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silence-burns · 4 years ago

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Please Hate Me //part 38

Fandom: Marvel

Summary: Based on: “Imagine having a love/hate relationship with Loki.” by @thefandomimagine Who would have thought that babysitting a god could be so much fun?

Genre: slow-burn, enemies to lovers

The pale cheek was rubbery and cold under your finger. You poked it again. "Are you sure he's dead?"

Loki looked at the severed, and a little chewed, bottom half of the ambassador. "Pretty much."

The body had been laid out on top of a desk, with all the books and documents previously occupying it put on the ground. It didn't really matter in the ways of making things messy, because the suite belonging to the recently deceased ambassador was already a dusty, chaotic mess. The room was dark and narrow and made even smaller by the bookshelves lined along one wall, stealing even more space. The carpet used to be gold and thick, but now it looked just worn and tired.

"Do we even have a plan? Like, anything in particular to look out for?"

Loki scratched his chin, looking around next to you. "Plans are for the weak of heart. We've got something better, love—a suspicion. Now we only have to find the evidence for or against it."

You looked at the shelves filled with old tomes to the point of almost breaking the wood. And then at the loose papers piled carelessly along two of the walls and also in the bedroom. The notes were haphazardly scribbled and left in places where a thought must've struck the man, and then left forgotten or lost. Ink was spilled on the less fortunate ones.

"...right."

You couldn't say you were happy about it, but there was little to do about it. Whatever the ambassador was working on before he died could shed some light on his death. Now you only had to find it.

With a deep sigh, you braced yourself and got to work.

It soon turned out you didn’t understand a single word of it.

"You said your spell would work and I would understand everything." You focused really hard on the wall of text in a language you'd never seen before. "And it works fine when I'm talking to the lords here, but not on this."

Loki leaned over your shoulder to peek a glance at the text. "I have no idea. Maybe it works differently on humans? Or maybe you're just a particularly weird individual of your species."

"Thanks."

"Welcome, love."

With nothing you could read, your job there was crippled. Even when Loki assured you he didn't mind doing everything himself and that it wasn't your fault, there was still a sour feeling you couldn't quite shake off.

"I'm going to see if I can find the kitchens and get us something edible." You decided to pass the time on something at least vaguely helpful.

Loki looked up from the notes he'd gathered from the windowsill. He’d made himself comfortable in one of the cleaner parts of the room, although unfortunately it just happened to be near the corpse. "Be careful. And please, don't kill anyone without me."

"I'd never," you promised with a wink and left.

The castle was huge, but empty. At first, you put in on the murder that must've shaken the people living there, but the longer you looked around, it struck you as odd. Everything was clean, even if touched by time. There must be people taking care of it, but you couldn't find any.

Or maybe they were avoiding the outsiders. Technically, you were an alien here.

You walked the empty corridors, enjoying the silent breeze passing through the open panels. It was strange not to see any glass in the windows, but with the weather so mild, there probably wasn't any temperature drop to worry about anyway.

There were shadows sneaking in the corners of your vision. They could be figments of your imagination and sense of wrongness of this place. They could be the things howling in the dark.

No. Thinking about that probably wasn't the wisest idea. In a place where thoughts apparently could shape reality, thinking merry, happy thoughts seemed like a much more rational option if one planned to survive and not be eaten by their own fears embodied. You had such plans, and even if Loki was convinced that you had absolutely no connection to magic unless it hit you in the face, it was better to stay cautious. And happy. What a lovely day it was, after all, with the creeping light avoiding particular parts of your vision, and something definitely following you. How nice would it be to meet someone. Anyone.

Your eyes wandered off into the gardens below, where the everlasting night was laying thick. A fountain shimmered in bluish speckles of water. And behind it, the night opened its eyes.

You might've jumped a little. Just the tiniest bit.

But there was no denying that, just for the briefest moment, your eyes met the Queen's, posed unnaturally still among the statues.

…and people said wishful thinking wouldn't get you anywhere.

You hopped over the railing, and onto the moss-covered ground. The guard you'd seen before was nowhere to be found. You stared around as hard as you could, trying to pierce the shadows and strange light. It took a moment to find what you were looking for.

From up close, the stars overhead and the stars shimmering on her skin looked like mirror images. For a moment, the night sky felt within a hand's reach.

