#just the right time fanfic

[seefasterdraws]

i think its so funny that no one knows that fionna and cake are real except simon. imagine if he forgets to tell marcy and just gives her a heart attack one day

[moongothic]

Crocodad AU where immidiately after having left Dragon and his baby boy Crocodile finds an 11 year old Robin. And while he's 100% only recruiting her so they can make a beeline for the Poneglyph and Pluton in Alabasta by the two of them... Crocodile accidentally sorta kinda adopts Robin.

At this point Robin's been running for her life from the Government for three years so her deep trust issues and fear of betrayal are starting to take root in her little heart. Like perhaps they haven't taken fully over yet, and being still a child I'm sure Robin might've still had that genuine hope that she could find a safe place to stay in. But I'm sure the though of "what'll he'll do with me once he gets what he wants?" would be nagging at her at the back of her mind. Meanwhile Crocodile's struggling between the pain and hurt he's already gone through and given him his trademark trust issues, as well as the aftermath of The Dragodile Divorce. But he also has his Fresh Paternal Instincts and probably misses his baby. So when given a small, scared child who is running for her life, being chased by the very same Government that'll want his son dead if they ever find out about him... Yeah that might fuck with your brain a little

You know this post was supposed to be just that first paragraph and just a few footnotes from the following two paragraphs. And then I kept on Having Thoughts. And I kept on writing them down. And oh no what happened when did this post get so long (Look I was going to either kept on writing my Additional Thoughts in the tags or I just put them in the actual fucking post)

Like considder this: based on this one SBS, we can kinda tell that if Crocodile was given a chance to raise a child, that child would be a spoiled little shit, right

So in this scenario, where Crocodile's looking after lil Robin, would he be kind of torn? Unsure how to feel about her?

Because on one hand, this strange child would have the potential to not only ruin his plans, strip him of his Shichibukai Privileges by outing him and his plans to the World Government, but also put his son in grave danger by extension (if she found out about him having been involved with the Revolutionaries and/or having a child). But on the other hand, his paternal instincts could make him want to spoil this poor little girl rotten. But only because he needs to (perhaps literally) buy her trust so she'll behave. No other reason, he doesn't feel sorry for her one bit, no sirree. (But maybe he did feel sorry for her, since his son could very well end up exactly like her. Poor little thing) (Which is why he needs to nuke Marijoa out of orbit as soon as possible, no matter the cost, and this child can't get in the way of Crocodile protecting his son) (But also this is a child. Like how bad could she be. Besides all he really needs to do to win her trust is be nice and make her feel safe, right?)

Of course, while I'm suggesting Crocodile could have some parental instincts, realistically, he hasn't actually spent any time being, you know, a father to a child (looking after his newborn for an unknown though short amount of time aside), so it's possible he wouldn't even know how to parent Robin even if he wanted to, would he? (Like taking care of a newborn and an 11 year old kid aren't the same either) So if he was kind of just emotionally flipflopping between No Trusting Ever and It's Just A Kid for God's Sake, Crocodile trying to be nice to Robin to make her feel safe and then telling himself to stop being so soft and vunerable... Yeah that would make for an absolute mess of a relationship. (Not to mention, let's be real, dude's a scary motherfucker too, and a bloody giant compared to itty bitty baby Robin. He could keep on accidentally scaring the shit out of Robin (who would be On Fucking Edge To Begin With) by just Being Himself. Like for example, can you fucking imagine if he caught Robin trying to cheer herself up with a little "dereshishishi" only to tell her to stop because "it was stupid"? 'Cause I can imagine him doing that, and boy howdy would that make Robin feel bad)

Or who knows, maybe Crocodile was just Born To Be A Dad, maybe he just Fucking Gets It. Like Crocodile is canonically pretty good at manipulating people to do what he wants them to do (see: how he played Vivi like a fiddle), so knowing Robin's position and understanding how she feels, maybe he COULD completely nail how she needed to be treated. Not being too familiar but still making her feel safe and happy, knowing exactly when to be stern and when to spoil her, etc. Dude just goes off and wins the Dad of the Year Award while being a deadbeat dad himself. The only thing Crocodile would have to worry about then would be making sure HE doesn't get too fond of her. And certainly that could never happen, he's so in-touch with his own feelings and so grounded, he's not a softie, get outta here. Or maybe he does but never realizes until it's too late and good luck backpedalling on those emotions now dumbass

Alright so, the reason I went on that whole rmble is just that like. I'm so interested in the relationship Robin and Crocodile already have in canon. I'm so facinated and curious about how the two feel about each other, considdering they did spend 4 whole years of their lives together as criminal business partners, though neither ever trusted the other. A partnership that was only ended because Robin betrayed Crocodile, out of her own trauma. (God, I want to see these two "reunite" so bad, I want to know how they feel about each other now after the timeskip and Robin joining the idiot in flipflops who foiled Croc's plans)

My question here is just that... if they had met 13 years earlier, would things have been different? Especially if Crocodad Real? Because as I mentioned in the begining, Robin would've been on the run for only 3 years by this point, as opposed to 16 years before running into Crocodile. Simultaneously, this would be before Crocodile went onto spend an entire decade all alone, slowly losing his marbles in his emotional solitude. They'd both be emotionally traumatized, yes, but would it have been as bad in this scenario? Like I did start this post kind of joking about Crocodile adopting Robin, and for clarity's sake I don't think they'd have like a father-daughter relationship nececarily. But it would be a strange relationship still, because we'd have two broken people, both struggling to trust anyone. One who had lost her mother and her only friends, leaving her all alone and afraid while running for her life. The other a father who had just given up his son whom he probably missed dearly. Both having these holes in their hearts from loss of family, holes that could not be filled with replacements. But could they find comfort in each other anyway, because they still as people occupy similar roles to their respective loved ones? If they both could just get over those trust issues?

Okay I've been going off on the Emotional Side Of Things for this AU Concept, THERE'S PLOT TOO

So if Crocodile did pick Robin up like 19 years ago, that should be before he set up base in Alabasta, long before he had built is homebase and financial empire etc.

Now the thing is, while we don't know when, where and how Crocodile learned about the Ancient Weapons, Pluton specifically and how the lead on it would be in Alabasta... Considdering Crocodile did once upon a time aim to become Pirate King, it would make perfect sense if he had learned about Poneglyphs during his past adventures, as he would have needed to get the Road Poneglyphs to find One Piece. And while the World Government did bury the truth about why Ohara had been burned down and why Robin had been given her bounty (remember, the WG claimed it was because she had sunken a fleet of battleships, which she had not, it was because she could read the Poneglyphs), considdering this is a Crocodad AU specifically, you could totally make an argument Crocodile could've learned about what actually happened to Ohara from Dragon and co. So, just to make this AU work, you could just assume Crocodile learned about the concept of the Ancient Weapons from Dragon. And who knows, maybe he overheard the truth about why Robin had been given her bounty from Dragon too (maybe Dragon was able to get intel from Garp in secret) or while going to Marijoa himself to attend a Shichibukai meeting or something IDK.

