#its been awhile since i scrapped her but the idea of scrapping one of my first ocs (made 2007 or earlier idk) is still so weird

[rando-lesbo210]

This is going to out me as the anon but I got too many ideas and wanted to show really bad how the au designs are in my brain because a lot of @scrap-brainzone 's stuff inspired with it and aus so this is a babble about it and some extra info on my aus!

(also at the end I made a doodle of gaige x ty x moze specifically in thanks and also to show appreciation as a gift)

ALSO SUPER SORRY THIS IS GOING TO BE A GIANT POST.

Going simple first, I wanted to show the differences, although I haven't touched Angelic Guardian in awhile and Hyperion brand new with posting I wanted to show anyways- I'll add tidbit about each under this, so sorry for anyone trying to decipher my chicken scratch

Underneath Ms Ceos heavy ass eyeliner and makeup is the eridium effects as displayed here, she's went under several different surgeries repeatedly trying to hide any of the effects and uses cameras and altering her look digitally to her advantage. Her big problem is she Can't let people know because she fears if people knew, they're going to try and kidnap her again. (Mildly irrational considering all her security but it's a fair worry.) She hasn't touched eridium since the end of BL2, so she's most clean, but with how much she had the damage has been done.

Ah, Fallen Heir au. Angel's given up caring about who sees, only hiding before to stay away from the Crimson Raiders and cultists, but after both sides know? It's so what to her. She's technically the most fit and least afraid to use her abilities because she doesn't care as much about hurting others around her. If I were to describe her attitude/self in one sentence of dialog it'd basically be, "They refuse to see me as anything but a monster, so that's what I'll be."

Alas, my dear Angelic Guardian. As you can see, she's very much not holding up well. Her suit uses eridium to help keep her going but still at what cost? She's technically extremely fit, but the repercussions are severe if she pushes too far. Her level of eridium poisoning is beyond dangerous, having been in stasis for 5 years while still receiving eridium to keep her alive. I'll end it here by saying this has severe consequences that unfortunately, she was doomed to face regardless.

Ai Ange? Well. Not very much of anything but mild traits. I, in turn, made one for Gaige with that au.

Angel isn't very the most comfortable with Gaige using eridium, mainly due to the fact its less "as needed" but she likes to test limits and see what she can really do.

moving on I made some goofies and such from my Fallen au, wanting to show interactions (Mildly for also scrap because I know tyreen and tygaige a favorite)

Tygaige alas, would heavy struggle unless we get villain redemption pt 2 like Angel, but she won't be very pleased about it at first before accepting. I'm a sucker for Gaigel, so it'll lean that way, but to entertain the idea would be interesting. I might do that sometime.

if you're curious though with Angel there, it is a shitpost and I have drawn it with the idea Tyreen was monologing, but Angel just turned off her shield and straight up shot a bitch. (Tyreen easily healed with eridium but it was the audacity that was most surprising) the fallen au is pretty funny because besides that, she's also: Made Troy punch himself, then also has made his arm punch Tyreen. Will hack their shows if she's upset enough and fucks with their things. General fun, yknow. An issue Ange faces in the end is because she's so "eridium enriched" it's like double tasty snack to the twins, so that's always fun. (In fairness to Troy and with another drawing, Angel in this au has also made Gaige punch herself a few times when she got upset. She's very petty and I support it)

AND LASTLY

This is a mild gift to scrap-brainzone! I'm really sorry thr quality and coloring isn't the best on this (or most of the images), I was mildly rushing from time and far too excited to finish this and post it to show.

FUCK I REALIZED I DIDNT ADD THE BLUSHES. GOD. I'll do it tomorrow and edit or reblog this one, god I knew I was forgetting something-

The trio may not be my personal cup of tea, but it is very cute and I couldn't stop laughing/thinking about a post similar about the White Girl Swag so I wanted to be silly and make one

I'm too loyal to Gaigel, but who doesn't like to look and toy with other ideas? I never considered it much until seeing their art and it good shit, how could i not? Anyways, rambling, hope this isn't too bad or shoddy of a gift, I'll hopefully make something better soon, I was just too excited to post and show

anyone else who.made it this far you should totally totally go to scrap-brainzone 's blog it's great good shit 100/10 👍

[blueikeproductions]

Wondering about Rise of the Beasts synergy atm. Age of Extinction somewhat influenced Rescue Bots and RiD15 by the inclusion of Dinobots as major characters (the Rescue Bots assuming Dinosaur beast modes while Bee’s unit would have a Dinobot that was originally a new stegosaurus character but would later become Grimlock).

The success of the first movie would’ve seen Animated’s Autobot team altered to mimic the team used in the 07 movie, like Ratchet turning green and Ironhide replacing Bulkhead, though Animated was canceled for this could take effect. (The one thing I am happy about because I wasn’t personally a fan of this change, despite being a fan of the movie and TFA.)

So I’m currently wondering how Hasbro might try similar synergy with EarthSpark. It’s been insisted by the likes of AndyUnicronus now Axiom Nexus that Optimus Primal and Megatron could appear but I’m not sure of the specifics there. My own, unlikely scenario was they’d be remnant Autobots and Decepticons from Cybertron stopping by Earth to check up on what’s happening, but Axiom offers ideas of them being Terrans to mirror the idea of Maximals typically being the descendants of the Autobots.

Rumors with RotB as of typing suggest the Maximals are from a dead colony planet (the Jungle Planet but take your pick if it’s called something like Animatros, Eukaris, Biosfera or Energoa) that escaped the Terrorcons’ wrath and settled on Earth in its prehistory until the Autobots met them in the 90’s. Optimus Primal appearing as a colonist feels more likely, but I don’t know if that would over complicate EarthSpark’s mostly simple narrative by including other Transformer colonies (as much as I would like to see it and the resulting culture clash).

I feel like though the easiest to implement would be Mirage and the Terrorcons for now though. Mirage is easy enough, he’s a young Autobot about Bumblebee’s age, has sort of a spoiled rich kid personality that’s thoroughly fed up with their Earth vacation but when the chips are down, comes through for the Autobots and Maltobots. He’s successful at hiding from GHOST because of his mastery of holograms and invisibility, and performs tricks to entertain the Malto kids and Terrans. I can see his arc being similar to Rescue Bots Blurr where he comes out of hiding and crashes with the Maltos for awhile, and he learns to become less selfish and more of a team player overtime.

The Terrorcons, similar to the film, are the Decepticon replacement, though instead of being minions of Unicron, they’d preferably be a splinter faction that resumed the Decepticon Empire out in space, coming to Earth to conquer it or just blow it the skrud up if it comes to it. Alternatively they could be akin to the mostly scrapped Star Seekers, Transformers mad at other Transformers enough that they’re blowing up colony worlds for “reasons”, and now Earth is the latest one in their sights (after that Gobotron and Skalor!). Scourge would still be the leader, but I’m not sure if Battletrap or Nightbird would be included in this scenario, since I don’t know if EarthSpark would whip out Nightbird as a hidden Decepticon instead (though would she be a Cadillac like Arcee since the modern trend is to repaint her from Arcee…). Whoever would make up the team, I feel strongly there should be some Beast Mode guys in there. Preferably some more Beast Wars characters, but G1 guys like Squeezeplay or Horri-Bull would fit well here. So would Skullcruncher but uh, he’s already here lol.

[starboundsingularity]

Um- hello there! Nice to see you guys stopping by my blog.

So uh- I've got some unfortunate news......

You see, as I'm writing this post, asks that I have yet to answer are slowly piling up in my inbox. And I'm starting to lose the motivation to write the prompts out. For awhile now, actually. I seemingly have no more ideas and don't have enough creativity juice in this noggin o' mine to actually produce anything else.

So, it is with great displeasure that I must announce that this au might be- discontinued. Which is really sad to me, because new people that are expecting *new* stuff are piling in! But I truly don't have the energy to continue this little project.

Well, now that it's kind of...over, for this. What happens next?

I figured that since I'll most likely not use the leftover concepts that's been cookin' in my head for this au- I might aswell share it with you all right now! So buckle up, buttercup. We're going out with a bang.

(WARNING: EXTREME RAMBLINGS INBOUND)

Okay! So, one of the more prominent concepts that I was planning on expanding involved mask and the rest of Team Cyan! For those who saw the post involving his headshot, you would have noticed that he was a bit...melty. And that's cause he is! And the rest of his team too!

Managing to survive the Nils Statue that started it all, Team Cyan stayed in inkopolis since day one. Surviving off of scraps and scavenging resources from abandoned apartments, they found no reason to leave. They were sneaky after all. Falling into whatever slime coated the city was the least of their problems. (And since the early stages of the ooze were relatively harmless, they were almost completely unscathed.)

Of course, the ooze slowly started to develop over time. And so did its potency. So without realizing- (or maybe they just didn't care) Team Cyan were exposed to the effects of the hive in an extremely slow process. By the time the hive reached a point where it could actually move around and "hunt", Mask and Co. Weren't even considered potential targets. To the hive, they were so close to the edge of joining that it cant even tell them apart from itself.

So yea! They're slowly yet surely becoming one with the hivemind. Woopsies.

Second major concept!!!

One of my favorite perspectives during the blog was with Prince and N-Pacer, and that was mainly because I was planning a huge story thing even before I started the whole blog!

For those who remember, they weren't able to recover Emperor and the rest of Team Monarch when the Nils Statue hit- as they were the only two together during the massive event. Prince is in denial, while N-Pacer assumed the worst. (Which played into her overprotective nature of his brother.)

So the thing is- Emperor is actually dead. Just gone. One with the cephalopod smoothie. And I wanted a moment where Prince snuck away from N-Pacer in the middle of the night to try and scavenge for himself, leading him to be isolated in the woods of Mt. Nantai.

And guess who's there with him!!!! That's right baby!!! The ooze is there!!!! And what can mimic voices????? THE OOZE!!!!

So using emperor's voice, the sentient Mt. Dew slushie almost lures Prince into an ambush- before N-Pacer manages to scare it away at the last second! She scoops up Prince, and a chase ensues.

They would escape, and would leave Mt. Nantai due to the fact that their safe space was now infiltrated. The duo would eventually meet up with Aloha's group, but that's about it.

And the last concept that I kinda scrapped rather quickly but I thought it was cool enough to include it anyways- there was a point where there would be a major twist in the blog where you guys: the askers- were the ooze all along!!! Trying to gather information about our protagonists to hunt them down! But unfortunately, it didn't make that much sense to me. How would they connect to the character's communication line? What would happen once they figure out the truth? Stuff like that. Alas, it was neat.

So! That's the end of it!

You all were an absolutely amazing audience, and I had a blast with the little time we had together. There's no end to the amount of thanks I need to give, truly! But this story needs to come to an end.

(Unless someone wants to continue it *cough*)

So, yeah. It's been fun everybody! I'll see you on the flipside.

-The Author

[miraelisarchive]

gentle.png

since i made this in december last year i have completely scrapped niari as a part of my story and as an oc, and i just feel like that deserves some acknowledgement (to myself). goodbye buddy 👋

[gremlinbehaviour]

leon and lancelot for the prompt "you- you did this! HOW did you do this?"

“Well, I hoped Elyan would have gotten neater with age, but it seems like that’s not the case,” Leon sighed as he made his way into the forge. It was truly a disaster. Tools were strewn everywhere, along with swords, hunks of metal, gloves, books, a loaf of bread, you name it. How one was supposed to work in such a mess, much less forge hot chunks of metal and handle deadly weapons, he had no idea. If this was what his shop looked like at home where he at least had Gwen and Lancelot around to help him clean up once in while, Leon was scared to see how bad his forge had been when he lived outside of Camelot. How had he managed to not kill himself on accident?

“Um, actually, this was me,” Lancelot said sheepishly as he picked his way around a pile of scraps. Leon just about tripped over an anvil in his shock. Despite the shenanigans with his seal of nobility, the First Knight had still kind of assumed that Lancelot was at least slightly less chaotic than his childhood friend. Maybe he only seemed that way since he was older, but still, he had been very honorable and logical when he negotiated with Uther about remaining in Camelot as a castle guard instead of a knight after he killed the griffin, and he’d managed to stay mostly out of trouble since then, becoming one of Leon’s greatest allies in dealing with the trouble that always seemed to befall the castle and its inhabitants.

“You- you did this?” Leon demanded. “HOW did you do this?” How could anyone stand to live like this? How had Gwen not thrown Lancelot out of their house already? Well, he supposed that since she had been very fond of him for awhile, and now he was dating her brother who had moved back home, perhaps she had to put up with him, but still. It was her house, legally, and Leon would have thrown out anyone who was such a pig, brother or lover or no. Perhaps he wasn’t the best judge of that, since he’d never had either, but still.

“Well, Gwen was complaining that she can never find anything when she wants to use the forge since Elyan tends to just put things down where they make sense for him, so I was just trying to clean up a little and open up some space and-”

“Wait, this is after you tried to clean up?” Leon asked, somehow even more appalled. A second ago, he wouldn’t have thought that was possible.

“Well yeah, you know that stage when you’re organizing and it looks worse than when you started?”

“Lancelot I have never been in a room in my life that looked remotely as bad as this.”

“I kind of assumed that was the case, which is why I asked for your help.” Leon didn’t know the proper response to that, so he just groaned. “I thought that since you keep the armory so neat and organized-”

“I have a literal army of squires and pages that do that for me,” Leon corrected him.

“Oh, um, sorry, I guess,” Lancelot mumbled. The First Knight sighed.

“Well, I’m already down here. Might as well help you out anyway. Tell me what your plan was for organizing this mess before it all went wrong.”

Lancelot smiled as he realized his friend would help and together, they got to work.

[alice-angel12x]

💔Dainseif x Reader

a bit Houseki no Kuni crossover/ characters

It's been so long since the fall of Khaenri'ah, there isn't much I remember from those times. Most of which are small facts and details most likely lost to time. Though there is one precious thing or person I remember before the Gods' wrath fell upon the city, their name was Y/n. I remember their lovely smile, their warm embrace, the softness of their skin, and their melodious voice whispering sweet nothing into my ear.

Sadly they were taken from me in the destruction of Khaenri'ah. It was my duty as the Twilight Sword to protect the people of Khaenri'ah, to protect them, and I failed. A curse of long life was placed upon me as many of the people turned and transformed into monsters.

I fell into despair when the strange goddess from Celestia appeared before me. If I were to stop the rebellion from the abyss, she would return what I lost. At first, I had no idea what she could have meant, but I would learn soon. In desperation, I foolishly agreed to her wishes, looking back now I shouldn't have so stupidly agreed. The gods have never blessed me in the past, I should have never hoped they would in the future. After so long many details of Y/n have faded, and at times I wonder if they were just my imagination.  Yet I did meet strange people along my travels, one of them had grown dear to me.

---------

The last thing I remember is seeing a red sky with a strange goddess glaring down at everyone below. Red and black cubes floated about her. Some was calling out a name, Y/n I believe, then suddenly everything goes black as I was shoved to the ground. During that time of darkness, all I could feel was a strong will. I didn't want to perish and return too... I can no longer remember. Whenever I try to search my mind all I can find is a strange figure standing ahead of me, with its hand outstretched to me.