Not one muscle betrayed the Queen had she noticed your arrival. Her eyes were dull and completely blank—to the point where you wondered if you hadn't imagined everything.

You stood right next to her and still weren't decapitated, which was a comfort and a good sign. You bowed stiffly, even if she didn't see it.

"Hi," you said quietly, looking for any sign of comprehension. "I'm one of the people who came here to explain the recent murder."

Nothing. Just the vast expanse of the night enclosed in a fading body and crumbled into a vaguely humanoid shape. The Queen only had one horn intact, white as a bone, and sharp like the crescent moon—the only one to ever be seen on the edge of the universe.

"I wondered if you knew anything about it," you tried again. "We're doing well so far, and I'm sure we'll find the murderer eventually, so don't worry about that, but… We'd still appreciate any and all help."

Birds chirped somewhere in the trees. Shimmering pollen flew on the light breeze squeezing through the thicket. The night turned her eyes toward you.

It'd been a while since you cowered under the sheets, afraid of the darkness. It was a common fear among children, and one that only a few grew out of. Those eyes reminded you of those sleepless nights.

Not a word left the bloodless lips. Not a muscle twitched. The edges of the woman blurred into the night.

"...right. Sorry to interrupt you, Your Majesty."

You backed away a few steps before turning your back to her. A shiver ran down your spine. If that was what fading was, you preferred death.

Loki enjoyed reading, he really did. Even as a child, he'd often been found buried among the old tomes in the palace's library, or smuggling particularly interesting ones to his rooms. There was something in the way of the written word that captured his attention way better than whatever training he was forced to participate in for the sake of Odin's misplaced ambition. There was a certain rush in learning facts previously unknown and in understanding the world or the forces in it better.

Loki felt absolutely none of that while going through the ambassador's notes.

Most of them were full of incomprehensible babble of half-finished ideas or references that led nowhere without the books they'd been taken from. Some seemed to be copied pages, which led Loki to the conclusion that the books were not to be taken off the library grounds.

There were a lot of dates and numbers that made little sense to him, so he put them down on the pile of things he deemed irrelevant to the investigation. The pile was growing and now consisted of several piles, forming the majority of the room's contents.

The doors opened. Loki was relieved to see you; the dagger disappeared back up his sleeve.

"That took you awhile," he noticed, throwing the crumbled papers to the right, onto the pile of nonsense. "I was getting worried."

"I'm good. I got you some apples."

The apples were a dusted orange, but tasted sweet enough to justify the unusual color. Loki leaned back in his chair and let you settle on his lap. The feeling of your body pressed into his made you share the warmth and comfort, and made some of the stress building up since morning fade away.

"I met the Queen," you said around a mouth full of apple, and the other hand buried in Loki's hair. "She seemed nice enough. The creepiness definitely runs in the family, though."

Some of the stress came back. "Did she… say anything?"

"Nope. I don't think she’s… aware of things. Which is a shame, because I seriously hoped she could help us."

Loki brushed your back in wide, soothing strokes. "There is a chance she'll regain her senses one day, just for long enough to answer some questions. Fading is a complicated process."

"You know a lot about it."

Loki's eyes dropped to the few remaining apples. "Gods fade too sometimes."

"Will you? One day?"

"I am a Frost Giant, love, even if I was raised on Asgard. I'm not sure how much that complicates my case, and there is no one to ask about it anymore."

"I'm sorry."

Loki closed his eyes and breathed in your scent as he felt you kiss his temple, gently and with enough unfiltered love to make his heart throb almost painfully. He was lucky, even despite the mess politics brought onto him. He was luckier than he ever thought he'd be. And luckier than he thought he deserved.

"Did you find anything interesting?" you asked with a face burrowed into the crook of his neck.

"There was quite a lot of nonsense, but the rest highlights the ambassador's interest in the wars and mass deaths that always follow them."

You froze. The corpse laid on the desk next to you no longer felt like something you could forget about. "...what an interesting guy. "

"Most definitely, but it's too early to judge just yet. I made a list of the books he mentioned most often. I think it'd be worth our time to pay a visit to the library to check them out and maybe ask a few questions to the people working there. They should know something about him and the dead assistant."