Maybe he learned about Pluton being in Alabasta before finding Robin by accident, and maybe they made a beeline for Alabasta the second Croc recruited Robin. Travelling takes time and the guy would've most likely had to find an Eternal Pose to Alabasta just to get there (also canonically Robin didn't enter the Grand Line until her 20s so they should've met in West Blue probably, since that's where Ohara was) Or maybe Crocodile had to haul Robin around for a few months while looking for That Missing Piece of Information that would lead him to Alabasta. (Imagine the two travelling from like island to island, library to library, Crocodile trying to find that leads while Robin's just so excited about ALL THESE BOOKS (she's helping too with the research) (but to her, research is playtime, so she's just having the time of her life) (Also, notice how Crocodile's Theoretical Child is a fucking loser ass nerd? Yeah Crocodile would encourage Robin reading and studying, surely. And that would be fucking cute))

But like, once they set sail to Alabasta...

Sure, Crocodile could try to do it The Slow Way that we know he tried in canon, building trust and creating his little empire etc. But also, in canon, Crocodile couldn't have jumped into action head first because without Robin, even if he had found the Poneglyph he couldn't have read it and found the location of Pluton. Crocodile choosing to do it the slow way may have been partially because he didn't have much of a choise and it could've felt like the smarter move long-term.

But in this scenario, he already has Robin. Yes, he could do it the slow, secure way.

But what'd be there stopping him from infiltrating Cobra's palace and kidnapping him (in the night, when nobody suspects a thing), demanding Cobra to spill the beans lest Crocodile kills him and/or his pregnant wife* (*Vivi was born 10 months after Luffy so depending on how long it's been between Crocodad leaving Luffy behind and this scenario... Yeah either the wife is there, still pregnant, or there's a newborn Baby Vivi)

Like it'd be a risky move but depending on how ballsy Croc's feeling and how confident he feels in being able to kidnap the king without being noticed... Yeah he could probably do it. And I'm sure he'd have no problem killing Cobra either, if anything it'd be required if he didn't want the Government to find out he was out to find Pluton, and god knows Cobra would tell on Crocodile if left alive. I could see Crocodad being maybe a little iffy about killing Baby Vivi though (it's not like the newborn baby could report him to the WG anyways), but if nothing else, he just needs to be able to pull off the bluff of his life to convince Cobra to do as he's told. And we all know Crocodile's good at convincing people.

The only question is, how would Robin take that?

Watching Crocodile go into Full Murder Mode, hearing him say he'd kill a pregnant woman/a newborn baby if he didn't get what he wanted? Like yeah, I'm sure 11 year old Robin would be fine with that, that wouldn't make any alarm bells go off in her head at all, it'd be fiiiine. IT WOULD NOT BE FINE, SHE'D BE SCARED SHITLESS. That fear of "what will he do with me when he gets what he wants"? Well, Robin may not have found the answer to that question in particular, but she certainly found the answer to the opposite question, and it's not good

So say Cobra, kidnapped (perhaps with Baby Vivi) by Crocodile in the night, guides the two to the Poneglyph under the tombs. Crocodile puts Cobra out of his misery because he's not needed anymore. And he asks Robin to read the Poneglyph for him.

Robin, who has spent the last little while, be it weeks or months with Crocodile, him having become her "guardian", the thing keeping her safe. Crocodile, who has now shown how cold blooded and cruel he can be. Robin, who might be scared out of her mind. Of him.

And the Poneglyph says Pluton, the thing Crocodile wants, isn't there. It's in Wano.

What's she going to do?

EDIT: I wrote a sequel post, enjoy

[radpool]

so brown eyes, I'll hold you near, 'cause you're the only song I want to hear...

- death cab for cutie, where soul meets body (inspired by @edgebug fic of the same name ❤️)

wip detail inspired by @edgebug's fic series where soul meets body. part 3 is currently being updated so go forth and read‼️

https://archiveofourown.org/works/58664485/chapters/149477867

[snowcoming]

'omg dick was trying to put tim into arkham' and 'omg dick put jason into arkham next to to the joker' like bbg the only one having a bad time in arkham was dick himself ���😭

[torchstelechos]

I love that Isabeau is the one to bring up the "what do we do if you die" conversation cause its a very good insight to his character at the very start of the game. Isabeau is practical, smart, and loves everyone dearly and wants to know how to help them when shit goes sideways. He's the one to ask about Bonnie too, which is a delightful read on how he thinks because everyone else shuts that down instantly as a "That wont happen and cant happen" but we see later in the game it can happen which is such a startling thing for a game to do but justifies the foreshadowing of Bonnie can die what do we do if that happens? Isabeau, despite everything, is also the one who gets to the heart of the matter even if its not something must people are willing to talk about. All without it being part of his friendquest, thats just him naturally. Which! Says so much about him and how he is! His character when its not about his relationship with Siffrin is a very intriguing thing because it feels like a very classic hard intellectual stance that's been softened after many years of learning to better communicate healthily with others. A reflection, if you will, of Odile but in a very drastic direction. I find him fascinating and I also want to scoop his brains out and study them under a microscope to see all his little brain thoughts.

[inkyrainstorms]

@aroace-get-out-of-my-face YOU. This. Woe be upon ye *casts animation on your fic*

they break my heart man <\3 I simply had to

[notbloominhf]

c!Joel in the first episode somehow acting more awkward than normal and unlike the last few seasons his partner doesn't leave him once, despite his bad jokes and clumsiness and complete lack of social awareness Gem stays and talks back and she does not leave and has he ever experienced that before? Permanence? Company? A friendship not built on bribes or desperation but genuine kindness

[idliketobeatree]

dead boy detectives contrapuntal poems — 2 — (1) (3) (4) (5)

[mothinflamesdoodles]

from a different life

Fanart for the fanfic The Golden Quiche and The Lone Defender by @sophtopus

the “classic” Sans from in The Golden Quiche is already very much unhinged. He already went apeshit across several reloads/resets and this was from before getting the data dowload from LD Dust. Man makes LD Dust cute in comparison XD.

[jade-len]

i think it'd be funny if someone transmigrated as xin mo. the goddamn evil sword. instead of taking it seriously, they just really fucked around with bingge. and, somehow, ended up having the opposite effect of what it's supposedly rumored to do.

picture this: bingge, on the quest for revenge and power, comes across the almighty xin mo. this demonic sword killed everyone that dared to even try wielding it. and, the few who were lucky enough to have it by their side, eventually succumbed to the swords' will.

it is said that the sword is unlike any other, that it etches into your head and eats away your brain, until eventually it consumes you whole. it whispers, speaking in lust, greed, and hatred. it slowly beckons the wielder into giving in to the worst part of themselves and feeds off of pure sin. but to him, it is no matter; luo bingge will surely tame it.

and then he gets to the sword.

demonic qi practically oozes from xin mo. the aura surrounding it makes every part of luo bingge scream, "run; get away, away from that monster." his gut prods at him, begging bingge that this is probably a really bad idea. it's a little terrifying, how even luo bingge, the determined, vengeful demon, is now getting second thoughts about wielding xin mo from just being in its presence alone.

