in the middle of its path. It’s an incredibly large, foreboding creature, pale like a ghost, a myriad of speckles dotting its back half. Immediately, adrenaline bursts into your veins, because random, galloping horses are not good news, especially when it seems to be heading right for you.

Just when you’re about to shed your stuff and dodge, the horse makes a sharp turn, kicking up some dirt as it does so. Even though the immediate danger is over, your heart is still quaking in your chest hard enough to feel the aftershocks in your fingertips. You are far too startled to do much other than watch the admittedly majestic creature with a wary eye as it gallops over to the lake, the white spray of water splashing about as it plunges beneath the surface.

All that happened within the span of a few moments, and you are far too surprised at the… the absurdness of it all to do much more than stand there, mouth agape, as you quietly debate the pros and cons of leaving your things so you could run away faster. Before you come to a conclusion, though, you see a head of black hair pop up from the water, and all you can think of is Fiore and a feral horse getting into a tussle that the creature would not lose.

You drop your things and run, but not away from the lake, towards. Wild horses could easily cave someone’s skull in like a mallet to a melon, and you’re not going to just leave when Fiore- whoever they may be- might end up pummeled to death by hooves. While you try to shout- keyword try here- you find that the ungodly speed you’re running at mixed with your panicking lungs, all you can manage is a weak wheeze until you near the edge of the lake.

When you get that close, you see that it is Fiore, her slim, long hair sticking to her skin from the water. You’re just about to run yourself into the mud, but you manage a screeching halt, gasping for air, a drop of sweat rolling down your temple as you manage to choke out, “horse, there’s a horse-”

“Not anymore,” Fiore chirps, completely unaware of your panic.

“What? No,” you bend over, your lungs desperately trying to compensate for the sudden strain, “there was like a huge-ass horse that almost trampled me earlier, it went into the lake- and-” come to think of it, why haven’t you seen it surface for air? Where did it go?

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Fiore steps closer to the shallows, the water only waist-deep on her. “I was just delighted to see you, I may have gotten a little too excited.”

You shake your head, only half processing the nonsense she’s speaking. “Not you, the horse. There’s a horse!”

“Yes,” Fiore sounds like you, almost exasperated that you do not quite understand what’s going on, “I didn’t mean to startle you, I’m sorry.”

“You didn’t startle me, the horse did!”

Fiore looks at you, her eyes narrowed slightly, making you feel like you’re missing a massive, undeniable piece of some puzzle you didn’t know you were playing. “And I said I was sorry, sweet thing.”

Even though a shiver runs through your back when she calls you that- sweet thing- you have to be misunderstanding something significant here because... is Fiore insinuating that she can turn into a horse? You are going to faceplant onto the ground if the answer is yes. “Fiore.”

“Yes.”

“So, you were a horse just a few minutes ago.”

“Yes?” She sounds almost relieved that you finally understand what’s happening. Like back and forth was exhausting, and she could not understand why you didn’t.

“Ha.” You’re going insane. Or maybe Fiore was trying to pull a fast one, a long drawn out fast one, and this is all some kind of elaborate hoax to mock the girl who hikes half a mile just to play the violin. “No.”

“Ha, yes,” Fiore counters, almost impatiently.

“But-”

“What makes it so difficult to understand?”

You feel like your brain is going to explode. “Um… I need to go fetch my violin.”

She brightens somewhat. “Don’t forget that I want you playing closer this time.”

“R-right.”

Surely you’re teetering on the very edge of sanity because that conversation did not just happen. Slowly, you gather your things, trying to mull the conversation over in your head. Fiore- the woman, the man, the horse, this can’t be happening. But you can’t come up with any sort of more logical explanation, especially since any other alternative seems far wilder than the simplicity of shapeshifter. So as you begin to put everything together to play, you ask, almost timidly, “what are you?”

“What do you mean?” She’s sitting out of the water, naked, only a few arm’s lengths away.

“I mean,” your fingers are shaking too much to actually play, so you pretend to tweak at the strings of the violin to tune it, even though you don’t have the means to properly do so, “if you can change like that, and you even said that you aren’t human, what are you?”

There’s another faraway look in Fiore’s eyes, the same as when you first asked for her name. Like she has to struggle to remember, as though she hasn’t had to explain her existence in a long while. “Your people have many different names for mine,” she says, reminiscing, “but I suppose that you might know the word ‘kelpie,’ hm?”

You are not going to be scared, not yet. Trying to keep your voice calm, you ask, “like the man-eating horse creature?”

Fiore, to her credit, seems to find that description funny, of all things. “I haven’t tasted man in so long, but I can’t say that I find it particularly delicious. I prefer those creatures with the horns, what are they called... cattle.”

At least she doesn’t seem to favor the taste human, so you force your body to relax a little. “And you live in the lake?”

“For as long as this village has existed.” She closes her eyes, you can see a timeline play in her mind. “Though, not so much a little vagabond grouping anymore.”

You think of the high rising skyline and let out a little snort, unbidden, “you can say that again. Have you visited the city square recently?”

“I’ve never visited the square,” she leans back on her elbows, staring up at the sky listlessly, “never needed to, really.”

“Huh,” you’ve finally managed to stop your shaking body, calming down enough to lift your violin to your chin, “maybe we should go together sometime.”

Before you give her time to process the offer, you drag the bow across the G string, letting the note resonate over the landscape, just to make sure you didn’t muck anything up during the impromptu tuning. Satisfied with the outcome, you begin to play, not bothering to set up your stand or bring out any books, sitting cross-legged in the soft grass instead of standing. This isn’t really about practicing, you decide, but about letting the music flow through you naturally.

By the way Fiore’s eyes become half-lidded, then slowly close, you can tell that she’s enjoying your improv. With your focus only on the next several notes, you need your fingers to grasp; you can’t put too much attention in how beautiful she is, sprawled out in the sun like this. Only that she is, but you try to only use your periphery to observe this.

“You said that you could show me the main square?” She asks when the music notes slowly ebb away.

“I mean,” how do you put this delicately, “you might have to put on some clothes, first.”

Her face scrunches up in a slight scowl at the mere thought. “Yes, I’ve noticed that humans are cautious about covering your bodies up. If you’d like, you can take yours off now, I wouldn’t mind.”

You try not to balk at the idea right off the bat because you’re not sure if mutual nakedness means the same thing to her as it does to you. “I’m fine for now, actually. I don’t mind the clothing.”

“If you insist.” She goes back to her leisurely lounging. “But I suppose that I would have to wear… something, if I were to enter the city.”

“Yeah, unfortunately, there are laws about public nudity.”

Fiore lets out a little hmph, “and there are certain rules to the clothing.”

“... Yeah,” you say, trying not to show too much sheepishness.

“But you will help me?”

“Of course.”

Fiore pauses, cocking her head to the side as she thinks. “I believe someone once told me that such an outing would be called a ‘date.’”

You just about crack the wood of your violin in half. Not entirely sure in which direction either of you would like to take, you say, “I mean- yes, it could be, but it doesn’t have to-”

“What do you mean when you say it is, but it doesn’t need to be? Are humans always so very confusing about such matters? Must be exhausting.”

There’s some truth to that statement, your brain is especially ready to explode again, though for a much different reason than before. “I mean… if you’d like it to be a date, it could be a date. But if you didn’t want to go on a date with me, it could be like a platonic get-together.”

Fiore squints, running over her options, then shrugs. “I’m fine with a romantic outing.”

The hairs on your arm stand up. “Really?”

“Yes.”

“Alright.” There’s an odd, explosive sensation in your chest, and you’re not sure what to do about it. “That sounds like a plan.”

[imjeralee]

Comfort in Despair: Chapter 8 - Me Kill You

Leon x F!Reader

Disclaimer: Do not own Pokemon

Summary:

Galar is rich in folklore and tales of the supernatural.

As a Pokemon Researcher who specialises in ghost types, this is a great opportunity for you to investigate and learn more about the paranormal.

Along the way, you meet Leon (in the most awkward way possible) who becomes embroiled in your adventures.

^ Basically this story is about ghosts :/

Rating: General/Teen

Me Kill You

…

…

[Robert the Doll is the world's most haunted doll. It can move on its own, change its facial expressions and cause misfortune]

…

…

After Sonia’s helped you pick an outfit and matching shoes to wear for tomorrow’s dinner, you fish out the Wooloo plushie from your closet. You had mentioned to Leon a while ago that you had a spare for his little brother and you inspect it, turning it round and round. It’s clean and in great condition so you place it carefully inside a white plastic bag, tie the straps together and leave it beside your backpack on the floor, ready for tomorrow.

When it’s around eleven pm, Sonia, Cutiefly and Poltea go to sleep so you quietly make your way downstairs. Magnolia has left spare food for you as usual and after reheating it, you carry the food with you to the lounge and sit down on the sofa.

You’ve got a whole night ahead of you and you have no active cases so it’s a good time to study Gengar.

It’s peculiar; for the past couple of years and you didn’t think about owning pokemon but here you are with a Gengar and Froslass, though you will need to hand the ice pokemon to Graves very soon.

It’s inevitable and hopefully she will be in better hands under the right ownership. You had thought about releasing her but if Graves finds out, you’re done for.

You finish your food and when Gengar emerges from your shadow, you grab your journal and ask him to stand still so you can sketch him.

He can only stand still for a few seconds or so before he yawns and decides to float in the air and cartwheel around the lounge.

When you finish the sketch, you ask him to stand before you which he does, his feet touching the ground for a change, and you use a measuring tape to take note of his height. He is roughly five foot eleven.

“You’re very tall compared to the average Gengar,” you utter and he nods vigorously, grin widening. “You have teeth too. Human teeth.”

He nods again and opens his mouth wide, showing you his pearly whites. You tap your chin with your pencil, tilting your head to the side as you inspect his mouth.

“You even have a human tongue.”

Gengar proceeds to stick his tongue out which extends all the way out of the door of the lounge and into the landing.

“Interesting…”

You use the measuring tape to work out the length of his tongue and it turns out to be even longer than his height. Once you’re finished, Gengar rolls his tongue back up and chuckles darkly.

“Well, according to the pokedex entries, you were a human in your past life…” you put the measuring tape away, flip your journal to a certain page and read aloud, “'Should you feel yourself attacked by a sudden chill, it is evidence of an approaching Gengar. There is no escaping it. Give up’.”

Gengar laughs in response and rolls around the air with glee, clutching his tummy.

“Do you remember your past life?” you ask and he pauses to ponder, then shakes his head. “Do you remember how you became a Ghastly?”

Again, he shakes his head.

“So you woke up one day and you were a Ghastly?”

He puts a hand on his hips and a hand under his mouth as though deep in thought, but shrugs.

“What did you do when you were with the Duke?”

Gengar glances round, points at your pencil which you give to him; he returns to float in the air, then pretends to stab at the air viciously and as though he is fighting an invisible enemy.

“You fought in a war?”

He nods and returns the pencil to you, sighing inaudibly and wiping his forehead. He looks tired.

“This is really interesting,” you mutter to yourself, scribbling notes in your journal before you reach over and pat the top of his head.

He is rather cold to touch and you retreat.

"You’re tangible," you mutter, before you plant your hand over to where his stomach should be to pat his belly. Much to your surprise, your hand sinks in and you feel...nothing. You attempt to grab but you cannot even feel your own fingers. "Whoa. Obviously you can be tangible or intangible at your own free will. What’s inside you? Can I see?"

Gengar nods, grabs you by the arms and pulls you inside his tummy face-first for a few seconds or so. When he pulls you back out, you gasp and blink dazedly.

"...Darkness, swirling vortex of nothingness, an eternity of black, a void," you mutter unfocusedly, before you quickly rush to the kitchen and pull open one of the cupboards to grab a few snacks, tearing off the wrappers and stuffing them into your mouth. You even grab a chocolate bar, unwrapping it and munching it quickly. You feel better at once and sigh with relief. Putting the chocolate bar down, you exclaim, "I shall write this down!"

You return to the lounge, flinging yourself over the sofa to grab your journal and you begin jotting down what you had witnessed and experienced when Gengar showed you his insides.

You describe how there was nothing and you had no sense of self, nor were you aware that you were alive though you experienced intense feelings of hopelessness, despair and sadness and you also write down that he smelled somewhat of sulphur but the golden question really is:

"Hey Gengar, can you take me to the spirit world?"

He looks at you with widened eyes, then shakes his head.

"Why not?"

Glancing left and right, he grabs one of the flowers from Magnolia's vase on the mantelpiece and holds it in his hands, then moves to float on his back, lying horizontally in the air as he clutches the flower to his chest with his eyes closed.

"Yeah, I know one is usually dead in order to go there but...can’t you separate me from my body?”

He looks confused.

“Like, um….split my soul from my body?”

Gengar glances at you before he circles the side of his head with his finger.

“Don’t give me that, I’m not crazy, okay? I mean, what happens if a living person is accidentally brought there? Can they escape? Are they alive or dead?"

He looks confused by your question and again, imitates being dead.

You sigh, shaking your head, and turn to a new page of your journal, eager to study more and so you let Froslass out of the capsule and into the lounge.

You sketch her as she looks around and inspects random objects; she appears curious about her surroundings and eventually picking up one of Sonia's hairbrush which she had left lying on the coffee table and returns to your side, brushing your hair and trilling a somewhat melancholic tune.

You try to study her as much as possible but she doesn't appear to listen to you and keeps floating around, picking up random things and throwing them around in the air when they're not interesting to her.

When you are left to pick them back up and put them into their respective places, she puts her little paws to her mouth and giggles. Quite the prankster, this one. You determine she has an impish personality and she has taken a liking to the hairbrush, holding it tightly to herself.

When it’s six am, the ghost Pokemon are exhausted and you emit a loud yawn and stop studying them though the entire session has aroused more questions than answers. It’s time to retire and you're exhausted; you quietly head up the stairs and into the room.

Sonia dozes in her bed, lying on her side with her back to you. You slide into your bed noiselessly, wrapping your thick, cosy covers around you and close your eyes.

You drift off to sleep until a rough shake on your arm forces you to wake and you open your eyes groggily to see Sonia standing by your bed.

“…Huh? What…what is it, Sonnie…?” you croak out, rubbing your eyes.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you up so early but you have a new client…” Sonia mutters and you check the clock.

It’s ten in the morning…and you groan out loud and slap your hand over your eyes tiredly.

“They really want to talk to you," she adds, "They really, really want to talk to you.”

You can hear the emphasis so you nod.

“………….Alright, fine,” you mumble as you get up from bed and grab your black dressing gown from the chair and drape it over yourself, half-awake. You only managed roughly four hours of sleep…

Sonia watches as you tiredly trudge downstairs, barely awake, and the light hurts causing you to hiss and wince as you blindly make your way through the lounge. You head to the direction of the conservatory where you peek through the gaps of your fingers to see a couple seated on one of the sofas. They look relieved to see you despite your frumpy and drowsy appearance.

Lethargy has taken over; once your eyes has adjusted to the light, you stop wincing and plop yourself in the empty sofa as the couple nervously fidget, balancing a white plastic bag in arms.

You're finding it really hard to stay awake.

“Thanks for seeing us,” says the man, and you’re assuming it’s the husband.

You nod wearily, crossing your arms as you nod off.

“No problem..." your voice is sluggish as you fight to stay awake whilst emitting a huge yawn, “How....how can I help…?”

You are so tired you can only catch snippets of what they're saying as you yawn once more.

"We live in Turrfield,”

"Our daughter turned eight."

"We got her a gift for her birthday."

Your eyelids are drooping no matter what. "...Okay…Zzz…”

"This doll."

"...Mm….hmm…yep…what about it…”

"...Makes strange noises......moves on it’s own…."

Your eyes jerk open.

"What?!"

Looking up and around, you see that you are still in the conservatory but the couple are gone and you are alone. In an instant, you sit up as you look left and right. The room is empty.

"Where'd they go?" you squawk.

Sonia enters the conservatory and you throw your wide-eyed glance to her.

"They left an hour ago. You fell asleep," she says, walking round the sofa with a teapot and cup before she seats herself on the sofa opposite yours, crossing her legs.

"Oh," your eyes grow wide and you scrabble up to stand, "That's terrible. I should call them.”

"Relax, they said they left something for you." Sonia gestures to the corner where a white plastic bag sits against one of the potted plants, the straps tied tightly together.

You head over, picking up the bag and realizing that it is exceptionally light; untying it, you pull the straps apart and peer inside.

It's empty.

“….Hey Sonnie, where’s the doll?”

“What doll?”

“There should be a doll.”

“I didn’t see any doll.”

“That’s weird,” you mutter, rubbing your chin, “They came all the way here and forgot to bring the doll?”

Scratching your head, you shrug and decide to return upstairs with the white plastic bag. There is no doll inside so you’re not sure what’s going on. You will call the client later to inform them they must have forgotten it.

When you return to your room, you emit another long yawn, scratch the side of your hip and flop over your bed, snuggling into your pillow and burrowing yourself with the blanket once again; the moment you hit the bed and you close your eyes and begin snoring immediately.

You’re not sure how long you had slept when you feel the blanket slowly being pulled away from your body and you begin shivering.

“Nnmm…Yamper, cut it out…Stop…stop that…” you mumble under your breath.

The blanket continues shifting down your body until it slides off the bed and flops loudly onto the floor. The coldness forces you awake and you open your eyes, blinking groggily in the dark room.

“Huh?” you croak out as you push yourself off the mattress using the back of your elbows, looking around the empty bedroom before you spot the blanket lying crumpled at the foot of the bed.

You must have kicked it off in your sleep somehow… though you swear someone was pulling the blanket off you...

Crawling to the edge of your bed, you bend down and reach for it, grabbing the blanket and lifting it up and you do a doubletake when you see a strange shape lying on the floor underneath it.

Lifting the blanket up, you reveal a small, grey and dirty ragdoll with an enlarged head, two black buttons sewn on for eyes and a jagged line of black stitches that you assume is supposed to be the mouth. It has short black strands of thick yarn for hair and its limbs are round and stubby.

It can’t be Sonia’s for you believe it’s rather unsightly for her liking… and it’s certainly not yours, that’s for sure. You don’t think this could be a new chew toy of Yamper’s, either.

It’s most likely the doll your client mentioned.

“They got this for their daughter’s birthday?? It looks like a voodoo doll...” you say aloud before you can help yourself. Shrugging, you scoop it up and let it sit on your bedside table where it slumps against Sonia’s hairdryer, and you grab your duvet and wrap yourself up once more and roll over to sleep, closing your eyes.

The room falls silent.

You’re so exhausted, your body begins to relax. Your mind grows weary, a blanket of darkness consuming your thoughts until a cold grip seizes you by the ankle and drags you several inches from your spot.

You sit up at once, kicking the blanket off you and staring wide-eyed at the edge of your bed only to see the ragdoll sitting near your left foot with its head flopping backwards.

“What the….”

As you gawk, the doll begins to twitch aggressively before its head flips forward and into its normal position, and your eyes grow wide.

“Haunted doll!!!” you yell, and Gengar manifests from your shadow on the wall. You point hurriedly at the doll, “Gengar, attack!”

Gengar obliges and immediately fires a beam of purple energy at it, blasting it off the bed and burning a small section of your mattress in progress. The ragdoll flies into the air before it lands on the ground with a thump.

It doesn’t move and you and Gengar glance at each other warily before you quickly tiptoe forwards, seize the white plastic bag, grab the doll by the scruff of it's back and dump it inside. It begins to thrash and you tie the bag in a tight knot, then hastily murmur a quick chant to immobilize it. Rushing to your desk, you open one of the drawers and find a scrap of scritta paper, grab a red marker and draw a symbol on it before you stick it on the bag. That should do it.

The entity sealed inside the bag struggles and flails and you glance at Gengar with a wince. “Well, that’s a first,” you say, lifting the bag up and giving it a shake.

It continues wriggling violently, accompanied with a sound akin to the noise of teeth grinding. "Kccchhhkhhhkk...."

“Yeesh, it’s like a tiny terror, right Gengar?” you mutter as the sound sends various shivers down your spine, and Gengar nods.

You throw a glance to the clock; it’s now one in the afternoon. You need to get ready for the dinner which means unfortunately, you will need to deal with the doll later. However, you're still sleepy so with the doll subdued, you fall back into bed, fast asleep.

At five pm, you awake from the beeping of your alarm and unfortunately you're still tired from being woken up so many times during the day but you force yourself to get up so you can utilise the additional two hours to get ready. You get dressed in the outfit Sonia had sussed out for you and before you leave the house, you grab the bag with the Wooloo plush that’s meant for Hop.

The Wooloo doll and the haunted doll have been placed in similar white bags but you made it a point to keep them separated and also, you put the talisman on the haunted doll bag so you pick up the bag that has no talisman and open it for a thorough doublecheck.

Indeed, the Wooloo doll is inside.

You put the bag back down and continue getting ready, rushing around your room to grab some accessories and a spare hair tie just in case. Once you’re done, you grab your pouch and the Wooloo bag and leave the room.

“Sonia, professor, I’m heading out now!” you exclaim as you head downstairs..

“Have fun at Leon’s, dear,” Magnolia says; she’s in the kitchen washing the dishes whilst Sonia lounges with Yamper in the living room, watching a chatshow.

“Tell Leon I said hi,” she says.

“Okay,” you settle the Wooloo bag on the floor and head to the cupboard under the stairs to grab the sandals Sonia prepared for you and return to the front door, slipping them on.  

When you leave, Sonia gets up and off the couch a few minutes later with her empty mug to get some water. However, she spots something lying on its side, hidden behind the umbrella stand.

It's a Wooloo plushie.

…

You make your way down the path of Wedgehurst to Postwick. Sonia’s picked out a white summer dress which she thinks is perfect for the weather.

Whilst you’re far more inclined towards the colour black or anything that would cover up the most skin, this dress seems to reveal a lot of leg and chest than you had wanted. She’s picked a pair of matching nude sandals and a little beige pouch to complete the look, and she’s also helped with your hair and makeup; she has brushed your hair neatly and applied minimal makeup for a more natural look.

You can't help but wonder what Leon will think of you.

The path to Postwick is linear albeit covered with tall grass which you avoid at all costs and very soon, Postwick looms into view; it’s a tiny farming town with a small population. It’s pleasant and dainty with cottages straight from fairytale picture books, with thatched roofs and walls covered in ivy. One wouldn’t have thought the Champion of Galar would have roots from this modest settlement.

Leon’s house is not hard to miss. As he pointed out, it’s the biggest house and you pass the trimmed hedges and stone walls, pass the mini battle court and the garage. There’s a large barbecue grill and an outdoor table which is where the dinner will possibly take place. Leon wasn’t kidding. His house could be mistaken for a mansion...

You arrive at the front door and press the doorbell, then take a step back and wait on the doorstep whilst smoothing your dress down and tidying your hair, inwardly rehearsing some lines in your head. “Hello, Mrs Leon’s mum. I am a Pokemon Researcher. How do you do? Wait, let’s try that one again: How do you do? Oh, how splendid. Me? I’m well, thank you very much. Thank you for inviting me for dinner….”

When the door opens, you stop practising and look up to see the same woman from the hospital standing before you and she smiles widely.

“Oh! You must be…” she says your name and you nod. “It’s lovely to meet you.”

“It’s lovely to meet you too.”

“Come in, come in!” she exclaims happily as you shake hands, and she opens the door wide for you and ushers you inside the house, “Leon, your friend is here!”

You hear footsteps from upstairs; Leon arrives at the top of the stairs and hurries down, looking rather flustered. He’s also dressed very casual, barefoot and donned in a pair of black joggers, a thick and woolly, white sweater and shirt.