When I finally opened my eyes, I found myself surrounded by ruins that had long burned. Plants grew through the fissures in the destroyed stones, many skeletons were scattered along the ground. I felt strange for some reason, looking down at my arms, they sparkled in the sunlight. It shined a gleaming blue, it looked like Noctilucous Jade. My whole body seemed to be made of it; my legs, fingers, even my (Hair length) hair glimmered of the gem. Who am I?

I shakily got to my feet, as my body shined in the sun. The land ahead was a beautiful green as the leaves and trees swayed in the gentle wind. I was quite obviously alone, but why? Why was I so desperate for life? Maybe If I wander about I'll... Find my answer.

-------------

As I tracked the abyss, I came across a small group of the abyss mages. Who was occupied with corning some poor wanderer, raising my hand and unleashing my power made quick work of the horrid creatures. Something was off about this wanderer, so I approached cautiously. This being looked to be made of precious material, jade perhaps. Yet their form looked familiar to me, somehow.

A brief image of Y/n flashed in my mind. Yet I quickly shook my head, they are not the same. Everyone from Khaenri'ah

"umm, thank you, sir," They said as they slowly stood.

As looked them over, and noticed they wore greatly diminished garments of a Khaenri'ahen citizen. "Where did you get those clothes?" I asked.

"I don't know, I just woke up with these clothes," The being said as they looked down at their clothes.

"So wondered, why do you travel teyvat?" I asked them.

"I do not remember, I just remember not wanting to parish and return to someone. Yet I can't remember who?" they said with a confused look in their eyes. " Why do you travel?"

"That is not important," I said simply.

"So why do your eyes appear so sad?" They asked again.

"What do you mean?" I asked them.

"You seem lonely. Can I travel with you, just till I find my answer," They begged?

Staring at their sparkling face, I couldn't shake that feeling of familiarity. Still, if they really are a tiny few of Khaenri'ahen that survive, and didn't turn into monsters. I guess their companionship would be fine I suppose.

"If that is what you wish I won't stop you, but I will be following dangerous monsters. I will not always be able to protect you, so follow at your own risk," I warned them.

"Thank you, Mr... Umm,"

"Dainseif," I answered. ," And what of your name?"

"Mr.Dainseif," They smiled warmly

"I don't remember my name, I'm not sure if I have one," The being said.

"Hmm, well from now on your name is... Jade," Dainseif said.

"Well, my name is jade. Mr.Dainseif,"

--------------------------

It has been 500 years since the fall of Khaenri'ah.

I have been traveling with Jade for almost as long, even when they learned many things of me. Even when the abyss princess offered Jade the option to join her and her war on destiny, Jade always remained by my side.

"Why didn't you leave with Lumine, jade?" I asked them.

"I understand her, but I don't think the entire fall of Khaenri'ah is your fault. And I don't think you're a bad person, so you must be doing this for a good reason," Jade smiled.

"No, I'm doing this for a selfish reason. The gods of Celestia promised me, that if I take down the abyss, they would return Y/n to me," Dainseif said with a sad and bitter look on his face," I was foolish to accept, but I now know better to anger the gods."

"You must really love this Y/n. That so sweet," Jade smiled warmly.

"I think they would have agreed with you, but it's unlikely they would actually return them to me," I explained.

"Well, it wouldn't be godly of them if they don't uphold their own promise right?" Jade asked.

"I suppose, but who can say," I said as a sigh escaped my lips." I really do hope Y/n is waiting for me at the end of this journey."

"So it's off to mondstadt right?" Jade asked with an excited smile on their face.

"Yes,"

----------------

In mondstadt we met a very odd but familiar-looking traveler, he looked very similar to Lumine, but with longer hair and different clothing. With him a floating child accompanied him, they seemed to be interested in Mr.Dainsleif. Soon they accompanied us on the hunt for the abyss herald. Soon we found ourselves in wolvendom

"Stay here Jade, I'm going to look around for further clues. If danger comes around, just find me, or run to safety and I'll come and find you," Dainsleif said gently to me.

"Alright, be careful," I said with slight worry on my face.

Dainsleif nodded as he patted my head softly. As I waited for his return My mind tried to dig further into my hazier memories. She remembers running with someone pulling her past the destruction of Khaenri'ah. Yet I was pulled from my thoughts when the traveler and Paimon shortly arrived.

"Oh, where did Dain go?" Paimon asked.

"He went to investigate the area further," I answered." He'll be back soon."

" O-oh alright. Hey, Jade right? So how long have you been traveling with Dain?" Piamon asked.

"For as long as I can remember," I answered simply.

"What is Dain like, if I may ask?" aether asked.

"Well. When I first met him, he was quiet and hard to talk to since he mostly kept to himself," I said, as I thought back. " Though Know he is very caring in his own way, and he is very lonely behind his stoic face."

"Lonely? W-what makes you say that?" Paimon asked.

"Well, a long time ago he lost his lover. And at times, I think he projects them onto me," I said slowly.

"What do you mean?" Aether asked.

"Sometimes when he is in time of sorrow, he would hug and hold me close, and whisper sweet things to me, but the name he calls is Y/n," I said sadly." The next day he would ask me to forget about it."

"Wha that so sad, Paimon feels sorry for him," Painmon frowns.

"What about you? Why do you travel with him?" Aether asked.

"At first I simply followed in hopes to learn about myself, and why I am this way along my journey with Dainsleif. Maybe learn what I have forgotten, but know I follow Dainsleif to keep him company. I can learn about my origins after Dain finishes his journey." I smiled.

But before we could continue our conversation, abyss mages and hilicurls appeared. They surrounded us as they slowly closed in on us. Aether readied his sword, as I unsheathed my sword as well.

The fight was tough, I got scrapped and chipped along the way but we managed. It of now was an ice shard flew past and cracked a good chunk of my face. Half of my face was broken off, but thankfully traveler made quick work of the monster.

"Ahh! Jade are you okay?!" Paimon gasped.

"I'm fine, thou could you help look for my face?" I asked.

"Jade!" Dainsleif called out.

I slowly and nervously turned to face Dain. As I slowly opened my one eye and saw the sadness and worry in his eyes.

" What happened? I thought I told you to run away at the first sign of danger," Dainsleif said as he cupped my cheek and held me close.

" We were surrounded, there was no choice but to fight," I said to him.

"You need to be careful, you're too fragile," Dainsleif sighed as his fingers traced the cracks on my face. As I stared I could see he wasn't seeing me.

"I'm fine, I just need the left side of my face," I said as I looked away.

"Y/- Jade, please be careful," Dain stuttered as he looked away bashfully," I'm sorry."

--------

Soon the two groups parted ways as Aether and Paimon watched them leave.

"Wow, Dain must really miss this Y/n person if he mistakes two different people," Paimon sighed sadly.

"Something tells me there destiny and journey are more intertwined then they relieaze," Aether said veguly.

"What makes you say that?" Paimon asked.

"Aether is not wrong about that," Venti said as he suddenly appeared.

"AHHH! Tone deaf bard what are you doing here?!" Paimon gasped.

"I was around dragon spire for awhile. Those two have such a tragic story," Venti frowned sadly.

"What do you mean?" Paimon asked

"The princess the knight searches for has always been by his side, and the companion made of beautiful jade's answer had always been beside them," Venti said sadly as he strumd his lyre.

[heyhey-heyward]

WHAT WE WANT | part one

THE INVITATION

summary: You’ve always had a complicated relationship with JJ Maybank. Complicated in the sense that JJ has always had a crush on you and is unable to express it in other ways than shameless flirting. 

word count: 1.5k

series masterlist

If you’re a tourist on the Outer Banks looking for some place to eat, you’re probably going to end up at The Wreck. If you’re a strapped for cash teenager named JJ, Pope, or John B looking to score a free meal, you’re also probably going to end up at The Wreck.

Which is where the three found themselves as their fourth member, Kiara, the daughter of the owner of The Wreck, finished her shift. They were at a table in the back, halfway through lunch and trying their hardest to not be too rowdy and get kicked out. Kiara told her dad she was taking a break and shoved herself into the booth with the boys.

“Kegger tonight?” John B questioned out of the blue, pausing his game of throwing fries at Pope as he tried to catch them in his mouth. So far, they had been unsuccessful—evident by the way the ground around them was littered with fries.

“That’s a good idea.” JJ pointed at his best friend since the third grade with a grin that seemed to always spell trouble. And without further deliberation, it was settled. The Pogues would throw a party in celebration of absolutely nothing.

The door opened and a new customer entered, though that didn’t catch the attention of the group. JJ, who was seated in the same side of the booth as John B, both had their backs to the door. Neither bothered to turn around, assuming that it was just another tourist stopping in to escape the summer heat. That was, until, the newcomer spoke up and JJ recognized the voice immediately.

“Hey, Mr. C.” The cheery voice called, and JJ spun around so fast in his seat his friends were genuinely worried that he might have given himself whiplash.

Y/N Y/L/N. A name more renowned on The Cut than Maybank or Routledge or Heyward, you knew everyone and their mother on the island. If something broke, they called you and within five minutes you’d be able to tell them what’s wrong and how to fix it. You learned from your father, who owned the best auto shop on the island.

“Well, what’s the verdict?” Mr. Carrera asked as you approached the counter that he stood behind. He had called you to take a look at one of his old generators that hadn’t been working properly, and you had been out back working on it.

“One of the parts rusted so bad it stopped working, but I’ve already called to order a new one. I’ll let you know when it arrives.” You explained, giving him the short version of what you had accomplished.

“You’re a lifesaver, here’s lunch as payment.” Mr. C grinned, putting a container of your usual order on the counter. Usually, you charged Kooks, but his cooking was good enough that you overlooked it. You grinned, thanking him before turning to leave. Before you could get too far, someone called your name. You recognized the four faces that sat around the table that the sound originated from, and made your way over to them with a smile.

“Hey, guys, what’s up?” You asked as approached. John B had been the one to call out to you. You knew him from school and hung out together at parties every once in a while, but you were never the closest. Across from him sat Pope, who you had studied with on a few occasions and even helped his dad deliver groceries when you needed the extra money. Beside him was Kiara, who you didn’t know all too well since she went to the Kook Academy. Still, you liked the girl from what you had seen of her.

And then there was JJ, whose stare you were actively avoiding. It wasn’t that you had anything against him, it was just the fact that each time you crossed paths he would flirt with you if given the chance. And you were trying really hard to not give him the chance.

Because as much as you had a reputation on The Cut, so did JJ Maybank.

Looking past his family tree of smugglers and whatnot, he had made a name for himself among the tourist girls that visited the Outer Banks. He was famous for his one night stands with Tourons that would leave in a week and he’d never see again. Ever since you had met him, he had been trying to get you to be one more of his conquests.

And as tempting as his bright blue eyes were, you were determined not to let yourself be just another notch in his bedpost.

“Are you busy later today?” John B asked, ignoring the way JJ elbowed him. You shook your head, mentally running through your schedule for the day. The Carrera’s generator had been the last thing booked for the day, knowing you needed to run some errands for your father before heading back home, leaving your evening free. “Could you look at the HMS Pogue? Something is wrong with the engine and I can’t figure it out.”

“No problem.” You waved him off. It wasn’t unusual for you to work on John B’s boat, it probably would have been scrapped for parts if it weren’t for your repairs. You were a saving grace among the old equipment that many Pogues owned.

“We’re throwing a kegger after, so if you want, you can come with us after.” John B offered. You grinned, it had been awhile since you had let loose, too busy working to help keep your parents afloat like most teenagers on The Cut.

“Yeah, that sounds good. I’ve got to run, but text me when you want me to come by.” You called as you started backing away from the table. After receiving a nod from John B, you moved to smile at the other three sitting around the table. Before you could stop it, your gaze locked with JJ’s and in the split second it took for you to turn around, he shot you a wink that made your heart rate spike. As you left the restaurant, you couldn’t help but wonder just why the blond had such an effect on you, even when you so adamantly wanted to avoid him.

“How can you do that?” JJ turned to John B with an incredulous look on his face as soon as the door shut behind you. He was met with an amused and slightly confused look from his best friend, who was having a hard time figuring out what was so out of the ordinary.

“What, talk to her?” John B questioned, a look of realization crossing over his face. He’d seen the way JJ looked at you, and he was quickly connecting the dots.

“Talk to her like, I don’t know, she’s one of us! That’s Y/N Y/L/N, practically Pogue royalty.” JJ gushed, waving his hands around dramatically to drive home the point that he thought you were something spectacular. “I’ve been trying to get with her for months, bro, and she won’t give me the time of day.”

“That’s because she’s smart, J.” Kiara teased, reaching across the table to ruffle his already messy hair for added annoyance. JJ scoffed, running his hands through his hair dramatically to try and get it back to its previous unstyled style.

“And she’s really nice, and offering to fix the boat for free, so you better not ruin this for me by sleeping with her.” John B threateningly pointed a fry at JJ as he spoke. The blond surprised the whole table by flushing at the brunet’s words, glancing down at the table to try and hide his embarrassment.

JJ Maybank had a reputation of being a player. And yes, he did hookup with Tourons after most parties—but he thought you were different. Ever since he had seen you for the first time at The Boneyard laughing loudly at something someone had said, he was done for. You were the first girl that he wanted something more with, the first girl that made him not make fun of other couples because you were the first girl that made him realize he wanted what they had.  

“Shut up, does my little JJ have a crush?” Kiara cooed, and John B went to pinch JJ’s cheeks, but the blond was faster and slapped his hands away.

“No, I don’t! She’s just cool, I wouldn’t do something like that to her.” JJ mumbled. He wondered why he couldn’t just stop himself from talking, but then he pictured your smile once more and the corner of his lips quirked up subconsciously.

“Yeah, JJ, that’s because you have a crush on her.” Pope joined in on the teasing, and JJ decided that he had enough and tossed his balled up napkin at his friend.

“Don’t we have a party to get ready for?”

—

taglist:

@pixelated-pogues​ @bailspogue​ @delilahandshawn @annedub​ @shawnssongs​ @beautyandthebleh​ @kylosleftbuttcheek​ @sunflowerbecca​ @maybankiara​ @mimithefangirl25 @deviouscharitos​ @drewstarkeyobx​ @starryblueeyesandstarryblueskies @ihatemyself21​ @sunwardsss​ @kayak-huesgen​ 

tags with a strikethrough didn’t work

let me know what you think !!

[bitter-sweet-farmgirl]

Pick Up Lines

Welp, so a special someone has a birthday today, and I took part in a writing contest that she had to celebrate it. The funny part about this is that I wrote this story literally the day after I picked out my prompt. So I've been sitting on this story for about 2(?) months just waiting in suspense to share it, XD

HAPPY BIRTHDAY @guardianofrivendell!!!

I used this quote.

And this is a pairing between Fili & Tullaina

Warnings: Well, there maybe be an innuendo in there somewhere... ;) and a swear word or two. Nothing crazy

Pick Up Lines

My eyes flickered across the yellowing parchment of the scroll I had been assigned to read. At first the words were interesting and held my attention. Then as my attention began to wander, they became dull and frankly, dare I think it? Meaningless?