but luo bingge is too, a monster. so he ignores the screams of plea; pushing every thought of doubt in the back of his head, and tightly grips onto the handle. the world around him seems to spin and shake, tumble and crack, from the amount of force bingge needs to use in order to pull the sword of sin out of its place.

when bingge finally has it perfectly fit into the palms of his calloused hands, he hears whispering. he knows that the sword has accepted him as its new host.

the sword's language crawls up to him, as if it were feeling around his body and mind. checking every nook and cranny for it to settle into bingge's form, truly becoming one with the embodiment of sin. the words flow through his brain like a tragically broken guqin, a melody that holds him in a frighteningly familiar trance - all while simultaneously eating away at his brain in the worst ways possible, akin to a child and their favorite snack. it seems to beckon something, but even with luo bingge's impressive hearing, he cannot make out any words from the tone-deaf musical notes xin mo sings.

and then, it is clear. the land around him settles, and everything is still. xin mo itself seems to be.. content. at least, that is what luo bingge believes.

the language of this wretched sword reflects the state around these two monsters.

luo bingge expects it to demand for bloodshed, for the erotic ecstasy of multiple women, for bingge to steal the last of the finest gems of these horrible, vast lands.

instead, he hears this:

"yoooo damn that shit was crazy. did you see what i did there? man, you know, it feels so fucking good to get out of the dirt. hey, do you know if people can like, feed their swords or something? i'm kinda craving something spicy. we never know, in this wack world! wait, don't hold me like that, buddy. it'll make things real awkward."

but luo bingge is determined to get his revenge, so he puts up with the swords' constant rambling about.. whatever the hell it's thinking.

"wait, dude, did you seriously fuck a dying girl? that's wild. yeah, like i know she was dying but it doesn't sound like you wanted it. yo, listen to me, consent is very sexy."

"HAHA hey, dude, sir, man. you wanna play some 'i spy'? we don't have anything else to do. no? too bad, we're playing it. i spy a loser who doesn't wanna play i spy. hint: he's holding me right now."

"okay i know i'm supposed to be this super evil sword and beg to be used - woah that sounded real wrong - but can you at least clean me when you're done killing shit? if you don't, i'm gonna refuse to respond to you and you'll look like a dumbass trying to wield me."

"i can't hear you lalalalalalala you're not being very it girl right now lallalalaalalalla-"

somehow, this is worse than if xin mo was actually eating away at his brain.

weirdly enough though, as luo bingge starts spending more time with this weird ass, seemingly possessed sword, it starts to become more of a.. comfort to have it by his side than pure annoyance. he finds himself responding to it more, like, actually having full on conversations with it. it puts him at ease, wielding xin mo. the hatred doesn't consume him, instead, it seems to soothe the burning rage (and, admittedly, just replace it with small irritation) that holds onto his darkened heart.

xin mo is actually quite kind and caring, for a sword that's supposed represent and be the literal embodiment of sin. sure, it is a hassle to have it cooperate with him sometimes, and it does just ramble on and on about the most random things ever, not giving a single shit if bingge was in the middle of sleeping with maidens and slaying those who get in his way. for the first time, bingge feels so comfortable around something.

it's.. odd. what was supposed to be the turning point in his life, a big step in his plan for revenge, is now something akin to an... acquaintance. not like mobei-jun, or any of the women he's come across, but an actual, dare he say, friend.

sometimes, he finds himself thinking all of this delusional. is this what people were driven mad by? perhaps they simply could not handle dealing with a talking sword. he understands that xin mo was undoubtedly unbearable to be around at the beginning of their alliance, but it has never actually beckoned for blood, power, and sex. if anything, it does the opposite.

maybe he's the delusional one. maybe this is xin mo's way of getting to him.

maybe, xin mo should be considered a thing. the thought feels terribly laughable, as if he were witnessing a person horribly explain themselves. it also makes his teeth grind together in pure agitation.

"hey, you know, you didn't deserve any of the things they did. it wasn't your fault, binghe. the fact that you're half heavenly demon doesn't make you a monster, or any of that wild stuff.. uh, i'm here for you, okay? i know you don't really like talking about all of this or opening up, but i just want you to know that you can.. talk about it. it's not like i can tell anyone else, anyways.

hey- shit i didn't mean to make you cry! wait, wait it's okay to cry! you need to let it out anyways, i promise it doesn't make you weak. there, there. i don't have any hands, so me patting you on the head with my handle will have to do. there, there.. everything will be alright, you'll be okay. i'll be here every step of the way, even if you want to get rid of me."

xin mo, the demonic sword, is more of a person - a good person - than anyone he'd ever come across.

...and then bingge and the xin mo transmigrator become besties or he falls for the damn sword. knowing him, he probably doesn't even know the difference between platonic and romantic attraction anyways. maybe bingge gets a plant body for xin mo using airplane's wack writing. idk i typed all of this down in one sitting.

(plot twist: it's not that the transmigrator xin mo had the opposite effect, it was literally just a placebo effect. luo bingge thought that, and thus it actually did help him lmao)

[seleneprince]

Beron Vanserra is a capitalist first, Fae second

[fearandhatred]

the rapture

it's a holy thing, in theory, a glorious celebration, where those who believe rise to meet the lord in the air. it's a day of joy, in theory, and maybe even of vindication for those who have always believed.

but no one thinks about how it's like to see the dead rise again—bodies clawing their way out of bolted wood and six feet of packed earth, bodies decomposed and maggot-feasted, nails stained with rot and dirt. no one thinks about the violent lurch of their bodies being jolted into the air by the stomach, gravity flinging their heads back down to earth as they struggle in vain to find footing on molecules and gas. no one thinks about those who don't make it.

no one thinks about the screams.

crowley hadn't thought about any of these things. he certainly hadn't thought about the angels that would be called back to heaven along with the believers.

here they stand dead in the middle of absolute ruin, the promise of heaven the only thing left to look forward to on the wasteland of this earth. the sky has opened up like the eye of god, watching over her people for the very first time, and crowley's black wings against the beams of light only remind him that he doesn't belong up there with the rest of them. crowley wraps his arms tight around aziraphale, squeezes his torso like he can maybe keep aziraphale with him through sheer will or, laughably, demonic intervention. like love could ever be enough. like love could stay.

around them, the cacophony of wails and mockingly exaltant trumpets scorch the earth in their intensity, clashing and agonising even—especially—for them, and words make no sound. but they hold on to each other, even as they shrink into themselves against the noise of the undying. i don't want to leave you either, aziraphale doesn't say, but his hands dig into the cotton of crowley's sleeve, and crowley hears the words through his fingertips.

he feels a stronger upward resistance against his embrace now, and he clings tighter, steadfast, even as aziraphale's grip falters. but he knows he can't hold on forever. he knows that nothing ever lasts.

trembling with something unspeakable, he lifts his arms from aziraphale's torso and covers the angel's ears with his hands. he feels more than hearing aziraphale's resulting sob, and he spreads out his wings to wrap them around their bodies. a shield, a comfort, a goodbye.

it's okay, the gesture says in silence. i'll see you in another lifetime.