When he sees you at the door however, he freezes on the last step as he gets an eyeful.

“Hi Leon.” You wave at him as you stand on their furry ‘home sweet home’ mat.

“H-hi,” he utters. His face grows pink as he looks at you from head to toe, jaw going slack. His reaction does not go unnoticed; his mum giggles as she heads over to his direction and plants a hand on his shoulder, steering him towards your direction until he’s directly in front of you and you look up and he looks at you and your gazes meet.

Following that, you hear another set of rapid footsteps bumbling down the stairs and it’s the little boy from the hospital clutching a Charizard figurine in hand. With a Wooloo rolling down the stairs after him, he leaps off the last step and lands in front of you, looking up at you with a big grin whilst Wooloo takes a baby leap off the step and trots over.

Leon’s little brother grins widely at you and says, “Hi there, Lee told me all about you! I’m his little brother, Hop.”

“I know, he told me about you as well,” you say with a smile as he looks up at Leon, who grins and playfully loops an arm around the back of his neck and Hop begins to laugh as Leon proceeds to playfully drive his clenched knuckle over his head.

“And he’s my biggest fan too,” Leon adds.

“Leon told me you like Wooloo so I brought you something,” you hand him the white bag, and he blinks as he accepts it.

“…For me?”

“Of course.”

“Oh wow! Thanks, mate!” he exclaims, “Lee was right, you’re pretty and kind!”

Your eyes bulge as you gape at Leon who begins spluttering at once. Leon’s mum and Hop exchange glances before they grin at your interaction.

“Hip-Hop, would you like to help me get the barbecue sorted out?” Leon’s mum coos before Hop can open his gift.

You chuckle under your breath. Hip-Hop….how adorable…

Hop looks at the bag briefly then nods, “Okay, mum, let me put this in my room first," he says, before he rushes up the stairs with your gift.

“I’ll send the Hopster to get you when everything’s ready,” Leon’s mum says to you with a wink, and when Hop returns downstairs, they make a speedy exit towards the direction of the kitchen.

It’s just you and Leon.

“So uh…where can I put my shoes?” you ask, and Leon finally tears his eyes away from you to throw his glance to your feet.

“Oh, here is fine,” he gestures to the side of the door where a bunch of shoes are lined up on the floor over a mat and you slip out of the sandals and carefully place them beside Leon’s champion boots. “You look lovely.”

And your cheeks grow pink in response. “Thanks,” you offer him a smile, gingerly placing your hands behind your back, “You have a very nice house.”

He chuckles and rubs the back of his neck at your compliment. “Come on, I’ll give you the grand tour,” he says with a grin, and he leads you into the living room where an elderly man sits on an armchair with a Purrloin who is fast asleep in his lap.

Leon enthusiastically introduces you to his grandfather who looks up from the snoozing pokemon and greets you politely and you do the same; he asks you briefly about your work before he’s conveniently called to the kitchen by Leon’s mum.

You’re alone with Leon once more as grandpa settles the snoozing Purrloin over the sofa and slowly shuffles to the kitchen. Leon tosses his glance to you as you take the time to look around his large and spacious lounge, spotting the numerous trophies displayed on the mantelpiece. There is also a portrait of Leon in his champion attire beside a framed medal on the wall.

“Where are these from?” you ask as he joins your side, “This one looks interesting.”

He looks sheepish, cheeks reddening as you step towards the fireplace and peer at the engraved words on one of the trophies. “I won that at the World Coronation Series."

“That’s really impressive.”

Your words only serves to make him blush harder and Leon blurts out, “Do you want to go to my room?”

There is a brief silence until Leon’s face grows even redder than ever before and he begins spluttering incoherently.

You guess he doesn't invite girls to his room often but you say, "Sure."

Leon stops stuttering and his eyes widens a brief fraction at your response. Nodding limply, he leads you out of the lounge, heading up the stairs. Along the way, you pass his grandmother; she greets you politely and after a brief introduction, decides to head downstairs to leave the both of you alone.

Leon’s house is huge with several winding corridors and turns, and you can’t help but wonder if his poor sense of direction started with this but you see there are signs stuck to the wall that will help him find his own room and when the signs run out, he has arrived at a random door, opening it.

He lets you go in first and this would be the first time you’ve stepped foot into a boy’s room - and the Champion’s room, nonetheless. You’re stunned that his room is quite plain and the interior decor are Autumn-inspired, with the reddish floor and the tawny shade of his walls and curtains.

There’s his bed, a desk, a bookshelf lined with boxes and a workout station in one corner though they don't appear to have been used much. You also spot a colourful collection of snapbacks on display, neatly lined up side by side on several shelves. You count them all and the total goes over thirty.

As you look around his room, Leon watches you as though he is waiting for your reaction. You head over to his desk where you see a desktop calendar with random dates circled and notes, and Leon makes his way up to you when you scrutinise it.

“That’s my schedule,” he says, as he scoops it up and hands it to you for a closer look.

“You’re booked out for the entire year,” you utter in awe as you flip through the pages and he nods.

Once again, you are subtly reminded of who exactly you're dealing with here. You're talking to Leon, the Champion of Galar. Not only that, but he has invited you for dinner. The gravity of it all makes you almost faint. Leon is...a celebrity.

You go through the dates and what the events are. "Rose of the Rondelands Charity Gala Ball, Paediatric Visit, Soda Pop photoshoot, Soup Kitchen for the homeless…Miss Galar Beauty Pageant??”

Leon crosses his arms over his chest, nodding, “Yeah, I’m supposed to make a brief speech.”

You raise a brow at the thought of Leon being surrounded by smiling, beautiful girls in swimsuits. You didn’t realise his duties as Champion would extend to the Miss Galar Beauty Pageant too...

“I see,” is your reply, before you catch glimpse of his 'Official Fanmeet and Signing'. It's then you recall you have his poster and wonder if it would be possible to sign up...

"This is for you," Leon fishes out a flimsy small envelope from one of the drawers of his desk and hands it to you, "It's the ticket to my next match. Actually, it's an annual pass for Wyndon Stadium... so you can attend all my matches."

Your jaw drops. The Wyndon Stadium annual pass costs a five figure sum!! "You're kidding, right?"

"No, why would I be?"

He sounds a little puzzled and it occurs to you he took your words quite literally.

You accept the envelope with a wide grin and Leon's face grows red at the sight of your gratitude. "Thank you so much!!!" you gush at him.

"You're welcome," he says quietly.

And you put the envelope away safely and return the calendar over the desk. As you turn, your bag swings round and you accidentally knock a random snapback off. It’s a white cap with a black visor and the League’s symbol on it. It’s quite possibly an expensive collector’s item and you gasp.

You attempt to catch it before it drops to the floor, diving for it, and so does Leon, and suddenly he has grabbed your hands and you both completely miss the snapback, which lands on the floor.

The two of you simultaneously freeze at the same time.

His hands are so warm compared to yours, and you look at him and he looks at you before he quickly releases your hands. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay,” you croak as your fingers tingle all over from the unwarranted contact and your heart begins to pound. You quickly pluck the cap off the ground and you both move to stand. “H-here’s your hat.”

“Thanks,” Leon cradles it to himself gently, “This one is vintage. In fact, my collection are all vintage, limited or special editions. This one commemorates the fiftieth Galar Pokemon League gym challenge,” he says with a smile and as he glances at the hat in his grip, he reaches over and fixes the cap over your head and proceeds to fasten the strap behind your head, tugging on it securely.

You go still once more, swallowing down the lump in your throat.

He is standing so close to you. He doesn’t need to be, but he is. You can feel his breath on your cheeks, his hands skimming over the side of your face gently. You swerve your eyes up to him and as he looks at you at the same time, you quickly avert your gaze and he takes a step back once the hat is fastened properly. “It suits you.”

“I’m just missing your cape,” you blurt out.

“You’re right. Wait a second, I’ll go get it,” Leon replies and he heads to his wardrobe, opening it and pulling out the thick, red champion cape from within.

“Uh…” you pale slightly when you realise Leon had taken your words seriously again. With cape in hands, he proceeds to step behind you and carefully position it over your shoulders and tie it around you, and you realise there are also two unnoticeable clips on it that attaches itself onto the shoulders to prevent it from falling off.

“There we go. All done.” Leon says, and you’re astounded he’s letting you try it on.

“Oh, I…I feel weird,” you croak out as you attempt to twist your body left and right to see the cape; Leon is taller than you, so unfortunately the cape brushes against the floor and you attempt to bundle it up.

The beautiful fur that lines the cloak tickles your chin and the sides of your face and ears. Furthermore, you accidentally catch a heavy whiff of Leon’s scent all over and you blush.

Leon takes another step forwards and begins slipping his fingers underneath the cap and brushes some hair from the side of your face, tucking it behind your ear. He replaces the cap over your head once more and smiles. “You look really pretty today,” he murmurs.

“Um…..thanks.” you can’t help but blush furiously; he’s said it twice now. As you glance down at yourself, you grab a section of the cape and lift it up, hiding the lower half of your face with it. Leon laughs in response as you quirk a brow at him. “How do I look?”

“Not bad!”

“I could get used to this,” you say, “No wonder you wear it all the time.”

Next, you use your other hand to grab the other side of the cloak and lift your arms up in the air, the cape rising and Leon chuckles as you parade around the room.

“I should take this off now,” you say before you get carried away as usual.

“How did it feel to be Champion of Galar for five minutes?”

“Pretty good but the cloak is heavy," you reply, as you take a few steps and the cloak’s weight makes your shoulders feel hefty.

He grins and helps you remove the cloak, it brushes against the floor once more and as you hop backwards, you accidentally step on one corner just as he lifts it up and your eyes grow wide as the ground beneath you disappears; you lose your footing and begin to slip.

However, Leon’s quick to catch you by wrapping a thick and sturdy arm around your back but it doesn’t stop you from falling and he doesn’t abandon the cape; you fall flat on your back with a grunt and Leon topples over you, the cape spooling over him.

His weight causes your eyes to bulge and a few strands of his long hair catches in your mouth which makes you splutter. Muttering a long string of apologies, Leon scrabbles to get off you and the heel of his hand accidentally presses hard against your breast and his jaw drops in horror.

Before either of you can move, Hop suddenly pokes his head into room.

“The barbecue’s-“

Hop pauses, eyes widening at the sight of you lying on the ground with Leon on top and the cape covering your lower bodies and most importantly, his hand on your breast. Hop blurts out an apology for disturbing you but not before spinning on his heel in a one hundred and eighty degree turn and he rushes away, stampeding down the corridor.

“Hop!” You and Leon yell at the same time, before you gape at one another.

Next, you throw your gaze to where Leon is touching you and finally he lifts his hand off your chest, lifting himself off you in general and as he sits up, his hand is trembling, his face a thousand shades of red. He collects his cape into his arms and bundles it up.

“Arceus, what a mess!” he groans before he turns to you, “I’m so sorry! Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine, Leon…” you croak out as he sticks his hand out; you accept his hand and he lifts you off the ground so you can sit up. One of the straps of your dress – and your bra – decides to fall off your shoulder and Leon accidentally catches a glimpse of your exposed shoulder and your bra strap and he looks away to bury his face into the soft material of his cape.

“Sorry.” Is his muffled apology.

“It’s fine,” you wave your hand dismissively before you pull the straps over your shoulder and into the proper positions. “It was an accident. Is Hop gonna be okay though?”

Leon lowers the cape, then nods. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll handle this. Let’s go find him.”

You agree with a nod and you both get up to stand; Leon carefully hangs his cape in his closet and you both leave his room. Following the directions on the wall, you both make your way to the stairs and as you pass a random door, it is open and it’s then you see that Hop is inside, sitting cross-legged on the floor.

“Hop?” Leon says, and he looks up.

He has the white bag in his lap and when he sees you and Leon, his face visibly goes red. “I-I didn’t see anything!!!”

“It’s fine, Hop, it was just an accident,” you say as you step into his room. “I fell after slipping on your brother’s cloak and he tried to help me, but unfortunately he ended up falling on top of me too and his hand-”

Hop’s eyes grows to the size of saucers.

“Um…” Leon steps in before you can finish, “Maybe I should…”

“Oh right, yes, please do…”

Leon moves to sit down beside his little brother, sitting cross-legged over the carpet and places a hand on his shoulder. “Hop.”

“Yeah, Lee?”

Leon takes a deep breath then says, “I know it’s not yet time for you to have that talk with mum about the Pidgeys and the Beedrills, but I wanted to let you know that what you saw in the room, I wasn’t the Beedrill and she wasn’t the Pidgey. It was just an accident.”

Leon goes on and on and you’re left standing, wondering what he is on about.

“Hey Lee?”

“Yes, Hop?”

“I get it.”

“Oh, you do? That’s good.” Leon pats Hop on the shoulder; the younger brother grins at Leon, then turns to you with a somewhat sly grin.

“Whatever you say, Lee,” Hop adds, grin broadening, and you don’t think Hop is as innocent as he seems. “Can I open my gift now?” he adds excitedly.

“Sure, go ahead,” Leon replies with a smile.

Hop proceeds to open the bag with an ecstatic whoop of glee and unties your bag, sticking his hand in and once he’s grabbed the doll, he pulls it out. There is a silence when he lifts it up in the air.

It’s the ragdoll.

“What the-?!?” you squawk, whilst Hop and Leon blink blankly at the hideous toy, before they turn to you questioningly. “Arceus, I’m so sorry…Hop, there was meant to be a Wooloo plush but-"

When the ragdoll squirms under Hop’s grip, he drops it in alarm.

“I-it just moved by itself!!” Hop exclaims and the two brothers are quick to jump onto their feet with Leon immediately ushering his little brother behind him.

Before anyone can make a move or speak, the doll twitches fiercely on the floor of the bedroom and you, Hop and Leon exchange wide-eyed looks before the doll twitches on the spot, its stuffed body convulsing rigorously and finally, the ragdoll inches off the ground and sits up.

“Mi…..me….me kill you….” A distorted voice emits from within.

Hop yelps with panic and you immediately call for Gengar whilst Leon steers his brother away from the doll as far as possible.

When Gengar manifests from the corner of the room, he spots the doll and you command, “Dark Pulse!”

Gengar aims a beam of dark energy at it and the attack smacks into the doll; it soars into the air once again and one of its stitches comes loose on the little doll’s face as it flops to the floor.

“Kkkccchhhkkk….” the noise akin to nails scratching on a chalkboard returns and the doll struggles to sit up as one of its button eyes pop off, its head flopping to one side limply, revealing a pair of glowing dots underneath the worn out fabric. “Kcchkkkk….!”

“Look out!” Leon yells, as the doll's head snaps back onto its normal position and a shadowy appendage bursts out from the gap between the torn stitches, aimed at your direction.

You gasp but Gengar jumps in front of you and the claw slams into his body. Gengar goes reeling from the impact and finally, Charizard comes bumbling into the room.

“Charizard, ember!” Leon is quick to instruct, pointing at the doll of terror.

Two long shadowy claws have emerged from the ragdoll's body, rising high in the air as it takes tiny steps one foot at a time towards your group, and Charizard stares at the minuscule adversary in confusion for a split second or so before he coughs out a weak ball of fire the size of a golfball from the back of his throat which immediately catches onto the doll’s yarn hair.

The doll stops at once, the two glowing dots blinking numbly.

“Mi??” a voice from within squeaks, before it senses the flames on it's yarn hair and leaps an inch into the air with fright. “Mi mi!!!”

The doll begins running around frantically in the room, its hair on fire.

“Mi!! Mi mi mi mikyuu!!”

You and Leon gawk at each other whilst Hop blinks wide-eyed at the spectacle, before everyone bursts into laughter.

As the doll runs around the bedroom helplessly, you walk over and begin stamping on its head with your foot to clear the flames and you hear the doll squealing and squeaking in agony until the fire goes out and it flops over the floor, it’s hair fizzing with smoke.

You’re amazed the fire alarm hasn’t been triggered and when you and Leon look at each other again, you let out a chortle under your breath.

“Go ahead.” Leon says, crossing his arms and you pull out an empty Dusk ball from your pouch, tossing it at the pokemon and it is sucked inside. The capsule shakes a few times before the light goes off, indicating its capture.

You pick up the black and green coloured capsule and sigh whilst Leon checks if Hop is okay. “Sorry, Leon. Sorry, Hop.”

“What do you mean??!!!” Hop exclaims with a wide grin, clenching his fists tightly, “That was soooo awesome!”

You raise a brow until you hear Leon's mum downstairs, informing everyone that the barbecue is ready. Leon gives you a wide smile as Hop makes a beeline out of his room.

"C'mon, let's race! Last one down is a rotten Exeggcute!"

Leon turns to you and grins, "Let's go," he says, motioning for you to follow and you nod, trailing after him into the corridor.

[skvaderarts]

Apocrypah Chapter Forty: Judgement

Masterlist can be found Here!

Chapter Forty: Judgment

Notes: See the end for the closing notes! Thank you so much to everyone who did the poll! It’s still open until Sunday in case you still wanted to do it but didn’t have time! More on that later!

(-~-)

Sunday, August 25th, 5:30 

None of them could recall the last time they had participated in such a woefully silent ride in the van. Despite the obvious time pressure and severity of the majority of the missions that they underwent, there was normally an air of excitement or humor on board the van, even on the occasions that the passengers present were missing a sense of humor altogether. Tension wasn’t an emotion that most of the Devil May Cry crew associated with their commutes, but on this specific occasion, that was the perfect adjective to use to describe how they felt about the situation that they currently found themselves in.

The strangest thing about the situation was that their new guest didn’t seem the slightest bit fazed about the situation. He sat atop one of the two stools that accompanied the bar-style table that was bolted down behind the drives seat, more or less silently content with flipping through a magazine that one of them had left onboard sometime ago. Some sort of mind-numbing fashion periodical that none of them really cared to flip through aside from Nero who claimed to have taken a nap under it at one point or another during a mission. All in all, it wasn’t the sort of thing that any of them really cared to read, but the unfamiliar redhead in question seemed to be captivated to some considerable degree with every single page of the thin paper booklet, nodding to himself quietly as he read each page, genuinely intrigued.

In an effort to ease the admittedly agonizing silence between them, Nero sighed and came to the conclusion that maybe trying to talk to this new guy might make things less uncomfortable. V was sitting shotgun to him, quietly contemplating something that Nero couldn’t fathom. He’d been around V long enough at this point to tell when he was thinking deeply about something, and he was willing to bet that in this particular situation, it was the mysterious redhead they were currently traveling with. There was no way that his older brother was going to initiate a conversation with him, so it was probably best that he do so himself.

“So, um… Sirrus right? What’s so interesting about that magazine? You’ve been reading it since we left.” Nero said with a passive glance towards the back of the van. He’s become accustomed to driving with Nico around, but that didn’t mean that he’d forgotten the basics of road safety. For a moment he caught himself wondering if V could drive. He’d seen him sit in the driver’s seat before, but the white-haired summoner had never so much as reached for the steering wheel. He’d have to ask him about that another time when he wasn’t so… preoccupied.

A surprisingly pleasant smile spread across the newcomer’s face, his grey eyes leaving the magazine for a moment to acknowledge Nero’s question. He seemed pleasantly surprised that the devil hunter with the short hair was actually speaking to him. It was a nice change of pace from the last half hour or so of awkward but admittedly welcome silence.

“Oh, and here I thought you were giving me the silent treatment. Understandable, of course. I don’t tend to mix well with strangers, either. But regardless, I’m glad you asked.” He glanced between V and Nero for a moment before nodding towards the magazine in question. The older of the two white-haired demon hunters seemed to catch his gaze for a moment, still in the process of combing over his mental quandaries.” I love to see how the clothing and the people that wear it change over time. It’s kind of a timepiece in of its self in that regard. I find it truly fascinating. Living history has always captivated me in a way that times long since passed could not, though in that sense, all moments are instantaneously relegated to the annals of history the moment they pass, so history will always be both living and dead. Strange how that works.”

Nero stared at him blankly for a moment, simultaneously confused and yet somehow fully understanding what Sirrus meant by that all at once. At least from what he could tell. He hadn’t expected that response in the slightest, and his lack of a sufficient response pointed to that factor. But then who would expect such a philosophical answer to such a benign question? No one in their right mind expected to receive a thesis paper as a response to a simple inquiry, after all.

Without warning, V stood up and made his way over to the couch that sat across from their new companion, seeming finished with whatever had kept him so preoccupied the majority of the car ride. There was a certain level of obvious curiosity that was evident in the other man’s gaze as V sat down, giving him an intense but otherwise harmless look that was difficult to decipher. From what Nero could tell at a casual glance, it seemed almost as if V were attempting to study the man in the hopes of understanding something. Maybe there was more to him that he has initially suspected, and V knew something that he did not? That wasn’t impossible. Neither of them had moved past the point of suspicion when it came to this new person who they had only met a short while ago. Much like when Nero had first met V, he had far more questions than answers, and what questions he did have were profound and needed to be addressed as soon as possible. Hopefully they would have them in a few minutes when they affixed at Magnolia’s house.

“I’m curious. What do you mean by living and dead history? Is that to say that history that has yet to be created is living, but that which has already been created and resigned to paper should be considered dead as, by its very nature, it is in the past?” V reclined slightly, attempting to make himself somewhat more comfortable than he previously was. This conversation had suddenly piqued his interest, and he wasn’t going to miss an opportunity to gain a better understanding of who they were working with.” Can actions that have yet to be carried out be history, or are they simply predestined, if you believe in that sort of thing?”

Sirrus raised an eyebrow, nodding to himself slowly as he took in V’s response, taking a moment to linger on the questions that he’d been asked. He chuckled slightly, closing as he nodded in agreement, this time much more noticeably than he had before; more sure of himself and of how he felt about the inquiry.” I think I like you. I hope I don’t come off as the smug, pretentious lout that you probably think I am by now. In actuality, I’m quite approachable. I just lack people skills.”

Nero scoffed slightly at the statement.” Well, if that’s the case, at least your self aware.”

A thoroughly exhausted expression crossed the young summoner’s face, signaling that he suddenly felt more exhausted than he had a moment ago. It was as if the possible repercussions of such a bold statement had physically aged him several years. While there was a part of V that genuinely loved Nero’s no-nonsense attitude, neither of them was sure what this stranger was capable of just yet, and he was willing to bet that possibly the worst place to receive that education would be in the back of a moving vehicle. While he was sure that they could both handle themselves, he wasn’t eager to limp the rest of the way to Magnolia’s home after pulling himself out of a car accident, especially if they then had to explain what had happened after arriving.

Much to his surprise, Sirrus burst into hysterical laughter. Nero glanced back at him for a moment as the red-haired man whipped a few stray beads of moisture from his eyes, noting the curious look that V was giving him. He seemed almost confused, unsure as to how to interpret that kind of reaction. Was he angry, or did he actually find that entertaining? In truth, it was all a bit much from him this early in the morning. The summoner was far from the sort of person who enjoyed being up this early, and critical thinking? Well, that didn’t occur until at least nine am at the earliest.

“To be honest, I think your probably right. I am a stuck up git, aren’t I?” Sirrus said as he took a few deep breaths to settle himself.” The environment I come from demands composure and a keel intellect above everything else. Having an actual personality is secondary. It’s nice to do fieldwork for a change. Thank you for entertaining my insanity.”