The librarian--and Ori--would strangle me, no questions asked if they knew how dull I found this ancient scrap to be.

The soft rustle of paper brought my attention back to the Dwarrowdame sitting across from me; dark-haired head bowed over the pages of an absurdly large and heavy tome whose title was written in overly large, flourishing golden script: A Brief History of Durin's Line: Volume 205.

I made a mental note to add my tutor, Lorelei, to the list. If she knew that I was more interested in a certain dark-haired dame than the 'exceedingly valuable and history-filled document whose knowledge is crucial to your future role of King' scroll, then she would be madder than Uncle Thorin when Kili had accidentally, (I wasn't so sure about that part), kicked Thorin's clothes into the river as he attempted to jump into it as we camped by it during the Quest.

It probably wouldn't help that Kili had already pissed her off earlier today during his session with her when he tried--unsuccessfully-- to flirt with her. Apparently the dame couldn't tell that my baby brother was head-over-heels for her.

"Oi, Fili!" A low, feminine voice called out loudly, making me cringe and breathe a sigh of relief all at the same time.

I twisted in my wooden chair to look over at the approaching Dwarrowdame. Dark red hair bounced messily across her shoulders as she trotted towards the table Lorelei and I occupied. The bright, beaming smile on her freckled face lit up the whole room and I found myself grinning automatically as she stopped beside my chair.

"Are you still studying these dusty old scrolls? Doesn't Thorin know that the sun is shining outside and there are things," she winked meaningfully at me, "that need to be done?"

I chuckled, pushing my chair away from the table with a soft scraping sound and stood up to tower a few inches above the dame.

"Good afternoon to you too, Tullaina." I answered, hurrying to roll up the parchment I had been trying to read until thoughts about Tullaina entered by head. Lorelei took one look at how I was treating the ancient parchment and let out an indignant gasp.

"I'll handle that, Prince Fili. Just don't damage this priceless piece of knowledge!" She gasped, snatching the scroll away from me and cradling it gently.

"Sorry, Lory." I apologized sheepishly, but she only shook her head.

"Just go on, I know you are eager to go spend time with Lady Tullaina. Do not let me stand in your way, Prince Fili." She sighed, and I shot a grin at Tullaina.