[polysyndetonaddictsupportgroup]

pez dispenser debris for the fic ask thing? 👀

As much as this is my “kill no darlings you will get EVERY flashback” fic, there’s overarching sociopolitical backstory explaining why Izuku and the rest of class 3A exploded in the public eye that I don’t think I’ll ever fully fit in.

It’s a combination of it being more of a meta analysis than anything and also requiring information from a perspective that I know will never appear in the fic. Like, the fic still gets the different moments that make up this analysis, but there’s no explicit connecting thread to show how they all locked together to create this sort of global cult following of class 3-A. I almost put in a little fake news article opinion piece that was meant to sort of walk the reader through why society is Like This, but I decided it was too heavy handed and deleted it.

Everything that I’m going to reference has already appeared in pez dispenser debris to some degree, and none of it will ever actually materially impact the plot. They may receive a little more detail down the line if they’re mentioned in passing in the fic, so out of an abundance of caution, I’ll stick it below the cut so people can avoid this, but I don’t personally consider any of this spoilers.

Izuku and the rest of the class are famous in pez dispenser debris in a way that’s pretty much unprecedented for students. Canonically, not even all might had a name for himself until after his graduation. Pretty much everyone from class 3A are public figures, with Izuku specifically being considered a major global figure.

In my mind, there was this perfect storm right during their second year that catapulted them into fame. The class personally has varying levels of awareness of why they got so popular, but there was this perfect cross winds of societal unrest and fear that made them household names.

There was an approximately one month span in their second year where they were just hit one after another with a major firestorms of events: The UA Sports Festival, the Sidekick Strike, and the Tartarus Prison Break/Desertion of Yokohama.

The UA Sports Festival is the one that the kids attribute this most to, because so many of the news articles that followed referenced their performance in it. But it probably gave them less mileage than what the other two events did.

What the UA Sports Festival did was showcase their skills to the world in a venue designed to show them off. The public was already on edge. All Might had retired, crime rates kept going up, and people were rapidly losing confidence in existing heroes. Class 2A made such an insane showing of skill in the second Sports Festival that it made the public rave about them for weeks after. It was extremely reassuring to Japan that they had such powerful heroes in the barrel and would soon be on the streets. But that attention probably would have died down had it not been for the Sidekick Strike and Yokohama.

The Sidekick Strike actually had nothing to do with them. But it undermined the public’s faith in heroes at just the right time.

The Sidekick Strike is just one of those things that I have no POV that would even tangentially be involved in it so we’ll get a few passing references in media clips and it’ll never be discussed in depth. Which is a shame because it’s such an interesting conflict to me.

The Sidekick Strike was heavily inspired by the 1919 Boston Police Strike. Effectively, it was the height of the labor rights movement, and police officers got together and went on strike to get the police union recognized. They had tried to negotiate and negotiations failed, and so they all walked off the job. The city descended into lawlessness, the national guard was deployed, it was a whole thing. Famously, Calvin Coolidge fired the entire police force over it on the grounds that there was no striking from public safety.

I thought it would be really interesting if there was something similar that happened with the sidekicks. The thing is that the heroics structure as it stands really incentivizes abuse towards sidekicks. We have a society where there’s a decent amount of heroes who are only in it for the fame. A not insignificant amount of money must come from marketing deals. And it’s a ranked system, so they’re all in competition with each other.

Heroes wouldn’t be incentivized to showcase their sidekicks—they’d be incentivized to take advantage of them and take credit for their work.

Like, think about the work-study experiences. Momo didn’t even officially work for the hero she studied with. She wasn’t getting paid. An adult woman used her for a shampoo ad. Who wants to bet whether Momo saw a dime from it? It’s probably very predatory because the nature of the system incentivizes predation.

I thought the underlying legal issues would be interesting and complex. Who owns a sidekick’s image—the agency or the individual? Who gets the proceeds of their brand deals? This all would be governed by their employment contracts, and sidekicks just starting out have very little leverage compared to big name heroes. And those heroes would want to keep their sidekicks names small and theirs big. The rankings are competitive, after all.

It’s a situation where I do think that like. The sidekicks would have a point in unionizing. The use of their image, appropriate compensation, and proper credit for their busts would all be like, very legitimate concerns in a normal employment context.

I see agencies like Idaten settling immediately with the union and having their sidekicks back on the street before the day is out. In my mind, idaten is considered the gold standard for sidekick jobs already, and their employees mostly did it out of solidarity with the people they worked alongside of. Like, Idaten was already doing most of the union’s demands and signed off very quickly on the remaining ones. If it was just about the Idaten sidekicks, none of them would have gone on strike, but they had a lot of colleagues who they depended on in the field who were in terrible situations. What were they gonna say, sorry, sucks to be you, I got a great gig though so condolences? These were the people keeping them alive. They went on strike because they knew Idaten would publicly settle before the day was out and set an example for the rest of the agencies. Hopefully it would help other agencies follow their lead.

But that didn’t happen. Some agencies, like Endeavor’s, fired everyone immediately. And I think a lot of agencies spent a long time picking over every line item in prolonged negotiations. It dragged out.

And that went over fucking terribly.

All Might just retired. Crime is up. And their sworn defenders are bickering over who gets what cut of the action figure line. Like I think the public would have fucking hated this in a post-All Might world. It would have seemed like the only real hero just medically and irreversibly retired and the rest of them are squabbling about whose turn it is in the spotlight.

I also think that the villains would have taken advantage of it.

The Tartarus Prison Break in pez isn’t the one that happened in canon. Here, the League of Villains attacked Tartarus and set everyone loose. In the process, they made a very clear stance: they are going to leave with All for One, and they are not going to attack any civilians. They won’t fight at all unless attacked first.

All of the horrible and sadistic villains they just let go have not made the same promise.

They chose to do this now because of the Sidekick Strike. All their heroes don’t give a fuck about protecting them, so they’re strapped for staffing. So they’re taking back their leader and going back to ground, and the heroes are free to immediately go after and contain all those bad bad villains who just escaped. And those guys are headed to the heavily populated mainland, so better be quick.

The whole world knew that was their explicit reasoning and promise. Because Himiko fucking lived tweeted the escape.

The Sidekick Strike took the hit for a lot of the blame, but I do see all the sidekicks breaking strike lines to go respond to the crisis. But response times were severely handicapped by the fact that most if not all of them were cut off from their agencies. It was just a complete systemic breakdown.

And then there became the question of what crisis do you respond to: All for One’s escape, or everyone else’s?

I mentioned in one of the little fake tumblr posts that the Tartarus Prison Break was seen as Endeavor’s greatest failure. And part of that is because he chose to sacrifice the nearby area, Yokohama, to contain All for One.

I am one of the biggest haters of Endeavor’s later arc, specifically because it required going back on the nature of the abuse he had subjected his family to that was already established in canon, but that’s a different rant. This is not canon endeavor. I hate what they did with canon endeavor.

That being said, I do think that the self doubt weighed on him once he became number one. And this was the moment of his career where it really crushed him.

All for One had escaped. So had every other villain from Tartarus. He should go after the most immediate threats. He knew this. It was basic triage.