Before either of them could ask him to elaborate, they turned onto the street that Magnolia lived on and Nero pulled the van to a stop. The porch light was on, and the front door opened as soon as the key was removed from the ignition, signaling to both of them at they had, in fact, been expecting them. Sirrus nodded and then opened the side door to the van, gesturing for V to go ahead of him. After a moment, he obliged, noting that the man in the black coat patiently waited for him to exit before hopping down and closing the door. Nero exited through the front door to the van, joining V as their companion forged ahead, waiving at Magnolia. She stood in the doorway shaking her head as they approached, seemingly saying something under her breath.

V glanced over at Nero as he joined him, the two of them heading up the stairs just behind the intrepid man in the foreign getup. He seemed slightly perplexed, earning him a curious look from the younger of the two as they approached the door.” What is it?”

The young summoner shrugged slightly, a gesture that Nero was not at all accustomed to seeing. From what he could tell, V was more than ready to see what was going on so that they could enact whatever plan they had probably been summoned here to discuss. He needed to put his mind at ease, not that he was exactly worked up to start with. He just needed a more concrete idea of who and what they were working with.

“It’s nothing. I simply find it amusing that you could drive as well as you do this entire time, and yet you insist upon allowing Nico to nearly kill us every time we travel.” V chuckled slightly under his breath, smirking as they entered the building.” If others had not been foolish, we should be so.”

Nero followed behind him, shaking his head as they entered the room to find two familiar faces sitting across from them. Both Dante and Vergil seemed to be just a few moments shy of a disagreement, and he got the feeling that their arrival might have been the only thing that had stopped that from occurring. Between that and the quote that V had just thrown his way, Nero was about as done with the situation as his older sibling was, and they’d only just arrived. How was it only six in the morning and things had gone this poorly already?

“Okay, now that everyone is here, I think I have some explaining to do,” Magnolia said, a slightly somber look on her face. She took a deep breath and exhaled, clearly displeased by some turn of events that the majority of the group had missed.” Well, everyone except Nico. But I suspect that she will be along in a moment-”

As if summoned by the words that Magnolia had spoken, the mechanic came from the kitchen, clearly caught red-handed in the act of eating something. Magnolia gave her a humorous look as the young gunsmith shrugged, clearly embarrassed by the number of eyes that she found on herself. It seemed that she’s been found out long before now, and the kindly botanist had simply been biding her time waiting for an opportunity to publicly shame her for her gluttony.

“Hehe… My bad. I was hungry, and there were dinner rolls, and one thing lead to another and…” Nico rapidly realized that there were more pressing things at hand, her gaze turning to Sirrus as she finished chewing whatever was left of what she’d been eating, still holding a spare in her off-hand as she raised her free hand to gesture towards the newcomer.” Should I even ask who this is, or should I just go back to eating?”

Dante laughed to himself slightly, gesturing in a manner somewhere between a shrug and a disingenuous “whatever” motion.” If you’re going for the second option, then so am I. I still have no idea what’s going on here, and I’m actually pretty hungry.”

Vergil shot Dante a look of flabbergasted disbelief before turning his attention back to Magnolia and Sirrus. Just as she’d said, they were due some answers, and he intended to receive them sooner rather than later.” … What is this about, then? Time is of the essence.”

The plucky botanist nodded before reaching into her apron pocket and producing a familiar black book. Confused looks were exchanged across the room before she contented, gesturing towards Sirrus as she did so.” When V brought this book back, I enlisted the help of a longtime associate of mine to help deal with it. As I might have mentioned before, it’s heavily cursed and, as such, needs someone experienced to decipher it. That is where he comes in.”

Everyone glanced in the red head’s direction as she handed him to book. He opened the cover, flipping through the pages with a look so casual that it actually unnerved Magnolia slightly. He then closed the book and scoffed, groaning as he returned it to her.

“Honestly, Magnolia. Associates? Were far more than that. I can’t be that embarrassing to know.” he turned back towards the room, facing the rest of them in an attempt to settle the discourse he felt brewing in the small space.” Yes, that book is very cursed, and for good reason. I think I’d be more concerned if it wouldn’t try to kill me for reading it. It’s an Apocrypha, a book of forbidden knowledge. I wouldn’t be surprised if the influence of that book alone was enough to drive those cultists I’ve heard about insane.”

Vergil looked visibly uncomfortable with that revelation.” … I have a feeling that I may know where they got it from. Have you heard a devil prince named Belial?”

A somewhat startled look crossed Sirrus’s face as he nodded, immediately understanding the implications of what the eldest Son of Sparda was implying.” Ah. Truly wonderful. And just when I thought this part of the country couldn’t have more problems. Now I understand why I’m here.” He took a moment to remove his coat and hang it on the coat rack nearest to the door, clearing his throat before proceeding.” I am an adjudicator on behalf of… well, that’s not important. What is is that I’ve been assigned to find out what the hell is going on in this region. But with a Prince of Darkness involved as well as an Apocrypha, I can’t say that it’s much of a mystery anymore. Cult or no cult, this honestly can’t get much worse.”

Dante raised his hand, interjecting. While the gesture was entirely unnecessary and he knew it, it garnered the correct response. In the end, he’d done so more to bring humor to a bleak conversation than to actually ask for permission to speak. He’d never asked for that a day in his entire life, and there was no point in starting now.

“Would an Arcana make it worse? Because the cult had one of those, too. And a Conduit. Well, they did before their master killed them all. But that’s what I’d call a “technicality.” Dante gestured towards V and Nero, the two having gradually made their way over to the couch during the discussion. They couldn’t have been more lost as to what was going on if they tried.” You two got any ideas?”

Nero shook his head, more interested in finding out more about what was going on than anything else. It was problematic, to say the least.” Honestly, I just wanna know how you two even know each other.” He said, pointing between Magnolia and Sirrus.” I mean, are you two related or something? I don’t know anyone that can read a cursed book or whatever, and I live in Fortuna. What a lucky break.”

Much to their collective surprise, Sirrus nodded. “Yes, that does make it worse. Considerably worse, actually. I work in antiquities, so to speak. And ironically, yes, we are related. Though distantly. Probably a few times removed. There are a few divorces in there somewhere.” He shook his head, clearly recalling some until and more than likely complicated series of events that they were not privy to.” It’s quite a long and complicated story, so you’ll forgive me for not retelling it now. There will be time enough for that later. Regardless, I’m happy to help in any way that I can. This is a case of both business and pleasure, and the two rarely mix. When Magnolia askes, I deliver. It’s that simple.”

His eyes traveled to the far end of the room, landing on Nico as she gave him a perplexed look that he couldn’t quite quantify. The rest of the room followed his gaze, sharing his puzzled sentiments. None of them were sure what was going on with her, but they also knew that if it was Nico, then she probably had a decent reason to look so confused. As a whole, she tended to keep her composure in most situations. Something was clearly bothering her.

“Have I done something wrong, Luv? You seem disconnected from the situation.” The redhead looked genuinely confused as to why she looked so lost.” I there something I can do to put your mind at ease?”

The normally silly, funloving mechanism gave him a sideways look, nodding to herself as though she had just confirmed something for herself.” I knew it! We have met before. You been in town recently?”

An amused smile spread across Sirrus’s face as he chucked under his breath slightly, nodding in agreement.” Guilty as charged. I was wondering if you’d recognized me.” He looked genuinely pleased with himself as he continued to laugh to himself, clearly reveling in the irony of their encounter.” So, how was the blueberry pomegranate danish, then? Did you end up getting it?”

Nico shook her head and flopped down in one of the nearby seats.” Yea, I got it. What the hell? Small world, hu?”

He nodded.” Yes. Yes, it is.” he turned his attention to the rest of the room, a more serious look on his face.” I do hope there is some sort of plan?”

Vergil gave him an ambiguous look, not entirely sure that they should even call it that.” We have to return the artifact to the guardians that watch over it. After that, no. Not at all. I don’t make plans that far ahead.”

Dante repressed the urge to laugh. They were thoroughly fucked, weren’t they?” Well, at least you can admit it. But yea, getting that knife as far from this demon as we can is all we’ve got at the moment. Unless we decide to go down to the underworld and pick a fight with him, that’s all we really can do until we know more about what he’s planning.”

Sirrus nodded, the severity of the situation weighing on him.” Well, then I won’t keep any of you any longer. I have my own investigations to undergo, and it looks like you have a trip to prepare for. Good luck to you. I’ll be back with you shortly.”

With that, he grabbed his coat off of the coat hanger and slipped out of the front door, leaving them to sit and consider their next move carefully. There were still far more questions that there were answers, but that was normally the case, wasn’t it? For now, all they could do was deal with the task at hand. There was one eventually that they could prepare for, and so long as that was the case, that would be their main goal. Taking things one at a time could be their best shot at figuring out how best to combat what they were up against.

Dante glanced out across the room. No one needed to say anything. They knew what they needed to do next. “Ok then that settles is. I’ll call the girls. It’s time to visit Lucia.”

(-~-)

I want to take a moment to thank everyone who took the time to read this fic! I never would have thought that such an awesome community of people would spring up around this AU, and I can’t thank you enough for everything! This isn’t the end, don’t worry! Were just going into book three soon.

Book three is called Hiraeth

On Friday, December 18th, 2020, book three starts! I just need a few weeks to get the new pages together! Don’t be surprised if you see me throw a few chapters of a new fic up. I’m thinking of doing something fun just for the hell of it during that period, so look out for a new fic called “Saudade”. It’s just a collection of side fics to fill in parts of the story that didn’t need a whole chapter in the main series. Might even throw some stuff in there from Dante and Nero’s childhoods. I’ll toss it into the Seriese section for this fic, so keep an eye on that sometime next week if your interested!

My poll from last week is still open as well! Thank you to everyone who took the time to fill it out! And thank you for everything! See you in two weeks!

[littlesliceofmarvel]

Manipulating a God | chpt. four

Synopsis: Trying to break the information out of Loki during the attack of 2012 wasn’t exactly the easiest task, but it was a challenge you were willing to take head on. So, what happened when a master manipulator tried to get information from the God of Mischief?

Series warnings: Swearing, mentions of violence, blood and gore

Pairings: Stark!Reader x Loki

A/N: sooooo. i am sooooo sorry it has been so long. there have been many personal/school/work issues the past few weeks and i have neglected this. :( But, I am back and very excited to continue. So, i hope you all enjoy and thanks sososo much for you patience i love you all. xoxoxoxoxo

-

Since agreeing to the case of investigating Loki, the entire team had been throwing tidbits and important information your way any chance they could get.  You told them you were listening, jotting down everything in your mental notepad, but honestly, you were more confident about the whole thing than they thought. Thor was the only one who seemed to believe you could handle it yourself. Of course, he didn’t view Loki as a murderer the same way everyone else did, but he was also the one who really knew what Loki was capable of.

Thor told you a lot about Loki’s history and childhood; a frost giant, taken in by Odin, given the impression that he could eventually rule, living in incredible self-doubt, all that jazz. Small, personal things you hadn’t found on Google. You debated questioning him about the whole ‘Loki fucking a giant wolf’ thing but figured that that wasn’t information you needed - nor wanted - to know.

Tony on the other hand wanted to stop you as best as he could. He even tried locking you in your room once or twice (or five times.) Of course, he was fully on board with dragging Loki through verbal (and probably physical) Hell to get information that was desired, but he was worried you would fall victim to his lies and lose your mind, and in his words ‘have a Joker-like descent into madness.’

You couldn’t say you had the same vision, but we all know Tony can be quite the drama queen.

Steve, who you now trusted more than you thought you could, told you he’d be there for you if ever you needed help. Apparently being a part of the second World War could help this situation, so he offered you some strange advice on how to hold your ground. Your favorite, for example, was; “if ever he tells you he’s going to be a wonderful ruler, don’t trust him, Hitler said the same.” Steve had good intentions, sure, but his constant reminiscing made you feel as if you were a child listening to their grandfather speak about how ‘getting to school was so much harder in my day.’

Natasha, who was quite trained in the field of manipulation as well, gave you some tips she learnt in her mysterious past - some of which you already knew. Always form a connection. Listen to them. Don’t put them down if you want them to trust you. Simple things that worked wonders. Things you had used before, mostly on Tony, but they worked either way. 

Sure, Loki was of another world, and he was the infamous God of Mischief. So, he had an obvious advantage over you, and you’d admit, a part of you was worried that he wouldn’t fall for you tactics and eventually be the one to drag you down to the deep dark depths. But, you were willing to take this challenge head on and nothing was going to stop you. For now, at least. If ever Loki dug his claws into your lungs to the point where you were gasping for breath and surrender was the only option, you’d opt out. But your goal was to not let it get to that point.

You hadn’t actually gotten the chance to speak one on one with Loki since his capturing, but Fury gave you a rundown of his so-called ‘prison’ chamber to ensure your safety. Which button to press if Loki went ballistic, where the security cameras were hidden out, which button to press to drop the cage - the basics. He also told you there’d always be someone listening in at all times, so if ever there was danger and you somehow didn’t sense it, you wouldn’t be alone.

But finally, today was your first day in getting to start breaking him down, and a part of you was slightly looking forward to it. On the countless times you had used your manipulative tactics to gain information from people in order to save your slightly self-sacrifical brother, none of it felt like it was up to the standard of actually being of worldly, even grave importance. The information you were trying to get from this guy was going to be do-or-die, and the sadistic side of you was slightly exhilarated at the thought.

“Alright, Y/N, are you ready to start? Remember, I’ll be watching everything,” Fury warned as if you were his daughter and about to go hang out with someone of the opposite sex for the first time.

“Yes, dad, I know you’ll be watching,” you reassured him, following him into the room where Loki was being kept, the loud thud of your overly-eager footsteps startling the man at the computer when you entered the room.

The dark, circular room was surrounding by computers, machines, pipes, wires, anything technological that you could think of. The only light source, though, seemed to be coming from the glowing white cage in the center of the room. The overwhelming scent of metal was almost aggressively jabbing at your nostrils, but you weren’t too affected - this is what Tony usually smells like after his Iron Man expeditions. You eventually turned your attention to the man standing in the center of the room.

When your eyes landed on him, you ended up staring more than you wanted. He looked so much worse than the first time you saw him. His pale, white complexion looked almost green, the deep indent of his eyes and cheekbones resembled the deepest craters and the pale blue of his eyes dulled down to a lifeless grey. His hair was messier, the little points at the end no longer bouncy, almost looking discouraged. You know, if it were possible for hair to have that emotion.

Fury had dismissed himself quietly and walked back out the same door, leaving you and Loki glaring at each other. You could tell he was reading you the same way you were him. His long cloak stayed put on his shoulders, but somehow, it looked just as dead as the rest of him. 

“So, is this the best Fury has to offer?” His sultry voice spiked your ears, and you almost forgot you were here to actually speak to him, the staring contest feeling like it had lasted eight years. 

“If anything, I think I’m the best Fury has. Period.” You shrugged, eyeing the small metal chair placed in front of his cell. You slowly walked over to it, fully aware of the God’s undivided attention following your every move. 

He chuckled lowly at your comment as you sat down, “So, to what do I owe this insufferable thrill?” 

Insufferable thrill?

“I’d like to think of myself as an angelic pleasure, but whatever suits your fancy,” you replied, crossing your legs and leaning back against the cold metallic chair, brushing past Loki’s insult. 

Remember: don’t let him affect you.

“Why are you here?” He quipped, the teasing tone of his voice gone as he sat down in his cell, eyes boring into you as he searched for his answers.

Your mind thought up of something to justify your presence, “Uh - is it true you fucked a giant wolf?”

Smooth. Real smooth. 

“Where did you hear this?” He asked, slightly more amused than he had previously been. His lips formed upwards into a subtle smirk, slightly confirming your question which once again, you didn’t really want an answer to. 

“Never mind, uh, I actually have something serious I want to ask you,” you brushed past your initial awkward question, trying to set the tone that you were going to ask the questions around here and not the other way around. 

He raised his hand as if to say ‘go ahead,’ leading you to proceed with your so-called interrogation.

“What’s the interest in Earth?” You found yourself asking, out of both curiosity and in following with Fury’s plan. Loki leaned back against the glass, crossing his arms as he took in your question.

He seemed to ponder, “Have we not gone over the cockroach metaphor--”

“Yeah, yeah, we have,” you rolled your eyes, “but seriously, out of all the galaxies and planets that have life and resources, what is it with out little home that’s caught your specific attention?”

His face seemed to drop slightly as you said ‘your’ - almost as if referring to the attack as ‘his’ had somehow upset him. He looked down to the ground, uncrossing his arms before making eye contact once more.

“Earth has something - something very valuable, priceless, something we’ve been looking for.” 

If you didn’t know better, you’d think his tone was somewhat luring - as if he wanted you to ask for more information, but at the same time, wanted you to stay away from the details. It didn’t really make senseYou scanned him with your eyes once more. His body was slouched, showing vulnerability. If anything, this was way too easy. He had to be playing you somehow.

“What have we got that you want? Obama? Maybe some chicken wings?” 

Loki scoffed, “No, you dim-wit. Something much more valuable than some Earthling. Or  cheap food. Besides, your puny human brain wouldn’t be able to comprehend the power that I could find here.”

You made a mental note to bring that exact quote up to Fury later - the tone of Loki’s voice led you to believe there was subtext or some sort of hidden meaning that you couldn’t quite put your finger on. 

“And what is this ‘power’ you speak of? Spill the tea, Loki,” you responded, leaning forward in your chair to listen better. Sure, you could hear just fine from the previous position you were in, but your subconscious says otherwise.

“As if I’d tell you,” he rolled his eyes once more, “I know Fury’s sent you here just to get information from me, but it won’t work that easy, I know they’re all listening in.” A smirk made its way onto his lips as he caught onto your act.

You knew Loki would catch on to what you were doing eventually - I mean, you were here to get information, and that was obvious, but a part of you felt as if you had already failed your little quest and it hadn’t even been ten minutes. But honestly, what else was he supposed to think with you coming in here and asking questions? You were here to get information.

Struggling to find your next words, you started laughing. Loki raised an eyebrow in confusion, looking around to check if there was some sort of joke he hadn’t seen.

“Ha, you think that’s why I’m here? To just wait around and work with what you’ve got at your pace?” you toned down the laughter slightly, regaining your breath, “Please, we wouldn’t go through that much trouble, we just want you dead. Or gone. Fury’s already planned the ten thousand ways he could behead you. No, no, we’re not that desperate, nor are you that important. I’m here because once I get framed with murder for ripping you apart, I’ll be able to justify it.”

Loki’s smirk dropped, the amusement disappearing from his eyes, “What did you just say to me?”

Chuckling once more, you raised an eyebrow at him, “What? Don’t like it when someone talks back to you, Mister Hot-Shot?” you leaned back in the chair, “Get used to it.”

Loki let out a sassed-filled sigh, dropping his shoulders as if he had been scolded, and started to mumble what sounded like, “No, it was just unnecessary.”

Now it was your turn to scoff as Loki took offence, looking like a small child who had been denied cookies before dinner. Your amusement spiked at his behaviour, his avoidance of eye contact being the cherry on top. 

“You’re such a child,” you remarked, the unmissable pout disappearing from his lips, his eyes snapped back up to you as he stood up to defend himself.

“A child? Please, I’m over a thousand years old, have experienced wars, loss, have wrecked havoc - I have seen things your eyes can’t even begin to comprehend, and I am a God,” he was now right in front of you, of course separated by glass, but intimidating nonetheless, “Do not refer to me as a child--”

“You don’t have to be so touchy,” you smirked, standing up as well, “Sit down.”

Not used to taking commands, Loki blinked multiple times as he registered your words, practically discarding everything he just said about himself. Silently, he sat back down, leaving you to mentally swim around in victory.

“Now, here’s what’s going to happen, Loki,” you placed your hands behind your back (you felt like Fury) as you started to walk around the circular cell, Loki’s eyes glued to you, “You are going to tell me what’s going on. I don’t care how much you think your honour and God-liness is going to prevent that - I will eventually get the answers I’m looking for. Now, you can either cooperate and get yourself sent safely back to Asgard - or we can do this the hard way - and believe me, with a team of enhanced superheroes who have a lot of fucking built-up anger and long-lasting unresolved issues, I can’t see that as being fun for you. Unless, of course, you’ve got some sort of dark sadistic torture kink, that is.”

You had made your way around the whole cell by now and were standing by the door, Loki’s eyes still stuck on you like flex tape, his mouth slightly open. To say you were basking like a champion would be an understatement. You felt over the fucking moon right now, having left the God of Mischief speechless on your first day of your mission. His lips formed into a smirk once he caught up to what you had said. 

A small smirk formed on your lips too as you turned away, “Anyways, I need to go eat, my stomach’s been gurgling for a while now, so whenever I return, you can feel free to give me what I’m looking for. Have a lovely evening, Loki.”

You swayed in pride as you walked out of the room, Loki not uttering another word as you disappeared from his sight. Part of you felt as if you could have stuck around a little more to apply a bit more pressure, but at the same time, you didn’t want him thinking you were giving him all of your attention. He’d probably love that too much. 

Making your way back into the main control room, you noticed Tony, Steve, and Thor huddled around the table, probably having watched your encounter with the dark-haired man. Fury stood not far away, hands clasped behind his back, his eye on you as you entered the room.

“How’d I do on my first day, boss?” You asked, a small smile playing at your lips. Fury sighed, looking over to Tony who had now stood up.

“Well, you were only in there for twenty minutes, so it was short--” Fury began speaking until he was cut off by Tony’s obnoxiously loud voice.

“I didn’t realize how much of a badass you were, lil sis,” he wrapped an arm around your shoulder, leaning in to say the last part to you instead of yelling it to the whole room, “You make me proud.”

You chuckled, leaning in to his touch, “Gee, thanks big brother.”

“As I was saying,” Fury regained your attention, “It was short, but effective. You’ve left him thinking.”

Fury pointed to the screen which displayed the room you were just in. Loki was sitting in the same position, his eyes still glued to the door that you walked out of not five minutes ago, that damed smirk still on his lips.

“What can I say? I have that effect on men,” you smirked, a strange wave of confidence coming over you from who knows where. Fury groaned slightly, ignoring your comment. Tony played the exact same reaction.

“You’ve messed with his mind, that’s a good first step. But, you’re going to have to be more logical than emotional from now on. You got this.”

You grinned, patting Fury on the shoulder as you made your way to the small array of snacks on the table. You couldn’t lie, a part of you was left thinking about Loki too. You didn’t really like it, but at the same time, it helped you process what had just happened. You remembered the mental note you had made to yourself while talking to Loki, but figured you’d bring it up once your stomach got food. Fury’s ears were probably dealing with a lot right now since Maria just dragged him away, blabbing about some computer errors.

Thankfully, someone had brought out some food (finally) and you were grabbing just about everything you could - salad, crackers, cheese, whatever was in front of you. If this was what being aboard the helicarrier brought you, maybe you could live with it. 

For now, you continued to think about what you were going to go over with Loki tomorrow, and hoping that things would work out much better now that you stood your ground. 

You were proud of yourself too, in all honesty. Loki’s shock to your statement might have just been some sort of game, but at the same time, you had the guts to say it. That’s what mattered, and that’s what was important. 

Fury’s words echoed into your head as Tony started a conversation with Thor about how hotdogs weren’t sandwiches. 

You got this.

Damn right, you did.