"We could get some more apples on our way," you offered, standing up. Loki already missed you.

"Sure, why not. It's not like you'd take the fruit of the sacred trees from the very clearly separated part of the gardens, right?"

"...of course. I'd never overlook that."

You did overlook that in the end, and Loki just happened to overlook it too. Overlooking things was always more fun in good company.

The gardens were a beautiful, lush place, bursting with colors and leaves that danced on the wind instead of falling. Some of the branches were covered in flowers so tiny they looked like ants, traveling up and down the bark. Birds too shy to leave the shadows chirped and sung.

It was a strange change to witness, especially having in mind what the gardens were like in the morning. Whatever put them in a good mood had clearly done a good job. It made the winding paths easier to follow, and the water passing through the fountain shimmer like starlight.

Loki shrugged when you voiced your thoughts.

"In your world, the weather changes just as rapidly," he said, looking at his mirrored image. "Here, it's the very essence of the Edge that's capable of changing."

It was poetic, like most things on the Edge. And just like them, the forest suddenly decided to hate you.

First, the birds vanished, their voices cut short.

Then, something else moved between the curled, twisted trees. Loki noticed too, and handed you one of his knives. The knives had a habit of appearing around him in just the right moments, and you loved them for it.

And finally, the Edge decided how to make your lives difficult this time.

The monstrosity that circled the fountain was a terror of thin legs and bulky torso, armed with too many teeth.

"Is it a spider?" you asked in a voice too high because of your heart leaping into your throat.

"It could be, if someone really hated spiders," Loki said, but there was a smile on his face. "And it might present a problem, if we were still on Earth—but now I'm free and ready to deal with this the old-fashioned way."

You blinked when golden light enveloped him in a flash. The green armor poured onto his body while magic danced around his fingers. The golden helmet you'd seen only once in the battle of New York, now returned in its full glory.

You cheered as Loki stepped out, swinging a spear with a nonchalant ease only available to children forced to learn something for years against their will.

"Kick its ass, babe!"

Loki winked.

The creature didn't want to have its ass kicked. It charged on its eight legs reaching far and fast. Loki striked, gutting its belly and cutting two legs off. It should've died, but it didn't. The cuts should've killed it, but they healed.

Loki's magic should've blocked the furious mass hurtling itself at him. It didn't.

The spell flashed a blinding yellow before it cracked like glass and shattered. The legs that were no longer cut, they hit and didn't miss.

A gold-and-green body flew through the air with a very surprised face. The fountain crashed in a rain of water and marble, covering everything in a thin layer of dust and a thick one of mud quickly forming under your feet.

"...Loki?"

Loki didn't answer, half buried under the stone.

The spider turned its too big head to you. Its legs were black and covered in thick stubble.

"Shit," you whispered.

The spider agreed.

You ran.

#please hate me #loki x reader #loki x you #loki imagine #loki laufeyson x reader #loki laufeyson x you #loki laufeyson #loki laufeyson imagine #loki marvel #loki mcu #loki laufeyson marvel #loki series #i love loki #loki fanfic

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fizzingwizard · 4 years ago

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Go ahead y’all ask me how I am... do it, I DARE you... after Digimon Adventure: episode 50 - the 1999 equivalent of which, I feel compelled to mention, was “Jou’s Battle,” when Taichi strategically splits his group apart with the goal of gathering the whole team for the final confrontation - I think my emotional state can best be described like this:

meme so funny haha

but the truth is I’m very sad. I just can’t with this show anymore. I don’t know if I’ll continue to review future episodes. Actually, as I was watching this one, I thought it was the final episode, even though I knew there were supposed to be more and it hadn’t been hyped as the finale at all. I just thought, “What else can they do after this? It seems like the kind of ending this shitshow would get. At least it will be a relief to not watch it every week anymore.”

However, let’s be clear that this is NOT the finale. I’m gonna watch till the very end, but idk if I have it in me even to make these depressing little reviews. At first it was fun, then it was meh... I held out and the show got fun again, but the last month or so have been such a drag. And this week’s episode is just the final straw. So we’ll see.

Anyway real episode review below the cut. Warning: I hated everything except for Taichi’s face so it’s mostly caps of him.