But they would never have a better chance to stop All for One.

Prisoners in Tartarus aren’t exactly hitting all their macros and micros or training daily. They are not adherents to the Bakugou Katsuki Fitness Lifestyle. All for One was coming off spending the last few months drugged up to his eyeballs and strapped to a chair in a straitjacket with at least fifty guns pointed at him at all times. The man has not scratched his own nose in weeks. He’s weaker now than he’ll ever be again.

It was their best chance.

If he escaped, and he went back to ground, he’d have the time and space to get as strong as he wanted, and then he’d come back for real. And he’d be coming back for everything.

Stopping him the first time had cost them All Might.

And Endeavor simply was not All Might. And he still wouldn’t be All Might when the next fight came.

It really was the hardest decision of Endeavor’s life. He had to admit to himself that his own inadequacy was going to cost them countless lives. But he thought it was a hard decision he had to make. He was losing the battle for the barest chance at winning the war.

So he made the call that all heroes were to respond to All for One. They had to hit the league of villains now with their full force if they were to stand a chance. They could not afford to divide their already sparse forces. They’d respond to Yokohama when AfO was contained.

He was also the one who made the call to broadcast the warning message that we hear in the Twitter post. He thought it would give civilians their best chance. He didn’t want them to act with the expectation of the heroes being en route.

Of course, that meant that the entire city got fucking sirens going off and a message telling them that the heroes were not going to save them. Which, as you can expect, did not do a lot for public morale.

In my head, Tartarus is like, the equivalent to Gotham’s Arkham. It’s borderline an institute for the criminally insane. You don’t end up there unless you did something super fucked, are super dangerous, and have extreme violent tendencies. It’s exclusively for the most dangerous and indiscriminately violent criminals in the country.

The entire world was watching in real time while the tragedy unfolded. A lot of people were livestreaming after the emergency broadcast dropped, because they didn’t want the government to be able to handwave away how terrible their death was, or because they didn’t know what else to do, or because they just didn’t want to be alone. The full expectation was that it’d be a massacre.

But it wasn’t. Because Class 2-A responded instead.

The Class 2-A defensive efforts were discussed in one of the silly little fake tumblr posts and in the fake twitter post. In those, we find out that 1) Class 2-A, along with Lemillion, Suneater, and Nejire responded to the scene; 2) the entire class rolled out of Mirio’s fucking mom van and tamaki and nejire’s cars like they were fucking clown cars; 3) the HPSC claimed it was a legitimate operation blessed and coordinated by them; and 4) a lot of people think this was a lie, in part because videos leaked of Aizawa bitching them all out in the street afterwards. We also see Izuku’s green lightning at the end of the twitter video, showing him responding to the scene just as the first villains hit the mainland.

This fight has a lot of names in the backstory that lives in my head. It’s called the Tartarus Prison Break for obvious reasons. It’s also been called in some circles the Desertion of Yokohama, because of the call Endeavor made.

But it’s also called the Battle of Yokohoma. And it’s ranked alongside the Battle of Kamino as one of the finest acts of modern day heroics. And that’s because of Class 2-A. If it hadn’t been for them showing up, it would have gone down in history as the Massacre of Yokohama.

Like. It kills me that I can’t include the full details of what happened, but there’s just too much to make in a flashback. It’s a fic in and of itself. But it really was the fight that made Class 2-A.

It was the first fight where they were really the only heroes that could be counted on. Granted, they’d had to fight for their lives alone, but this wasn’t just their lives. These were thousands of terrified civilians who all thought they were going to die.

It was the first true test of them as heroes in the world. And they actually rose to the occasion. They didn’t just fight the villains—they realized that they needed to get emergency services working throughout the city if everyone was going to make it. Momo and Tsuyu conducted a mildly hostile take over of the emergency call center so they could coordinate relief. They had fucking Tokoyami and Dark Shadow single-handedly holding the line on the hospital while Kaminari, Shoji, Jiro, and Sato all learned to drive for the Very First Time while commandeering the city’s fucking ambulances. They were fighting and containing villains, performing emergency aid, putting out literal fires, everything. It was the hardest fight of their lives.

There was a hot second where Class 2-A was The Moment. Like. The entire world was watching them during this fight, and they had no fucking idea until it was over. People lost their minds when the first footage made it out of Yokohama of a bunch of teenagers showing up and immediately throwing hands with S-Class villains.

It was global news. Think of the kind of media attention that was received by the search for the Titan, the Tham Luang Cave Rescue, the Suez Canal getting blocked by the Ever Given (rip queen you will always be famous to me), that kind of thing. Class 2-A was fighting for their fucking lives and then found out three days later while they were all still in the hospital that there was a prayer vigil going on in Portugal for them during the battle and CNN had 24 hours live coverage of the fight that had so many viewers it outnumbered the population of Finland. Like what do you even do with that information.

The world expected a massacre. They didn’t expect a bunch of footage of high schoolers kicking the shit out of superpowered murders and personally ferrying the injured to the hospitals they were also defending.

The other part about this fight that really made them permanently part of the public consciousness is that it was not lost on everyone that every single person who responded to that fight did so at the risk of their license.

All of them had provisional licenses, save Lemillion, Suneater, and Nejire, all of whom went AWOL from the explicit directives ordering them to respond to the fight against All for One. The operation could not have been less authorized. They had to steal their gear and jimmy the UA fence to even get out. The explicit plan was to steal one of the UA buses and have Bakugou fucking drive them to the fight (he also did not know how to drive but he seemed the most likely of them to break literally every single motor vehicle code to get them there but still be naturally talented at it enough to not kill them) but Izuku told Mirio what bullshit they were up to and Mirio, who was with Tamaki and Nejire when the news broke, immediately decided he would be on that bullshit too and pulled up in his mom van.

In my mind, there were strict rules around provisional licenses and how they could be used, and they broke pretty much all of them to respond to Yokohama. It would have been grounds to revoke their provisionals and permanently bar them from heroics. Lemillion, Suneater, and Nejire could have all lost their licenses for helping them and for going AWOL.

The HPSC fucking fell over themselves to legitimatize the entire operation. They knew they were utterly fucked if they didn’t. These kids already had murals being painted of their faces in other fucking countries. There was a little old lady in Kyoto livestreaming herself working overtime to embroider Iida’s face onto a cushion because that lovely young man saved her darling granddaughter from *checks notes* horrible and painful death directly caused by the failings of the current HPSC administration. There were multiple trending posts online agreeing to fucking riot if those kids got in trouble for this.

Every single actual hero in the immediate vicinity of this disaster had responded to fight a villain who wasn’t actually attacking anyone. And then they fucking lost. They publicly broadcast a message saying Good Luck Champs Because We’re Not Going To Save You. It was an actual PR nightmare that they had a bare chance of salvaging if they just latched onto these kids like an aggressive parasite and that is exactly what they did.

They totally knew. Actually, it was a joint operation coordinated by and between UA and and the HPSC. Why would the kids be in trouble?? They had responded because the HPSC told them to.