Taglist 

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@appleappleton @what-a-fantasy @the-girl-of-many-fandoms1414 @brighteyedmichelle @leasly @cassiopeia-barrow @jay-the-mothafuckin-gay @themusingsofmany @bambamwolf87 @thefandomzoneisdangerous @cyberskeletonhandsbat @ultracarpediemfan @vgirl-10123 @bangvateez @leximills666​ @littleredstarfish​ @blue-spider-official​ @what-a-fantasy​ @hello-lemons​ @yandereforyou​ @hippityhopitygetoffmyproperty​ @godhateskyleigh​

[emospritelet]

Communion - chapter 3/4

[Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3] [Part 4 Ch 1] [Part 4 Ch 2]  [AO3]

81: “Come sit by the fire”

x

Belle was disoriented when she woke, the bed at the inn harder than she was used to and the grey light of dawn coming from the wrong place. It took several minutes before she realised it was Christmas Day, and she ran her hands over her face with a yawn. Going to the window, she could see that fresh snow had fallen in the night, a smooth layer of pristine white over what had already lain on the ground, and she shivered a little. The sky was clear, the sun just starting to rise, and it looked as though the day would be fine, if cold. Perfect for going to see the father of her child to discuss what they were going to do to plan for its arrival. Which according to him included lessons in Latin and the identification of poisonous fungi.

She had slept poorly, mind working through what Gold had said to her about who and what he was, and what their child would be. Shock. It must have been shock at the news. There was no other explanation she could think of for what he had said, other than him deliberately making fun of her, and she hadn’t thought he was that sort of man. Hopefully a night to digest her news would have made him more inclined to have a serious discussion about the future.

Taking a shower made her feel better, and she dressed in a warm woollen dress and thick tights above heavy boots, brushing out clean, shining hair. She was too nervous to feel hungry, but she was aware that the baby wanted food, even if she didn’t, so she ate some toast and butter and drank three cups of tea. The diner was quiet, the only other occupant a stocky man with a bristling beard. He was ploughing his way through a plate of eggs and bacon, a cup of coffee steaming by his side, and had the heavy eyes and surly expression of the hungover. Belle elected not to disturb him.

When she stepped out of the diner, the air was cold enough to make her catch her breath, and she shivered, pushing her chin down into her scarf as she walked. She was surprised to find Gold’s shop locked and silent, and after peering through the windows with no sign of him, chewed her lip in frustration. He had said he would be doing inventory, but perhaps his late start was a nod to the holiday. Or perhaps he was at home, wherever that was, quietly panicking over becoming a parent.

It was too cold to stand around and wait, so she decided to explore the town a little before trying the shop again, and set off at a brisk walk. The street of shops gave way to tree-lined avenues, and a pleasant, snow-covered park. A church poked its steeple out of the trees, a rough stone wall surrounding a cemetery. Belle could see a pretty old building beyond, which she expected was the home of the priest. She pushed her hands deep into the pockets of her coat and walked on.

“Lacey! Lacey!”

Belle glanced around at the sound of running feet, and yelped as a man skidded towards her on the icy sidewalk, tripping and almost falling into her. They grasped at one another to keep their balance, and she found herself looking into an earnest pair of brown eyes in a thin face, brown hair flopping over a forehead creased by lines of worry. The man who had collided with her was dressed all in black, except for a priest’s white collar, and was smiling at her.

“Lacey,” he said breathlessly. “I thought it was you.”

His accent was very Scottish, even more so than Gold’s, and there was an air of excitement about him, an energy that was almost infectious. He was beaming at her, and it made her want to smile back, even if he had mistaken her for someone else.

“Oh, I’m - I’m not Lacey,” she said, and his smile widened.

“You’re going by Belle again?” he asked. “No matter. Your choice, of course. I didn’t realise you were back in Storybrooke.”

“I…” She was about to say it was her first time, but he cut across her, excitement making his words bubble over.

“I just wanted you to know that ever since we met, my life has changed for the better in so many ways,” he said. “I stopped drinking! Just - just stopped, like it was nothing! I never thought I would do that: I was always too scared to try, but ever since - well, ever since—” He pulled a face, looking awkward “—ever since you, I haven’t touched a drop!”

“Er…” Belle was at a loss for words. “Uh - well done!”

“And it’s just made everything so much better,” he went on. “I was feeling so - so lost, like I told you, and it’s like you helped me find myself again!”

“That’s - that’s wonderful!” she said, feeling desperately awkward that he was pouring out his soul to the wrong woman. Perhaps she and this Lacey looked similar, and he had met the other woman while drunk. It would explain why he had them mixed up. Whoever Lacey was, she must have been a force for good, to help this priest find his way again.

“I have to go,” he said, glancing back at the church. “I have Mass at ten.”

“Oh, of course,” said Belle. “Don’t wait around in the cold on my account, Father.”

He grinned broadly, white teeth shining in the morning sun, breath steaming in the air.

“Thank you!” he said fervently. “I mean that, Lacey - uh, Belle - from the bottom of my heart. Thank you!”

He cupped her face with freezing hands and kissed her forehead. 

“Thank you,” he whispered, and then he was gone, hurrying up the street to the church.

Belle gazed after him, brow wrinkled in confusion. This is a very strange town.

She walked on, past the cemetery and towards the edge of town, where the trees grew thick, the bare trunks of birch and maple in amongst thick evergreens. In the distance, the sound of a car engine grew louder, an unpleasant, low roaring in the peaceful morning, and Belle glanced at the road ahead, eyes widening as an old black car she didn’t recognise came swerving into view. There was some sort of rock music blaring from it, which cut off abruptly as it squealed to a stop on the road just ahead of her.

Belle wasn’t sure who she had expected to step out of the car, but it certainly hadn’t been Roni and the blonde woman she had seen in the bar two nights previously. The blonde had a determined look on her face, and she fixed Belle with the light of fervour in her eyes. Roni’s expression, in contrast, was somewhat resigned and wary, and she kept glancing around nervously as she drew nearer.

“Belle,” said the blonde woman firmly. “I don’t believe Roni introduced us the other evening. My name is Emma.”

“Uh…” Belle glanced between the two of them. “Hi?”

Emma smiled warmly, reaching for her hand, and immediately let out a yelp as a spark of electricity snapped between them.

“What the heck!” she spluttered, shaking her fingers.

“Protection spell,” said Roni. “I thought as much. Don’t touch her again, you’ll only hurt yourself.”

“Huh?” said Belle, bewildered. “Protection what now?”

“Belle, please listen to me,” said Emma urgently. “After a great deal of persuasion—” She frowned at Roni. “I managed to find out what happened to you, and I want you to know we’re here to help.”

“Hey, leave me out of this,” said Roni hastily. “I agreed to give you a ride, that’s it.”

“What - what is it you think I need help with?” asked Belle, confused.

“The child you’re carrying,” said Emma. “You know it’s not human, right?”

“I - what?” Belle shook her head. 

“Oh, real subtle,” said Roni sarcastically, folding her arms. “You said you’d break it to her gently!”

“Do you have a better way to tell someone their child is a demon?”

“I don’t know, maybe at least sit her down and make her a chamomile tea first?”

“You think chamomile tea is gonna soften the blow?”

“No, I think a decent shot of whisky would, but you can’t exactly give it to a pregnant woman!”

Emma threw up her hands, clearly frustrated.

“Why did you even agree to come here with me?”

“Because you can’t damn well drive!” snapped Roni. “And you have no idea what subtlety is! Left to your own devices, you’d probably turn up at Gold’s house with a bunch of angels and try to fucking smite him!”

“I would not!” 

“I thought if I brought you here myself, maybe we could sneak in and sneak out without him finding out,” Roni went on. “You seem intent on making everything ten times harder!”

“Roni, you’re being no help whatsoever, do you know that?”

“May I remind you that coming here was your idea?” said Roni. “And that it’s me who’s trespassing in this town? I told you how our kind reacts to territorial incursions, right?”

“Yeah, but I figured you were over-reacting!”

“She wasn’t.”

Gold’s voice, flat and deadly calm, made them all jump, and Belle shook her head in disbelief. He had appeared out of nowhere, a faint mist swirling around his feet as he glared at the two women. There was a faint hint of sulphur in the air, and she could almost see his hackles rise as his eyes found Emma. They were dark with fury, boring into her as she faced him down.

“Get out of this town!” he hissed. “This is my domain, angel!”

“I don’t see your name on it, demon,” said Emma, raising her chin. “There’s a convent here. That gives me equal footing with you.”

Gold let out a hollow laugh, mouth twisting in a nasty smile.

“You think the righteous outnumber the rest of us, do you?” he said. “Please. I could tell you tales about that convent that would give you nightmares. At least I don’t pretend to be a force for good.”

“No, you just pretend to be human.”

“I’m more human than you, dear,” he said acidly. “I came into this world just as any human does. I enjoy the pleasures this world offers, just as any human does.”

“Oh, I just bet you do…” 

“But there again perhaps such things are beneath you, celestial being that you are,” he went on. “Probably survive on nauseating self-righteousness.”

“I’ll take self-righteousness over evil any day of the week,” she said witheringly, and Gold showed his teeth.

“As I thought,” he drawled. “Every bit as judgemental as all angels I’ve had the displeasure to meet.”

“You’re a demon, it’s my job to judge you!”

“Everybody stop talking!” shouted Belle.

There was a moment of silence. All three of them turned to face her, and the look of rage drained from Gold’s face, his expression turning soft and sad-eyed. She put her hands on her hips.

“What the hell is up with everyone?” she demanded. “Is this some elaborate joke I’m not in on? Why the hell are you all talking about angels and demons and good and evil and - and my baby not being human?”

“Belle.” Gold’s voice was gentle, and Emma gave him an odd, sideways look. “I’ve been trying to tell you that. I told you what I was.”

“Stop it!” she snapped. “It’s not funny! I’m - I’m pregnant, and - and it’s Christmas, and - and somehow you’re all making fun of me, and it’s mean!”

“We’re not!” protested Roni.

“I don’t understand what’s wrong with you people!” she went on. “Just - just stop being weird, all of you! Right now!”

Gold sighed, and exchanged a glance with Roni, who shrugged in a defeated manner.

“Show her,” she said, and he winced.

“She won’t like it.”

“You ashamed of what you are, or something?” said Emma dryly. “Because from where I’m standing that would seem like personal growth.”

“Oh, I moved past that a long time ago, angel,” he said, his tone very even. “I’m just very aware of human aesthetics, and I doubt Belle’s idea of the perfect human form includes me.”

“How do you know?” asked Roni. “She went to bed with you, didn’t she?”

“Yes, like this!” he snapped, waving a hand up and down himself.

“Like I said.” Emma curled her lip at him. “Ashamed.”

“Easy for you to pick up on, is it?” he said snidely. “Shame is your stock in trade, is it not?”

“Just as - as lust is yours!” she countered, and Gold grinned.

“Well, I know which I prefer.”

“Would you two stop sniping at each other?” snapped Roni. “Gold, don’t pretend you’re suddenly suffering a crisis of confidence. Maybe you’ve been in human form so long you’ve forgotten how pretty your other form is.”

“Oh, I’m sure that humans are known for their love of wings and tails on romantic partners,” he said sarcastically. “You know as well as I that no one but our own kind finds that attractive.”

“I wouldn’t say that,” muttered Emma, and Roni gave her a sharp look before turning her attention back to Gold.

“I told you from the first that you’re underestimating her,” she said. “Belle is - unique. You saw that about her, right?”

Gold smiled slightly.

“True.” 

“Stop talking about me as though I’m not here!” said Belle petulantly. “And - and stop talking nonsense! Are you all drunk?”

“Dammit, Gold, just show her, would you?” snapped Roni.

“Show me what?”

Belle felt like stamping her foot, her heart thumping with a mix of anger and frustration, and Gold let out a sigh, turning on his toes to face her.

“Belle,” he said gently. “I have to show you something.”

“Yeah, so I hear!” she snapped. “What the hell is it?”

Emma snorted, and Roni gave her a flat look. Gold sighed heavily.

“Don’t be afraid, alright?” he added.

Belle folded her arms.

“I’m not afraid,” she said evenly. “I’m annoyed. Whatever it is you have to show me, bloody well get on with it.”

Gold muttered under his breath, then shrugged out of his suit jacket, tossing it to Roni, who caught it and narrowed her eyes as he went to work on his tie.

“Seriously?” she said. “You’re getting naked in the freezing cold? I really doubt that’s gonna add to the impressiveness of your physique.”

“This is an expensive suit,” he said in an aggrieved tone.

“So just poof it off.”

Gold’s hands stilled.

“Oh,” he said, and glanced over his shoulder at Emma. “Best avert your eyes, angel. I’d hate to tempt you.”

Emma made a gesture that was far from angelic, and folded her arms.

“Just wanting to point out that I’ve already seen you naked,” said Belle dryly. 

“You have,” he said, lifting a hand and spreading his fingers. “But not like this.”

“Like what?”

Gold swept a hand down the front of his torso, and a cloud of red smoke enveloped him, making Belle jump in surprise. Her heart was pounding, her breath coming hard in her chest, and she watched the smoke thin and drift apart, wisps clearing to reveal what was unmistakably Gold, and yet not. His skin was covered from head to foot in tiny golden scales, his fingernails black, his eyes gleaming gold, reptilian and ancient. Two large, bat-like wings unfurled behind him, stretching outwards as though stiff from lack of use, and a long, tapered tail lashed the air. Belle stumbled back, eyes wide with shock, and her arms flailed as she lost her balance and toppled backwards into the snow.

“Belle!”

Immediately he was by her side, cradling her in his arms.

“Are you hurt?” he asked anxiously.

He was himself again, once more immaculate in his suit and tie, his skin as soft and pink and human as it had ever been. Belle struggled in his grip, and he released her, squatting on his heels as she pushed to her feet and backed away from him, her breath coming in rapid, frightened pants. Her heart was thumping painfully, pulse throbbing in her ears and behind her eyes, and her outstretched finger wavered as she pointed at him.

“You,” she said haltingly. “You - you…”

“Yes,” he said quietly.

She shook her head.

“No,” she said. “No. No no no.”

“Yes.”

His voice was a whisper, a breath in the air, and she went on shaking her head, as though that would somehow dispel the strange dream she appeared to have wandered into. Gold rose to his feet slowly, as though swift movements would scare her, and extended a hand to take hers. Belle pulled away abruptly, almost jumping out of reach.

“I can’t,” she said. “I - I can’t…”

She turned on her heel, walking blindly back towards the town, her mind a maelstrom.

“Belle, wait!”

She held up a hand, fingers splayed, a blocking motion shutting them all out.

Gold watched her go, feeling strangely powerless, and Roni inched closer, until she was standing by his side.

“That went well,” she observed, and he shot her a sideways look.

“Are you still here?”

“Looks like it.”

He waited for her to say something, but she simply stood there in silence. It was almost as though she pitied him. Or at least that she could empathise. He glanced over his shoulder at where the angel was looking down her nose at him, and turned his back one more.

“What are you doing hanging out with a bloody angel, anyway?” he demanded.

“Oh, like you cornered the market in cross-species relationships, or something?”

“Yes, but an angel?”

Roni shrugged.

“Not that it’s any of your business, but we happen to share a number of common interests.” She glanced around. “Look, Emma’s probably not gonna leave town until we’re sure Belle’s okay. Is that going to be a problem?”

Gold turned slowly, swivelling on the toes of his shoes. The angel - Emma - raised her chin defiantly, blonde hair gleaming in the winter sun, and he sighed, shoulders slumping. I don’t have the energy for this.

“Just stay out of my way,” he said wearily, and disappeared in a plume of red smoke, leaving behind the faint smell of sulphur.

x

He had intended to spend the day in his shop, but instead he went home to pour himself a glass of brandy and brood. Belle was still in town, he knew that much. He would feel it if she left.

Thinking about it logically, he wasn’t sure what he had expected, but Roni was right: he had seen something different in Belle. He was the first to admit that picking up on human jokes was something he had never been very good at, but his conversation with her in the bar had felt genuine. After all, he had heard countless tales of humans who enjoyed the thrill of bedding a demon, who would willingly let one into their dreams, and later into their beds. He had met many of them himself, over the years. None of them wanted to see the demon’s true form, of course, but they still got off on the danger. He hadn’t thought Belle one of those shallow creatures, but he hadn’t realised that she had thought him fully human either. 

There was something about her, he reflected, something that went far beyond her beauty and intelligence, and her kind heart. Something that held his interest far more than any other human he had met. She was different. Even if she didn’t fully realise it yet. Most humans could sense the darkness in him, and avoided him, even if they didn’t understand why. But Belle had sought him out. Belle had wanted him. Perhaps he simply needed to give it some time. Perhaps she would return.

x

Dusk had fallen when the knock came. 

He glanced up, brandy glass hanging from his fingers, his body grown stiff from the length of time he had been sitting in his chair. The knock came again, and a spark of something like hope took life in him. It wasn’t Roni, and it wasn’t the angel either, he could sense that much. Hopefully they would stay out of his way for the duration of their visit; he really wasn’t in the mood for a showdown. Which left only one possible visitor.

He pulsed out of his chair, rolling his shoulders as he walked to the hallway. The third knock was rapid and insistent, and he quickened his pace a little as he reached the door. 

It had been snowing again, and Belle was covered in a light dusting of flakes, her cheeks pink with the cold. She was bouncing on her toes, looking nervous, but she fell back on her heels as he appeared, her expression shifting between caution and relief.

“Hey,” she said, and he smiled faintly.

“Hey,” he said. “You must be freezing.”

“Yeah.” She sniffed. “I - uh - went for a long walk.”

“And you found your way here?” he said. Belle wrinkled her nose.

“Everyone in town seems to know where you live,” she said. “But they were pretty reluctant to give me the address. Kept telling me to stay away, like I’d suffer some terrible fate.”

“That sounds about right,” he said wearily, and she shrugged.

“Yeah, well, no one decides my fate but me,” she said. “Can I come in?”

Gold smiled, and stepped back, holding open the door.

“Of course,” he said. “Come sit by the fire.”

[what-you-dont-surrender]

Killing Eve 2x07 Analysis

At V’s: Reflections reflections…with a camera pan to V and Eve that has to turn away from the sight. She’s almost there, but not quite.

“Do you want to talk about it? You’ll feel better if you do.” This is coming from the woman who’s heard people beg for mercy, who’s heard people tell her they have kids who depend on them, who never ever cares. Yet this time she wants to listen, she’ll encourage someone to speak, so long as that person is Eve. Sympathy, which in V’s case could be a progression to empathy, seeing as she already feels a connection with Eve strong enough to use the term “us”. For once, Villanelle doesn’t care about whether or not this is a fun activity, whether or not she’ll be bored listening to Eve, what she cares about is Eve being “ok”.

“Two AA meetings and suddenly you’re the expert on honesty?” “Yeah”

Thing is, she just might be. Let’s not forget that V is exceptionally intelligent, shall we? She may not understand the concept of honesty (which she’s self-aware about) but what she does understand now is that it is important to Eve. She’s so well-versed with honesty now, in fact, that she knows enough to be able to say the following lines: (“Do you mean it?”) “I don’t know” (“You don’t know if you’re telling the truth or not?”) “Not really.”

Add to this her facial expression:

Our murder baby is trying so hard to reach within herself to know because she knows that, to Eve, honesty is important. She’s learning the weight of her words, she’s learning that even if she doesn’t understand honesty, she needs to try to be as sure of what she says to Eve as she can be. There is even a mild sense of insecurity, perhaps? A worry that this is something that will turn Eve away from her? But by god, she will admit that she can’t tell the truth apart because it’s the least she can do. The next part, I’ve already written about so I won’t delve into so much, feel free to read it here.

What I do want to add is how utterly sure V is of her next sentence: (“You don’t feel anything?”) “I feel things when I’m with you.”

The smallest pause…

Absolute certainty…

Vulnerability, if she had a face.

That small pause in the first image, it was so brief, to be honest I don’t think V was thinking. I think she was feeling. She understood why that question mattered, she understood why Eve had to ask. She understood its implications, the way their dynamic hung in the balance by the answer to that question alone. But the second image, she doesn’t have to even think because she knows. Because there is a boy in a grave who knew that to Villanelle “Eve” was synonymous with the word “love”, because her first clean kill was titled “love in an elevator”, because the dance floor in an underground club knows, because the bathroom stall in which she almost choked a girl to death knows, because her hotel bed, her hotel bathroom, that damn mirror – all of Amsterdam knows. She doesn’t have to think twice before telling Eve: she feels things when she’s with her. And on that third image, that stare, that certainty. V is no expert at being vulnerable, but she will she try, if only with Eve, to make sure she gets just how honest and true she is being here. Honestly, I think watching a 3 second clip of this moment makes it more clear than still images but it’s the best I could do.

And then my favorite line: “I’m not with them when I’m with them.” I talk a bit about that on the link above as well. 

Restaurant scene:

“It’s the best thing on the menu,” homeboy Aaron is obsessed with the concepts of best, perfect, exact, etc. And honestly he’d be worthy of a diagnosis if I was more interested in him as a character beyond his interactions/comparisons with V.  For now lets just say he’s somewhat of a “social voyourist” per se; he likes to watch, to live vicariously through others, it’s so much safer. I love the way this interaction initiates because

Otherworldly pasta!

So much so, Sigh by Unloved starts playing in the background. This song, by the way, played during the Niko and Eve scene from 206. It implies arousal and carnal desire, lust, if you will. But this time it’s not V who’s aroused, it’s

homeboy Aaron

Also, notice how the moment this scene is initiated we get close ups; this implication of intimacy, along with Sigh playing in the background, but felt by Aaron instead of V. (thank the gods)

And then it begins to switch back and forth from them to

My sexual senses are tingling, must call my gf - I mean V. Sigh continues to play through this constant scenery switches, by the way.

We then get the wide pan as V and Aaron begin to talk about Amber, only for the camera to slowly begin zooming in as we get:

“I like buying things” “Go on,” “I like owning them…I like looking at them” “You’re a collector then?” “I guess so” “Of what?” “All kinds of things, things that make me feel something.”

One of the goals this episode set out to achieve was to create a parallel between Aaron and V, to show just how similar they can be. They are not reflections however, as we will see later on in the episode.

And here V reaches an understanding, she knows exactly what it is he wants. Whereas at first she had assumed he wanted to sleep with her, she now sees he just wants to observe, it is the only thing he craves.

“Lets go out and see something, that’s something we can do.”

And so, V begins to perform.

At V’s apartment:

“Cancel what I’ve been through and now I’m changing my world and now I’m changing my world…”

The song continues to play as V listens to Eve’s voicemails, smiling like the smitten dork that she is. And this is telling because V really is changing her world. She’s feeling for the first time, she is exhibiting behaviors she never has before, she feels compelled to do things for someone else, she is learning to control her impulses, she is trying to understand the concept of honesty…she is somewhere much different than where she was back in that opening scene, mimicking behavior before dropping ice cream on a little girl after having murdered an old man in Vienna without knowing why she was getting paid to do so.

And then:

Worried I’ve been murdered? Me? World’s deadliest assassin?

Yeah, really, worried, murdered, all of it. I see people saying this was funny cause, come on, Eve’s just being awkward. But no. I think this is very honest of Eve, she really does worry about V, we see this when she talks to Martin too. She might’ve gone along and spoken to Martin about herself, but she means it when she says she worries about V and her well-being. And this must be strange for both of them, I mean look at V’s face. No one’s worried for her before, hell, they pay her to put herself in these situations in the first place. She’s a weapon, its what she does. But here is Eve calling her 9 times, leaving 3 voice mails, sounding anxious and then forcefully collected, wondering if V is okay. Just wanting to hear her voice and be sure she’s safe. And though new and strange, well:

It’s also nice.

At Carolyn’s:

“You weren’t listening?” “Not this time, no.” And she says this with a straight back, head held high; someone’s proud.