"Let's go and you can tell me about what things you have in mind."

~~~~~

We strolled through an abandoned corridor of Erebor together, Tullaina chatting animatedly about a prank she had conjured up when she'd accidentally set fire to one of Erebor's kitchens while attempting to assist one of the cooks with the cutting of a slab of pork.

"...and all the smoke and the blood from my finger made me think of setting up a sort of scene in one of the corridors and making a huge smoky fire and spilling berry juice everywhere. It would look like one big murder scene without a body." She finished up excitedly, and I could only smile.

"I like the idea, Tulls, but don't you think that's a bit complicated? I mean, coordinating all that and finding all those berries..." I trailed off as Tullaina's nose wrinkled up as she frowned.

Adorable.

"I guess..." She nodded, pondering my words. "Is there something else we could do for June Fools?"

I glanced over at her, making momentary eye contact with those wondrously captivating brown irises of hers.

"Well... I was considering something that is a bit more.... Criminal."

Tullaina's eyes got big.

"What?!" She hissed, stopping dead to stare at me in disbelief. "Fili, are you nuts? If your Uncle caught us doing something illegal..."

I shrugged, a smirk winding its way across my face as I took in her confusion. "You've already committed a crime, Tulls, and you made it look easy."

She let out an indignant gasp and put her hands on her hips in a gesture that warned me that she was getting angry. "Fili, I may be many things, but I am not a thief." She ground out, but I kept smirking at her. "How dare you accuse me of such a thing! I've never stolen a thing in my life!"

My smirk only grew as she denied any thieving activities. Crossing my arms across my chest, I raised an eyebrow at her in perfect seriousness. "Oh, but you have stolen something, Tulls." I murmured, making Tullaina frown up at me.

"What are you accusing me of stealing? Fili, I swear, if this is about that bloody teddy bear you had when you were thirty--"

I shook my head, holding up a hand to halt her angry spew of words. "No, you stole my heart." I murmured, holding eye contact with her.

Her mouth dropped open in an expression of complete surprise and shock and she stared mutely up at me. "I, wha-what?" She choked out, and I quickly dropped my serious approach.

Today was not the day.

Quickly plastering on a teasing grin, I nudged her with my elbow, forcing out a laugh. "Gotcha." Then I started walking again, stamping down all the doubting, questioning thoughts threatening to break through the wall I had built.

But in a moment, Tullaina was beside me again, her laughter echoing off the stone walls. "Mahal, Fili.... You really had me going there for awhile..." She giggled, raising her hand to brush her hair over her shoulder. "That's a really bad pick-up line, though...."

I grinned sheepishly. "Yeah, I thought you'd get a laugh out of it. And unfortunately there's more where that came from."

Tullaina's warm brown eyes lit up and she looked expectantly up at me. "Okay, spill." She asked excitedly, almost bouncing as we walked.

I eyed her anxiously, unsure how to proceed with this. But then she looked over at me and all my doubts were whisked away in the blink of an eye.

I was her friend, she was mine. There was nothing more here. Just treat her like you always do.

"Alright, what about this one? Do you have a sunburn or are you always this hot?"

At first, Tullaina gaped, then she snorted; eyes closing as she giggled. "That one's not bad..." She commented, and I felt a burst of encouragement.

"My friends bet me that I wouldn't be able to start a conversation with the most beautiful girl in the tavern. Wanna buy some drinks with their money?"

Tullaina shrugged at that one, tilting her hand from side to side. "That one's okay..."

To my horror, the next one that popped into my mind--and subsequently out of my mouth--was one that I never would have dreamed of saying to Tullaina. "Aside from being sexy, what do you do for a living?"

Instantly, Tullaina's cheeks turned beet red--likely matching mine--and she turned to look at me, the corners of her mouth twitching as if she couldn't decide if it would be appropriate to smile or not. "Ummm...."

"Mahal, I didn't think before I spoke, Tulls." I apologized, rubbing the back of my neck.

Tullaina giggled nervously. "It's alright, Fili. I just never expected that to be something you would say to a lass."

"It's not something I would say unless I'm completely off my face." I admitted, and the smile returned hesitantly to her face. "But, what do you think of this one? Do you believe in love at first sight, or should I walk by again?"

Tullaina stuck out her tongue. "That one is awful..." She stated with a wrinkled nose. "0/10 would recommend using."

I laughed, feeling a soothing wave of relief wash over me as the previous awkward mood faded. "I thought that one wasn't half bad!" I defended the line, but Tullaina only rolled her eyes.

"You're a Dwarrow. Of course it sounds good to you. But if you were a dame... We have a different perspective on things." She explained offhandedly. "Please, continue."

"Do you have a name or can I call you mine?"

"Where in Mahal's name did you get this one?!" Tullaina exclaimed, pretending to gag. "That one is worse than the last!"

"I'll agree with you on this one. I'd never dream of using this to get a lass' name. It's just rude."

Tullaina nodded vigorously. "If you used it on me, I'd slap you so hard you'd have a permanent imprint of my hand on your face." She stated venomously, and I took a hesitant step sideways. This made her laugh as she watched me. "Not now, if you had just met me and were being weird. Only one of those things applies to you so you're safe."

I let out an affronted gasp. "I'm not weird!"

Tullaina only shrugged, smirking at me. "I'm a girl, and to girls, boys are weird."

"Fair point. And the same is true likewise."

Removing the extra space I had put between us by taking a sideways step, Tullaina looked over at me. "Okay, one last one, then we actually need to move onto serious topics. If you let me, I will procrastinate over June Fools, and that cannot happen on our first try at doing Twelve Months of Fools. I mean, we've already gotten through five months successfully! We can't stop now!"

I nodded, giving Tullaina a sly look. "Alright, unless that would be the prank all along since people are expecting it now?"

"NO!"

"Fine, fine..." I relented, extending my hand towards her. "Your hand looks heavy, can I hold it for you?"

"Sure." Tullaina placed her hand in mine; palm gentle and warm against the calloused, rough surface of mine.

The unexpected motion had my brain shutting down as I frantically tried to figure out what was supposed to happen next.

Tullaina shot me a confused look, glancing down at our hands. "Fili, you're supposed to hold my hand back, not just suddenly let it become a limp noodle."

I didn't respond, trying frantically to think of something--anything!--to say. Which, of course, led to the absolute last thing I wanted to say being the exact thing I said.

"Your lips look lonely, would they like to meet mine?"

Tullaina's lips parted; the bottom jutting out just the tiniest bit because it was slightly bigger than the top. Not that I knew this because I'd spent literal days just gazing at her perfect, sensual lips.

No, not at all.

"Fili, I, uh, yeah..." Tullaina whispered, and I stared at her in shock.

She stared back expectantly.

The silence continued on for another very long, very awkward moment until Tullaina spoke up. "You're not going to say anything? Are you serious or is this just a prank?" She asked, and I detected just the barest hint of vulnerability in her soft-spoken words.

I sucked in a deep breath, realizing that I hadn't really been breathing between my last sentence and Tullaina's. "I don't know," I breathed, staring at Tullaina in terror. "I didn't think I would get this far!"

The corner of Tullaina's mouth turned up in a smile. "Maybe we just experiment a bit, yeah?" She asked, taking one step closer to me. "Because I'm bloody scared out of my mind, Fili, but if I don't do this I'm going to regret it for the rest of my life."

I nodded silently, staring down at her as she took another slow step closer, rising up on her toes. Automatically, my hands settled on her waist, steadying her as I leaned down to meet her plush, distracting lips.

"OH DEAR MAHAL, FINALLY!!"

Tullaina and I jumped apart, looking around wildly for the terrifyingly familiar voice. I found it in the form of Kili as he peeked out from a pillar, hands clamped around his mouth and a look of absolute panic on his face.

"Oh, uh, I wasn't supposed to interrupt you... Just go back to kissing or whatever. Pretend I was never here." He faltered, looking at Tullaina and I sheepishly. "Sorry."

I took a step forward, bristling as I prepared to teach Kili a lesson he wouldn't forget. "Kili, I'm going to--"

Tullaina grabbed my sleeve, stopping me in my tracks as she finished my sentence. "Spend time with Tullaina. Come on, Fili. We have things to do and abandoned corridors to explore."

[catyo90]

The Hunt: Chapter 52

Thorin awoke first to see Y/n sleeping peacefully as he carefully moved his hands away to place a light fur blanket over her making her snuggle into it like a babe with its mother. He smiled at the sight of her. He looked out the window to see the sun beginning to set, almost on cue he heard footsteps by the door. It was Dwalin who walked in and spoke but not before Thorin hushed him as he pointed to Y/n sleeping form. Dwalin nodded and whispered.

“Kili and Fili claim they saw the armory as we were headed here. I say we sneak in now and grab whatever we can carry. This Bard fellow is of no help to us and we have no time to waste.” 

Thorin said nothing as he looked out the window toward the lonely mountain. He nodded.

‘Let Y/n stay here. She needs the rest.”

Dwalin said nothing as he looked over at Y/n.

“You think her safer here then? You know she’ll be quite upset.”

Thorin just looked at him. Knowing he was right.

“Alright then Everyone is ready. We should hurry.” 

Thorn nodded his head as Dwalin carefully left the room as not to wake her. Thorin walked over to her side and leaned over placing a light kiss on her forehead bringing a soft hand to hair and gently stroking it making him smile at the sight before him. His hand lingered for a moment, he sighed as he left her side and closed the door to the room. 

-

The sound of a door bursting open made Y/n awake and immediately noticed Thorin was gone. She looked outside to see the sky had turned dark as she walked out of the room and saw bard down the stairs catching his breath. She saw Bain immediately run up to Bard 

“Da! I tried to stop them-”

“How long have they been gone!?”

Bard looked up the stairs to see Y/n was still in the home. He rushed up to her and spoke.

“Where did they go?!”

“I swear, I have no idea. I only just woke up, i thought they would still be here.”

Bards younger daughter Gilda spoke. 

“It’s true Da, they asked us not to wake her.”

Bard looked over at y/n and then to his children.

"make sure she does not leave. I'll go look for them and make-"

Before he could finish his sentence she ran past him clinging her cloak close to her as the sounds of a crowd nearby echoed out. As much as she tried she seemed to have found herself lost through the crooked paths. It wasn't until she had actually seen Bard run past a small alley pushing through the large group.

She followed after him and squeezed through trying to reach the others. She could see and hear Thorin speak to the crowd as how he would return the City of Dale to it's glory and that the people of Lake town would gain riches more than they could imagine.

Aa she neared the others she saw a big fat man on the stairs behind Thorin speak.

"and can anyone other than your dwarf friends vouch for you?"

The crowd started to murmur as Bard was silent. She was about to speak until a hand shot up and the sight of Bilbo made her smile as everyone turned to face him.

"I'll vouch for him. Thorin Oakensheild will keep his word to you and your people.

Y/n watched as the people cheered as Bard shook his head. She looked up to see Thorin nodding in thanks to the hobbit. She smiled to herself as she started to join the others.

That night the baron of Lake town had offered a feast for the dwarves and a night of plenty drink and rest was needed for them.

But for Y/n she seemed troubled by what laid beyond those mountains. Or rather what slept inside. The thought of facing Smaug made her shutter as she wrapped her arms around herself as she watched the others enjoying themselves. She decided to retreat for night into one of the rooms the baron offered.

But sleep was far from her mind. She closed the door behind her and sat on the bed opening the parchment from her medicine. Reading it over and over again she began to fear not for herself but for their child.

She wanted to tell him. But she felt afraid. An alpha with an omega is one thing but an omega with child. That causes even more problems. One that she dare not introduce. Especially now.

Her eyes looked up through the window as another fear opened in her mind.

She suddenly heard the floor by the door creak open.

She saw it was not Thorin but Bilbo. She sighed a small sigh of relief as she gestured for him to join her. Bilbo closed the door and walked over to her. He struggled a little to get on the bed but managed and smiled to Y/n looking at her hands to see the small bit of parchment. She hadn’t fully noticed he saw it until he asked.

“What's this?” Bilbo said pointing to the paper.

Y/n was silent. She tried to think of anything. A letter, a reminder or even a scrap or some lost paper. But as she turned her head to explain she found herself unable to lie to him. He had done a lot for the company and everyone was treating him as a friend. She knew what she had to do.

“Bilbo...I need you to tell you something. But none of the others can know. Do you understand? Especially Thorin...at least for now.”

Bilbo adjusted himself and nodded in understanding as she passed the paper to him to read. With every word he read a thousand reactions happened in his mind. He turned to her and looked down at her stomach.

“Your...Your pregnant? With child. Oh...oh my goodness what am I doing you need to rest. Do you need anything?”

Bilbo got off the bed and started to ramble on. Y/n smiled but quickly and calmly took his hand and spoke.

“Bilbo...Its alright. I feel fine. Its only been a few weeks. I should be fine for a awhile.”

“But Thorin...He should know. He should know about your condition.”

Y/n shook her head as she explained.

“Bilbo, Thorin is an Alpha. If he were to find out that I, his Omega was pregnant. He would be too defensive of me...even beyond reason. He would clash head with everyone in the group. Especially Dwalin since he is one as well.”

“But-”

“He could even hurt you. You are very kind to everyone in our company but any gesture of kindness toward me, to him would be seen as a act to seduce. No matter how small the gesture. You must not tell him. Please Bilbo...Promise me you will not say anything to him.’

Bilbo sat their silently the only thought of what would happen if Thorin found out that he knew before him. But as he looked into her pleading eyes. He sighed and nodded as he smiled to her.

“Well I may not be able to tell them. But I can congratulate you on such remarkable news.”

He said hugging her as he rubbed her back and started to laugh and smile to make Y/n feel better. 

"I actually started to wonder if you were... Back when we encountered those spiders."

"You could understand them? how?"

Immediately Bilbo realized the ring was how he knew. He laughed it off and pretended to be a little intoxicated.

"well then y/n. Tomorrow will be a long day. And as a hobbit who knows the joys of comfort. You should rest til then."

Y/n nodded her head in agreement as she started to settle into the bed. And could hear Bilbo leaving and just as he was about to close the door until he noticed Dwalin with Thorins arm over his shoulder. Dwalin said nothing for a moment but laughed and said.

"Ah. You help the nice one of the pair. Hahaha. Well help me get him into bed."

Dwalin laughed as Bilbo opened the door a bit wider. Y/n sighed as they help Thorin into bed. She gently laid his head on the pillow and moved a few hair strands away from his face. Bilbo felt Dwalin rest an arm on his shoulder and walked both of them out and asked Bilbo if he had ever seen Bombor drink two barrels at once.

Bilbo quietly shut the door behind them leaving Y/n and Thorin to rest in peace. As she laid there she felt Thorin move a bit and saw him open his eyes. He was clearly still drunk.

"ah, Y/n did you sneak into my chambers."

"no dear we are sharing a bed, you were brought here." She said softly as she brought a hand to his face. Smiling at seeing him still able to have a good time. Well at least once a month. Thorin brought a hand to hers and hummed and looked up at her.

"then sleep seems to be what we both need." He said as he gently brought her in close to his chest. He held her close and sighed as his muscles relaxed into the bed and soon the both of them each finding comfort in the other drifted off into a very welcomed bit of sleep.

[fandomn00blr]

Aaaaaah Porcia and Ser Pounce, Karl and Kristoff and Stowaway DS9 for the WIP ask meme? Please and thank you!

lol...YESSSSS! Some of my weirdest ideas to date! Thanks for giving me an excuse to talk about them!

Edited to tag @pinkfadespirit in this one because I just saw your ask about these first two! ❤️

Here’s an excerpt from the Porcia & Ser Pounce folder. Hawke’s old mabari and Anders’ ageless cat follow their family to Skyhold (Hawke and Fenris tried to leave them on the farm with Merrill like responsible pet owners, but y’know...Homeward Bound came out when I was a very impressionable child, and I’m a sucker for two cranky old ladies on a journey, so...omg, this is probably going to be called Skyhold Bound if I ever finish it):

The small, standoffish feline ends up being much better-suited to travel than Porcia is. She needs far less minding than the goats and the furless pups Pork has spent the past few years herding around the house and the farm. And she also seems to be an adept hunter. Porcia, on the other hand, desperately misses the treats slipped under the table by small, sticky fingers, or scraps tossed to her by the pointy-eared one her Mistress is so very fond of.

Pounce sits on a branch just above her head, cleaning the meat off the tiny bones of a swallow she’s just killed, and Porcia’s stomach growls. She swallows her pride, and then burps it back up, and finally lets out a pathetic little whine, looking up pleadingly at her. The cat glares down, yellow eyes glowing, but at least she doesn’t hiss this time. She bats a wing toward the dog, and then curls up defensively around the rest of her dinner.

And here’s a glimpse at Karl & Kristoff (a second set of Fenhanders twins, born post-Inquisition, because why not?):

Anders hands Hawke one of the babies, and Fenris hands her the other, and they both curl up on either side of her, staring in awe at the newest members of their miraculously growing family. 

"I was thinking we could call him Karl." Hawke smiles weakly over at Anders. "If that's alright with you?"

He nods, wiping tears from his face that he’s been holding back for awhile now. "And Kristoff?" he asks, drawing the back of his knuckle lightly over the other infant’s cheek.

For a moment Hawke has a hard time placing the name -- it's familiar, but in her post-delivery haze she can hardly be expected to remember its significance until Fenris chimes in...

"Karl Justice and Kristoff Clemence Hawke?”

Hawke laughs. "They sound like a pair of heroes out of one of Varric's stories..."

"So that settles it, then?"

Hawke nods. "Welcome to the world, little ones!"

Stowaway is a Star Trek x Dragon Age crossover, featuring Jadzia Dax waking up after a warp core breach on The Siren’s Call as Isabela and Anders (and a bunch of other DA2 characters) flee Ferelden during the Fifth Blight. I have ideas about Jadzia and Isabela and Anders...but this was also going to be a weird fun meta-fic because holodecks and unreliable narrators and Isabela writing fanfic, obviously. Here’s Jadzia being treated for a concussion...

“Come in, Anders…” Isabela rolls her eyes as a tall, lanky man in feathers and threadbare robes with his strawberry-blonde hair tied back in a messy bun marches into the room, full of urgency and purpose...and a very familiar sort of insecure self-importance.

“Is this the patient?”

“The stowaway, yes…”

Jadzia nods, sharing an amused glance over his shoulder with Isabela who leans back to watch as the two of them interact.

“I’m Anders, the ship’s Healer.” He extends a hand which she grasps firmly. 