Pic of the day:

“At this rate... I’m gonna request a transfer to Boruto...” /Sanpei Yuuko joke

More below

Last week big bad Millenniumon appeared to be resurrected. Here he is.

Totally lacking a clear motivation other than “destroy the world...” Even in appearance, ALL of Devimon’s evolutions mid-season were WAY scarier.

Turns out Taichi and Agumon have faceplanted on this hunk of rock, which immediately breaks off and sends them catapulting earthward.

Wind noise what? Taichi and Agumon encourage each other while freefalling.

Agumon: Hey shouldn’t we have broken every bone in our bodies by now

Taichi: I once broke my leg tripping over Hikari’s hairbrush. This is starting to seem silly.

Meanwhile the others awaken inside what Tailmon explains is a cut-off dimension created by Millenniumon, where they will eventually fall into a dreamless sleep forever and ever.

Millenniumon’s power is immense and he makes volcanos erupt. So his power is he gives the earth digital acne.

Yamato evolves MetalGarurumon and stars just attacking the walls (of... the endless void... lol). This appears to slow Millenniumon down in a total rip-off of the way cooler way Koushirou slowed Diaboromon down in Our War Game.

The Holy Digimon are inspired by Taichi’s courage to fight wheeee I didn’t realize they were having problems with that

no kidding

Taichi fights a lot and escapes certain death a lot. Even when he and WarGreymon take a head-on hit and are sent spiraling into the ocean. Still fine because THE POWER OF BELIEF

Chumbawumba: I get knocked down but I get up again you’re never gonna keep me down

WarGreymon is able to knock the black ball thingy out of Millenniumon’s mouth. This is fortunate because it’s what contains Yamato and friends and now they are able to free themselves thanks to the Holy Digimon, who randomly start acting like the Crests are important. But since we don’t know what they are *cough* they just call them “everyone’s hopes!”

Now let’s interrupt my mocking to appreciate an adorable Taichi waking up face:

Alll the d’aaaaawwwww

... Aaaand his back is broken x’DDD

The HolyDigimon have evolved to Ultimate level! More on that later. First, they divided the group in halves with them, because because. Hikari gets Taichi, Sora, and Koushirou, and Takeru gets Yamato, Jou, and Mimi.

So yes... those Ultimate evolutions... Tailmon becomes Magnadramon and Patamon becomes... GODDRAMON, GOD OF STEELY ABS

no seriously thats all I could think. Magnadramon is all soft and fluffy looking and then Goddramon is like “I HAVE SMALL HEAD HUGE BODY ABS ABS UNTIL KINGDOM COME, VERY MACHO”

He punches Millenniumon in the mouth, of course.

Millenniummon considerately starts to melt. Thank you, Millenniumon. We wouldn’t want Goddramon’s ego to get bruised.

There’s a few good attacks here - I liked Magnadramon’s Apocalypse attack - but like who even cares. The animation is so half-assed that there’s nothing really to appreciate.

Just when it seems Millenniumon’s defeated, he comes back like... this. It’s enormous. Even Koushirou’s digimon analyzer doesn’t know what it is.

Lopmon does though!

bahahaha

but wait what’s this

sparks! are they fireflies????

no they are the hopes and wishes of all the Digimon we’ve met on our journey! how lovely and inspiring! what are they saying?

hopes and wishes: I DONT WANNA DIE I DONT WANNA DIE I DONT WANNA DIE

now I shall spam Taichi looking adorable while being as cliche as an anime protagonist can get.

Good heavens, WHY. WHY WHY WHY. I looooooove Taichi (obviously) but WHY is he the one fighting here?? First it was Taichi, then it was Goddramon/Magnadramon, and now it’s... back to Taichi??? FOR WHAT REASON???

I mean the reason is, we don’t know anyone else well enough to cheer for them the way we cheer for Taichi. As cool as the Holy Digimon are meant to be, I guess the one thing the producers realized is that, uh, they’ve only spent time building up Taichi (and even that, while they’ve done a lot of it, they haven’t done it well).

Kinda cool death scene.

Our heroes wake up no worse for the wear. Millenniumon is gone. Everyone is together and happy. I’m just spamming Taichi again.

his face when Mimi gives him the corsage

Taichi: “Wtf, what is this, is this supposed to mean something??? also didn’t we see this burn to a crisp a few frames ago??”