“What’s her state of mind? “She is excited”

Konstantin cutting Eve off here, I’m sure Eve wouldn’t have said that to Carolyn if she had had the chance to answer, which he probably knew. “Have you been razzing her up, Eve?” “Razzing?” “I’m counting on you to keep her calm.” Interesting choice of word here, indeed. Have you been teasing her Eve? Teasing? Carolyn didn’t even have to think, it was her go to word here. And Eve is confused.

“Villanelle? Sit still?” “She will, she just needs to think that she’s in charge” I mean, yes, which is something Konstantin hasn’t quite figured out how to manage in his years with her, but also, no. Did ya catch him looking at Eve when she says this? This would work if Eve wasn’t actually falling for our dear V, so while she’s right in theory she’s wrong in practice. V is a master manipulator, I don’t think she’s quite gotten that yet.

Its interesting to me how Eve is okay with the concept of a team up until Konstantin say he can “supervise”. She’s more than okay leading a group, but having someone above her? Not interested. Honestly, this plays into her own psyche, as she believes herself to be more capable than others.

“Don’t forget what she did to Anna.”

You mean, nothing? V thought she loved Anna, and while her courting method sucked, she never actually hurt the woman. Sure, she isolated and pursued her, hoping her fixation would be reciprocated but she didn’t pose an actual threat to her even after she was rejected. But the thing is, Eve has shown to respond to V’s courting: she’s thrilled by V’s kills, she gets a high from the little messages V leaves her, she becomes aroused by the adrenaline she feels when V imposes herself on her. And Carolyn knows this: “Well, maybe you do need a bag man, take Hugo.”

Storage unit:

“You’re a hoarder” / “You’re a collector, then?”

Eve has a type, with one huge difference: V likes to look at them, Niko just likes to keep them. “I like owning them…I like looking at them.” Niko only owns; he only keeps Eve. Sure, he claims to love her, but only the parts of her he deems appropriate. He likes to keep her, but he’s not an active participant in her life, barely even for sex. He likes to go to Bingo night, come home, have Indian food, and read a book before falling asleep with the certainty that Eve will be there to do it all over again tomorrow. But V? She wants Eve in every aspect of her life: she wants to come up with intricate kills that Eve can admire, she wants to leave little hints only Eve can decipher, she wants to buy gifts in every country she visits and surprise Eve while she’s away, she wants to pick outfits only Eve is worthy enough to see her in, she wants to learn how to do things that are innately difficult for her because they matter to Eve. She wants to look at her, yes, and interact with her too, as we’ll see later on in the episode.

Boy, do I love cocky Villanelle. Asking for a thank you, bless, rub it in his face some more. And then her face when she says “Eve likes it, so…” As if “my baby likes it so of course I’m going to hold you at knife point and demand you tell me how to make it cause, trust me, I’ve tried and it’s just not worthy of Eve at all. Oh, Worcester sauce? Of course!” I mean it’s such an “duh of course, absolutely” moment. Eve likes it. That’s all the reason she needs to be doing this. Eve.

At Carolyn’s:

“Any escalation? Increased attention-seeking, recklessness?” A chuckle and a no for V and then “How about you?” Sadly, we’re interrupted by Kenny, but we know the answer. For one, the answer for both is a resounding yes. I mean, as they’re speaking V is in a storage unit interrogating Niko and Gemma about Shepherd’s Pie, for god’s sake. But also, that very morning Eve was sitting on V’s bed, leaning into her, dancing around words, trying to figure out if V also feels something for her before storming out after finding out she slept with 2 other women.

She mustn’t kill anyone but ya know, there goes Gemma lol

Back at the storage unit:

“Do you love Eve?” Cue the trembling voice, because this is the question that matters. I know some may wonder why Niko didn’t lie but let’s be honest, V would’ve known and that would’ve been worse.

“Of course I’m sure, she’s my wife.” I HAVE A PROBLEM WITH THIS SENTENCE. Niko knows V knows Eve’s his wife, she’s still asking him if he’s sure, this response only serves to establish his territory. Being married to someone isn’t a guarantor of love. V doesn’t care so much that Eve is married as much as them being in love. It’s also a lazy answer, why are you sure Niko? There’re so many aspects you can’t stand about Eve, why are you so sure you love her? Cause of a paper you signed years ago? Do better.

“But Eve would never forgive me if I hurt you, Niko.”

Ugh, that delivery! The tremble at the “me” the emphasis on that “you”. V knows that as long as Niko chose Eve there would be a possibility of them getting back together, she was so willing to let them both go if he only said he loved Gemma, because Eve wouldn’t be able to forgive him loving someone else. But as long as he still loves her, as long as he feels comfortable enough calling her his wife, well, V feels like her place in Eve’s life is a fragile one.

“But Eve would never forgive me…” What is V’s concept of herself? What makes up her image of “me”? A murderer, a liar, a deceiver, someone who doesn’t understand the concept of honesty, someone who sleeps with other people to redirect her desire for her, someone who’s been impossible to love as far as she knows, someone who can’t settle and build a home, someone damaged. Her concept of “self” (or ego in psychology) is as fragile as her voice here. Why would she forgive her? Of course she wouldn’t.

“…if I hurt you, Niko.” You, her husband, the person she’s spent most of her life with, build a home with, someone who understands the concept of honesty to the point of risking their life when threatened by one of the deadliest assassins in the world, someone who she comes back to even though he drives her crazy sometimes, someone who makes her feel empty yet she still willingly shares a bed with.

Why would she forgive me if I took her concept of safety away? She wouldn’t.

And this level of self-awareness? It’s outstanding. Villanelle has gone from the overt narcissistic psychopathic murderer with APD to someone who questions her worth. V is a narcissist through and through and yet – AND YET – has now reached the ability to question her self-worth and her past decision-making. Talk about a character arc, my god, this is monumental. She could have very well killed Niko here, considering he poses a possible threat to her courtship of Eve, but making the decision to kill Gemma instead shows her ability to understand that that is not how people work. When she did this with Anna she though that by removing Max she would have what she wants, but now she refuses to make that same mistake even though she’d love to kill Niko. For one, she manages to frame him, punish him for straying from Eve (which, how dare he), and shows growth. I mean yes, is this a tactic to get to Eve? Sure, it lets Niko know that as long as he chooses Eve he will have to deal with V because she isn’t planning on going anywhere. But also, it shows how much she cares about Eve to place Eve’s feelings before her own urges. It is, perhaps, one of her biggest gestures of love so far.

At V’s:

“Maybe we’re soulmates.” Okay, so I’m not interested in V’s little joke as much as her ability to use the concept adequately. The woman who’s struggling with the concept of honesty is able to understand and apply the concept of soulmates. This caught my attention because if she can understand what the implications of that word are and if she can apply it for comedic value, then she can do this in the privacy of her own heart and mind as well. So then, does she think Eve is her soulmate? She’s already used the term “us” with Eve before, is this also something she’s considered? Does she really consider Aaron her soulmate or is this really just a joke?

The little eye-roll when asked if she’s planning something, her smile at the concept of being alone with Eve, giddy like a schoolgirl. I think this concept of soulmates might be more real to V than we’re being shown just yet.

Martin’s:

“He could kill the shit out of me” Eve, you truly identify the best with those who aren’t psychologically stable, huh?

“Aren’t they already [out of hand], putting a psychopath, possibly two, in a high-risk situation, and just…hoping for the best?” This is LITERALLY a summary of Killing Eve, folks. That’s it, that’s the show, we can all go home.

“I want her to be safe.” “Sounds like she can take care of herself” “No, she can’t”

Eve is doing two things here: 1. Speaking of herself through V, which Martin notices, and we’ll go into in a sec 2. Being honest.

We’ll see more of this throughout the episode, Eve goes through great lengths to make sure she’s sure V will not be harmed. She really does want V to be ok and the only safety she can provide is physical safety. She has yet to figure out V’s emotions, which she only just learned this morning exist, so what she can do to care for V is to make sure she’s safe. Eve worries for one of the world’s deadliest assassins, how endearing.

Now, Martin dismisses this second point mostly because he’s ignorant to what we’re privy to as the audience, and he also ignores her dismissal at being here for a “work thing” and that’s when we get:

“How much of the day do you pend thinking about her? “Most of it” “Are you two in a relationship?” “Define relationship.” “Are you having sex?” “No” The mistake Eve and some of us as viewers might make here is assume that “are you having sex?” is a question used to clarify Eve’s “define relationship” when it isn’t, it’s its own question. If Martin is as good as we’re led to believe he will notice how telling it is that Eve’s answer to “are you two in a relationship?” is “define relationship.” If the dynamic Eve and V have now is so complex and intertwined that the boundaries that define what a relationship is have been blurred then it’s safe to say that yes, they are in fact in one. Whatever the terms of it might be have yet to be established but a mental health professional must recognize that once these concepts require situational specification then we’re in trouble. Martin uses Eve’s request for clarification as a way to find out how intimate and safe they feel with one another at this time, because having sex would require them both to finally let their guards down with each other completely.

However, this may also give Eve the false idea that as long as they don’t have sex she hasn’t fully surrendered herself to her attraction to V. To Eve, as long as she can say she hasn’t slept with her, then no one can say she’s in too deep, as long as she doesn’t sleep with her she can keep crossing every line there is. And that’s simply not true, of course. Villanelle knows this though, she knows that sex is something Eve will not simply allow nonchalantly, she knows it’s not something she can charm her way into. She can’t just flirt with Eve, arouse her, and lead her to her bed, because Eve doesn’t work like that. Eve needs to bring down her walls on her own, on her own terms, at her own time. So yeah, V is definitely playing her cards in just the right way to get closer to Eve, but ultimately Eve will be the one who has to cross that threshold. @lesbianmoonlobster and I have previously spoken about my theory of The Threshold, for lack of a better term. I’ve mentioned to them how, if PWB was still writing, I’d be skeptical of Eve’s capacity to kill someone until next season, but now with Emerald, it has become clear that we’re driving at a faster speed, turning this into a possibility. At the very least, I do believe that Eve will reach a threshold this season and that, regardless of what form it takes, it will cause Eve’s grey morality to get a shade or two darker. My point is here, that V is playing her role in slowly coaxing Eve into her bed. “How are things at home?” “My husband left me.” “Are you behaving differently, doing things you normally wouldn’t?” “Yes” A vocal tremble on that “yes” “Do you feel unsafe?” “Yeah” A whispered response. “How else do you feel right now?” “I feel…wide awake.” Cue teary eyes.

The way I observe this part? “behaving differently” = subway man, using Niko, etc “unsafe” = herself “wide awake” = a realization A lot of people have mentioned how “bitchy” or cold Eve has been acting with V despite V’s attempts at casual get-to-knows (for lack of a better term) but part of this, I’m sure, has to do with Eve realizing that yeah, she’s very much like V. She’s scared of herself, of the things that she does, of how much she enjoys them and how much more she wants to do. But boy, does she feel revitalized – does she feel more herself.

“I recommended that you be taken off this operation, I said you were too involved and too compromised, but my recommendation was ignored.”

Eve’s eyes search, her tears begin to gather, she ponders.

“I’m telling you for your own safety.”

She looks up, she leaves.

This part, to me, is her moment of confirmation. Hearing Martin reveal what he had observed in their previous meeting, a professional, and expert, affirming that yes, you’re at risk of plunging into the very thing you’re dreading, only serves to confirm Eve of her realization. Perhaps even encourages her to continue on that path.

At the restaurant:

Number of things going on here but one I’m leaving alone ‘til its culmination point later in the episode. For one: here’s Eve trying to keep V safe again, risking being seen and blowing their operation because the only way she can protect V is by making sure she’s listening in so, all be damned, she’s gonna get her a back-up mic if it’s the last thing she does.

Little bit of light teasing from Hugo before this but it does tie in nicely with the way V caresses Eve’s hand as she takes the bread:

Because V knows what this looks like, Aaron buying her things, taking her to Rome, dinner at an expensive restaurant. All things V could want without the need to kill anyone. All reasons she could be charmed by Aaron, so yeah, she’s going to reassure Eve. Also, such a cute little way of saying “the creation of Eve” considering V has been the catalyst, or god in this sense, which has spurred Eve’s change. Except their hands are touching, unlike in the painting, implying they’re equals, Eve becoming in V’s likeness.

Cut to Eve’s hotel room:

“She’s having a great time.” Someone’s jealous. Someone’s doubtful. Despite V’s reassurance, the possibility of V finding someone else who watches her (“do you like to watch her or do you like being watch?”) scares Eve.

“I knew she wouldn’t let me down.” Oh boy, Eve. Development of trust, that’s a biggie (understatement of the year, worthy of a complete essay). Eve believes in V, she trusts her, she counts on her. The woman she professed she’d find what she loves and destroy it, the woman she stabbed, all of a sudden is worthy of her trust.

Also, V choosing One Way or Another? Subtle V, real subtle.

With Aaron:

“You’ll be bored stiff” “I’ll be fine” “You’ll be bored” “Ok, I’ll be bored” “Good”

Remember how I said Aaron would be worthy of a diagnosis if I cared enough about his character beyond his relation to V? We’ve reached that point. The beautiful thing that the show has been trying to do this entire episode is reaching it’s culmination point.

Aaron doesn’t only function as a parallel but also helps create a spectrum for the viewers. It is no longer just grey morality, it’s no longer just a psychopath, a dysfunctional MI6 agent with failed marriages, and a possible sociopath. Now it’s a spectrum because now we have that absolute black, or, as Aaron describes later, that “void”. Now we can line them all up.

Does that stare look familiar?

The very thing Aaron wants to see in V is what she once was, what he is: devoid of expression, devoid of her ability to interact with others in the manner she has now achieved.

“They’re both cold-blooded psychopaths…” “She’s just doing her job”

Well Hugo is right about one thing, as far as we’re shown, and as far as the show wants us to believe, they are both candidates for an Antisocial Personality Disorder diagnosis, albeit they fall in different categories. And Eve, though she may be basing her answer on her feelings, is right about her observation. Ultimately, V and Aaron would not function well together as they both have different needs and different understandings of the world, which we’ll see later on.

Russian meeting:

“…all this information is yours.”

“Language is information and information is everything.”

Look at V’s smile, she likes the sound of having access to all of this. Can’t blame her, really, it’s what she’s been lead to believe ever since The Twelve broke her out of prison, it’s the only way of life that’s really worked for her.

After:

I…love this scene.

“I told you you’d be bored”

Oh, but she wasn’t Aaron, she was thrilled.

What follows is, similarly to Eve, V’s own revelation.

“You’re the only person in the world I know nothing about. Nothing real. A void.” “That’s me” “I thought so, me too.”

But let’s look at V’s response:

She says it with so much certainty, the only thing she’s ever been really sure of. Everywhere she goes it’s all anyone perceives her as:

“You should never tell a psychopath they’re a psychopath, it upsets them.”

All she’s ever been told is how unstable, how cold, how different she is from everyone around her. So yeah, she sees herself as a void, we’ve established that V has gained a sense of self-awareness this season.

But Aaron is not privy to her development, he does not know that much of where V’s statement is coming from is no longer sound, and so he misidentifies himself with her.

And I say misidentifies because:

“Do you ever get lonely?” “Never” Because V does! V gets lonely, she gets bored, she craves attention and gratification. Loneliness, in particular, is something she mostly feels when away from the object of her fixation, now affection, such as Anna, Nadia, and now Eve. “You don’t want to…talk to them…touch them, sleep with them? “God, no.” “Do you?” “Yeah! I do, all the time.” She is so animated here, so surprised. Consciously or not, V seems to have formed this idea that she and Aaron were the same side of the same coin. “Soulmates” if you will. Cut of the same threat, both loving money, loving items, loving to watch. Both willing to discard people when they’re bored, both doing anything to pass the time, both valuing information, seeing those around them as less than. But here, this monumental difference. This desire to create connections and relationships with others, to not only watch but to engage in what we refer to as play in psychology. This is V’s revelation: they are not the same, she is capable of so much more than she’s allowed herself to believe.

Look at that smile!

What the show achieves here is the establishment of a spectrum for all of their characters. Something that shows who wish to portray psychopaths often do is create this robot-like person who is most often a sadist who lies and cheats and is the epitome of all things immoral and evil. Psychopathy is just a symptom of people who fall in cluster B personality disorders, often a mix of APD with a few others. Something I’ve mentioned before is how some psychologists have theorized that APD patients can actually feel emotions but often struggle with actively feeling them or identifying them because they feel them much more fleetingly or to a much lesser degree than most people. There is no exact depiction of a psychopath or APD patient because there is no one way in which this disorder presents itself, it is a spectrum. And here we see this established, we see Aaron as the one who can only function through I-it relationships, whereas for V there is an I-you, however mild and chaotic. And this revelation to her is a doorway; it opens up so many possibilities that she may now have the strength to aim for, particularly Eve because, all of a sudden, there is validity in her desire for their connection.

And who knows that now?

THAT scene:

It was sexy, I know. I won’t take the sexy away but I do want to point out a few things here:

1.       Eve making sure her girl – I mean V – is safe, again. She’s ready and willing to listen all night if she has to. Whether it’s because the last time she left her alone V slept with 2 chicks or because extreme-end-of-the-spectrum-psychopath Aaron is around, Eve is making absolutely certain she’s there should V need her.

2.       Remember that relationship/sex question from Martin? The way Eve deflected by asking him to define “relationship”? Remember how I said she might fool herself into thinking that as long as she doesn’t sleep with V they’re not together, she hasn’t gone too far? Eve is so close to crossing her own blurred line. V is more than aware of just how far she can push Eve, just how to inch her closer little by little over that line. Notice the progression here: Eve’s sexual drive revived with the arrival of V in her life, of course, but notice the way it has escalated over time. At first it was the excitement of her new job, the gifts V sent her, the thrill of danger, the flowers at her doorstep, Niko angered by V’s presence, and now V pleasuring herself. It began by situations, then items, then their dynamic, V’s show of affection, V vicariously through Niko, and now its her on own voice. She’s been easing her way into Eve’s bed, slowly fixing herself as the object of Eve’s desire. Eve has begun to embrace this longing; she did not put up a fight the moment she realized V was ready and willing to spend the night with her through Hugo’s body. Eve understood that she too has been with others without being with them. And does she care?

 Not one bit. Not as long as she gets to wake up hearing Villanelle’s voice, it seems.

Good for them.

[everyman0]

A PALE BLUE GHOST

over on the discord, i announced my decision to make another trip to the Edge to try my luck at finding any kind of clue that could help me make sense of it. patrick gave me a whole lot of lip about not using his fucking mirror and other bullshit, but ill save that for another post. this is a lot more fresh and painful for me.

going back outside was a mistake.

i journeyed the five hours it took to get to the impenetrable black wall of the Edge. my plan was to walk down its length, survey anything unusual, you know. obviously i wouldnt have been able to observe all of it in one day as ive mentioned the area it covers is rather large, but i felt some effort was better than none at all, and i wasnt exactly comfortable with the idea of spending the night this far away from the house. simple enough right? there was nothing out of place on the way out here, so i hardly expected what i saw just as i approached the wall. 

it was jeff. sort of.

when i first saw him, he appeared almost like a reflection of me in the blackness. as i stepped closer to the wall, so did he step forward as well - until eventually seeming to step out of the wall entirely. we stood face to face, a mere foot apart, and i noticed then that his entire being was tinted with a pale blue.

i was terrified. i wanted to run away, but i couldnt make myself do it. so i asked timidly, "what are you doing here?"

jeff seems to come alive then.

"what? you told me to grab some stuff for the video today."

fucking bastard. i was still scared, but somehow i just knew he was mocking me. i frown, reaffirming my stance. i had to ask myself if jeff would even do such a thing to me...and then i figured yeah, probably - ghost or not.

"dont you dare pull that bullshit on me," i said, "those days are long gone." and they were. 

jeff laughs. "don't you miss it? simpler times." he splays his hands out like an offering. "cant be all that bad to pretend, for a little while."

i squint my eyes at him - both of them. these days i dont bother wearing an eyepatch, since the point was for evans comfort to begin with. now it doesnt matter that i have a gaping fucking hole in my head for all to see.

i ball my fists at my sides. "i dont have time to pretend, and i dont have time for this conversation - so lets get to the point. why are you here?"

"to see my old friend again! and to tell you there's always more than meets the eye." jeff then taps a finger underneath his left eye, and a phantom pain throbs in my own empty socket. i try to ignore it. 

"yeah, no shit," i say, and cross my arms. i was losing my patience. "if you're just going to spout vague nonsense at me like every other motherfucker does on a constant basis, i'm sorry to say but i will have to pass. i have more important things to do."

"like stand in front of this wall and bitch? is that what you're doing here?" jeff grins, and tilts his head at me. i just scoff, and deciding i had enough, i begin trying to do what i came to the wall for in the first place and begin walking parallel to it. jeff follows after me.

"im only bitching because here you are to distract me," i say, side-eyeing him, "so if you don't mind, kindly fuck off."

"i do mind, actually. why do you even want to leave? its paradise in here. no need to eat or drink, perfect climate, no irritating neighbors or awkward staredowns at the grocery store- you'd love it!"

i stop in my tracks. i hate that the sound of his voice is enough to get me to actually consider his words. but i do, and then i say:

"you know, for a while there, i did enjoy it. to an extent, anyways. you can only enjoy so much when you are all too aware of every little fucking thing. and maybe i could have handled the ghost thing, right? like you said, no neighbors or weird interactions. but then i saw this wall, and now i feel like a trapped animal - and im not okay with that."

"so if you couldnt see the wall, it'd be fine?"

i shake my head, "i came out here the first time to see if i could leave, and i wouldve kept walking if there was nothing to stop me. maybe i would have returned, after a while, had i done so. maybe not." i shrug, somewhat frustrated at the thought. "a wall is a wall, whether i can see it or not. seeing isnt the problem, the existence of the thing is."

"well yeah, but you can't just leave." jeff says it like its obvious. in hindsight, maybe it was. i could already imagine a few reasons as to why, but i wanted to pry out what jeff seems to think the answer is.

so i ask, "and why is that?"

jeff answers: "because there's...people, out there? like, innocent fuckin people, dude." well duh.

i roll my eyes, "im aware. but what does that have to do with me, exactly? habit is already somewhere else doing god knows what."

jeff looks on blankly. "we don't need two of you out there."

ouch. and unfortunately, on some level i believe it to be true. and the implication that i would intentionally hurt or even kill anyone like habit would...im sadly all too aware of the likelihood, really. it doesnt hurt because i feel bad, it hurts because i dont. however, i wasnt about to let this guy know that.

i say, "it's not like id be very social anyways. at this point, i dont think i could even stomach it."

jeff takes on a darker sort of air about him. "evidently so, based on how you treated evan. do you have your head screwed on straight, dude? because like, holy shit was that hard to watch."

i tense up, and i can feel a spark of anger rising from within me. guess it didnt matter what i tried to hide, jeff knew what weak points to hit.

"i was just trying to protect him." 

"uh huh," he nods, "sorry vinny, but you're not the guardian in this one."

"clearly," i grumble, "but i was fucking trying, okay?" i was trying. jeff thought otherwise.