She’s no stranger to human handshakes, and she’s relieved to find something familiar, though it is clearly not as intimate a gesture to them as it is to a Trill. Still, she can’t shake the weird feeling that he is probing at her in some way as he slowly pulls his hand away, staring curiously at it, then back at her.

“I’m Jadzia. Nice to meet you.”

“May I?” He motions toward the cut on her forehead and she nods, curious to see, given everything she’s seen so far of this ship and these people, what kind of rudimentary treatment he has in mind. 

Anders bends down to look more closely at her wound, wiping away the dried blood with a rag he pulls from his pocket. “Alright if I use magic? I’m Circle-trained, but I’ve learned a bit more since I…” He suddenly eyes her combadge suspiciously, and then looks up at Isabela, who shakes her head dismissively. “Since I left,” he finishes defiantly.

Jadzia supposes she’s meant to react somehow to this, but she is busy trying not to laugh. Magic? Oh, this is going to be fun...

[flightfoot]

I'm not someone who watches Miraculous Ladybug but why are there so many Marinette/Damian fics? I keep seeing them when I scroll through Timsteph fics.

OH HELL. You know, I’ve been wondering what Batman-only fans must think of the flood of Marinette/Damian. It’s uh. Yeah it doesn’t make a ton of sense. 

See, here’s the thing; there’s a LARGE section of the ML fandom devoted to salt, specifically salt towards one particular episode; Chameleon, where Marinette - the main character - has her seat reassigned during class so she has to sit at the back away from all her friends in order to make way for a returning student who *claims* she has a hearing disability so she can sit in the front row. However, said character, Lila, is a notorious liar, as Marinette, Adrien (the deuteragonist and Marinette’s main Love Interest), and the audience know. Adrien actually offers to go sit in the back instead, but Marinette and Lila both shut down that idea and Marinette stews in the back of the classroom for awhile. 

Then at lunch, Lila tells more stories of her fabulous life and gets people to bring a tray of food for her since she claims she hurt her wrist. Marinette tries to tell two of her other friends that Lila’s a liar and a fake, but can’t actually produce any evidence to prove it, so she throws a napkin at Lila to try to prove she’s faking her injury... which Lila then catches, but pretends to have hurt her arm. Her other classmates scold her for throwing a napkin at Lila and causing her to hurt herself, Marinette storms off, and Lila corners her in the bathroom and threatens to turn all her friends against her and stop her from ever getting close to Adrien unless she sides with her.

Adrien actually catches up with Lila soon after that and asks her to please stop lying, that she doesn’t need to do that and she’ll only turn their classmates against her, and offers to help listen if something’s bothering her. He doesn’t  realize that Lila’s targeting Marinette, or that she’s actively malicious in general, just thinking that she’s lonely and is lying to try and make friends.

Lila brushes him off and purposely seeks out an akuma to get herself akumatized, turns into a villain, tries to defeat Ladybug and Chat Noir, the usual jazz.

Anyway, at the end after defeating her, when Marinette’s about to try to publicly call Lila out for switching up which ear Lila has Tinnitus in, Adrien asks her whether she thinks exposing her will actually help anything, and that humiliating her will make her hurt more, and making a bad guy suffer has never turned them into a good guy.

So Marinette decides not to do that, and when they go back to the classroom, Adrien goes to the back and sits next to Marinette of his own accord. Then the whole class decides that they liked the old seating arrangement better, and everyone goes back to their old seats and Lila’s left sitting by herself in the back (she’d claimed her tinnitus magically got better, so she didn’t need to sit in the front anymore.)

Salters took that episode and RAN with it, writing fic after fic of epic revenge fantasies that WAY ramped up how bad any of the characters could POSSIBLY be, making the class force her to do commission after commission for them for free, never showing her proper appreciation for all she does for them, and when Lila shows up and starts manipulating people, have the class scorn and shun Marinette for being an awful person, rip up her stuff, and beat her up, often with her (former) best friend Alya leading the charge, and Adrien just standing and the background telling her to take it.

A lot of people writing these hate Adrien’s guts, having decided that he’s a sexual harasser/assaulter/potential rapist, and wanted to ship her with other people - her second canon Love Interest, Luka, and the scrapped first draft for her partner from the original concept for ML, Felix, at the top of the list.

Felix, notably, was generally perceived as being cold, aloof, and no-nonsense, but with a heart of gold. So he was sometimes used to inflict punishment on everyone the salters hated, plus Marinette could be one of the few people to slip past his cold exterior and become someone he cared for.

Then Felix was gonna be made canon. And someone new was needed to fill that role. 

One tumblr user wrote a story where the polite, yet aloof, young man Damien hears a girl screaming in trouble, sees Marinette in Gotham, and instantly falls in love with his Angel, and she ends up staying in Gotham instead of with all the horrible, horrible Everyone Else In Her Life.

Yeah, Damian wasn’t remotely in-character in those early fics at least. His name was often misspelled with an “e”, actually. 

But anyway. A few advantages to this; Damian can be made to be super sweet and a perfect gentleman around Marinette, who can instantly see all the worth that everyone else in her life threw away, and as a bonus, can reap revenge on her classmates who tried to beat her up/destroy her notebook/poison her/whatever the fic writer came up with, since Damian might feasibly be willing to inflict cruel punishment on them (not that being in-character has ever been valued much in these fics), plus Marinette gets the entire Batfamily to dote on her and be her new family and be totally removed from everyone the author doesn’t like, which tends to be most of the ML cast. Except for her canonical bully who made her life miserable both before and during the actual series, Chloe; she’ll often become Marinette’s new best friend. Though I don’t think that’s as common with the crossover.

It mixed up the Chameleon salt formula, which I think even the salters had gotten a little tired of (though it’s still going strong), and gave possibilities for a lot more different character interactions, and just generally breathed new life into it.

At this point it’s kinda become its own thing, and some people are actually stepping away form the salt and bashing that birthed the pairing and just shoving her in with the Batfamily generally, because... honestly I suspect there’s some wish fulfillment going on there. And people seem to have a slightly better idea of how the Batfamily works now? Maybe? From what I’ve seen, I think people may have at least STARTED doing some research.

Anyway, yeah. They’re basically a separate fandom at this point, pretty much just devoted to like. That one episode of ML, the first episode of season 3, that released over a year and a half ago.

But uh. Yeaaaah, don’t judge ML by what you see in those crossover fics. Their relation with canon, especially canon characterization, is tenuous at best.

As you might be able to tell, I don’t ship it. I also hate the OOCness, but actually like the potential for the crossover, and wrote my own ML X Batman crossover fic, “We’re The Same”, that was sticking with the canon ships, characterization, and overall just dropping the two franchises into each other in a more canon compliant way to see what would shake out. Especially since dammit, ADRIEN AND DAMIAN WOULD BE FRIENDS. 

[yicruz48]

On CBR Community, there's debate about Event Leviathan : Checkmate is being indefinitely l postponed, is it related to Damian's fate after TT annual (lose Robin title, missing, etc). Because on Leviathan Dawn Damian is still Robin, so if Checkmate event want to use him as Robin, that will confuse the timeline. But on the other hand, the postponing is after pandemic break, and before pandemic break, Damian supposed to lose Robin title after issue 41. So what do you think about this?

First of all, I am so sorry for taking too much time to answer your question! 

I’ve been taking my time thinking about how to answer this post and how approach answering. 

Me and @wesavegotham discussed this a bit after the news broke, so this will be a culmination of our thoughts on it. 

To reiterate, a lot of things seemed to have changed at DC Comics since Dan DiDio left and quarantine put the comic industry on pause for a few weeks. These events coinciding with each other seemed to have given writers a chance to cancel and/or pause events (5G), expand events (Death Metal), extend their time on books (Tynion) and add new stories. Even Teen Titans changed during this time:

-> Annual being pushed an arc later than after the Djinn Arc.

-> Solicitations for issue 42 not making sense with the actual storyline in 42.

-> Eduardo Pansica was supposed to draw the interior in TT 42-44 not Javier Fernandez. And Javier Fernandez was supposed to draw the interior of the annual not Pansica but as you seen that has switched. Which means either stories were either scrapped or extended.  

-> You could even see Robbie Thompson’s entry as new main writer as a change brought upon TT. He has seemed to have returned Damian some what back in character, or more in character. That could’ve lead to changes. 

So it didn’t surprise me very much to see Leviathan indefinitely postponed. But as you said, it does brings a lot questions about Damian. 

Bendis’s upcoming Leviathan event is well about...Leviathan. And Leviathan not only has history with Talia but also Damian. And this is something Bendis himself empathized in Leviathan Dawn: 

Leviathan was Talia’s and Damian’s (whether he wants or not) family business. Initiated by Talia to be passed down to Damian. In other words, this event not only is important for Talia, but also for Damian. The future of Leviathan will make an impact in Damian’s life.

This comic is also supposed to ‘restructure the DC Universe’ (Surprise, surprise, name a comic Bendis doesn’t claim to ‘change’ the DC Universe). It also supposed to clean up all the similar organizations in the DC Universe and have a lasting impact.   

It is also important to note that this comic came into fruition between Dan Didio and Bendis and well...DiDio is not at DC anymore so who knows if that has had an impact on how big this event is suppose be. The one thing I know is that Manhunter: Secret Origins was canceled so it looks like this Leviathan thing has been minimized and/or changed. 

Now that I have established the apparent importance of this event, let me finally answer your main question:

“Because on Leviathan Dawn Damian is still Robin, so if Checkmate event want to use him as Robin, that will confuse the timeline. But on the other hand, the postponing is after pandemic break, and before pandemic break, Damian supposed to lose Robin title after issue 41. So what do you think about this?”

I am assuming your big question is; Do you think that Leviathan: Checkmate being indefinitely postponed has any relevance to Damian losing his Robin title or was impacted by DC’s future plans for Damian? 

Well, first we have to acknowledge we have a lot events going on at the moment in DC not just the situation with TT:

-> Joker War 

-> Nightwing Returning

-> Death Metal 

 And that DC said this about Leviathan being postponed: “ rescheduled to align with upcoming DC Universe storylines.“

So one of my thoughts is that they have so many events going on at he same time, they are trying to space it out by postponing it. 

But as you said, Damian is Robin in Leviathan: Dawn so it wouldn’t make sense to have 6 part series that runs through the time Robin supposedly loses his Robin title and goes missing. Plus its kind of strange to have Batman involved in this story if he’s out dealing with the Joker elsewhere. 

I think they are either waiting for Damian to return as Robin in the future in order to publish the series. Tynion did say that he going to demonstrate what the future of Batfamily will look like at Batman #100 and also that he had “big, big plans for Damian in bat-books” which could mean something positive or negative. On a positive note it could mean that Damian will return to work on Bruce’s side more often and separate from TT.

But also this is a theory, but Damian going ‘missing’  in TT could have something to do with Event Leviathan: Checkmate. Crazy thought, but Mark Shaw (Current Leviathan leader) could’ve kidnapped Damian to use as leverage against Talia in order for her give up Leviathan forever. Would be a great opportunity to patch Damian and Talia’s relationship although the thought of Bendis writing it makes me uncomfortable.

Or if we are inevitability going through this “Damian becoming an anti-hero/ Villian path” we could have Damian running off and working with Mark Shaw. Either because he wants to infiltrate Leviathan or because his current opinions about the world kinda aligns with Mark Shaw:

They both look like taking/willing to make radical decisions in order to change the world for ‘better’. So after the annual if Bruce does hurt Damian, it could be the final straw for Damian to decide to fully work against him and his mother. This also works with Tynion’s “big, big plans” for Damian. As I said before this could either a positive or negative thing. And the negative would be Damian returning as Batman’s enemy (which by the way making a child a threat to big hero is always a bad idea for the child. They wouldn’t be taken seriously by the readers or heroes alike, I mean see the Trickster in the Flash).   

But again, my second prediction would only work if Damian is gone for awhile. And we need too wait for the solicitations of TT #46 to get a hint if Damian missing is temporary or going to last longer than the Joker War.

Again, I’m sorry this took awhile to get out. 

Also, I am interested to hear your thoughts and also anybody else’s theories for that matter in the comments or in re-blogs.

[kelseyfitzherbert]

countdown to the end of the series - favorite song 

so this is for yesterday (i never found the time to write this) for the first day, i want to talk about my favorite song and why it is the way it is to me. 

this series has so many good songs. that’s one of the biggest blessings when it comes to the series existing. how cool is it to listen to eugene and rapunzel singing in 2020?! it still blows my mind when i think about it while im listening to the songs. and the songs themselves are fantastic. they’re intense and amazing and it so awesome to be able to hear these characters get to flex their vocal muscles (seriously - we got a new dream breakup song and a eugene solo! 2010 me never would’ve imagined that!)

but out of all of these songs, my favorite is set yourself free. its not the most crazy, intense song of the entire series, but it means a lot to me personally. 

i was in a very abusive relationship for over four years that left me with scars and trauma i still deal with today. ive also struggled with anxiety, major depression and an eating disorder since then. so, a lot of stuff. it hasn’t been easy, but in the past year, i’ve been able to actually break free and start to heal. the past year has been super hard but super empowering. 

but this is where the song comes in. rapunzel talks about setting herself free from what people wanted her to be, knowing there is more inside her and finally taking that step to make those changes and i needed this. knowing that she was strong and she’s known it all along (that’s my favorite line). i am convinced this song was the push i needed to finally take care of myself and start to heal. i have never related to her more than i do in this song. and to hear these words come from a character i have adored for so long was life changing. 

and i wanted to do something to commemorate that. so i decided to get it tattooed because i have been wanting a tangled themed one for awhile. but i wanted it to be perfect. 

i was going to design it myself, but i really wanted the words “set yourself free” to be in rapunzel’s handwriting. that part was important to me. i looked through screenshots of the journals but she never wrote it and i was almost about to scrap the idea. but one night i was hopped up on preworkout on my way to the gym and i got an idea. i was going to go out on a limb and message claire keane and see if by some miracle she could help me out. i didn’t expect it to work. i didn’t even expect her to read the message. but she did! and she told me she could design the entire thing. 

my personal, one of a kind piece of art from claire keane herself based on such a strong message. this was like rapunzel literally used my arm as her wall, her journal, her canvas and drew me a picture and i will never be able to tell you guys how special this is to me. every time i look at it it reminds me of myself, my journey, and my girl rapunzel. 

so yeah. it’s my favorite song. ever. <3 

[gasp-iwrotesomething]

Can you please do R8 for cal please

Sure thing, anon! Thank you for requesting and I hope you enjoy!

R8: “How about a good ol’ game of rock paper scissors to settle things between you and I?”

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“Come on, don’t you know basic decency? A man always pays the bill.”

“I do know basic decency, excuse you. I just don’t follow it. You’re perfectly able to pay it, so pay it.”

“I don’t see why when you’re the one who suggested going here. I think you’re the one here who’s perfectly fit to pay. Stop arguing and just pay already.”

“No, I don’t like your attitude. Be more convincing and maybe I’ll consider it.”

“Cal...”

MC groans. The two of them had been going back and forth since they had cleaned their plates, right when the waiter brought their bill. Neither of them wanted to pay, even if the amount was barely twenty dollars. We’re both stubborn like that. Cal sits back in his chair with his arms folded over his chest, expression stagnant except for the small smirk on his lips. “Will it kill you to be the gentleman for once, MC?” That smirk transcends his usual capacity of cockiness, the naturally carved lines in his face stitched with the ego of a thousand kings. MC hated how smug he was. It was as if he knew that he’d win no matter what she said. But I’m not about to let that happen. “Will it kill you to be a gentleman for once, Cal? That’s the only real question here.” Around them, the standard bustle of customers clanking their silverware against glass plates and smooth, jazzy music playing over the speakers continues, simultaneously locking them in a bubble of banter. MC lost touch of the reality beyond that frolicking sea in Cal’s eyes--they seemed so alive with mischief and amusement under the soothing atmospheric lights. Why’d I ever let this circus performer take me out to a fancy restaurant for a date? I should’ve known it’d be a mistake. “There’s no such thing as a ‘real question’,” Cal argues as he prods the few scraps of food he has left on his plate with his fork, “only dumb questions. I don’t think I’ve been the one giving them out so far.” MC frowns and loads her fork with some parsley from her plate, slinging them at the gunslinger. To absolutely no one’s surprise, he catches them in his mouth and grins with his victory as he chews. “Yeah, well, neither have I, so I guess we’re tied on that.” That grin sours as the taste and papery texture settle over his taste buds. Ah, his reflexes aren’t sharp enough to recognize that he’s catching and eating garnish. MC snorts behind her hand and snickers as Cal discreetly spits out the parsley into a napkin. His glare is as sharp as the laughing pains she feels pierce her gut. “Ha ha ha, what a comedian you are, MC…” He deadpans.

MC gulps in air and dabs at her eyes with her napkin, still cackling like a villain. She didn’t think Cal’s glower could get any deeper; he looked like steam would shoot out of his ears. Finally, after another minute or so of attempts to calm down and Cal most likely plotting on how to get his revenge, MC quiets down though she can’t quite peel the grin off her face as easily. 

“You know, if you didn’t want to be laughed at like that, you should just let it hit you in the face. Besides, my aim is trash. It would’ve bounced off your shoulder or something like that.”