And we end with a blue sky, which is both the most beautifully animated frame as well as the most Digimon Adventure-like scene in the entire episode -____-

So, like I said, I was all prepared for this to be the inauspicious ending, despite what I’d heard about the number of episodes. But nope, there’s more. Although I’m frustrated beyond belief, I’m somewhat relieved because this does mean there’s still potential to recover somewhat from this utter train wreck of a battle. The big problem is that Millenniumon is a TERRIBLE villain.

The other problem is that the show HASN’T been terrible the whole time. It’s been up and down a lot, but the ups were very much there, and they gave us some stuff I found pretty interesting. Like, I really wanted to know more about what the heck went down between Taichi and DoneDevimon - the fact that only Yamato has any idea about it (Takeru too but he’s a baby) hasn’t been addressed. Then there’s the connections between Devimon and Angemon, SkullKnightmon and Tailmon. Those have been addressed, technically, but they left sooo much room for more.

Then there’s things like the kids’ family situations - my guess is we’ll end up back in the human world at some point quite soon - which were hinted at back when most of the team was exiled to the human world. Really want to see that expanded on.

Mosty of all, what gave me any positive vibes about this reboot at all was the first three episodes, which were pretty good overall - did a lot of things different but still preserved what I felt was most important. We saw Koushirou coming into his own, Yamato being standoffish and slowly opening up, and Taichi being the glue that keeps things together. Those first three episodes are arguably better than the rest of the show combined. And I bet it’s no coincidence that they predate covid-19 (sort of - I mean, covid was already a thing and around, Japan just hadn’t started caring much about it yet).

Episode 4 is when we started hitting misteps, and that’s also when the show went on brief hiatus due to covid. It never got back what made those first three episodes so promising, even during the highs.

I’ll make a list of the things I liked sometime, but I suppose the main points are the ones I mentioned above, plus the arc with Ogremon, and the kids getting new evolutions not seen in 99 Adventure (well, by “kids” I mostly mean Taichi tho - but I thought it meant everyone would get them. Technically, Takeru just did.)

So yeah. I’m so done with this show and the things is, I just love Digimon Adventure so much, it meant so much to me as a kid. I didn’t expect the same show. I think my expectations were set at a reasonable level, though I knew I had to be cautious about comparing the now and the before too much. This show just hasn’t been able to live up to 99 Adventure, but that’s not even my issue - it’s that it doesn’t live up to other current children’s cartoons either. It’s got no heart. Just think about that, Digimon has got no heart. It’s literally all about the connection between kids and their partners, kids and their friends, kids and their families, and it has no heart! That is failure. It says to me that something got confused in production - there wasn’t enough money, or there was too much staff turnover thanks to covid, etc, and people just lost sight of the story they were planning to tell.

That’s what I think happened. It can’t be fixed at this point, but I’ll still watch till the end and hope for the best. At least maybe I’ll get more Taichi pics to spam.

I probably need to rewatch 99 Adventure soon to get my soul back.

Next week, apparently the Crests will finally matter. My hope is that this whole debacle with Millenniumon is gonna turn out to have been a cover for something much bigger and less boring going on. Millenniumon didn’t even get a villain monologue. He reminded me of the way Mugendramon had been somewhat, more like a puppet than his own person. Makes me wonder if the Vademon were up to more than simply resurrecting a vanquished evil. Here’s hoping.

#fizz watches digimon 2020 #digimon adventure 2020 #digimon adventure:#digimon reboot #digimon adventure psi #digi spoilers #digimon

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osakaso5 · 4 years ago

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La Danse Macabre

Episode 16

Chapter Index

16-1: Kokujohyako (5)

Vida: Get in.

[Slam]

Arme: Ugh... Coff.. coff..!

Vida: You'll spend the night here. They'll come get you tomorrow.

Arme: They..?

Vida: The people who paid a fortune for you.

Arme: You sold me off... What's going to happen to me..?

Vida: I don't know. I've never really cared to think about what happens to the stuff we sell. What matters is that we get paid.

Arme: So to you, all I am is money...

Arme: I suppose not everyone on the Surface thinks like Libel and the others.

Vida: Huh?

Arme: They were going to use me... the Celestial, to bring peace. To bring freedom.