UA gave it a week of dead silence and then issued a short statement praising the bravery of their students in a recent HPSC approved mission, and then they never said another word about it. They didn’t have any choice but to go along with the HPSC’s story. If they contradicted them, all of class 2-a would find their licenses pulled by the end of the day, and lord knows they wouldn’t wait for the court of public opinion to work its magic and would just all go out and become fucking vigilantes, because why not. Aizawa has aged 100 years since he got this class. Every single day he thinks of how it was a 50/50 shot between him and Vlad.

No one in the class is fully aware of just how famous they were in the immediate aftermath, because the school bent over backwards to try and shield them from it as much as possible. Like, they have an idea, but none of them saw the full explosion firsthand because of just how hard the school worked to keep it from them. Aizawa confiscated the internet router and told them it was punishment for whatever the fuck they did to the buses (thank god Mirio was just as crazy as them because they were NOT GOOD at hotwiring cars) but really it was to try and insulate them from it a little bit. Like. Japan’s Imperial Family wanted to do an official visit. The White House offered to host them. They received interview requests from every major talk show on the planet. Buzzfeed wanted to do a puppy interview with them.

Right now, Aizawa’s terrified for Midoriya’s graduation, but in the aftermath of that, he was breathing into a paper bag about all of them. Society had sort of latched onto them like they were the last life raft on the titanic. All for One was back, and All Might wasn’t, and the heroes had publicly broadcast a message saying they were useless, but don’t fucking worry, fifteen year old Iida Tenya is on the case. Society will be upheld by Kaminari Denki, currently viral for driving a real life city ambulance one hundred miles per hour down the street while screaming “WEE WOO BITCH.” And don’t forget the pillar that will be Mina Ashido, who rushed over to him earlier that day to show him her extra sparkly pink nails. And if you have a major fight that needs to be won? Don’t fucking worry, just send out bone-breaking boy wonder Midoriya Izuku and his equally reckless brother Toogata Mirio, because their dumbasses managed to take down an S-Class villain team that only All Might could defeat the first time around. Don’t worry about the multi week hospitalization they needed after, because that’s an acceptable burden to put on children.

When Aizawa started this job, he promised himself he would never send a student out to die. Some of them would die. But it would be tragedy, not damnation. He’d have given them their best chance. Part of the reason why he made that promise was because he sort of felt like his teacher sent him out set up to die, and it’s only luck that he made it through his first couple of years.

He has gone to the funeral of every single student he has ever had who did not make it. He goes back to their graves every year.

He was fucking petrified after Yokohama that society would push these kids too far too soon. Every single one of his classes before them had gotten the benefit of being practically unknown their first few years. They didn’t have the world talking about them like they were already the top heroes. He was terrified they wouldn’t have the space to learn and grow when they started.

A lot of teachers would have tried to mine the notoriety of Yokohama to hard launch their students’ careers. Aizawa told Nedzu point blank that he would quit tomorrow if he did not help him quash this thing as much as possible, and nedzu agreed.

This world killed its real heroes. It sucked them dry and left them like All Might, and he just needed fucking time. He needed fucking time to let them be kids and maybe they’d survive.

Izuku ended up being the one who escaped the aftermath of everything the least. His Quirk was too much like All Might’s for the world to let go of him easily.

And then Stain got fucking dogpiled by idaten in the aftermath of the Tartarus prison break and implied he considered Izuku the only true hero in the absence of all might and everyone started asking super inconvenient questions like “how does stain even know you exist” and “no really he called you by your actual legal name how does he even know that” and it just. It didn’t help things. Izuku’s suffering.

So yeah. There was just this absolute collision of a total lack of faith in current heroes combined with a huge swell of public trust in class 2-a that led us to being in the landscape we are now. All of the currently licensed heroes said that they wouldn’t be there to save the public, and then Class 2-A immediately hit back that they would be there. Actually, they’ll risk everything to be there. They’ll die to protect the public and they’ll risk the entire future they had been trying to build and they will fucking be there to save them.

There’s a lot of people that never forgave the heroes for deserting Yokohama. And there’s even more people who have absolute faith in Izuku and his classmates because they didn’t. That’s why the world is watching them so aggressively. These kids are the most trusted heroes in Japan right now.

I wish I could fit in more about what happened, because I love this backstory so much, but 1) some of it absolutely requires POVs like Endeavors, which we won’t get in pez dispenser debris, 2) there’s no one POV that could tell the full story via flashback and 3) it’d just be too long of a divergence. Like. It really is a whole fic of its own. I’d love to write it one day but I probably won’t have the time

[twstgarden]

✿ ❝ 𝗹𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝗹𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁 ❞

━ lilia vanrouge x gn! reader (reader can be yuu or an oc/twstsona)

━ you were once his light in his darkest days, but since then, he has not seen you and still yearns for your return, yet he wonders if he is just deluding himself into thinking you're still here.

this work may contain spoilers for chapter 7, diasomnia's arc.

do not steal or translate without my permission.

ko-fi here if you want to support me, commissions are open

silver and sebek were in lilia's room, aiding him in tidying up his items as they tried to distract themselves from the fact that their beloved father and mentor had dropped the bomb that he was migrating elsewhere.

in the middle of their packing, silver came across a photo album that he had not seen before. sebek also saw the photo album and spoke, "is that yours, lilia-sama?"

hearing sebek's query made lilia turn his head before realising that his son held the photo album, and with a smile, he replied, "yes. go through it if you wish."

and so they did. silver sat on lilia's bed with sebek standing beside him as they went through each page of the photo album together. they were filled with pictures taken during their younger days, and one even had the photo that lilia took on silver's birthday with malleus and sebek.

as they moved on to the next page, they came across a photo of lilia in his prime general days with a person smiling next to him. they looked ethereal, the very definition of beauty and grace. they looked gorgeous and breathtaking, and yet they had never seen this person before.

silver took the photo and examined it with sebek as the former asked, "who are you with in this photo, father?"

lilia looked at the photo in silver's hand and his eyes widened a little in surprise. 'oh, they found it,' he thought to himself. as he tried to keep a smile on his face, lilia responded, "someone very dear to me... however, i don't know where they are now."

"a lover?" questioned sebek as he and silver looked at one another in surprise.

"i had not realised that father had a special someone before..." mumbled silver in surprise.

lilia laughed a little at their statements, "what's that supposed to mean? i am the charming little fellow! is it such a wonder that i have a fair lover in mine arms?"

silver and sebek were about to respond until lilia continued, "ah, but... that was in the past." he then took a seat beside silver, taking the photo from his hand as he looked at it once more, gently caressing the image of his love - the only remaining piece of memento he had on them.

"...it has been over 300 or so years since i last saw them. i don't even know where they are until now," muttered lilia, "they were the charmingly funniest person i have met. quite shy, but definitely can sense danger."