"yeah, trying to get everyone killed. thanks for that one, by the way. you've been self absorbed, irresponsible, reckless and horrible to everyone around you that isn't the entity playing games with our lives, and you can't keep pretending it's not true! do some soul searching. meditate. i don't care. but you're not leaving any time soon, so you'd better get used to it." jeff jabs me in the chest with a pointed finger.

it didnt take but a moment to process jeffs words, and ultimately, i agree with him. im a terrible fucking person. i just am. but i wasnt going to give jeff the satisfaction of me fessing up to it - because i felt like all of this was beginning to become unproductive bullshit and i wanted to do what i came all the way out here to do dammit.

i go to smack jeffs hand away from me, but i come to find that i simply pass through him like he was air. i felt the jab, though, even if superficially. this confirms my suspicion about the ghost thing, but jeff was different from the ghosts in the town; like being able to talk and acknowledge my existence.

i take a step back, "we'll see about that. who the fuck made this wall, hm? you of all things must know right? since you are apparently a plethora of knowledge of good and evil now. can you do that much for me jeff?"

jeff considers my words before he turns away from me to face the terrible wall, his hands on his hips, and his head craning back to presumably observe the wall's endless climb into the sky above.

"habit designed this gaudy architecture as part of his grand scheme. you probably could have figured that much, eh? but what you wouldnt know is that its been here since the very beginning, before you even arrived at the house." he looks back at me, "come on vin. you should know by now that habit is well prepared...even if this timeline is bonkers. you shouldnt need me to tell you that."

i grumble in annoyance, but consider his words carefully. sure, maybe i didnt need him to tell me habit was a suspect in all this, and maybe i could have figured that out just by doing what i had originally planned with scouting the perimeter of the wall. but...here jeff was, telling me things outright. it was a convenient time saver really, even if he was going about it in a bitchy way. i needed to take advantage of this.

"so, if habit made this cage to keep me in, why shouldnt i try to break out? why shouldnt i try to fight his subjugation?"

"one, because habit has eons of experience over you and you'll likely fuck something up really badly," jeff says, and turns towards me again. "two, you're part of this place now. removing you would shatter a really delicate balance. the house is a place of fluctuation, because there's not enough power to sustain herself. and you're radiating power, dude. would you really just abandon her like that, after all she's done to keep you safe and alive?"

ouch again...ugh. i dont usually feel guilty over a lot of things, but jeffs second point seemed to get to me.

i relent. i cower my head to stare at the ground. "i wouldnt have left her forever."

jeff gives me a disappointed sigh. "go back home, man. she's really worried about you."

i bite my lip and give the slightest of nods. i still want to do what i can to escape, and i hadnt forgotten about why i came to the wall in the first place...but jeff's words had me thinking about my desires for the house. in truth, the house and i have formed a strange sort of...i dunno, friendship? its the closest human word i can think for it. i would talk to her, she would listen. id even clean up her rooms, even though ive observed that she can do it by herself.

i think she may be the only thing in this world that can understand me now.

so i feel like in some weird way, the house cares about me. she has done quite a few favors for me, after all; favors that kept me safer. jeff was right again, and i couldnt shake the wrongness of abandoning the house enough to continue talking my way out of this bind.

it was time to go then. but first, i look back up at jeff.

"what about you?" i ask, my mood seriously taking a nose dive off a cliff. sad and desperate and pathetic and lonely. "you came all this way from wherever, however you did it, to tell me all this...are you going to leave me now too, just like evan?" fuck. "i wouldn't blame you if you did...but i have to admit, it was nice seeing you again."

and truthfully, it was - despite the treatment i received. its fine. i deserved it.

jeff leans in, and i can feel the pity in his eyes as he puts a hand on my shoulder.

"that choice isn't mine to make."

and then he shoves me away from the wall with a force that sends me tumbling across the ground a good few feet. i think it fucked up my shoulder. its fine. deserved that too.

and then i went home.

>>

[timegal25]

The Odd Side of Youtube

     YouTube, the popular video sharing website, has been around for over a decade. It’s had it’s over abundance of videos themed around Fortnite, “emotional apology videos” stuffed to the brim with ad revenue, a disturbingly high number of poorly animated nursery rhymes, and surprisingly graphic skits targeted at kids. But it’s also been an outlet for creative expression and connection for those outside the mainstream. For a socially awkward and isolated kid who found companionship in watching YouTube, fandom videos offered a sense of connection, belonging and reassurance that there were “odd people” out there who shared his interests and passions.

While the vast majority of people know about things like “Gangnam Style” and “Let’s Plays,” not as many can say they have extensive knowledge of the various niche fandom videos that make up a good portion of the website itself. These are the odd clips that either you only come across by looking up directly, or have randomly pop up in your recommended feed with no real reason as to why.  In my case, I remember a majority of these from watching them when I was younger, and then rediscovering them when looking deep into the site on late night nostalgia binges. It’s  a common hobby of mine, and it usually leads to me finding some of the strangest things as a result. Oddly, a great many of these strange finds just so happen to include Sonic the Hedgehog.

Let me preface this by saying what follows is in no way an attack on any of the creators of these videos, nor is it a call for others to go out and harass them. In fact, that’s part of the point. Many of the people who create some of the more odd or innovative content on YouTube are doing it as creative expression of who they are or what interests them. It’s a place to express a part of themselves, and it takes courage to do it. It’s easy for those who aren’t so brave to attack the creators.  I actually enjoy a lot of the content I’ll be referring to because the people behind it are genuine and clearly having a ton of fun making it. This is all done in good fun, and shows just how strange and odd fandom culture as a whole can be. And for some of these innovators who dared to put themselves out there, it paid off big time just by how fondly remembered they are by those who talk about them. Now that that’s out of the way, let’s begin.

Part One: Hedgehogs and Dragon Balls

To start things off, let’s look at a project that is fully animated. Before YouTube, there was the popular website Newgrounds, a place where you could watch videos, play games, and just mess around. This is where a lot of influential and important creators got their start by posting their little animations on the site. On August 14, 2006, user Chakra-X (real name Aaron Cowdery), posted the first part in a three-part movie called Sonic: Nazo Unleashed with part two coming a week later and part three following in 2007. All three parts were later uploaded all into one HD remaster under the title of Sonic: Nazo Unleashed DX on YouTube in 2014. The film follows Sonic and his friends as they take on the mysterious and powerful Nazo, an unused form of Sonic from a promotional video for the anime Sonic X.

Now what makes this special from say the dozens of Sonic themed fanfics that follow a somewhat similar premise? Chakra-X did something no one had dared to do before. The animation was very heavily inspired by the anime megahit Dragon Ball Z and its then airing sequel Dragon Ball GT . The sound effects used and the presentation of special moves were ripped right from the series and even parts from the climax are just ideas presented in the show such as two characters fusing to make one new powerful being. In 2006, it was unheard of to see Sonic characters perform such high speed anime action. What was even more notable is that it was created by one single guy on the internet.  The professionally produced Sonic X TV show that was airing at that time paled by comparison, even with a team of professional animators with high tech equipment.

In the decade since Nazo Unleashed originally came out, Chakra-X has been a part of various animated collabs and now works for Titmouse Inc , an animation company that has done work for companies like Warner Bros., Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, and even Disney. What was even more inspiring for me, Chakra-X is a young black man . This was the first I’d become aware of anyone who looked like me being a much sought after animator. It told me that I could be him, I could be in his position if I put in as much effort and love into a creative project. And with how amazing the upcoming sequel he’s working on looks, I feel that kind of hopeful inspiration even more.

The next piece I’m going to examine is another well known series in the Sonic fandom community that also is heavily influenced by Dragon Ball Z. While it is also animated and is full of high speed action packed fights, this one has its own amazing identity. The series I’m talking about is the always spectacular Super Mario Bros. Z by Mark Haynes, aka Alvin Earthworm, starting in 2006 and going until 2009. While this series was originally created on Newgrounds, it’s real exposure and popularity came from being uploaded to YouTube.

The series follows Mario, Sonic and friends as they go on an epic race against time to secure the powerful chaos emeralds from the clutches of the evil Mecha Sonic. Much like Nazo Unleashed, the influence of Dragon Ball Z series is anything but subtle, with the plot of “good guys need to find powerful objects before bad guys” being one of the key ways to describe Dragon Ball as a whole. One of the key things that makes this stand out on its own is the fact that this entire series is animated using sprites from the games. Just about every character that wasn’t made specifically for the series has their models taken right from their games. Mario and Luigi for example come from the Mario and Luigi role playing game (rpg) series on the Gameboy Advance (GBA), while the Sonic and Shadow sprites come from Sonic Battle also on the GBA. An extra step is taken by having the characters act like they do in their retrospective series. Mario and Luigi never actually use dialogue boxes in their games, with other characters still understanding them. The same is true here with the brothers’ words never actually being seen on screen. Going that extra step to emulate the games made the videos feel more authentic.

I was relatively young and new to the internet when Super Mario Brothers Z  (SMBZ) started popping up. I wasn’t fully aware of what sprite animations were, as they weren’t as easy to make or common back then as they are now, so I would see all the action and Sonic and Mario on screen together and I thought that it was an actual game. I wanted to play it so badly on my Gameboy Advance SP. On one trip to a Gamestop, my young self boldly walked up to the lady working the register and asked “Hey, do you have Super Mario Bros Z ?” She gave me this look that said either she knew exactly what I was talking about or didn’t have a single clue at all and just nicely said that they didn’t. I went on to repeat this at several more gaming stores before I realized that it wasn’t a real game, nor did it ever claim to be. It was then that I started looking for games I wanted myself because sometimes just saying a title out loud can make you look like the strangest person around.

What made the SMBZ series so attractive and so entirely different from anything found on YouTube at the time was the animated action. You might think  that since the series is using pre-made assets and models, that there must be some limitations on what can be done. However, with a bit of help from some custom new sprites as well as some fast editing and sound effects, things can get insane . Being able to translate the speed and intensity of a Dragon Ball Z fight is hard enough to copy with regular animation, yet Mark was able to do this with 2 dimensional sprites and flashing lights. And even that pales in comparison to the pure adrenaline of fights concerning the series main antagonist, Mecha-Sonic.

Originally starting off as a mostly side boss in Sonic and Knuckles , Mecha Sonic became a fan favorite thanks to this series. Like any good antagonist, he can easily prove himself as a threat to the heroes while also being able to take the hits himself. This comes across easily in the series most popular episode, Brawl on a Vanishing Island . This 30 minute episode has a variety of characters going up against each other, but the mood quickly turns the second Mecha Sonic arrives and absorbs the power of the Chaos Emeralds. What follows is an absolutely brutal beatdown of another team of antagonists, the Axem Rangers X. The speed, the sound effects, alongside an amazing remix of Sonic and Knuckles’ Doomsday Zone playing in the background, this is a simply amazing bit of animation that can’t really be put into words without it sounding absolutely ridiculous. And much like with Nazo Unleashed, so much of this was done by just one guy.

After episode 8 in 2009, things basically ended on a cliffhanger with the series being presumed over. Haynes had his own life and things to deal with, and something that took up so much time to make could be easily seen as poor use of it. In the years following, many others tried their hand at sprite animations with heavy action scenes with that becoming its very own subgenre on YouTube. Then, in 2016, Mark made a glorious return with the first episode of what was basically a reboot of the series. Fans loved it, amazed to see how far things had come. And then..there was basically nothing else. Originally, Haynes had a Patreon set up so that fans could fund him making this as well as possibly being a way for him to make this his job. It was shut down, most likely due to him directly saying it was going towards the series and Nintendo seeing it as someone else profiting off their IP. With any funding that could go towards rewarding all this time and effort being taken away, as well as Haynes having more important personal things and depression, it is unlikely that we’ll see an update anytime soon. It’s been three years since the first episode went up on YouTube, and while I still hope someday he’ll return, but as someone who knows that forcing yourself to make something others want even if you don’t want to is like, the personal happiness and health of Mark Haynes is so much more important.  He’s already left an amazing legacy on the net, and the stuff he’s given us is already great enough as is.

And now to go from flash animation, to sprite animation, we’re reaching the next logical step. Out of all the series discussed in this part, this one is my absolute favorite. And it is one of the weirdest things out there. Another crossover series featuring the world of Mario and Sonic, alongside a few notable others. One that’s full of action and character, and it’s all animated in PowerPoint (no, I’m not kidding), this is Chocobro Cinemas’ The “Dimension” Saga. Strap in, things are gonna get really, really weird.

The series started in 2007, with Dimension Mix-Up as it followed various characters from Super Mario Bros, Sonic the Hedgehog, Frogger, Invader Zim, and Calvin and Hobbes. That was all 100 percent serious, and to the credit of both this and Super Mario Bros Z, there is a feeling of self-awareness running throughout the whole series. I unironically love this entire series from start to finish, mostly just due to the fact that there’s so much creativity and love being put into something that most people would just brush aside as another cheap fanfiction. When I originally found this back in 2007, it was like the most amazing thing ever. The computer I had at the time took forever to not only load flash animations, but even playing them took like 5 years for just a few seconds. I hadn’t really known what Newgrounds was fully back then either, so Super Mario Bros Z also wasn’t something I watched at the time, and I came across this. An action filled adventure that had characters not only from Sonic and Mario, but also Invader Zim which was still super huge at time, and Calvin and Hobbes?! To a megafan of all those things who would actually spend their time on Fanfiction.net reading stories about this stuff (Yes, even Calvin and Hobbes), this was like the holy grail. Also Frogger was there, so...that was cool?

This story should not work, these characters all being together on screen expecting viewers to care for them all should not work, this idea of using powerpoint back in 2007 to simulate animation of any kind should not work. Yet somehow...it does. Even with the fact that this is clearly just a camera recording a screen at this point, there’s something rather entertaining about it all. And the action isn’t half bad for something made with a tool that clearly was never meant to be used in this way. It can actually be creative with how some fight scenes are done. The whole of episode 6 is able to show off a giant robot boss battle with some pretty decent speed, while episode 8 can trick viewers with its looping backgrounds. The best part of this comes just from watching how not only does the quality of the video improve over time, but so does the writing and the story. Dimension Takeover and Dimension Obliteration are amazing and admittedly addicting watches that have the same level of love and care put into them as the previous two series discussed in this. Giving the fans such high quality action and adventures while also doing a really great job of making all the interactions feel like they’re from their source material. Well, at least as close and one can get when you have a hedgehog talking to an imaginary tiger and a group of cartoon frogs. I can’t say thank you enough times to the people who’ve made all their series, as my love of writing stories based on my own favorite series probably wouldn’t be as strong today. And hey, one can surprisingly do a good job with powerpoint. At least it wasn’t just a slide show.

Part Two: These literally are just slide shows!

Sticking to the topic of Sonic, he seems to be a super popular subject for crossovers. Besides Mario, he and his friends have appeared in both official and nonofficial meetups with all kinds of pop culture favorites. The one series that seems to dominate the realm of Sonic crossovers online is My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic . The series itself has had quite the impressive run of nine years, with its final episodes airing this year. What probably would have been seen as just another cheap product placement by the majority of people if it hadn’t been for the rather large audience of grown up fans that for a time basically ruled the internet. While in the later years the fan base has shrunk as all fandoms do, there are still those that happily enjoy watching cartoon ponies and doing various things related to them online, myself included.  

Now how does a super fast and cocky blue hedgehog that saves the day from an evil egg shaped man and his army of robots have any kind of connection to a cartoon about six colorful and talented ponies as they go through their lives learning about and solving problems with the power of friendship? Well, both are series that have similar characters with Sonic and Rainbow Dash both being blue,fast, and cocky. Both series deal with giant world ending disasters by using powerful gems and the power of teamwork. And both believe in the real power of friendship. So, yeah. There’s bound to be a ton of fan series based on seeing these two worlds meet up. And hoo boy, Youtube sure seems to love hosting a ton of them.

The common theme in all the Sonic/My Little Pony Crossovers in this part is that they’re all going to be slideshows. There might be a few clips from the shows or games, maybe a piece of fanart or two, but 99 percent of the stuff in these videos is just going to be static text. Let’s start with the...highest quality one of the three brought up in this part, Sonic X Equestria by Speedstar Productions . The plot is nothing new. Eggman shows up to wreak havoc and Sonic must team up with the cast of My Little Pony, or Mane Six as they’re called, to help stop him. When I said most of these are just slideshows... I wasn’t kidding. The entire series will go from random screen cap to random promotional images, with text overlaid on the bottom. There is no original voice acting either, with the only voices that occasionally can be heard coming from the clips or sound bytes. There is no promised sense of consistency either, as photos of the characters can be pulled from different seasons, games, comics and shows all together. In this, Sonic is supposed to have his normal modern look but some screenshots are from Sonic Boom which is a show with different designs. Another example of this comes from shots of Twilight Sparkle. This show takes place in the My Little Pony world after Twilight becomes the princess of friendship and gets her own wings. Even shots from the first episode will use photos of her without them. It’s never actually a thing that matters to the show, as it acts like everything is on model, and that we can perfectly see everything that’s going on.

Another thing that this and many others like it seem to have in common is the idea that Sonic is the one doing all the work, while all the ponies just kinda...watch in the background. Sure, Twilight will pitch in with her magic every once in a while, but if Sonic’s taking on Eggman? He’s mostly going in solo. Sure, these ponies have easily taken on things like chaos incarnate, and powerful tyrants with black magic. But a man in a giant robot suit? Too unpredictable . Sure, one could argue that it’s because the mech being used in the fight only has images of Sonic fighting it...but in a later episode , the girls join in a fight that’s entirely animated! I shouldn’t be mad about this, yet I am!

Though..despite the rant, I still find myself enjoying watching this series. I can’t fully explain if it’s ironic or if it’s unironic. Maybe it comes from the fact that everyone still acts in character to their on-screen counter parts, leading to interactions that fans wanted to see. We want to see the ponies talk to Sonic characters, and help take down Eggman. The use of actual pictures from the shows and games helps too, making us help visualize it as if it were an actual episode.  Maybe it comes from the fact that it feels like something I would watch in the early days of Youtube. The kinda low effort yet also decent attempt of trying to make events appear coherent in some way, even if the images shown aren’t the most in continuity. Though, episode 11 is literally the Shadic vs Nazo fight from Nazo Unleashed. Those things aside...this is still kind of a guilty pleasure watch that I’ll binge from time to time.

Sometime last year, I was looking up Nazo Unleashed videos late one night, due to that time bringing out a large sense of nostalgia for days gone. As I was looking, I saw a thumbnail that stuck out to me. Or rather...a title that stuck out to me, as well as a runtime that had my interest set to max.

The Adventures of Sonic in Equestria Nazo Unleashed The Movie HD , by Adam Selvig, is a title that feels like it should be one of those videos that promises an upload of a current movie in HD that only links to scam sites that will give your computer a virus. It isn’t that. This is a slideshow that’s the length of a movie. College lectures aren’t this long. The best way to describe this one is that Sonic and the ponies must come together to defeat Nazo as well Tempest Shadow, a character from the My Little Pony movie. Also, Sonic and Rainbow Dash have a daughter called Sondash, which is literally just art of a child Rainbow Dash. This series is weird. Another strange thing is that a lot of the channels posting Sonic / My Little Pony stuff in series like this...usually have around 1K subs. That’s nothing to any major Youtuber, but the idea that even just one thousand people subscribe to watch this stuff as soon as it comes out..is just mind blowing.

This film is part of a series, one that started all the way back in January of 2018. The playlist for this thing says that the series as of March 4th, 2019...is 103 videos long?! And with seemingly all of them in the 20 minute range...the question becomes, how long has Selvig been working on this thing, and does he have others help him with it? And again...why is it always Sonic that seems to be doing everything around here? Are the ponies just lazy now that an outsider is here?

The odd thing is that there are so many Sonic/My Little Pony crossover videos on Youtube, but when looked into, so many of them are the exact same content. Stills and transparent photos with clear backgrounds with text overlaid. And so many are able to get these creators at least a few hundred subscribers. In a surprisingly deep sea of similar executions, are there any left that stand out above the rest? Good news, there is at least one series that goes in another direction. In more mixed news, well…

This is Harmony and Chaos by Michael Evans. While originally popping up as text on gradient background sometime in 2017, the whole series is now being voiced over by its creator. That’s all this is. Text on a background while one man narrates over it in various voices. And for the most part, there isn’t much there at all in terms of action. Now, I’m only nine episodes in this seemingly sixty plus episode run with multiple seasons series, so I might be wrong. The main focus of this series is romance, and boy is there a lot of it. If there’s a male character from Sonic and a female character from My Little Pony that interact a lot in this thing, there’s a pretty good chance they’ll end up smooching somewhere on down the line. This sounds exactly like what many seem to see fan bases as general as, writing overly long amounts of fan fiction that are also chock to the brim with romance and needless drama. In this series, Rainbow Dash is getting a divorce from her husband who she thought was cheating on her, when really he only made it seem that way so that she wouldn’t have to know that he was dying from a deadly disease. It’s a move right out of the soap opera playbook.

Despite all of this, I find myself coming back to all of these series and watching them in huge chunks. It comes from a sense of odd curiosity on how the story is going to play out.  It also helps that the people behind this stuff seem like just genuinely nice people that want to post their creations online and share it with the world. It’s just that the stuff they make is really weird, not bad, just strange. And even then, it’s not the most strangest thing on the net that’s out there.

Part Three: Big Adventures, Bigger Casts

The best way to start this final part was with an image. An image that perfectly tells someone everything they need to know, as well as absolutely nothing at all. Welcome to Pooh’s Adventures , a seemingly endless number of movies and tv shows that are “edited” to include characters from Winnie the Pooh, My Little Pony, Transformers, Thomas the Tank Engine and so, so many more. I put edited in quotes because really, does this count as editing in any way, shape or form? To give a basic plot outline of just about every single Pooh’s/Thomas’/Insert Character name here’s adventure, large group of characters are inserted into popular movie or show, where they help the main character of said movie or show against the antagonist who is now usually joined by other villains from various forms of media. Rinse and Repeat for every movie ever with vague hints of events from previous adventures running into this one.  Take any movie, and there’s a good chance there’s at least the idea for a Pooh’s Adventures on it. Like for example Winnie The Pooh vs. Jaws , which while not a real movie as of this writing does have a devoted page on the fan wiki . And it seems to promise quite the cast of characters.

It can actually be somewhat hard in trying to find some of these, due to the fact that they’re just full movies with other copyrighted clips put in at random intervals. Those that are still up on Youtube seem to be the ones that use the most obscure of movies as their source . And just like with the Sonic/Mlp stuff, all of these channels seem to have at least a few thousand subscribers thanks to it. Of all the adventures that still remain on Youtube, Winnie the Pooh Goes to Hotel Mario / Pooh’s Adventures of Batman Forever is the one I’m most proud still remains. There is no connection between the two, besides the fact that both Hotel Mario and Batman Forever are both seen as surreal experiences that have very little connections to their source and are enjoyed in a “so bad it’s good” way.

There are still ways to find both older and newer uploads of the various adventures online. Many of the members will just upload their older stuff to Google Drive or Dropbox , and more recently, a lot of uploads are being moved to Pandora.tv, a mostly Korean based website where they can run ads on the video.

The wiki for this fandom is massive, with there being over thirty five thousand articles as of the time of this being written, with new ones being added or updated seemingly every few minutes. Most fantasy wikis can’t reach numbers that high! Though, most of the pages on it are bare-bones with only a single line or two for a ton of characters while others are pages clearly ripped right from other fandom wikis. There’s also ideas for series that are just the title and then nothing else, along with transcripts and posters put next to dozens of dead or empty links. For a site that seems so bloated and full, it’s actually pretty empty and hollow upon closer look.