Arme: On top of that, they even took my feelings into accord. They gave me a chance to see things for myself.

Arme: ...Never in my life have I used my powers for something other than the duty I was born into.

Arme: I was happy to be of use in such a way...

Arme: And though you only see me as a source of income, Libel said I could bring hope.

Vida: ........

Arme: Vida, yes? I want to use my powers to help the people of the Surface...

Arme: Won't you help Libel with his plan?

Vida: ........

Arme: If someone as strong as you works with him, you should be able to build an equal relationship between the Surface and the Ark.

Vida: ...Ugh.

Vida: You done?

Arme: .......

Vida: Blah, blah, blah...

Vida: Whatever. Libel's reasons for kidnapping you don't matter to me one bit.

Vida: I couldn't care less, in fact.

Vida: What I care about is how many days we'll eat with the money we get from selling you.

Arme: ...D-do you not have a creed you follow? Surely, it can't be so simple--

Vida: Huh?

[Crack]

Arme: Urgh..!

Arme: Coff... coff..!

Vida: You think a creed's gonna fill our stomachs?

Vida: You saw the shithole we live in when I brought you here.

Vida: The Surface you got shown by those other guys was the tourist trap version.

Arme: Huff... huff... huff...

Vida: Meanwhile, District 12 is done for. Our soil's so rotten that nothing grows in it.

Vida: It's no place for humans to live. It's the reason we go hungry most of the time.

Arme: ........

Vida: Yet we can't leave. We have no choice but stick it out in here.

Vida: We're barely getting by! Unlike all of you!

Arme: ........

Vida: ...Tsk, I've said too much already.

Arme: You're--

Placer: My turn to watch the kid, Vida.

Vida: Yeah, you do that.

Placer: 'kay.

Arme: ...It's you.

Place: Yo... Long. Time. No. See!

[Crash]

Arme: Ugh..!

Placer: Ah... That's better. Needed to get back at you for last time, you see.

Arme: Gh, ugh...

Placer: Oops... I better be careful.

Placer: Horca told me to only leave marks that'll heal quickly... Anything else will lower your value.

Placer: So relax!

Placer: At least I won't break any bones.

[Thump]

Arme: .......!

16-2: Kokujohyako (6)

Arme: Ah... ah...

Placer: Mmh...

Placer: I guess you're not much of a screamer, huh..? Boooring.

Arme: Ah... Haah...

Arme: I-I was busy... thinking...

Placer: I'm impressed you could do that while I was beating you up.

Arme: You people are different from Libel's group...

Arme: You don't even have the time to think about your future... You're too busy surviving in whatever way you can...

Arme: You live one day, then the next, and the next...

Placer: ...Yeah, and?

Arme: It's because you live so close to death... Which is also why you have such a hunger for life.

Arme: Right now, I'm in more pain than I've ever felt before... The death that I've only read about in books is encroaching on me...

Arme: I understand now... How scary it is...

Placer: ...I don't get what you're trying to say.

Arme: I was naïve... Though I like Libel's ideas, I never considered the existence of people like you...

Arme: I saw all of the people here as one and the same...

Placer: I thought I hurt you nice and good, but you're telling me you had time to think about all that crap?

Arme: As I thought... I like it here... There are so many people, with different ways of thinking...

Arme: It makes me want to use my powers to help the Surface even more...

Placer: You're insane.

Placer: The bomber who was with you told me that a sane person can't survive on the Surface.

Arme: I see...

Arme: Hah... hahaha... I'm so happy... to know I could survive on the Surface.

[Thump]

Arme: Ugh..!

Placer: Well, not like that's any of my business.

Arme: Haah... haah...

Placer: Y'know. You think like someone who has it too easy, and that's why I don't like you.

Placer: Don't act like you know our problems. It just sounds like you're looking down on us.

Arme: ...Someone told me the same thing earlier... My apologies...

Placer: I dunno all the details, just what Horca told me a long time ago.

Placer: That there's not even enough people in District 12 to make more of us.

Arme: ...You're a minimum viable population...

Placer: Yeah, something like that. So.

Placer: Sooner or later, we're all gonna die off.

Arme: ...Wait... But couldn't you mix into the general population of the Surface..?

Placer: That's not an option. Not for our people.