✦•······················•✦•······················•✦

"what are you doing in here?" the sudden voice made you jump out of your seat as you looked around your garden in a cautious stance, wondering who had just spoken when you were peacefully sitting alone in the lovely garden of your cottage deep in the woods. "who's... who's there..." you muttered to yourself, uncertain if you should even ask. a rustle was then heard nearby and in a blink of an eye, you were caught in a chokehold. you tried to pry free from whoever was holding you, but they had a strong physique. "i won't ask again. what are you doing in here?" "i live here...!" you quickly answered. hearing this made the perpetrator raise a brow before looking around and noticing the cottage, "...here? deep in the woods?" "yes!" they then stared for a while before sighing and unhanding you. you then got a good look at them. it was a fae, standing at 158 cm tall, with a mask to cover his face yet his uniform gave away his occupation. "...an imperial guard...?" you muttered. "a human?" muttered the fae as well, "living in the woods... hah! good joke." you raised a brow at his words before speaking, "um... i do live here, though..." feeling threatened, you quickly backed away from him, making sure you were getting closer to your crops. he thought nothing of it, but he sure did sense your weariness. nevertheless, he spoke, "you shouldn't be here. no human is supposed to live deep in these woods. do you live under a rock? if other soldiers stumbled upon you and this cottage, you'd be dead in no time." "and here i stumbled upon a soldier..." you remarked. he took a step closer as he spoke, "i won't say this again. lea——! wha— hey!" before he could complete his sentence, you grabbed a bunch of your tomato crops and threw each of them at him while yelling, "go away! i won't hesitate to throw more tomatoes at you if you try to kill me!" the fae clicked his tongue and groaned in annoyance as he shielded himself with his arms from your tomatoes. "stop it!" yelled the fae, "cease this tomfoolery at once, human!" he eventually got close enough to you and grabbed your wrists before you could throw another tomato at him. with a glare, he spoke, "what do you think you're doing, throwing tomatoes at a faerie - a general at that? do you have a death wish?" once you registered his words, you blinked owlishly and eventually brought your hands down, letting your other tomatoes fall back to the ground, "...general...?" 'i'm done for.' with a sigh, the fae dusted off some tomato residue on his clothing before glaring back at you, "i was only giving you a warning and you already threw tomatoes at me. do you really think that will help you when others - especially with bad intentions - come over and attack? really, this is the first. attacking people with crops. horrendous."

✦•······················•✦•······················•✦

"they threw tomatoes...?" spoke silver in surprise.

"what kind of defence weapon is that?" muttered sebek in shock before silver spoke, "perhaps it was the only thing accessible." lilia laughed a little as he replied, "well, it did take place in the garden. at least they had the initiative to be resourceful and use their surroundings to their advantage."

"i suppose..." replied silver, "what else?"

"well, aren't you two curious? they're also very sweet and ensure i am taken care of."

✦•······················•✦•······················•✦

"you need to stop throwing yourself at the battlefield so carelessly." you scolded as you looked at his injuries and tried to tend to them, even if he said he could heal them with magic. "i do not need your he— hiss!" "calm down! i can't clean the wound if you keep moving," you scolded once again as you continued to dab the cotton on his injury, "really now. is this a thing with you gents - humans or faeries alike? just throwing yourself at war and getting yourselves injured without a proper plan?" lilia huffed in annoyance at your nagging, but he did not exactly do anything to stop you as he let you clean up his wound. "i do not 'throw myself at the battlefield'. i was merely defending myself." you sighed and muttered, "whatever you say, general vanrouge." after cleaning his wound and bandaging him up, you collected your first aid kit supplies and returned them to your cabinet. "have you eaten?" you asked. "...roasted lizards, yeah." hearing his reply made you freeze as you blinked in shock. though you are aware that faes tend to have a different palate than humans — though they do enjoy a human meal from to time — you still could not believe his version of a "meal" is some random animal he comes across in the woods and roasts it. "...i'll make you some dinner."

✦•······················•✦•······················•✦

"your lover cared for you a lot, lilia-sama," cheered sebek, "how wonderful! this is an amazing love story!"

lilia smiled at sebek's remark as he replied, "...i'd like to think so too."

silver then spoke, "then... what happened, father? why have you not seen them for years now?"

"...i do not know if they're still alive and hiding from me... or..."

lilia did not have to finish that sentence for the two to know what he meant.

✦•······················•✦•······················•✦

"f/n!!!" lilia cried out as he rummaged through the cottage, entering every room and going through every space possible to check if you were hiding. he had just gotten back from the silver owls headquarters and was supposed to be on the way back to the wild rose castle to chase them back and make sure they didn't get to meleanor. on his way back, however, he came across your cottage and saw its dishevelled state. not caring for baul's calls, he got off his grip and ran to your cottage, ignoring the aching pain coursing through his entire body due to his injuries. "shit! shit, shit, shit!" lilia cursed as he looked everywhere and found no one. baul was quick to enter the cottage as he called out to the general, "right general, we must go! princess meleanor might be in danger!" "THEY TOOK THEM!" his loud, wrathful voice stunned baul as he spoke, "right general...?" "f/n! that human i'm with! those bastards took them!" baul then realised who he was talking about. lilia had mentioned a human in the cottage once that he was acquainted with, and baul started to connect the dots. "let's go!" before baul could ponder more, lilia's command quickly snapped him back to reality as they both continued their journey back to the wild rose castle.

✦•······················•✦•······················•✦

"they were kidnapped...?!"

"father, that's...!"

their concerned and shocked faces were not lost on lilia as he smiled sadly, "i tried searching for them everywhere, and i did everything... and yet, nothing came to fruition in my endless search. eventually, i thought... maybe i was too late."

lilia then stood up, looking at the photo before he cast it aside only for silver to grab it and return it back to the photo album once more.

"it may have been centuries ago, but i will never forget the radiant light they shone in my life."

'and now, i don't even know if i'll ever see my light again.'

© twstgarden 2024 || please do not steal, translate without my permission, or use this to train a.i.

[morganski-19]

Chills Right to the Marrow Part 17

part 1, prev part

Wayne’s hands are clenched so hard they’re starting to hurt. Wrapped around the wrist of burning anger. His nephew’s eyes boring into his soul, filled with confusion. Resentment and fear.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Eddie was supposed to wake up slowly. Calmly. Surrounded by people he loved. Bringing him back into a world he was almost lost to. There were going to be questions, there were going to be answers. But, anger, Wayne was refusing to believe it.

“Son, calm down,” he tries to reason with the anger in Eddie’s eyes. “You’re not in danger here.”

Eddie’s eyes blink blankly. As his nostrils flare with struggled breaths. Arm pulling away from Wayne’s, trying to break free.

“Fuck you,” he mutters. With all the energy in his soul. Taking everything to insult instead of praise.

In his heart, Wayne knows that these words aren’t true. That the confusion and pain is lacing Eddie’s speech. Keeping him from seeing things properly. Keeping him from reducing that instinct deep in his mind to run and fight.  

Eddie’s always been a runner, ever since he was a kid. Ran away from home all the time to get away from the world. To the woods, to the quarry. Any place where he could get some peace and quiet from the taunts and threats. Where it was just him and his mind, however restless they were. Where he could forget about it all for a while.

It wasn’t a surprise to Wayne that Eddie ran that night. He would have done the same thing. But part of Wayne wishes that Eddie had come to him. So they could figure it all out together. Make a plan that could have saved him from this tormented state. Kept him alive without this ongoing pain.