I wanted to share all of this because so much of this resonates with me in some way, even Pooh’s Adventures , since I’d be lying if I said I haven’t thought up crossovers with insanely large casts that really should have nothing to do with each other.I guess in a way...I saw these all as the things I wanted to make but never knew how to. I’ve always wanted to animate, to tell my stories with these characters that I know and love to as many people as possible, to hear their feedback on all of it. That’s why I got so passionate talking about all certain moments or episodes, it’s all the things I would do! They’re people just like me, and that’s why I wish Mark Haynes the best in his life, why I’ll say the guys who work on the Sonic and My Little Pony  seem like nice people. That’s why I’ll be so amazed by someone having a thousand subs or more. I see myself in these creations and the experiences of their creators. The pains of depression, the joy of seeing how their work has influenced others, the effort and care put into these things. I want to see them succeed and be supported, because that shows me that I can succeed too.  

[raendown]

Chapter: 3/9 Pairing: MadaraTobirama Word count: 3815 Rated: M Summary: Walking patrol around a university for mages probably sounded like a wild time but Tobirama has never found it all that exciting. He’s not even technically supposed to be here. When responding to a tripped alarm becomes a desperate attempt to stay alive, however, excitement is the last thing on his mind. All he’s ever wanted is a quiet life alone with his books until he finds himself bound to Uchiha Madara in the most impossible way and finally learns to think about more than just himself - in a way.

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Chapter 3

By the time Madara woke up Tobirama was certain he had a complete mental list of all the possible challenges they might be facing in the days ahead of them. The second that Madara became aware of the world again he realized that there was one significant thing he had failed to even consider as an option.

“He’s cold.” The thought occurred to him so suddenly he hardly realized he’d spoken out loud until Tsunade looked over from the bed of another unconscious patient she was tending to.

“Really? And how would you know?” she asked.

“We can feel it,” he said with a note of wonder in his voice. And it was true, dawning in the back of his mind was the vague sensation that his second body – and that right there was a whole new can of worms – was chilly. Tobirama yanked the blanket off his own mattress and pulled it over on to the other as best he could. As soon as he did so he felt the aimless gratitude of a sleepy mind that finds warmth without being conscious enough to understand its source.

Madara’s fingers tightened around his briefly, no signs of trying to get away. The closer he drew to actual consciousness the more Tobirama felt his sense of self blurring around the edges. What Madara felt he could feel and what Madara was thinking danced along the edges of his own thoughts, just close enough that he could push himself in to them if he so desired. Out of habit he asked himself why the hell he would want to know what Madara was thinking and almost immediately he berated himself for being a stuck up prick. Tobirama frowned.

“Well we don’t like that,” he murmured.

Relaying the same revelations to Madara as had been given to him upon waking turned out to be somewhat anticlimactic. Able to latch on to Tobirama’s calm state and subconsciously already aware of these things, he took the news with no more than a light frown and a distracted hum.

Having him awake also came with the unexpected boon of solving Tobirama’s ‘royal we’ problem as they both recovered their unconscious sense of self. The less they leaned towards that diaphanous line between their minds the more they were able to think in the singular. It was harder when they strayed towards each other, naturally trying to slide together as one person, but Hashirama was good enough to point out when they began to speak in ‘we’ and ‘us’ to warn them what was happening.

Other problems arose rather quickly when it came time to decide where they should stay for the foreseeable future. Obviously both of them wanted to stay in the comfort and familiarity of their own rooms – and even more interestingly they each yearned for both places at the same time, feeding off of each other’s desires until it was impossible to tell which of them wanted what. In the end Hashirama flipped a coin and shuffled them off to Tobirama’s rooms.

Something none of them, as reasonable and intellectual adults, thought to consider was what hundreds of students might take away from seeing their professor and the infamous forever-but-technically-not-a-student walking through the hallways hand in hand. It took several waggled eyebrows and over a dozen outbursts of whispering before mortification shot through their bodies as though the thought had occurred to them at exactly the same time. Letting go was a non-option, however, so they did their best to close their ears to the fast moving gossip about a teacher-student relationship, despite the fact that Tobirama only technically qualified as a student because Hashirama let him stay there without forcing him to become a professor.

If he hadn’t enrolled in any classes for the last three years and he refused the teaching positions every time they were offered to him then he needed some sort of excuse to stay. He’d have been kicked out by the Board of Magical Education a long time ago if he weren’t related to the Headmaster.

Of all the small mercies they didn’t expect, Tobirama’s quarters were at least closer since they were located in a quiet corridor just passed the student dormitories but a floor below where the professors resided. Twin sighs of relief escaped their lips once they had a solid door closed between them and the rest of the world. As one they turned to survey the room before them with a critical eye.

To Tobirama it looked like home, familiar books stacked in patterns that would look like nonsense to anyone else but made sense to him and him alone, ingredients for his elixirs balanced on every surface and summoning crystals dotted in random places, the occasional personal touch present in the form of one of Hashirama’s sculptures and that sword he once wrestled from a basilisk. Even the dust sprinkled deliberately in certain places to mark whether his things had been messed with was a sight for sore eyes. Were he alone he would have taken a deep breath and allowed himself to sink in to the knowledge awaiting him.

But he wasn’t alone. He was held back from diving headfirst in to the closest tome he could reach by the sheer exasperation he could feel drifting over through his link to Madara. Apparently his companion found this level of chaos to be stifling instead of inspiring, their bodies tensing with minor claustrophobia. Tobirama wrinkled his nose. It had taken a long time to organize his belongings properly and he was loathe to disturb them now.

“Shall we go through to the other rooms?” he asked.

With no one else living near him and his unique status as perpetual researcher he had quite a lot more space to spread himself out than most others in the university. Madara held his arms close to his body so as not to upset any of the carefully stacked books around them and Tobirama was almost knocked off his feet when he realized why, that Madara was feeding in to his reverence for his possessions and probably unconsciously treating them like they were his own. Fascinating. That was definitely something they would need to explore.

The next room over was much more tidy and excluded any strategically placed dust, much to Madara’s obvious relief. This was where he most often came to read, although the compartmentalizing part of his brain refused to see it as a place to store anything and so the tomes he read from went back in to the other room when not in use. He wasn’t at all surprised to see Madara’s attention hone in on his favorite chair.

“We can’t both sit in it,” he muttered dryly.

“Right. Well we shouldn’t both have to do anything. I mean, I’m not saying…”

Madara trailed off but Tobirama waved him onwards impatiently, already aware of what he was trying to say. Awkward as it was to admit, it was obvious that neither of them were willing to even think of the option to separate entirely. Their cores had merged so completely it wasn’t likely anything could separate them even if they wanted that. Even other magical folk wouldn’t truly be able to understand what they were going through. The only way Tobirama could think to describe it would be to say that they now only had one soul to share between their two bodies and it was as thrilling to think about as it was terrifying. All the hatred that he had once carried for the man at his side had been replaced with nothing more than the natural and instinctive desire to stay whole, uninjured, just as any other human would want.

“Anyway. I’m not saying that. But it would be much more convenient if we didn’t have to be leashed together all the time. You will agree, I think, that your darling niece only wanted us to stay in the infirmary for the rest of the day because she wanted to see what would happen the first time one of us had to piss.”

“She’s always had a very strange sense of humor,” Tobirama mused.

“I don’t like being the butt of a joke.”

“But you make such a nice butt.” As soon as the words were out they both paused, Tobirama’s jaw snapping shut. He had the distinct impression that he’d been trying to say two things at once there and only one of those points had originated from himself.

Letting the moment slide, Madara cleared his throat. “Whatever. Let’s just see what happens with this because I really don’t want to take you to the bathroom with me.”

“As much as the very thought horrifies me as well, I’m not sure if it’s a good idea just yet. Even while unconscious our reactions to separation were worrisome.” Tobirama twisted his mouth to one side in thought. A moment later he frowned because he’d never made that expression before in his life and Madara was mirroring it back at him. “Never mind. Perhaps you’re right.”

“Oh? So y-”

“Don’t. You wouldn’t let me say ‘I told you so’ before, what makes you think I’ll let you say it now?”

Madara pouted but conceded the point.

Ignoring the squashy armchair they both wanted to sit in, they stepped over to the couch instead and sat together to think over how to go about this little experiment, trying to convince themselves and each other that they actually wanted to do it. Privacy would indeed be nice in certain situations but the draw to stay together went beyond instinctual. It was primal. Eventually it was Tobirama pointing out that letting go of each other’s hands didn’t mean they had to completely separate, just that it would be nice to have access to their own limbs. Madara agreed with relief obvious in his eyes.

“Yes, right, so if I touch you somewhere else then we should be fine.”

“Exactly.” Tobirama nodded decisively.

He waited until Madara had shuffled across the seat cushions to press their hips together before very slowly and very carefully unfolding one finger at a time. Both of them tensed as they edged their palms apart only to relax when absolutely nothing happened. Evidently they had been worried over nothing. Feeling a little ridiculous that they had let themselves get so worked up about this, Tobirama huffed and moved to get off the couch.

Immediately he fell to his knees with his head cradled in both hands, unable to process the sheer agony ripping through his body. No words could ever possibly describe the pain, his very soul itself torn in to pieces and every one of those pieces burning, tearing, grinding, shattering, all at once. His mind screamed until he couldn’t tell whether the sound was coming from his own throat or from behind him and he had no idea how to stop it until suddenly the world fell quiet again.

Madara’s hand on his shoulder, squeezing tightly, was the only thing anchoring him to the earth in that moment. Panting like he’d run for several miles, Tobirama fell back in to the man’s knees and marveled that he’d managed to avoid falling off the couch too in his lunge to bring them together again.

“Right,” he whispered. “So that didn’t work.”

“Clearly not!” Underneath the attempt at a good snarl Madara sounded just as breathless as him despite the sparks lingering in his hair.

“New plan: you’re just going to have to suck it up and piss where I can hear you. Disgusting but necessary, it seems.” Tobirama ran one hand through his hair and settled further between Madara’s knees.

Then he jolted to one side and almost separated them again when the man shifted in place to harp down at him. “What kind of scientist are you? You’re not supposed to give up after one experiment!”

“I’m not a scientist, Madara. That is a non-magical word and I think we’ll both agree you don’t want me to prove I have magic right now. I am, first and foremost, a scholar. We had an idea and it ended with great pain. My new idea is maybe not feeling that amount of pain again in the near future!” He would have jabbed an elbow backwards in to the idiot behind him if he weren’t so comfortable in his current position.

He was a little amazed when Madara failed to offer some sort of comeback and for a moment he entertained the incredible notion that he’d actually won the fight that easily. Then he felt thoughts not his own pressing in against him and frowned as he danced around the edges of the muddled confusion and uncertainty his companion was experiencing.

“Was it something I said?”

“Did you just call me by my name?” Madara asked, wiping away the humorous grin trying to form on Tobirama’s face.

“Sweet spirits I did. You’ve infected me. You don’t think of yourself as a pea-brained bastard so now I can’t either! This is intolerable!”

“Hey!”

Offense suffused his entire mind, so strong was Madara’s reaction, and Tobirama heaved a sigh of irritation. “Among other things that are also intolerable. I have to pee.”

Madara shuddered.

The next few days were dotted with similar experiments, most of which ended in exactly the same mixture of pain and desperation to reunite. When Hashirama stopped by to check on them they absolutely refused to answer any questions about what was ‘really so bad’ about being stuck together. Apparently certain parts of their situation hadn’t occurred to their Headmaster and neither of them were really jumping at the chance to explain it to him.

On the fourth day they had a breakthrough at last, though neither of them realized it at first. Being forced to sleep in the same bed had led to all sorts of things they both agreed to never speak of and waking up with Madara’s head tucked under Tobirama’s chin, warm and solid and perfectly shaped like he was meant to fit there, was far from the first one. It even took a few minutes for both of them to work their way out of the haze that always fell over their collective consciousness whenever they were wrapped up too tightly, minds working together in such harmony it was difficult to remember why they shouldn’t.

They both came back to themselves at the same time and, upon realizing the compromising position they were in, gave matching grunts of disgust and rolled away in opposite directions.

“I never cuddle,” Madara insisted. “This is your doing.”

“You can’t lie to me, remember? I can feel it when you lie.”

“Ugh, fine, but I would never cuddle with the likes of you! Even if you are somehow me now…sort of. This whole thing still hurts my brain when I try to think about it.”

Tobirama sniffed. He was on the verge of some sort of acerbic comment about how little Madara’s brain ever worked but held back, rather upset by the fact that he now knew how untrue that was. Having free tickets in to each other’s heads had led to all sorts of insights, chief among them being that Madara wasn’t nearly as stupid as Tobirama always assumed and that Tobirama wasn’t half as unfeeling as he preferred the world to think.

Such revelations had been uncomfortable on both sides and were quickly added to the ever-growing pile of things they agreed not to talk about. At least on that they were in accord.

Instead of the snarky comment he’d been gearing up for Tobirama sat up and stretched his arms above his head. There was no pretending his thoughts had been headed anywhere else but he did have enough dignity not to bring it up and start an unnecessary fight. Only after he’d brought his arms back down, one of them scratching at his chest, did he realize that his head was…oddly quiet. Where he would normally feel irritation or some other form of thought process from his companion there was a strange and worrisome sort of vacancy.

“How did you do that?” Madara demanded in a breathy voice.

“I’m not sure what I even did,” Tobirama admitted. When he looked down, however, he could see right away what the man was referring to.

They weren’t touching anymore. Still tucked in to the same bed, their bodies were a mere couple of inches apart with no physical contact at any point and yet there were no signs of pain. Madara slowly pushed himself up to rest on his elbows while Tobirama tried to work out how he felt about this.

“Unexpected,” he said. “Convenient, though. It will probably be good for us to get a bit of distance.”

“Right, yes. Good for us.” Madara cleared his throat and refused to let their eyes meet. Looking away, Tobirama pretended he didn’t understand why.

“Well, it looks like we’ll be able to go about things a little differently today.”

Swinging his legs out, he made to get up and walk over to the dresser to pull out a fresh set of clothing, his first idea being that it would be nice to finally shower alone without someone standing just outside the curtain with their eyes closed, hand pressed against his back so he could wash his hair. Those plans were thrown out the window when he stood up and immediately collapsed as an all too familiar pain washed over him. From the mattress above him he could hear Madara whine.

Just as he had been all the other times they attempted to separate Tobirama was immediately filled with an all-consuming need to get back to his other half. Everything in the world felt wrong as he forced his body on to its knees so he could crawl back on to the mattress and reach across it the find Madara’s hand. The moment their skin connected they both gasped with relief.

“Alright. Nothing really so different.”

“Thank you for stating the obvious,” Madara snarled.

“You are absolutely welcome. Happy to have provided my services.”

“Facetious,” the man hissed.

Tobirama stared up at the ceiling and held on tighter to the hand grasping at his own. “Sometimes,” he agreed.

“But you weren’t touching me! We were fine!”

“I think it’s best if we take things slowly. Think of it like a new muscle that we need to stretch little by little until we learn the really flexible moves.” He grinned at the wave of prudish disgust from his partner, proud of himself for working an innuendo in to such a serious conversation.

“Just for that I’m sending a note to Hashirama that I’ll be attending my own class today.”

Shooting upright in the bed, Tobirama looked down at the other man with outrage twisting his expression. “You most certainly will not!”

“Well I need to get back to my job sometime or eventually they’ll stop paying me.” Madara struggled upright as well. “So far we’ve stayed holed up in your rooms so that you can get lost in your research and the only contact we’ve had with the outside world has been your relatives. I’m going mad! You’re not the only one who would like to get back a bit of normalcy!”

Brows pulled down so far they nearly overshadowed his eyes, Tobirama hoped his glare at least balanced out the abrupt shock he was probably giving off in waves. The last few days had been sprinkled with a number of discovering about each other and he faced each one of them with a vague sense of betrayal. How dare Madara slowly grow more human in his eyes? What made it worse was being forced to recognize that he was being selfish and inconsiderate – and actually care about it. He very much did not appreciate being forced to see things from Madara’s point of view.

Chief among the reactions lingering just behind that malleable wall between their conscious minds was the sadness and longing that came from not seeing someone for too long; Madara missed his students, apparently. Tobirama had always assumed that his nemesis took a teaching job because it was easy and secure and it provided living quarters as well. Finding out that he actually liked his job sort of threw half of Tobirama’s impressions of the man out of whack.

Madara was supposed to hate kids so that Tobirama could hate him in return. It was irritating to find out the opposite was true and find himself ever so slightly endeared to a man he’d always disliked.

“No classes,” Tobirama grumbled at last. “But I guess we can get out of here for a little while. Where else do you want to go?”

“Literally anywhere but here. I want to see something other than these walls. We could have lunch with you brother or something, I guess.” Shuffling around, Madara pulled them both off the bed and headed for the bathroom so he could perform his morning ablutions. Tobirama hissed at him.

“One would think you’d gotten tired of him too.”

Madara conceded that point. While neither of them had overly large social circles and they were used to seeing a lot of Hashirama, they were also both used to having other people around occasionally to break up the madness a bit. Seeing anyone else would be a relief after dealing with only him and each other for so long. The only problem was that there really wasn’t anyone else in the castle that either of them were very interested in going to visit.

“What if we went to the library?” Madara asked suddenly. Hand reaching for his toothbrush, Tobirama paused like he’d seen a ray of hope.

“The library?”

“Yeah, it’s perfect. I can put out word that I’m willing to work with any students who need it and you can do your…whatever it is you do with your books. Make love to them with your eyes or something.” He snickered at his own terrible joke.

Rather than reprimand him Tobirama nodded slowly.

“I think that’s the best idea you’ve ever had.”

“Wait, seriously? You’re not going to fight me on an idea I came up with? Even a little?” Madara hummed thoughtfully. “Strangely I’m a little disappointed.”

Tobirama snorted and refused to comment. He didn’t want to piss the man off and ruin this chance to go visit his favorite place in the whole world. Whatever other problems existed in his life they always had a way of not mattering as soon as he stepped in to that glorious haven, the home of all knowledge, books as far as the eye can see and all of them patiently waiting for his attention. Maybe the day hadn’t started off as well as he’d thought but it was certainly looking up now.

[airyravenmaid]

Again There Were Four

What’s up, y’all? Guess who decided to write more weird stuff with my Final Fantasy Versus XV crossover AU? I actually do have a handful of snippets from it done and soon-to-be done, but I wanted to get this one up so it’s less confusing going off of my other fic posted on here (due to what certain others thought of the other earlier on in the storyline big sis and I came up with, but I’m sure you can guess that one). So, yeah, this one takes place after that and during Chapter 10 where everything in Noct’s life goes even more to shit, meaning this... isn’t the happiest of parts lmao. Nonetheless, I hope you guys like it, and if possible, I really hope to get more up! Enjoy! 💘

How could things possibly get any worse, Noctis kept wondering to himself on the train taking him and his comrades to the Cartanica Station in Tenebrae of all places following the disaster of a lifetime. It was bad enough he had to deal with Luna dying in the line of duty, but now not only could Ignis no longer see arguably because of him, but the latter incident caused a nasty spat between Noctis and Gladio over what the bigger problem was in their opinions. To say things had taken a turn for the worst would be putting it lightly in the cruelest form of the word.

There he continued to traverse the locomotive cars, idle whenever he heard some passengers speak of the events that befell Accordo’s unfortunate capital city (including word of the older of the Nox Fleuret siblings, who was currently facing punishment for being the blame). He passed his longtime friends in their own seats, but eventually came across a head of rose pink hair he knew only naturally belonged to one person in possibly all of Eos. They hadn’t spoken much since what was supposed to be their peaceful first date, but after their “forbidden” first kiss, things only got more awkward when they did somewhat spot each other before the Hydrean’s wrathful trial. Now was a good time to break the new ice, Noctis figured, since he really had nothing else left to lose in his life.

‘Alright, here goes,’ Noctis started in his thoughts, sitting next to Lightning and waiting until she looked his way to attempt to speak. A lot of words got lost on his tongue from the thick atmosphere and how he could speak again to the girl he liked following disaster after the next. To his luck, he managed to get something out for progress. “...Hi.”

“You’re not holding up so well still, are you?” Lightning wondered a tad too bluntly.

Well, so much for small talk. Being reminded at losing his first love by the second definitely put enough of a damper on Noctis’ already-gloomy mood. “Not even a little,” he confessed, head sagging forward with his arms supported only by his knees.

“As expected from you, really. Something would seriously be wrong if you were suddenly acting fine.”

“What? You gonna call me a mopey coward too? I heard plenty from Gladio in case you forgot.”

“Maybe if you didn’t put words in my mouth and waited for me to talk, then we’d actually be having a good enough conversation.” Lightning’s no-nonsense tone once again prevailed over Noctis’ hard-bitten variant, the man conceding easy defeat. “What I am still gonna tell you though, is that you can’t let yourself get dragged around by one sudden tragedy, whether or not it was out of your control.”

“This isn’t even just one sudden tragedy, Claire. It’s two after another that’s happened since I even left home. I’m not saying I’m ready to throw the towel in, but… is it really that bad I’m not exactly ‘overjoyed’ that people I care about keep having all this crap happen to them because of me?! It’s not exactly the easiest damn thing in the world to swallow.”

“Never said it was easy. Possible, but not easy.” Lightning saw how Noctis didn’t seem the least bit reassured. Bringing hope to nigh-damned souls was something she’d done fine in the past, but apparently pep talk here felt much harder than she thought. “Noct. You have to understand you’re not gonna be ready for— well, anything, actually. But also get you aren’t going through this by yourself.”

“That’s a shock. A lot of people that wanna help me wind up paying the price for it in the end.”

“And everyone who did knew that, too. They wanted to see you keep going, and did whatever it took to make sure it happened. Doesn’t that at least mean something to you?”

“Why would I say it didn’t?! If none of it meant a thing to me, I wouldn’t be feeling like this! How could you even know what it’s in any way like to—?!” Noctis stopped when he realized how angry he was getting and who he was about to say what to. Lightning, as usual, kept a stoic face, but he knew at this point not to mistake that for acceptance of just anything. He sighed, sitting up and looking more dejected than ever. “...Nevermind. I’m not gonna take this out on you. Sorry.”

“Smart choice. But, do you get what I’m saying, or not? At least tell me that part.”

“More or less, yeah. Question is why you’re bothering to tell me this, though.”

“Besides the fact that I and plenty of others care about you, you mean? Well… it’s another reason besides that.”

“What’s the other reason?”

“Noct, don’t you remember?” The hesitant pause in her voice was so short Noctis almost missed it, but what came from her mouth after was far more important. “‘Altissia and back’.”

...Oh. That was right, wasn’t it? Noctis felt his heart sink at the rather ironic reminder, looking right at Lightning almost shocked. He shouldn’t have been in any sense of the word, considering it was him who had initially held the deal to almost philosophy levels from the moment they left Duscae. But, how everything had changed since then. He remembered how the others did warn him on changing his mind about Lightning before their destination, but in no way did he think it’d be like this, or severely come to get back at him once the initial deal had been nonetheless kept and now unequivocally concluded.

Wow. Having to pretend he’d never met Lightning was aching far more than his past self thought it ever would. Noctis looked up with her, seeing a very familiar morose glint in her eyes that he only recognized as being in his own. So much swirled in his cumbersome heart about it, but in the end, it all fell defeated at the unavoidable truth of the matter.

“We did say that,” Noctis sighed, matter-of-factly. “In that case, you’re more than free to go, but I don’t need to tell you that. When are you leaving? Our next stop is near where the next royal tomb is.”

“I won’t be joining you then,” Lightning told him, equally somber. “After this, I’m boarding another train bound for home. A promise is a promise, and I have every intention of keeping it.”

“And you’re sure you don’t wanna stay a little longer and leave after we get the next arm?”