 Still, Cal remains sulky. He folded the napkin with his saliva-and-parsley concoction and rolled his pearly blue eyes. Apparently even the reassurance of a poor aim could do no good to wash the taste of a prank out of Cal’s mouth. He must notice a prickle of secretive laughter in her expression because he scowls. “It’s not my fault you suck at aiming, so don’t even think of blaming that on me. If you can’t make a shot with a weightless leaf, then it’s no one’s fault but your own.” Cal transitions into his scolding mode, the mode that said he was annoyed about something incorrect and was to fix it. MC doesn’t even have enough oxygen coursing through her to laugh at that. “Whose fault is it if my target eats the projectile then? I don’t think your lessons touched on that yet.” She could imagine the eye roll Cal does before he even does it. 

“Like I said, a real comedian you are.” His flat tone returns and it’s hard not to see a counter in his gaze, like a secondary emotion in the shadow of his anger. Could he be… amused? The way his eyes shined and his mouth twisted made MC think so at least. But that feeling is washed away by his deflated sigh, a hand raking through his hair. The windswept curls catch on his fingers; a detail MC wouldn’t have noticed if she hadn’t been staring so intently into his face. But she doesn’t even flush; after spending so much time watching Cal go through every tick he had, it was hard to get flustered when she was too intent on admiring the languid movement. “You know what? I’m super tired and I bet you are too,” though fatigue weighs heavy in his eyes, a sliver of liveliness worms its way in as his mouth curls, “how about a good ol’ game of rock paper scissors to settle things between you and me?” 

MC crooks a brow. He says this lazily, though his face sharpens with the smirk that pieces together on his lips. His eyes become alive, almost as if revived, and brighten with the promise of a challenge. She could sense his cocky attitude before he even says anything else, evident in his easy posture and eyes that peer at MC through lashes. Mirroring his growing smirk, MC offers her fist braced on her palm--the initiation position of rock paper scissors. Cal follows. “Don’t try anything funny.” MC warns, her brown eyes intense as they narrow. As expected, the slingshooter follows her example. “You think I’m some kind of cheater or something, MC?” He feigns offense and places a hand to his chest, right over his heart, as if her stern warning hurt him there somewhere. She doesn’t falter in the slightest. If a game of rock paper scissors gets me out of a bill, then I’m not taking any chances. “If the shoe fits,” she says, flat and devoid of the playfulness Cal probably wanted to hear from her. He shrugs nonchalantly. “Well, maybe, but I think that it’d look better on you by far,” his eyes flick to her shirt and in that brief flash of interest, MC’s chest seizes up like there was a clot in her heart and her blood flow was interrupted, “after all, ‘cheater’ seems to be your color.” Her eyes fell to the plate, smeared with the remnants of her meal, and she was suddenly so interested in how one piece of it resembled the state of Texas. Her face felt red and she hoped that her blood wasn’t bursting to her face because of his admiring remark and was just the result of the clot in her heart. Why does that seem like a better fate than to let Cal see his effect on me? 

Inhale. Exhale. Cool your mind, she silently directs. And dear body, don’t do stuff like those...kinds of things. You’re selling me to the slaughter, you know. MC pastes a grin on her face like nothing happened and gingerly brushes the tip of her shoe against his calf, just enough for the pressure to be felt through his pant’s material. She watches his face combust and his throat bob slightly; it was so darkly satisfying to watch him fall from that cloud of smug Cal-ness every once and awhile. The tips of his ears even burn scarlet--something MC didn’t see too much. “So you’re saying the shoe must fit me then, is that right? Wow, that’s impressive how you found out my shoe size from just playing footsie with me under the table, Cal.” She remarks, resembling his tone, as she withdraws from his leg. Just to be that much more of a tease, MC knocks his foot playfully as she retreats to its standard position under the table. Cal opens his mouth but just flaps his jaw a few times, the words ashes stuck to his tongue, before huffing and shutting it. “...I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about, MC.” At this point, the clatter of patrons digging in eagerly to their pricey meals is barely loud, the crowd having been deducted by the few groups leaving for the night. Looking around, only a few tables were occupied besides MC and Cal’s, which meant that they were among the last throng of people who stay at restaurants minutes before they close. Which overall meant that they were running out of time to decide who pays the bill. Meeting Cal’s eyes tells the same quiet urgency that she feels squeezing in her rib cage--it was now or never. That’s dramatic but… fitting. Competition seems to always be dramatic with him. Their eyes meet and narrow. Their hands pose to strike. Their hearts beat just a little faster. Both anticipation and determination reflects and bounces back and forth in their shared gaze; an intense stare-down.

Then they chant, muted, as to not draw attention to themselves. 

“Rock, paper, scissors!”

MC’s brain jumps to scissors and she separates her two fingers and tucks the rest into her palm--but anxiety makes her thumb jab outwards awkwardly.

Cal chooses paper last minute and flattens his fingers out to align with his palm and wrist.

A moment passes, a tense, wobbly, silent moment, then MC whoops with her victory and Cal’s scowl is back with a vengeance. “Scissors beats paper and I-” she reaches across the table to catch Cal’s flat hand between her two fingers, opening and closing to mimic the blades of a pair of scissors “-win!” She gloats, alight with the glee and relief of winning, while Cal rolls his eyes so hard and so dramatically that his eyelids flutter. Her snipping fingers manage to bisect his middle and ring finger, creating a divide in his mimicked paper. “That was scissors? Since when do scissors have an extra blade sticking out from the handle?” He snipes as he swats away her hand. Cal was bitter that he lost, obviously, and scavenging for a reason to redo and win--she could see it clear as day. He says he’s not one but that fits the behavior of a sore loser, I think. The trick shooter was casual and nonchalant about the way he pointed her jittery mistake out, though MC could see the disappointment leak from his tense shoulders as they relaxed. MC nudges the bill towards him inch by inch, to which he mirrors as he pushes it back towards her, stubborn. “Since I said so, which is now, so pay, would you?” 

“Hmm… how ‘bout no. You flubbed the scissors. What if that’s the sign of a cheater, hm?” Cal argues. He flicks the bill towards and it sails across the tabletop, to which MC frowns heavily at as she stops it. “I’m not a cheater just because your reaction was delayed, Cal,” she sweeps the bill towards him only for Cal to bat it back to her mid-slide, “I went off muscle memory, alright?” Still, that skeptical frown remains and for a second, they just slap the bill back and forth until it flounces to the floor. They must’ve appeared to be two children trapped in two adult bodies battling each other over something silly and childish. A few pairs of eyes flick towards them with bemused frowns while others pretend to not spot the flouncing couple just a table or two away from them. But they were so engulfed in their fleeting rivalry to spare any of their audience any mind. MC squints at Cal. Cal squints back. She swipes the bill up and stiffly offers it to him, her smile strained and her lips thin. “You lost. So. Pay.” Cal’s eyes don’t disconnect from hers as he slowly pushes the bill towards her again. “You cheated. So. Pay.” A silence stretches thin between them, just glaring at each other in an unexciting and monotone tug of war, before MC groans. Now you’re just pulling excuses out of your ass, Cal. “Fine, fine! We’ll play again and whoever wins this pays, no matter what,” she compromises as her abdomen feels like there’s dozens of hot coals simmering there. Had she ever been truly this angry around him? Who am I kidding? Of course I have! 

Cal’s scowl loosens a few ticks but no clear figments of relief color his face. He plants his fist into his palm and nods towards MC, “ready?” She sighs just to snuff the angry pit of fire in her bones--though she suspected that there would be a re-ignition no matter the outcome of their rematch. I swear if Cal wins this time… I might just flip this table right now. MC bobs her head in a silent agreement. Just like before, the atmosphere thickens and the rest of the restaurant is washed away outside their bubble, the conversations and clatter of silverware distant. Only the world alcoved within Cal’s illustrious and winding gaze fills her mind. Their eyes narrow in unison as they begin their chant for the second time.

“Rock, paper, scissors!”

Cal leaves his fist clenched tight, his fingers furled into his palm. Rock.

MC levels her fingers straight out. Paper.

And just like that, MC had won again. This time, she doesn’t make a scene with her victory snug on her belt; instead, she throws him a sleazy smirk and casts a knowing glance at the bill just waiting to be snuggled with some of Cal’s money. “Well, would you look at that, Cal? Looks like I don’t even have to cheat to win against you after all.” She saw the pout outline his lips and the way his eyes swung to the bill with distaste as she coyly slid it to him. She could see how the taste of failure felt wrapped around his tongue just from his taut posture. Arms crossed, shoulders slumped, jaw clenched, face scrunched… Those are the sure signs of a secretly sore loser, I bet. His eyes only briefly brush her gaze while he huffs, exasperated, and snatches up the bill. “Yeah, yeah, you got lucky,” Cal grumbles. MC pats his hand gratefully with a teasing grin. “Thank you.” She was partially serious and partially pulling his leg just to see the oceans in his eyes swirl with indignation. I really do appreciate him paying for it though. I hope he understands that too.

His attention flickers from fishing his wallet out of his pocket to feigning a cordial smile at MC, tone clipped and falsely cheerful. “Don’t mention it.”

...well, in time, of course.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thank you again for your request and I hope you don’t mind how late the request has been completed! I had a lot of fun writing this though!

Also, before you go, make sure that you support @vowtogether​!!

If you want to request something, here’s the Prompt List, here are the Guidelines, here’s Who I Write For, and here is where you can Request me.

[whispersafterdusk]

Lost in Time - ch 15

"So what part of Lucien are you from?"

Harrison quickly adjusted the pillow behind him (padded and pillow'd booths were still something he was trying to adjust to - how did Django keep these clean and free of stains?) and then settled his hands back around the fragrant mug of tea in front of him.  "We used to live on the border near Duvos but were forced to move."

The girl - Lily - frowned.  "Oh.  Yeah, I...I hear that a lot."

"When you live so close to warmongers it's going to be a common story."

"Did your family stay in Lucien?"

Harrison nodded and took a sip of the tea before answering.  "We did.  We went from a farm to a small home on the opposite side of Lucien -- not enough room for a farm but big enough for my mother's pottery business to continue."

Lily's eyes lit up.  "Pottery?  Did she happen to be the one who made the little teapots with the lids shaped like wild flowers?"

"...yeah, actually," Harrison answered after a pause.  "You've seen them?" ((Continued below cut))

"Ha!  Seen them?  I owned four!" she giggled.  "I loved those things.  I love floral things in general...what with having the name Lily and all. My mother's name is Rose - you could say a love for all things flowery runs in the family."

He laughed with her at that, and again sipped from his tea; it was a black tea blend with a really intense flavor that he'd had to temper with more sugar than he was used to (it was still very delicious though).  "-I just wish the place had a bigger yard.  We owned six dogs when we had to move and there never seemed to be enough space for them to run around once we set up mom's workshop in the back yard."

"Aw..." Lily sighed.  "I always wanted a dog but my mother wouldn't let me have one."

"Ours were farm dogs - they kept predators away from the chickens and goats. We couldn't keep the chickens or goats but the dogs came with us when we moved."

Lily nodded and rocked back and forth for a moment with a dreamy look, then made a little popping noise with her mouth and turned her attention back to him.  "What was farm life like?  Did you have siblings to help out?  How many animals did you have?"

"Eh...it was a lot of work.  I had just turned seven when we moved so I didn't have to do a lot of it but I had an older brother and sister who both complained about having to get up so early to get chores done before school.  I had just gotten old enough to be trusted to feed the chickens each morning..."  He sighed -- he really missed the farm some days.   All that open space to romp around in, the rooster crowing each morning, the smell of freshly plowed dirt.  "How about you?"

"Mom and I lived in a small cottage on the western side of Lucien.  Close to the border with Duvos but not so close that we ever had any trouble.  OUR troubles always came from the Peripheries -- lots of random beasts would wander out of there every spring.  Mom would go drive them off or have to kill them and then we'd sell the meat and hides.  She also had this big flower and herb garden too and she'd sell dried and pressed flowers for scrap-booking and the herbs would go to local chefs."

"Were beasts actually that big of a problem?  I'd sometimes hear my schoolmates talking about big monsters but it always sounded...like just stories, you know?"

Lily lightly slapped her hands flat on the table, leaning toward him with her eyes wide.  "Stories?  Ha, no - you should see some of the things that wander out of that area.  Nothing that mom couldn't ever handle by herself but sometimes they made a really big mess."

Harrison nodded slowly at that, and for a moment his attention was caught by the steam curling up out of his mug; in a flash of imagination he pictured the steam curling out of the nostrils of some big beasty, and shuddered a bit.  "That must have been rough."

"I guess it was."

Lily paused as Sonia brought out the fruit salads they had ordered; someone with a broken ankle had come in to the clinic during Harrison's lunch break and he'd gotten back to eating much later than intended so he wasn't all that hungry but had ordered something anyway because it had seemed like Lily was going to forgo eating since he was.

"-do your parents and siblings still live at your new place? -- well, I guess it's not new now if they have been," Lily giggled.  She stuck a grape into her mouth and Harrison could hear it pop from across the table as she bit down.

"They do.  We've sort of dug in, you could say," he chuckled.  "Set down new roots and now they're in deep." He picked out a grape for himself and almost drooled when he chomped down; these were really, really juicy -- perfectly ripe.  Portia really had some of the best produce around. "-how about your family?"

"Mom's still holding down the fort," Lily mumbled around her mouthful of grape pulp. "I don't think anything could convince her to move...it's kind of annoying, really."

"Why's that?"

"Well..." Lily sighed heavily, swallowed, and then absently twirled her fork around with her fingers.  "...I don't know.  When I was younger she always seemed so bright and cheerful, and loved doing odd jobs that took her out and about to new places.  At some point though she came back totally changed and swapped over to pressing flowers and growing herbs.  Life...got a lot more difficult when she did that, both monetarily and just in general.  It's like a totally different person came home."

"Oh."

Lily shrugged and began picking the rest of the grapes out of the salad; Harrison tried to keep a neutral expression but inwardly he was sort of dying for having managed to make this awkward.

"It's not a big deal," Lily finally went on (after what felt like forever).  "Mom doesn't have the heart to travel anymore so I do instead.  Take back all sorts of trinkets and stories.  She seems to love that part so I keep doing it. It's pretty easy to find odd jobs everywhere so I can see how she managed to do it all the time."

"Yeah, neat," Harrison replied in a rush.  "I mean, uh - that's neat," he added after a moment, hoping he managed to get a more normal tone out this time.

She simply grinned at him and bit a bite of watermelon in half.  Some juice trickled down her chin; she didn't seem to notice.  They ate in silence for a bit; Harrison still felt ready to melt into his seat and disappear but Lily seemed at ease, and the fruit really was good.

Thankfully they managed some more small talk once they'd emptied their bowls -- when and why Harrison decided to become a doctor, more about his mom's pottery business (she asked him to ask his mother if she could hold a lily-patterned tea pot for her, and he promised to write to her about it), Lily's vast knowledge of flowers and their care, some of her traveling stories.  That earlier feeling of awkwardness had faded and was replaced with a light, giddy feeling of having met someone new (and someone who...apparently thought he was cute, which was its own sort of sensation that made his heart race a bit).

It was almost closing time by the time they'd paid and walked outside; there was a chilly breeze whistling down the street and Harrison zipped his coat up to the very top.

"How long will you be in Portia?"

Lily shrugged and tightened her scarf.  "I didn't plan on staying long but I think I'll stick around for awhile."  She flashed him a mischievous grin with that.  "Pretty good reason to."

Again he felt his ears burning.  "A-ah."

"Do you work every day at the clinic?"

"Not EVERY day, no, but most."

She nodded and bounced on the balls of her feel again.  "All right.  I'll come poking around again...maybe tomorrow?"

"I...think I'd like that, yeah." They smiled at one another and the burning in his ears spread across his face. "Where are you staying?"

She pointed across the way to Happy Apartments.  "There, for now.  I WAS camping out near the beach but I'm tired of how cold it's been.  And with my arm having a hole in it I wanted ready access to hot water so I could keep it clean."

She waggled her arm at him and he nodded - clean water, hot or not, was definitely better than unfiltered sea water to keep the wound free of infection.

"-oh, speaking of my arm, I had a...weird question."

"Hmm?"

She pursed her lips and hesitated, then huffed.  "So up in Atara I overheard folks talking about some kind of machine you had down here - something that surgically fixed things?"

Some kind of-- oh.  "You mean the Uplifter?"

"Not sure what it's called but maybe? Someone there was bragging about how it had fixed their split lip without even leaving a scar behind.  Does it...only work on faces?" Harrison nodded and her shoulders slumped.   "Well, poo.  So much for that idea."

"What...idea?  Were you wanting to try and use it on your arm?"

She nodded.  "Yeah.  I'm cleaning it like the doctor told me to and everything but I was hoping it could be...you know, fixed, without me having to deal with it for the next several weeks."

"Ah.  Y-yeah, unfortunately it's only designed to work on the neck and up."

"What's it do, then?"

"Uh..." Harrison shoved his hands into his pockets, thinking -- Xu hadn't formally taught him about the Uplifter just yet but he sort of knew a few things.  "It...repairs injuries, and I know it can alter things about your face.  It can also temporarily cause your hair to grow in a different color too."

Lily's eyes lit up at that.  "Different hair color?!  Really?"  She blew out a breath and looked up toward the sky, smiling.  "I've always wanted green or blue hair... But it only does it temporarily?"

"Yeah.  No idea how long it lasts - I haven't been taught much about it."

All of a sudden her expression froze and she looked to him wide-eyed.  "Hang on - you said it can ALTER your face?"

"Yeah.  Dr. Xu said he's used it to fix cleft lips and a few other facial birth defects on people from Atara and Ethea."

"How?"

"I have no idea," he sighed.  "It's a complex piece of machinery.  I guess if I read the manual I could figure out the science behind it but I doubt I'll be learning about it any time soon...or ever.  I won't have one when I become a doctor and strike out on my own so it might not be worth my time to learn about something I won't have access to later."