He sees it in the way Eddie becomes so exhausted from the fight that he falls asleep. Arm finally laying to rest in Wayne’s grip. Body relaxing and returning to the peace Wayne craves for him. Not knowing how much of it will come in the future.

The nurse reinserts the IV into Eddie’s arm. As he pulled it out shortly after gaining consciousness. Scared by the hospital setting. By Wayne. By everything.

Eddie isn’t awake quite yet, Wayne tells himself. There is no way his boy could be awake and angry at him like this. He doesn’t want to believe it.

“Why don’t we talk outside,” the nurse says to him kindly. Sharing a small piece of sympathy with him.

Wayne stands without wanting to. Part of himself glued to that chair, forever stuck in that moment. Where the kind eyes he’s raised were hidden away.

“I am truly sorry for what you just saw, I’m sure it was jarring.”

All Wayne can do is cross his arms and nod. Listening carefully to the nurse with his eyes fixed on the door’s window.

“This form of anger and confusion is not uncommon for patients waking from a coma. Often times, they experience a form of amnesia that takes away the memories right before they came here. And after the brain loses consciousness for as long as Eddie’s has, it can cause more confusion than answers. He doesn’t mean what he says and does, it’s just his body’s response.”

“This amnesia,” Wayne swallows. “How long will it last?”

The nurse makes a sorry expression. “It varies. For some patients, only a few hours, for others, a few days. But now that Eddie’s awake, he’s been healing much faster than the doctor first anticipated. I have no doubt that it will pass soon.”

Wayne nods, thanking the nurse for her time. She leaves him standing in front of the door. Wagering how much pain his heart can take today, and whether he can stand to sit in that chair any longer.

His feet lead him to the payphone. Pulling out just enough quarters for one call, and a crumbled piece of paper with a number scrawled on it. The ringing in the phone reminding him of the sounds outside his head.

“Yeah.” The voice on the phone greets.

“Is this Jim? It’s Wayne. Munson.”

There’s a slight chuckle across the line. “I know who you are, Wayne. Yeah, it’s me. How can I help you?”

“I’m not quite sure. Don’t quite know what’s goin’ on, or why I called you. Just needed some company, I guess.”

“How about you come over to my place,” Jim says after a pause. “If that’s alright with you. We can have a chat with a change of scenery.”

Wayne lets out a shaky breath. “I think that would be nice.”

Jim relays his address before hanging up the phone. Wayne repeating it under his breath as he drives. Not wanting to forget it. The gas light blinking at him as it crawls towards empty. He can’t think about that now. There are already too many things on his plate.

A woman with a warm, inviting smile answers the door. Invites Wayne into the house with the promise of a cup of coffee, leading him to the back yard. Where Jim sits on a chair mismatched from the others. Staring off into the woods.

“Have a seat,” Jim offers with a cigarette.

Wayne takes it with more indulgence than should be necessary. His empty pack still burning a hole in his pocket.

“The weather’s been really nice these last few days, starting to really warm up.”

Wayne releases a long breath, letting the smoke fill the air in front of him. “I guess so.”

He hasn’t really taken notice.

“You meet Joyce?”

Wayne nods.

“Thing is between the two of us,” Jim motions back to the house. “Is that we both know what it’s like to have a kid go through all this hospital bullshit. We know the kind of pain that it brings, seeing them hurting and being helpless to it. It’s not something you’re alone in.”

That doesn’t stop him from feeling alone. Like he’s walking a path rocky and untamed. Vulnerable in ways he’s not used to and afraid to be. Wanting to be the strong pillar for those around him, but cracking in the foundation.

The grass crushes under footsteps as Joyce approaches. Places the mug on the table with stolen diner sugar packets and creamers.

“I didn’t know how you liked it, so I brought options.” She sits beside Jim, folding her hands in her lap. “I heard about Eddie. I’m so sorry. It’s terrible that he’s going through this.”

Wayne nods, staring at the table. “Yeah. Yeah, it is.”

“When my Will first went missing, it was the worst day of my life,” Joyce continues. Bringing her own experience to the table. “I didn’t know where he was, or if he was hurt. How he was going to be when he got back. It’s something I would wish on no parent. At any age.”

There’s this anger that wants to block out what she’s saying. Scream that she doesn’t know his situation. Doesn’t know the pain he’s in. How could she, his situation was unique to him.

But so is hers. And so is Jim’s. And Wayne’s eyes are fixed on a cup of coffee and a cigarette given in kindness. An offering of help for someone who is too proud to ask for it. To admit that this is breaking him.

“Seeing him so weak in that hospital bed,” Joyce speaks through quiet tears. “It was so hard. Seeing him so changed, fighting to stay the same boy that he was before. Knowing that he saw things that I couldn’t even imagine.”

Maybe it was easier to break with people who bear their cracks so openly. Share vulnerabilities so Wayne can be vulnerable too.

“I know what you mean.” Wayne wants to recoil when he hears the wetness in his voice. But he continues. Wanting the burden to be shared so he can breathe a little easier. “Seein’ him today, so full of confusion and fear, it broke me.

“Is he starting to wake up?” Jim asks, genuinely.

Wayne nods, ripping open the sugar packets with shaky hands. “Slowly. I thought it would make it all easier, but it’s not. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to recover from this.”

“You will,” Jim speaks with hardened certainty. “Over time, you’ll start to heal. Forget the pain of the moment. But the real pain, the memories of their faces through all of this, those never quite leave. You just learn to give them less hold over you.”

Joyce reaches and grabs Jim’s hand, threading their fingers together and comforting him. “What matters is that you don’t have to go through this alone. We’re the only people our age who know what really happened, what these kids had to go through. Some of it we don’t. But we make a point to be there for each other, that includes you. It includes Eddie.”

“I appreciate that.”

Wayne lets the coffee cool in his hands. The conversation resulting in silence. Letting the sounds of the forest overtake them. Letting the fresh air travel through their lungs. Wayne finding peace with the forest in front of him. Watching as the birds circle and chirp as the light starts to dim. Returning to their homes for the night.

He knows it’s time to return to his own. Leave Jim and Joyce to their night and stop being a bother. But his home is still a shitty motel that he’s racking the bill up on. Trying to pay as much off as possible when his checks come in, but it’s slim pickings.

And he’s so tired of the isolation. Relaxing into the comforting feeling of sitting in silent company. Or by sitting next to anyone at all. The kindness of somewhat strangers makes Wayne feel more at home than he has in weeks.

Somehow, he ends up inside with a plate of leftovers in front of him. And then on the pull-out couch for the night. Falling in a deep sleep, where he tries to ignore it all for just a few hours. Let his body rest the way it needs.

next part

Note: I'm back! Thanks for being patient during my little break there, I needed it. But I'm back in action and (for once) a little ahead in my writing. We'll see how long it lasts, but it's good for now. Double note: I think that conversation between Jim, Wayne, and Joyce is one of my favorite ones I've written for this fic.

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Extra:

Poor Isa is probably cold

Happy new years btw

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