“Well, as much of an… experience as it’s been here in Eos, you four aren’t the only ones I need to be with. I’m a woman of my word, and this is my decision.” Lightning glanced ahead at the front of the train, her pointer finger hooked over the front of her chin. “In a way, you could say this was sorta my ‘Focus’ that I needed to complete.”

Noctis didn’t at all know what she meant by the word spoken as if it were some object, but assumed it was the same as a goal to keep her motivated. “Then I won’t keep you here longer than you need to be.”

“Fun while it lasted, at least, but the next stop’s the one. For now… let’s make it last while we can.”

Noctis only nodded his head in agreement, staying put in his new seat next to Lightning. Both were unsure of how exactly to look at each other, at the very least positioning their bodies to be facing their seatmate in case their faces weren’t going to comply. Their hands were resting on the seats not too far from the other’s, Noctis’ wanting only to get close enough and hold Lightning’s for what seemed like the final time. His fingers, however, only got halfway to hers before flattening and only laying near it from a lack of boldness. She didn’t seem to notice either; too lost in wistful thought to notice how much her own love was beginning to hurt at the inevitable.

Cartanica’s arrival came too soon, something Noctis and Lightning both agreed on. The five initially traveling together all got off the train, all of them aware that this was the last time they’d all be a merry quintet. Lightning even looked prepared to depart, her outfit now her more casual open white blouse over a matching shirt tucked into brown capris pants with black open-toe, ankle-strapped low heels in place of her black “Heartstealer” outfit usually donned during her time in Eos. That in itself seemed to upset Noctis even more, taking it as the unforgiving nail sealing the goodbye coffin.

None of them looked particularly happy for this to happen, but they all understood Lightning’s decision to go back home. It was especially so in the fact that she wasn’t enlisted as permanent help, even with staying forever not going against her assigned mission. Everyone had a life to follow, and she knew where hers needed to be despite her tune changing from all that time ago when everything began. Her luggage was loosely gripped in her hands, its owner hesitant at carrying it and herself away from the new friends she’d made in the newer world.

“This appears to be farewell, doesn’t it?” Ignis sighed, no effort made to mask the melancholy in his voice. “I can’t say I’m surprised, but this journey’s gone by far quicker than I thought.”

“Seems like just yesterday, we were all picking you up for the ride,” Prompto brought up, a sad chuckle to match his mood. “Now, here we are…”

“Seein’ ya go for your last one,” Gladio finished for Prompto, arms folded and keeping his composure to mask his own missing of a new friend. “But, mission accomplished, either way.”

“I’ll certainly say,” Lightning agreed, keeping her head up high and showing her rare, mild smile at the boys. “What I can also say is that this last journey of mine’s been strangely worth it. Can’t think of any other way to retire.”

“Good to know we made your last hurrah the best one. You hang in there, got it, Sarge?”

Lightning gave a playful punch to Gladio’s arm, the group’s tallest member letting out just as playful a chuckle in response while also reminded at how strong the girl was by default. “It was an honor fighting with the King’s Shield. Hope to see you in the long run sometime, Gladio.”

“Heh. Don’t get yourself into too much trouble, ya pink menace. You’ve come way too far to get backtracked that easy.”

“I won’t let you down.” Lightning turned to Ignis, though not quite used to his visual scarring, still nonetheless showing a genuine fondness for him too. “I have to say, Ignis. I’m happy at least one other person in the group played the sensible one around here. I’m definitely gonna miss that.”

“T’was a pleasure working with the esteemed Lightning Farron,” Ignis told her, a gentle smile crossing his face while looking in her voice’s direction. “Truly, I’m thankful of all the help you’ve done, but at the same time, a valued, unexpected friend was gained in the process.”

“Likewise. I don’t think I’ll ever meet anyone able to come up with that delicious of ‘recipes’ either.” In midst of imitating Ignis’ trademark pronunciation of his cooking methods, Lightning found herself drooling a little at the scrumptious food she’s partaken in during her time with him and the others. “Especially… such a perfect, juicy behemoth steak— err! Bottom line is, I’m gonna miss you too, Iggy.”

“Your compliments to the chef won’t go unappreciated. Do take care of yourself back home, Light.”

“I promise you’ve also got my word, Sir.” Then, Lightning turned her attention to Prompto, who looked on the verge of losing it as she gave him a kind smile to ease things up a little. “You know. I think I’m gonna miss you most of all, Prompto. You behave for our friends out here, alright?”

That did it. His efforts to smile for her were washed away by the pipes ultimately bursting, the photographer running and hugging Lightning tightly through his incoherently emotional blubbering. “I’m— oh, Pink, don’t go, I’m gonna miss you…!”

“Don’t cry now, Prompto. Who knows? There could be a chance I could find my way back to seeing you again.”

“I’m trying, but they just won’t stop…! You sure you can’t stay just a little longer?”

“Would if I could, but I’ve gotta go back to where I came from at some point.” Not unlike that of a mother consoling her bawling child, Lightning ran her fingers through Prompto’s chocobo-esque spiked locks to console him, the man simmering down into sniffles and hiccups after a little while. “Try to hang in there for me, Prom. I know you can.”

“Don’t… try not to forget me too much where you’re going.” Prompto coughed a bit from sobbing, using his forearm to clean his stained face as he at last flashed a tender smile to Lightning. “‘Cause any photog worth his salt wouldn’t dream of forgetting being around a face like yours.”

“Good thing you fit that bill right on the money, then. Think I’ll be keeping a few of your best shots for keepsake.” Lightning held up the photos Prompto had given her before and waggled them between her index and middle fingers before putting them back for safekeeping.

“Well, why stop there?” Prompto had his camera out already, gesturing for everyone to get together behind it while he held it in the selfie position. “One last group shot! Everybody get in!”

Prompto adjusted his camera once everyone was present and made the pose they desired, snapping the photograph expertly and saving it to his camera. He’d make sure to send the picture to Lightning as soon as humanly possible, but for now, everyone opted for looking at their final shot taken together. With Lightning herself, she said her last regards to the others so she could ensure she caught the next train back home. She noticed the whole time, Noct had been eerily quiet, but showed no signs of resent or defiance to name.

“Ya gonna say something or what?” Gladio demanded to know sternly from Noctis, earning a dirty look from the Lucian prince. “In case you haven’t noticed, Light’s leaving for home.”

“He might just need some time alone with her to say his goodbyes,” Ignis suggested a little less bluntly. “Is that correct, Noct?”

“Mmm-hmm. If that’s alright with you guys,” Noctis uttered, his heart aching the more reality started to sink into him.

“Take all the time you need,” Prompto told him comfortingly, putting a gentle hand on Noctis’ shoulder before going to lead Ignis in the same direction Gladio took off from.

Alright, now it was just him and her. They faced each other eye-to-eye, Noctis shyly stepping closer to Lightning and sealing a reasonable distance between them. All the sincerity bled right through his eyes, the same morose feeling in hers at what had to happen without any foreseeable way around it. It pained her heart just as much, but if there was something Lightning knew like the back of her hand, it was how nauseatingly different ease and duty tended to be.

It also seemed to include the difficulty in leaving behind her actual first love with no certain reason of returning to him again. Both of them had lives to live and get through, and the choice was tough, but no less for the better.

“This… is really it, huh?” Lightning sighed, frowning.

“Guess it is,” Noctis agreed, a hollow desolation evident in his dry voice. “And there’s no backing out of this, is there?”

“Afraid not. Staying here for too long is out of the question.”

“Well, wait. I wouldn’t go and say that.” Noctis’ cheeks burned a modest shade of red, scratching the back of his head to get out what he wanted to without sounding too foolish. “Like I said, I won’t keep you here any longer than you need. But— and though me and the others can handle things just fine, with Ignis’ eyesight having not come back yet… having another person around to still help us all out in the meantime wouldn’t hurt too much. You know?”

Lightning sunk her chin to her chest, her heart growing heavier with Noctis’ earnest pleas to get her to reconsider. There was pressure behind her teal eyes, but she wasn’t going to give into it. Not in front of him. “Temping as it is to stay longer, I know where I need to be now too. Besides, you just said it yourself; you four are capable of handling things without me, with or without Ignis being able to see.” She looked back up at him, her eyes shining and dewed. “Altissia’s over and done with, so— and so are we. That was the deal. Breaking my promise by keeping everyone else waiting because of my feelings would be completely unfair of me.”

“I—”

“My fight’s over, Noct. Now it’s time to let you four continue your own.”

Noctis could feel the rest of his heart breaking into hundreds of pieces at Lightning’s sincere, but very much honest words. The worst part was, she was completely right too. Making her stay behind and selfishly preventing her sister and friends from giving her the warm welcome home they were looking forward to? No. He loved her far too much to do something so awful. Forcing his brain against his heart, Noctis knew what conclusion he had to unfortunately come to.

“...I guess you’re right,” Noctis conceded, offering his hand and shaking it amicably when Lightning met him the remaining way after hesitating. “I’ll see you around, Lightning. Thanks for everything, and take good care of yourself.”

“Pleasure to be a part of the mission,” Lightning replied, releasing Noctis from the handshake and smiling sadly. “You be just as careful out here. I’ve got a feeling you’ll do just fine in the long run. And… as a king.”

“Heh. Here’s to hoping.” Noctis began walking his own way when something in him commanded him to stop, turning back to Lightning before she had the chance to leave just yet. “...Claire, hang on.”

“What is it?” Further use of her real name captured her attention, Lightning facing Noctis once again to see what else was to be said.

“Well, first, I wanna give this to you.” Noctis reached into his pocket and balled the item into his grasp, laying it down on Lightning’s bare palm and letting go. When she opened her hand, sky blue eyes widening to see a studded rose gold scallop shell brooch resting on it. “I got this back in Altissia, but never got enough courage to give it to you. You said Bodhum’s a seaside town, so I thought you’d like something a little closer to your old home.”

“...It’s lovely. Thanks.” Lightning closed her fingers around the brooch, storing it in one of her pockets to keep it intact. “Is that all?”

“No, now I just wanna say something else. You may not be needed here anymore, but…” A wistful smile crossed Noctis’ face, his eyes watering and fighting back letting the tears fall to darken the mood even more, “just know you’ll always be wanted here. With us.”

Lightning was breathless when he’d said that to her, the words a heavy contrast to how they’d have been in the past. Without saying anything, she took long steps forward to Noctis while looking more downwards as if hiding her eyes. Once close enough, she pulled the prince tightly into a heartfelt embrace, her forehead to his shoulder. Noctis’ hesitated for a second at the sudden action, simmering down and wrapping his arms around her just as lovingly.

She released the hug to rest her hands on both of his shoulders to look into those alluring night-blue eyes for one last time. The delicate smile from before never left her face, matching her personal heartbreak to a perfect tee. From behind, the train whistle blared to warn Lightning that her ride home was bound to leave very soon, separating her from Noctis to hurry and run to it and board. Any sort of luggage bag she’d been carrying was stowed away, the owner taking her seat and feeling the train move away from its resting spot in the Cartanica Station. Lightning took the brooch from her pocket, staring it down as her tears finally dripped from her eyes after she’d already traveled further past where Noctis was last.

‘Don’t let him see you cry, Claire,’ Lightning vowed internally, using her sleeve to clean the tears away and clasping her gift brooch protectively in her other grip.

Noctis didn’t at all bother watching the train leave his sight. Before it went too far, he turned his back on it and another beloved he’d never again get to see to walk towards where his remaining friends were. The broken heart beating heavily in his chest started to numb, the pain still existing but hardening in the form of a tiresome gloom. He saw Prompto, assuming Ignis and Gladio’s absence to be justified by the two waiting on them both.

“...You gonna be okay, dude?” Prompto asked, sympathetic.

“Dunno,” Noctis got out, hardly able to even look at his best friend.

“What are you thinking now?”

“I think…” Noctis looked behind him, the tracks now free of Lightning’s train as if it was never there in the first place. “...I just got dumped.”

[sovietarchive-blog]

so i need to know what are certian things you see in illya others dont? does he fear anything? does he wish to redo anything? what is his relationship with solo & teller now? does he still see himself as a monster? how do you canon his sexuality and kgb training? is more attuned to uncle or the kgb? has he seen his parents ever again? does he lile to travel, if so best place he traveled? what was the one thing he got in trouble for the most as a child? who does he look up to?

          thank you so much for sending this in!  I love questions like this and don’t get the opportunity to answer them very often.  while I can’t say that I definitively see things in illya that other people definitely don’t  –  I do flatter myself that I’ve put an enormous amount of thought into his character and understand him pretty well, so I’m really excited to delve into all of these things!

does he fear anything?

          illya is very, very human, despite what some might think.  (see: solo’s initial comments to his superior officer after that first chase with him.)  he certainly has fears, although death isn’t among them ;  he’d much rather die with honor than live with shame.  for the most part, he’s been desensitized to fears the way most people see them, as part of his kgb training, because ultimately the goal is for these agents to have very little for their enemies to hold over their heads / threaten them with.  that said, his superiors, as exhibited in the film, actively fed illya’s single deepest fear:  ending up like his father.  in a way, I think that fear was partially artificially created by the institution which got its claws into him at an incredibly young age ;  even before his official kgb training, he attended ‘exclusive’ schools closely monitored by the government and was fed propaganda which eventually morphed his opinion of both himself and his country, which we see later.

          illya has very little concern for his own self-preservation and clearly quite a low self-image, in that he sees himself as little more than a cog in the soviet machine.  shame on himself is shame on his country  –  and perhaps more importantly than that, shame on his family.  his mother remains a deeply important part of his life and I think that he fears for her reputation as well.  solo brings up his mother’s reputation in the movie  –  and I think illya’s rage has less to do with how his father’s friends saw her and more with the fact that these were things she had to do in order to keep herself and her young son afloat.  he never wants to put her in the same position his father did, and the idea of shaming himself and compromising her in the process is also a great fear of his.  all other fears, in comparison, are inconsequential.

does he wish to redo anything?

          I’m not sure illya has ever felt like he has the sort of autonomy to be able to wish this.  even later on in life, when he’s been given the opportunity to step back from the soviets, join u.n.c.l.e., and eventually retire, even after he comes to terms with the fact that he didn’t deserve what they did to him, he realizes that things could not have ended up any other way.  he was too young to have had the opportunity to make a choice when they got their hands on him, and by the time he’s deep into the kgb, it was simply too dangerous to try to leave  –  and he has his mother to think about.  fortunately, u.n.c.l.e. provided him some relief and eventually he gets to leave spying entirely, but when it comes to wishing he could redo things?

          honestly there’s the occasional moment he wishes he could relive.  he wishes he could say something else to someone he likes, instead of being his awkward self.  he wishes he would have used a different move in a fight or a different interrogation tactic in a particular moment.  but when it comes to overarching themes of his life?  there’s not much he feels he could have done differently even if he wanted to.

what is his relationship with solo & teller now?

          I can honestly say that every dynamic I’ve ever imagined or rped with others has me convinced that, despite occasional roadblocks, illya grows to deeply care for both solo and teller more than anyone he’s ever cared for in his life, except perhaps his mother.  you see those relationships growing in the duration of the film, but illya  …  well, frankly, he’s never had anything like a functional family, nor people he feels actually care about him.  his relationship with gaby obviously progresses more quickly in the film  –  in that he’s willing to even voice his concern about her to solo later on and he’s very soft with her particularly in their last one on one scene  –  but I think that solo returning his watch is a real turning point in their relationship.  obviously, they’ve grown to care in some capacity about each other and they’re in a place where they won’t leave each other behind.  illya definitely feels some level of camaraderie with solo even before this moment.  but until then, he’s absolutely planning on killing solo for the disc.  sure, illya is aware that solo was, more or less, saving his own skin in that moment  –  but the fact that solo a) remembered the significance of the watch, b) considered that even as they were storming that island and c) thought enough of it to both recognize and take back the watch to begin with, is more thoughtfulness by far than illya is used to, despite the motivations of the exact moment in which he returns it.

          the following scene, in which they burn the disc, is by far the most egregious breach of orders illya has ever committed, but not only is he unwilling to destroy this relationship he’s built up, no matter how tenuous it remains, he’s also fully aware of the implications of either the u.s.a. or soviet union getting their hands on that disk.

          I can only imagine those strange yet strong bonds deepen with each mission.  regardless of any romantic connections, which largely rely on my rp partners, he would die for either of them, whether or not they feel the same.  he’s never had a dynamic support system like the one they offer, and frankly, I think waverly, to some extent, is included in this as well.  as far as illya is concerned, even if only on a subconscious level, this is the closest thing he’s had since childhood to a real family and he’ll do anything to protect that.

does he still see himself as a monster?

          yes and no.  having functional and meaningful relationships with other people, as we see him developing at the end of tmfu, certainly helps him understand his humanity outside of what the kgb expects of him.  I think he will always be somewhat ashamed of some of the things he’s done  –  and alarmingly blasé about others  –  and he’s certainly, to some extent, broken for the rest of his life, but having gaby and solo in his life absolutely helps him rebuild at least some of his opinion of himself, allowing him to see more than just a monster or a machine, because they help him see more than that, too.

          I haven’t written much about his relationship with waverly either  …  but I’m fairly convinced that the human way in which waverly treats them  ( shitty sarcastic jokes and all )  helps a great deal with this recovery process as well.  the way his soviet handler speaks to him is alarmingly awful, and even though waverly pokes dry fun at both the boys at almost all times, I have a hard time believing he wouldn’t be a far more empathetic boss than illya is used to  –  likely checking in on their well being, as he did for gaby, and just generally being  …  a pleasant superior in the harsh world of intelligence.  specifically I headcanon that waverly learns everything he can about illya’s skills and encourages him to use all of them, particularly those that aren’t connected to his physical prowess and rather to his intellectual side, which I think is often underutilized and underestimated by others.

how do you headcanon his sexuality and kgb training?

          since I don’t have time to go into his whole kgb training, I’m just going to kind of  …  do this as a ‘how did his training affect his sexuality’ even though I don’t know if that’s how it’s meant.  it’s really quite simple:  russia has never felt great about homosexuality, so although he’s always been attracted to men, it’s always something he’s vehemently ignored and tried to move past.  it’s been drilled into him over and over that same sex attraction is a bad thing  –  and furthermore that the government won’t hesitate to hurt him over it.  it’s something that makes him feel dirty and wrong for a very long time, at least until he’s a little more freed from their expectations.

          illya has been aware of his attraction to both men and women since he was in his mid-teens.  do I think he was ever punished for it?  no, because he’s always been quiet, cautious, and watchful.  I don’t think he’s ever told anybody up until  ( and frankly past )  tmfu canon, because before he ever had the chance to trust anyone enough to reveal it, he saw what happened to those who did and were found out.  within the ranks, it could be brutal and it put him off ever vocalizing his feelings, encouraging him instead to hold those urges back for years.

          in this way, u.n.c.l.e. serves yet another healthy purpose for him.  it gives him just a little more freedom to explore himself  –  and furthermore, an environment in which to do it.  I’m a big subscriber to the napoleon / illya ship and I actually don’t think that illya had much, if any, experience with men before he and solo started their thing  –  which again varies depending on who I’m rping with / what situation I’m thinking of.  this is something he’s repressed for a very long time, and no matter what, it takes time for him to be comfortable with his sexuality.  I also can’t get on board with the initial solo / illya hate-fucking that I see a lot, even though I really wish I could, mostly because I think that illya would absolutely have to learn to trust solo long before he’d be willing to engage with him sexually  --  because he’s terrified of the repercussions and what the russians would do to him, his mother, and his reputation as a result if they found out.

is he more attuned to u.n.c.l.e. or the kgb?

          I think that, at first, he’d like to think it’s the kgb, but he’s always been more attuned to u.n.c.l.e.  I’ve explained many of the reasons why further up in this post, but it basically comes down to the fact that u.n.c.l.e. offers him a camaraderie that the kgb never has and the people he works with in the organization actually care about him as a human being rather than just a weapon.

has he seen his parents ever again?

          he never saw his father after he was shipped off to siberia when illya was a child.  however, as for his mother, he did actually grow up with her still around and he maintains a pretty good relationship with her, although he doesn’t care for the man she eventually chose to remarry, who was a friend of his father’s.  he talks to her somewhat regularly and spends holidays with her when he can, although often he ends up being away and simply sends her a present.  he loves his mother very much and will always be available for her, no matter what.

does he like to travel?  if so, what’s the best place he’s ever traveled?

          this is another ‘yes and no’ question.  he’s spent the majority of his career traveling and I think that he has questionable memories in the majority of the world.  he equates a lot of his traveling experience with his profession and that’s not necessarily a good thing for his opinion of it.  however, he’s also an academic and he does love to visit certain locations around the world when he can.  he loves germany.  he loves vienna.  he loves egypt and scotland and croatia.  he didn’t initially like paris at all but he’s grown to truly appreciate it over the years.

          after his retirement, I think he finds much more peace in traveling for himself and thus will enjoy it more.  however, as for his favorite place, I headcanon that he purchases land sometime during his career in the black forest of western germany, a few miles outside a small town, in a very picturesque location where he can essentially just  ...  disappear.  the mystery and lore and beauty of that area just  ...  fits him wonderfully.  I think he’d want a place outside of russia in addition to his moscow flat, which he visits less and less as he gets older, and the entire area is just so lovely and fairly isolated and would give him an opportunity to really live his best life.  it’s not so much traveling, as he would live there, but it would certainly be his favorite place.  it’s peaceful and beautiful and honestly waht he deserves.

what was the one thing he in trouble for the most as a child?

          he was largely a very well behaved child, especially after his father was taken away, and I don’t think he got into pretty much any trouble after his father was taken to the gulag, because it scared him too much.  he was also always a very quiet boy without too many friends and certainly not prone to being disruptive or careless or really even particularly reckless.  ( even the recklessness we see in the film is typically very calculated. )  as a schoolchild, I think he used to get in trouble for a) not engaging well with other children and b) probably trying to read while the teacher taught, on occasion.

          when the ‘ psychotic episodes ’ began  ...  that was a different story.  I think that he unwittingly hurt several fellow students and was subsequently sent to reform / military schools.  nobody really did much to help what was happening to him and instead the government eventually took advantage of this part of him.  he has them largely under control now, but it’s still something that continues to haunt him  --  and that he continues to struggle with regularly, as we see.

who does he look up to?

          illya’s past is  ...  almost devoid of any role models, when you really think about it.  his superiors were almost always fairly cruel, and while he respected them and strove to please, I don’t really think he looked up to them.  he once looked up to his father, but that faded once he was sent off ;  frankly, his father broke his heart and betrayed him, and while he still holds love for him in his heart, I wouldn’t say he looks up to him.

          in his youth, I think that illya was guided largely by the heroes of russian literature, in the absence of anyone of flesh and blood.  grigoriy pechorin of lermontov’s a hero of our time.  pierre bezukhov of tolstoy’s war and peace.  ( oddly )  rodion raskolnikov of dostoyevsky’s crime and punishment.  university had an excellent influence on him, however, as the professors he encountered there gave him an opportunity to look up to real people, and he remains in contact particularly with his mentors from his graduate and doctorate programs, as often as he can.  university was the first time when he connected with people he felt were interested in mentoring him, rather than simply controlling him, and it was a very positive experience for him.

          I also believe that he eventually develops a real respect and admiration for waverly as a superior officer.  waverly, who is intelligent, often kind, but also firm.  waverly, who grows to understand illya’s humor more quickly than others do.  waverly, the first superior in his life who genuinely ends up being kind to him.  in his life as a spy, this relationship ends up providing him the most guidance and confidence, eventually.