Lily's expression relaxed, as did the rest of her, and she rocked back and forth from toes to heels.  "That's a good point.  Kind of wild that something like that exists and used to exist in the Old World too... I bet Old World people had crazy hair colors," she giggled.

He opened his mouth to respond and then immediately closed it; right on the tip of his tongue was Eli's name and situation -- if anyone would be able to talk about hair color trends of the Old World she'd be the one. But...it seemed like it wasn't his place to tell anyone about her.   There was rumor enough floating around without him pointing more people toward her, and he'd seen her therapy sessions; it just...wouldn't be right to put more pressure on her right now.  She was a person, not a novelty.

"Either that or they were really terrible about not injuring their faces," he said finally.

Lily let out a laugh that ended in a snort; she clapped her hands to her mouth and blushed a bit (or maybe it was just the way the lights outside the Round Table lit her face - it was hard to tell).  "Ha- uh, eheh.   Sorry.  That just immediately made me think of an entire civilization of people with too-short doors banging their heads everywhere they went."

Harrison bit his lower lip to cut back on his laugh - that WAS a funny image.   "Maybe the doors were all normal-sized and Old World people were just really tall."

"Or bad at building doors!"

She started laughing again and Harrison let himself laugh along; even if he knew that was just goofy speculation it was still pretty amusing to picture.

Once she'd caught her breath she turned toward the Apartments in the distance.  "Ok.  So I'll see you at some point tomorrow?"

"Sure thing."

"All right!  Good night!"  She waved over her shoulder and headed off toward the apartment building.

Harrison waited and watched until she made it through the doors and inside, then let his feet carry him to Dr. Xu's house.  He had a few books to pick up before he returned to his own rented room at the Happy Apartments building.

Oh.  Maybe he should have mentioned he was staying there too.

Man...he was really bad at this.

-----------------------------------------------

Two more weeks and no sign of the spy.

At least by then Mali had come back and she'd helped Arlo, Remington, and Sam comb the entire Portian countryside again as well as most of the territory between here and Sandrock.

They'd found a few old campsites but the tracks were too muddled to tell who they belonged to; with Old Bob wandering around and tourists moving through Portia it just wasn't possible to positively confirm who had stayed where -- Eli, Asher, and Mali had worked out a rough "when" for the sites but it wasn't any help at determining the "who" part of it.  And that rope bridge that went underneath the waterfall was gone now too.

They were essentially at a dead end and it had Arlo frustrated; he hated the idea of danger lurking around Portia.  Maybe that spy was sent here to do exactly that - spy.  But what if they were sent to harm or steal something? They'd already taken one gun off the first spy...who knew what this semi-invisible person possibly had on them now that their presence was known?

They'd all spent a lot of time discussing tactics; for now they were going to ask Selene to design a sprinkler system to keep the area nice and muddy and also borrow some of the builder's fine wire and hide trip wires in the tallest grass attached to...well, they hadn't decided on that part yet but it was going to be something that could be easily hidden and also made a ton of noise if something shook it.  Since none of them could come up with anything that could overcome the suit's near-invisibility they would have to focus on what physical variables they could actually affect.

One decision they'd made that Arlo didn't agree with was what Eli called a "Stupid Plan" - capital S, capital P.  The logic, she explained, was that the spy knew that THEY knew the spy was around; they should assume that the spy would be carefully watching them for signs of vigilance and be purposely avoiding their search efforts.  The trick to getting the spy to lower their guard again was for the rest of them to pretend to be stupid: everyone goes "back to normal" and pretends to stop looking for them (with emphasis on pretend - they'd all of course still be as vigilant as they could without tipping their hand).

"If we can just convince this person that we're convinced they're gone," Eli had said, "then I bet they'll get bold and sloppy, just like how they got bold the night we first fought them."

It made a sort of sense in a way but Arlo didn't like the idea; he wasn't comfortable with pretending to let his guard down (mostly because he didn't know how to actually do that).  The Pigs, Sam, and Remington had been willing to give it a shot so he'd been outnumbered, though they'd at least all respected his concerns about it.

The one good thing out of the decision to enact the Stupid Plan was he and Eli were free to go back to their respective abodes and sleep in their own beds.  He didn't realize how much he'd missed his bed until he was back in it - no hard pillow beneath his head, no rough canvas surface of the cot under him, no carpet burns on his elbows from said canvas.  It felt like a shameful luxury to be back in a proper bed and he actually overslept the next morning.  By the time he'd dressed and hurried down to Selene's to meet the others for their newly restarted morning training sessions they were already halfway through the warm up exercises. It did make him feel a bit better to see Eli looked a little...not tired, but not exactly focused.  More like she could fall back asleep if she laid down somewhere.  

Adam was here today in Asher's place; he moved to a spot next to the man and started in with the rest of them as they swapped between exercises and stretches to warm them up for their run and the harder stuff afterward.

"Anything?" he grunted after a bit, glancing toward Adam.

"Nothing," came the answer.

Well...he supposed he wasn't surprised.  

It was nice to be back to training at least; Eli seemed to be going easy (easier) on them today.  They finished their warm ups, did their run, and came back to do the harder things but it felt shorter than he remembered it being.  Still...the combination of sore muscles, sweat, and a heightened heart rate felt good.  When they were done and had cooled off some Remington and Sam headed out to take up their old patrol routes; Adam left to, presumably, head back to the facility camp, leaving him and Eli alone in the yard.

As he watched she did some stretches (ones that were different than those she'd taught them) and then moved over to lean against the fence and stare out into the fields; he glanced out that way too -- there were barren trees, bushes, and a few llamas out there that were picking at the first green shoots coming up.  With the spring melt finally upon them the bushes and trees would be budding soon and there'd be more out there aside from the isolated spots of hardy herbs that, somehow, managed to survive and grow even in freezing temperatures.

"I have to be honest," he said into the silence.  Eli shifted just enough that he knew she was listening but not so much that she was looking at him.  "I have no idea how to act like I'm not aware of my surroundings.  That's probably going to be the hardest part about all of this for me."

"Want to learn?"

He came up to stand beside her at the fence and eyed a couple of llamas as they suddenly burst into a hopping fit, bouncing around one another for a few moments before going back to grazing.  "How exactly do you teach something like that?"

"It's not hard - you just have to learn new ways to pay attention without paying attention."

She looked over to him with a smug smirk; he blew out a sigh but smiled.   "I'm guessing it's something I have to be shown that can't really be explained."

"More or less, yeah."

"I guess the next question is when would you want to start?"

She shrugged.  "Can be anytime we're both free.  It's not something that's easy to teach so you're going to need a lot of time to dedicate to it."

Arlo nodded; his schedule was back to normal now that they were acting out the Stupid Plan.  "We can make it work."

Out in the fields there was suddenly the noise of startled llamas; Arlo shifted his attention from Eli back out to the animals and could see a pair of figures walking in the fields.  He squinted that way and it took him a moment to realize it was Dr. Xu and...someone else.  Probably that student of his.  Xu had what he thought was a basket over one arm and seemed to be gesturing at the little dots of bright green among the brown, soggy grasses.  His student nodded and walked over to bend down over one of the green spots and began to carefully remove bits and pieces and hand them up to Xu -- Arlo knew the doctor went on walks to collect whatever freshly growing plants he could find, even in the dead of winter, so it seemed they were observing one of those.  

Movement from the south caught his eye then and he saw someone approaching the two in the fields; whoever it was was bundled up in a heavy coat and had a scarf on -- it looked to be a woman, but not anyone Arlo recognized. She waved at the two in the field and the student waved back (what had been his name?  It started with an H...Arlo had only met him once and now he couldn't remember the man's name).  Whoever the woman was didn't stick around long: she greeted them, very briefly talked to them, then continued on back toward Portia.

"Any idea who that is?"

Eli shook her head.  "Nope.  I've seen her walking around town but I've not talked to her myself.  Guess I can ask Dr. Xu at my next therapy session."

Arlo nodded, then looked over to her.  "...I don't want to make you uncomfortable with personal questions, but..."

A faint smile crossed her face; this time she did turn her head to look at him.  "How's it going?  It's...going.  Some days are better than others but overall it's getting easier.  Time heals all wounds as they say."

"I'm glad to hear it."  He turned to put his back against the fence and leaned.  "There's a holiday coming up - Day of the Bright Sun.  I bet a lot of people would like to see you there."

"What's the holiday for?"

"Have you heard of or read about Peach yet?"

She nodded.  "That's the guy who invented some machine that got rid of the clouds in the sky, right?"

"Right.  It's a holiday to celebrate the sun returning.  We spend the week leading up to it wrapping gifts and delivering them to city hall, and on the day of the holiday the gifts are dropped all over town from an airship that flies over Portia."

Eli raised an eyebrow at that.   "Not sure which is harder to believe - air-dropped presents or the fact an airship still exists."

"It-" Arlo paused, thinking on how to word it.  "-it's probably not the type of airship you might be thinking of."

"I'd hope not.  Airships were bigger than Portia is."

"Really?" he asked; she nodded, and he shook his head.  "Hard to picture...  But ah, no.  This airship isn't all that big.  Not much bigger than Mali's plane, to be honest."

"Is this a sort of buy in thing to participate then?"

"Buy in?"

"Do I have to give gifts to be able to receive any?"

"Not..." Again he paused.  "Not really?  I don't think there's any actual rule about it.  Why?"

"I'm not the greatest at choosing gifts - especially not for people I hardly know.  And I don't want to receive something if I didn't give someone a gift."

"Oh, don't worry about that.  Everyone gives something - usually several things - even if it's just small trinkets or even raw materials of some kind, and the gifts don't have anyone's names except for the giver on them.  Just last year a pair of gifts I received were a bouquet of flowers and a roll of cotton fabric -- it's sort of a crap shoot for what you might get."

Eli nodded slowly, wrinkling her nose. "Well, if I'm not buying for specific people that makes it a lot easier in that regard.  A lot less awkward too, since I'm not physically giving them out myself."

"Nope.  Just catch presents falling from the sky."

"Sounds...interesting, then.  I'd at least show up for the novelty."

He smiled at her.  "And companionship, I'd hope."

She returned the smile.  "Yeah, yeah, that too."  With a small grunt she straightened and dusted her hands off.  "I'll add gift shopping onto my To Do list.  Let me know when you next have some free time and we can start in on teaching you a few new tricks."

"I'm free now if you are."

He watched as she turned to head toward the opposite side of the yard where the gate to the road was; after a breath or two he followed her -- what else was he supposed to do?

"Now's good, I guess.  Without turning around, how many llamas were out on the field?"

"Uh."  Arlo slowed to a stop; the urge to turn around or at least peek was strong but she'd specifically told him NOT to do that.  "...five?"

"Seven.  How many bushes were out there?"

"Si...six?"

"Four."

He blew out a sigh and started to follow along behind her again.  "I'm guessing my first lesson is to assess everything I see?"

"The idea is to sort of...absorb it without actively counting or noting things.  Things like numbers, patterns, colors, people, details of places, sounds and what directions things are coming from or moving in. Take it all in, in a glance or two, and be able to recall it quickly."

"Right..."  Ahead of him Eli headed out of the gate and then waited, holding it open for him.  "Well.  I'm up for the challenge."

She just smiled and led the way down the road.

----------------------------------------------

Something about the sound of the airship overhead was distinctly...uncomfortable.

Not enough that it wasn't something she could tolerate but enough that she could feel anxiety and a bit of fear just beneath the surface; with it came an urge to duck into cover, or to otherwise get out of sight. Eli couldn't recall ever hearing something like it but clearly her subconscious did, and inside her head a small alarm system was starting to blare.

She'd been standing with the crowd of townsfolk only moments ago but the arrival of the airship had sent them all into a stumbling jog together as a group, laughing and lightly jostling one another; no one stopped unless they'd actually managed to snag a present and then those persons hung back to let the group run ahead and get a head start on the rest of the falling presents.

Eli wasn't anywhere near enough to catch any, and at the moment she didn't particularly care.

 I'm FINE.  I'm fine.  There's no danger here.

She kept it going as a little mantra in her head and forced herself to focus on the spectacle of an entire town catching things raining out of the sky.  Sam had said the airship swept across the city and then out to the fields; it should be out of sight and range soon.

Sucking in a breath she scanned her surroundings; a ginger-haired woman with a parasol and Gust were still here, as was Gale.  They were walking at a slow pace, talking and laughing amongst themselves, and hadn't seemed to notice she'd lingered.

She should...probably move.  To avoid drawing attention to herself.  This wasn't something she wanted to try and explain to anyone - especially not on a holiday.  Let them have their festivities and fun...no reason to bring the mood down.

Of course that meant following the source of the sound.

 Come on.  I can handle this.  It won't be much longer.

It took another breath or two to urge herself into a slow walk, heading off after the crowd.  Here and there in the street were bows and ribbons - she assumed they'd fallen off the gifts since she was still trying to wrap her head around how the presents could survive falling from such a height.  Did shock foam persist through the ages?  Maybe she could get a look at a box later.

The crowd was at the far side of the plaza ahead - the one with the big tree in the middle.  Eli glanced up and traced the path of a package that was wrapped in bright orange paper with white ribbon; it suddenly hit her that those looked an awful lot like New Year's Dawn presents.  A holiday that didn't exist anymore...one she'd never experience again.  No presents, no family dinners, no games, no costume parties...

Simultaneously she felt a heavy weight settle in her gut coupled with the sensation of her stomach twisting into a knot, followed by a familiar hot prickle behind her eyes.  Abruptly she stopped and spun on her heel, fully intending to retreat as quickly as possible back to her room.  In a split instant she realized Asher had been walking up behind her - it was clear he'd been trying to catch up to her and her sudden reversal of direction had caught him by surprise while also nearly bowling him over.

"Whoa-" Asher stumbled a bit as he tried to put some space between them.

"Sorry.  What's up?" she asked quickly.  She side-stepped him and looked up the street -- no one was in sight now.  Good.  She could still make an escape.

"Uh." His eyes were on her as she moved.  "-is something wrong?"

In the moment Eli knew she could just lie and say everything was fine; the problem was if he could already see it on her face then it'd be pointless to try and hide it now.  With a deep breath she rubbed at the bridge of her nose.  "Yes.  Sort of. I just need to get some distance between me and here."

With that she started walking; it was a little difficult to hear him over the sound of the airship but after a pause Asher's footsteps hurried after her.

"At the risk of sounding insensitive, what's the exact problem?"

"Dunno," she replied.  "Just something about that sound is...not good."

He sped up until he matched her speed and then walked at her side.   "Gotcha.  Um.  Let's -- have you seen the hot spring retreat?  We can catch the Dee-Dee up there and it ought to be far enough away you won't hear the airship."

"I hope you're not expecting me to actually utilize the springs."

"No, I wasn't thinking that.  That's just the first location that's within quick and easy reach that I could think of that would also be fairly quiet."

"I could just go home."

"Do you want to be shut in a room at the moment?"

Eli sighed and squeezed her eyes shut; what she wanted, right now, was to be normal and at the festival, holiday, whatever-it-was in the plaza.   Which...after that airship left, maybe she could go back. Maybe. Her obvious lack of caught gifts might invite questions she'd rather discuss with Dr. Xu first though, so maybe not.

Luckily as they came within sight of the Dee-Dee stop the Dee-Dee was only ten yards down the road; Asher waved at it and the driver stopped and waited for them to jog down to the stop instead of continuing on.  The hum of the Dee-Dee motor seemed a little more familiar, if a bit rougher than she was accustomed to, and it helped a bit to drown out the airship's rumble.   It was a short drive up to the retreat and, as Asher had said, it was way quieter -- she could barely detect the airship from here, and once they were standing on the dock that surrounded the little inset pool meant for the hot spring patrons to sit in there was the lapping of water and a bubbling noise as well.

Now that the "danger," according to her brain, was gone she could feel a bit of tension draining away and leaving what felt like a gaping, empty ache behind her right eye.  Asher found and unfolded a pair of fabric deck chairs and set them up facing the west, away from Portia and any chance of spotting the airship.  Eli dropped into one and ground the heels of her palms into her eyes.

"So."  She had to clear her throat and try again.  "-so, was there something you needed?"

Asher lowered himself into the other chair but didn't lean back.  "Not in particular.  Mali wanted to talk to Arlo and I was asked to play messenger but since he's busy with the holiday she wasn't expecting him to go rushing out."

"Don't let me keep you from an errand.  I'll be fine."

He waved a hand dismissively.  "They can wait.  Unless you're wanting me to leave."  With that he looked over to her.

She blew out a long sigh.  "I don't know what I want.  Well, I do.  But none of what I want is possible.  I want to go home.  I want to hug my husband and parents again.  I want to see my squad.  Some days I wake up and I'm perfectly fine with the thought that all that's gone and there's nothing I can do about it...other days, you just have to press on and act like you're fine."

Asher bowed his head slightly, resting his chin on his fists with his elbows braced against the hard wood of the arms of the deck chair.  "I wish there was something I could do, or say, to help with it all.  Sometimes being human seems like a waste, doesn't it?  Brains we don't have control over stirring us up and making someone think or feel things they probably wouldn't choose to otherwise."

Eli managed a very faint smile.  "I definitely can think of better emotions to be stuck with, yes."  She let out another heavy sigh and rubbed at her temples - the ache was spreading across the front of her head, through the forehead area and behind both eyes now. "I think I have a slight edge in that part of ranger training was focusing on instinct and logic and forgoing most emotional reactions.   We were...always ready for it to go to hell.  You had to be ready to switch off the emotional part of your brain and get shit done at any moment.  I think my 300 year long nap damaged that switch, or maybe this is just too much to switch off whenever I want to."

Asher nodded at her but didn't say anything; they both went quiet and Eli focused her attention on the details and soft noises around her: the wind, the bubbling of the spring, the small waves caused by the bubbles hitting the pilings that supported the dock.  A few times she heard faint birdsong.  There was a small building on the dock that she assumed held whatever was needed for the hot springs business; it was partially blocking the wind coming off the fields so the steam off the springs was actually making it a bit too warm for her liking.  She thought of taking her jacket off but didn't want her shirt to get damp.

Without any other option Eli just sat and steamed inside her coat until every last hint of sound of the airship was gone; after giving it a few minutes more she stood up and turned to look toward Portia -- at least from here it seemed like the airship was actually gone.  

There was the creaking of a deck chair to her right and out of the corner of an eye Eli could just make out Asher standing up.

"Are you ready to head back?"

"I think so.  It seems pretty quiet."

He studied her a moment.  "Are you wanting to go back to the celebration, or just head home?"

"We'll see how I feel when I'm at the gate again."

They put the deck chairs away and headed back toward the Dee-Dee stop to wait for the next one to drive by.

"...as embarrassing and awkward as this was...  Thanks."

Asher flashed her a gap-toothed grin.  "You're welcome.  Have to earn my keep somehow."

She snorted and shook her head.  "Typically 'friend' is not a salaried position."

"Good job security, at least."

------------------------------------------------

Everyone around him was buzzing with excitement and chattering over the gifts they'd gotten this year; Arlo had gotten a neat looking woven wristband in purples and greens (no name on it so no idea who had given it) along with a new bronze blade from Django, and (purely by accident, since his third gift had technically been caught up in the tree without anyone noticing until it fell out and hit him as he was walking by) a nice woolen blanket from Sophie.

The box that the blanket had come in was a tad too bulky to comfortably carry around so he had it sitting on the bench beside him as he stood off to the side of the Research Center; everyone was beginning to break off in small groups to go take photos together, and he knew that once Sam and Remington had done whatever personal ones they wanted to take that they'd be looking for him so they could all take their yearly Civil Corps picture together.

Skimming the crowd Arlo couldn't help but feel a bit sad that he didn't see Eli anywhere; he had the urge to go walking around to see if he'd just overlooked her somehow but knew it'd be easier for Remington and Sam to find him if he stayed put.

He knew that logically it was going to take time for Eli to feel fully welcome, and like she fully fit in...still, he couldn't help but feel like he was at fault in some way. Should he have personally invited her along, instead of leaving it open?  But then would it seem like he was being overbearing or guilting her into something she didn't want to do?  There were times he held back out of worry that he was about to be too pushy but perhaps that instead was making him look too distant?

"Arloooooo-"

At the shout he looked up sharply only to see a mob of children heading his way - the triplets, Jack, and Toby at their head.  

"No need to yell.  What do you need?"

Toby walked up and let the boxes he was carrying drop to the ground in a heap.  "Have you seen Eli?  We can't find her anywhere."

Hm.  So that confirmed that she just wasn't here rather than he'd somehow missed her.  "I haven't, sorry."

Toby huffed out a sigh.  "Guess we'll keep looking.  Mayor Gale let us grab some extra presents for her since no one had seen her and we wanna give them to her."

Arlo looked the kids over; the boxes at Toby's feet had been opened, as were the three boxes Jack was toting.  Each of the triplets had two opened boxes each but they also all carried one extra, unopened gift.  "That's very nice of you kids to do that."

"Guess we can check if she's at home," Jack said.  Toby nodded and scooped up his opened gifts.

"Try not to bombard her," Arlo called after them as they started to head off up the street.

"What was that all about?"

Arlo turned to see Sam standing there.  "They're looking for Eli.  Don't suppose you've seen her today?"

"Not since the very start," Sam answered.  "She was with everyone when the airship started its pass.  You don't think something happened to call her away, do you?"

He frowned; that hadn't crossed his mind, actually.  "...I hope not.  We should go check - have you seen Remington?"

"Selene cornered him for a few pictures but he should be free here in a few."

With a nod Arlo turned around and looked over the blanket box; there was a recycle bin at the bench near the base of the tree.  He first took the bronze sword out of its box and fastened its clip to one of the straps on his jacket, then slipped the sword into place until he heard it click securely.  Next he took the blanket out of the box and tossed it over his shoulder; it didn't take long to walk over to the recycle bin and deposit the boxes, and by then Remington had spotted them and they all met up at the barbershop.

"Do we have trouble?" Remington asked once he'd reached them.

"Possibly," Sam replied.  "Seems Eli disappeared right as the airship started its flight over town - we're worried something might have called her away so we're headed out to the facility to go looking for her."

Arlo nodded (even though they hadn't discussed the 'facility' part - it made sense to head in that direction so he wasn't going to try and correct her).  "If you're done here let's head out."

Remington gave a curt nod and the three of them turned to head up the street; once they'd crested the hill and arrived in Peach Plaza they, to their surprise, spied Eli -- she was standing with Asher and the five kids were huddled around them near Peach's statue.

"-well that's good news," Sam said after a pause.  "If she AND Asher are both here then there's probably nothing wrong."

"At the facility," Arlo added.  He looked between the two of them.  "There might be something else wrong, if you catch my meaning."

Remington frowned.  "Hmm.  Yeah...could be.  I bet this reminds her of a holiday back in her own time.  Bad memories."

Sam matched his frown.  "Didn't think about that.  ...well, let's go see."

Arlo walked with them up toward the group around Eli; Asher caught his eye and flashed them an 'OK' signal discretely, which Arlo acknowledged with quick jerk of his head.

"-AND," Toby was saying, as they got within earshot.  "Look!  I kept my grades up just like I said I would!"

The three unopened gifts were sitting in a small stack at Eli's feet; Arlo watched as Eli turned her attention to a square of paper Toby was waving around.  Finally she managed to grab it out of his hands and hold it still so she could read it and after a moment she nodded and handed it back.

"All right, fair enough - you did like you promised your mother you'd do.  So now, once your mother says it's ok to start, I'll start teaching you.  But only when your mother says so," Eli said, emphasizing the last part.

"Man, this is going to be great!" Toby squealed.  He stuffed the report card back into his jacket pocket and spun around, taking off in a sprint only to collide with Remington.   "-oof, sorry!"

Remington helped get him steady on his feet and then wisely stood aside as the boy took off running again.  "It's fine just-" and then, rather than finishing his sentence, just shrugged with an amused look as Toby was already mostly out of sight.

The other kids giggled and said their goodbyes and headed off to follow Toby (though at a much slower speed), leaving the five adults to look to one another.

"We were worried when we didn't see you," Remington finally said.  

Eli smiled faintly; Arlo thought she looked tired.

"I'm fine.  Just had to step away to get some air," she replied.  Her attention flicked down to the gifts at her feet, and then Arlo was almost certain she looked at the wristband he was wearing; the smile got a little deeper and he had an inkling as to who had given the gift without putting their name on it.  "Was nice of them to think of me like that."

"They wanted to make sure you got something," Arlo said.  "You were missed today."

Something flickered across her face but the smile came right back.  "Ha, c'mon - you're going to make me blush."

As she talked there was something written on Asher's face but Arlo couldn't read it well - it was something like thinly disguised concern, he thought.  It seemed to him like Eli hadn't just stepped away for air...but what had happened?

Asher noticed Arlo studying him and the odd look went away, replaced with a smile of his own.  "Well! Now that that's taken care of, what say we all head down to what's left of the festivities?"

"It's just pictures left, and then the town photo," Sam said.  "If we hurry we might be able to get one or two in before the big one."

Eli's brow furrowed.  "Another town photo?  Is that just...something that's done at every holiday?"

"Mostly," Remington chuckled.  "We do like our photographs here in Portia."

After a pause Eli nodded at that.  "I guess some things don't change -- ah, er.  I mean, people's desire to document things don't.  There's no conceiveable way that ANY city in my time could have ever gathered together for one big group photo where you could still even tell it WAS people."

She bent to pick up the gifts; Arlo stepped over to her and offered a hand.  "Want to open those before you head down?"

"Oh.  Guess I should, yeah."  

Arlo took two of the gifts off her hands and stood there while she balanced the third one on top of them.  The first box opened revealed a finely carved crystal inside a delicate wire filigree that was strung on a leather tie -- something Arlo immediately recognized because HE'D been the one that had bought that one from a traveling craftsman months ago and given over to city hall as one of his gifts.

When she flipped the tag over to read it Arlo saw her expression soften a bit, and the smile grew.  "Ha - interesting twist of fate, that."

"Y-yeah, I guess," he laughed quietly.  "Is the wristband something you...?"

"Saw me looking at it, huh?" she said as she tied the crystal necklace on.   "I couldn't figure out what to buy so I made a couple things.  Funny we got one another's gifts."

"Better than getting one of your own?" Sam offered.  She looked amused but also admiring of the necklace.   "Where'd you even get that?"

"I'll tell you later," Arlo answered.  He swapped one of Eli's unopened gifts with the empty box and stood there holding her last one while she opened the considerably larger box.

Inside was a pot (plastic, but painted with a gorgeous geometric pattern) with a healthy looking asteria plant in it with a tag from Alice attached to it; Arlo again swapped out her last gift with the empty box and then, as she was opening it, began to carefully break the boxes down so they could go into the recycle bin.  Inside the last box was a copy of Journey to the East, from Django.

Eli turned the book over in her hands.  "Huh...I remember a book by this name existing back in my day.  I wonder if this is the same story."

"Only one way to find out," Remington said with a grin.  He gently clapped a hand to Eli's shoulder and looked down the street.  "Why don't we all go get one photo squeezed in?"

"Sure."  Eli tucked the took under an armpit and carried the potted asteria in the same arm.

Arlo quickly collapsed the book the book had been in and deposited them in the recycle bin as they passed by; they had their picture taken together just outside of Portia's gates then hurried back inside to get on the riser for the town photo.

"How about dinner?" Asher asked once the picture was taken.  "We can all squeeze into a booth, probably."

"Didn't you have a message for Arlo?" Eli asked dryly.

Asher shrugged.  "I'm getting to it.  Mali stressed that it wasn't any rush."

Arlo looked over at him.  "What?"

"Mali wants to talk to you, when you've got time.  She specifically said it's not anything immediately important because she didn't want to interrupt your holiday.  So, let's go get dinner, then you and I-" he said, pausing to waggle thumb between himself and Arlo, "-can take them some dinner and see what Mali wanted."

"Assuming we can get into the Round Table," Sam said with a smirk and a nod of her head toward the crowd of people walking toward the restaurant.

Asher shrugged again and grabbed the elbows of Remington and Eli.  "Then let's get moving so we don't get shut out."  He began to pull them along with him, and Sam and Arlo followed.

They did manage to get a table, with Remington and Sam on one side and Eli sandwiched between Asher and Arlo on the other.  Arlo found it...a bit suspect, that it always seemed like Asher found a spot next to Eli; it wasn't his business but it stood out to him in a way he thought he should remember.

It looked like Eli's first lesson on noticing things had already sunk in.

[aceeddiekaspbrak]

Jumble of thoughts from my notes from ~nov/dec 2017

Contains canon typical references to teen sexuality, homophobia, and violence

so if we go off the idea that, for the bowers gang, everything that happened when they were twelve, with the junkyard and all, actually still happened that way but in 1985, how does that all turn out with out pat /dying/ in the end, and they live on to reach 1989?

Patrick’s able to clean out his fridge and comes back with his rags and all and really scrubs it, and stays away from it for a while. Can’t risk being caught breaking anymore rules especially when some kid like Henry can find out. But how henry found out keeps nagging at him, and he’s trying to stay away from Henry, too–so he doesn’t scare and go telling–, but it's harder because he needs to find out how he messed up and got caught in the first place so he doesn’t do it again.

(maybe he thinks about asking him, and then asking if he wants to see the freezer, since he seems like he might be into that shit, just to shove Henry in it and see how long he lasts. The fantasy keeps him occupied from asking for sometime)

When he finally goes to ask Henry when he’s alone, maybe winter that year, hoping six months is enough for Henry to get over himself. He hasn’t and just opens with, “What do you want ya’ fuckin’ pansy.”

Patrick knows he wouldn’t tell anybody directly, because then it would get back to why Henry had let him. And he probably wouldn't get anything out of pounding him either. Patrick wouldn’t mind if he did it anyways. So Patrick just asks him straight out how he knew. Henry would probably just do the douche bag ‘’wouldn’t you like to know‘’ thing twelve year olds do so well and leave.

There'd be some cold tension for a while. Patrick would probably start trying to play on Henrys good side, just to find out. But he asks maybe every few days at some point, Henry snaps and tells him if he keeps nagging him like some bitch he’s gonna beat him like he’s askin’ for. Pat says he wouldn’t mind. But he found out a rule, and asks just maybe once a month, and then eventually less and less.

Henry never tells him.

Maybe one time, last time Patrick asks him, its “did you see it? look in it?” 

Henry just thinks he’s fishing for how he knew again and starts to open his mouth to threaten, fist raising, when Patrick cuts in with: "Do you wanna see it?" in a way thats just a bit more concerning than usual for him.

Henry is curious because of that and his response is largely "I swear to god Hockstetter if this is some sort of faggy come on," and its maybe a year after the junkyard, and Pat hasn't experimented since, keeping true to staying away, but he has checked up on it frequently walking around town, to make sure its hinges are still intact and hasn’t been scrapped. he's thinking hes got to move it, soon, but no way pudgy little Hockstetters gonna be able to do that by himself. And it’s not that Henrys finding out stops bothering Patrick, but after awhile they might actually be the closest thing Patrick can recognize as friends. That's not exactly right, but the closest he’ll ever come to it. And eventually, Henry comes along to the fridge.

He doesn't get it. It doesn't do anything for him, not like it does Patrick, not even close on any front. But it’s not like he cares about Pat killin’ animals it doesn’t even really matter to him, and when he opens the door and it try’s to make a slow, breathless run for it, he’ll even help Patrick drag it back.

Now the fun in that he gets. They end up hunting together, maybe two years after the junkyard when Henry is 14, still small animals, when Vic and Belch have their fuckin jobs or some shit, and Henrys just wanting to get some anger out, since w/o pennywises influence, i dont think hed get to cutting letters into people just yet. Patricks not as much as into the chase with the animals they’re getting, usually just rabbits, birds, stray cats now, since Henry can’t go around as quietly as Patrick had with his box. Patrick however, really likes seeing them struggle in Henry's arms, before they shove them into crates to take to the fridge. The first time he sees Henry kill something, with his bare hands, he wrung some game birds neck just like it was nothing, he wasn’t expecting it and it wasn’t the plan and he brought his box all the way out here for it but he didn’t mind even though he broke his schedule. They just caught another, small rabbit to make up for it but it barely mattered he was so hard and Henry barely mentioned it and the memory got him hard for months. A long time after this has been going on, probably in lateish 1988, after a more exhausting and exhilarating hunt than expected, Henry lets Patrick do something about his arousal for the first time in earnest. He still punches him after, but Patrick doesn’t mind and Henry lets him get off to the blood too. They don’t bring it up, but it happens again a few months later, and it becomes an unspoken part of Patricks schedule.

This facilitates the relationship we see in the film, the two having more chemistry doing fucked up shit together. And eventually, when they reach a  better understanding what the consequences might be if they're found out–despite Derry being as weird as it is and Butch being a cop–they move the fridge into the neibolt house. They probably have to get at least Belch to help (he hopes they are gonna be hanging out there now, instead of the junkyard and shit, but the place is way creeper and he nopes out real quick, but not after his mostly joking question of stashing beer in the house fridge was shot down way to quickly and harshly to not be questionable. But he doesn't ask. Doesn't want to know.). Its only there for a little over a year before the events of the film, but they do hang out there. things seem to die quicker, though, and their escapes a deterred by being in the house, and Henry gets a little less out of that. There is something about the confusion though, that they cant just run straight out that is interesting. With kids missing and curfews being enforced its harder and harder to go out there, with animals, without drawing suspicion (real, or from their paranoid selves). So it doesnt truly get used much, So Ben Hanscom coming along when he did was a great outlet for the two.

>how does Henry know? maybe here it has something to do with his dad being a cop, or maybe when pat started hangin around him more Henry follows him, just to see what makes this freak tick, since hes so hard to read and has a reputation around school. 

[[1988henry worries sometimes that hes in love with patrick. Hes not. Hes pretty sure he /knows/ that too, but still, he worries. He knows hockstetter isnt with him, doesnt even think he (knows how to be?) can be in love, and maybe thats the part that worries him, that hes letting this kid who doesnt care touch him, use him, only because henry wants it himself]]

**AU where they dont die, pennywise doesn’t use henry to chase the losers, they escalate. Probably by 1991, Henrys friends are all moving on, except for Patrick, and hes left with his bastard of a father and the rage at everything and himself is an all time high. There’s some real small thing by a bus terminal during a layover, and they grab her and she fits right in, and nobody notices she’s missing for a real long time.