Arme: So then... You're just waiting for your extinction.

Placer: Pretty much.

Placer: We were born here, and we'll die here.

Placer: We've already got a grave ready, too. Though it's just a huge hole in the ground.

Placer: We toss the bodies in there, generation after generation.

Arme: Hah... haha... The Surface is home to such varying cultures...

Placer: Must be hard to wrap your head around all this, since you've lived in the sky all your life. Well? Aren't we a sad bunch or what?

Arme: ...Maybe so.

Placer: And since we're so unhappy, we've decided...

Placer: To try and make all the happy people in the world as miserable as possible.

Arme: ...What?

Placer: It's only fair. Can't have us get all the crap in the world, while everyone else gets off easy.

Arme: ...Doing that won't change anything..!

[Thump]

Arme: Aargh!

Placer: Yeah, it will.

[Thump]

Placer: Yeah, it WILL!!! Because it makes us feel BETTER!!!

[Crash]

Placer: What else are we supposed to do!? Just bear with it!?

Placer: Me! And Vida! And Horca!

[Thump]

Placer: We're all so PITIFUL!!!

[Crash]

Placer: Unless we can bring even one person down to our level!!!

Arme: Guhh..! Uurgh..!

Placer: Ahahahaha! AHAHAHAHA!

[Thump, crash]

[Bzzt...]

Arme: ........

- - - -

Horca: Yawn...

Horca: Let's hope he hasn't killed the kid...

Horca: Hey, Placer. Time for the little Celestial to leave.

[Clang]

Horca: ...The cell's open..?

Horca: Hey! Don't tell me you let the Celestial get away!?

Horca: ......!?

Horca: Placer..! Placer..!!!

Horca: He's... not breathing..?

Horca: Y-you've gotta be kidding me..! Right? Right!?

Horca: Wake up... Wake up, Placer!!!

To be continued...

#idolish7 #la danse macabre #translation #event story

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luluwquidprocrow · 4 years ago

Text

and i’ve written pages upon pages trying to rid you from my bones

originally posted: august 25th, 2019

word count: 13,060 words

rated: not rated

beatrice/bertrand/lemony

heavy angst, canon compliant, with enough canon divergence that makes the canon compliance worse, epistolary

summary:

and if you don’t love me, let me go.

[a much less than 200 pages break up letter.]

opening notes:

title from the engine driver by the decemberists

By the time you read this

I guess an at least interesting description of us could be like ships passing in the night

I think now is

I think now might be the time for us to

First of all, I have canceled my subscription to the Daily Punctilio, which was just a good move on my part to begin with, and second of all, I couldn’t believe all that anyway, but third of all, do you know, Lemony

You’ll think me such a damn hypocrite, won’t you.

Why now? Why would I

Why would you do this now?

My Heart and I

ENOUGH ! we're tired, my heart and I.

We sit beside the headstone thus,

And wish that name were carved for us.

The moss reprints more tenderly

The hard types of the mason's knife,

As heaven's sweet life renews earth's life

With which we're tired, my heart and I.

II.

You see we're tired, my heart and I.

We dealt with books, we trusted men,

And in our own blood drenched the pen,

As if such colours could not fly.

We walked too straight for fortune's end,

We loved too true to keep a friend ;

At last we're tired, my heart and I.

III.

How tired we feel, my heart and I !

We seem of no use in the world ;

Our fancies hang grey and uncurled

About men's eyes indifferently ;

Our voice which thrilled you so, will let

You sleep; our tears are only wet :

What do we here, my heart and I ?

IV.

So tired, so tired, my heart and I !

It was not thus in that old time

When Ralph sat with me 'neath the lime

To watch the sunset from the sky.

Dear love, you're looking tired,' he said;

I, smiling at him, shook my head :

'Tis now we're tired, my heart and I.

So tired, so tired, my heart and I !

Though now none takes me on his arm

To fold me close and kiss me warm

Till each quick breath end in a sigh

Of happy languor. Now, alone,

We lean upon this graveyard stone,

Uncheered, unkissed, my heart and I.

VI.

Tired out we are, my heart and I.

Suppose the world brought diadems

To tempt us, crusted with loose gems

Of powers and pleasures ? Let it try.

We scarcely care to look at even

A pretty child, or God's blue heaven,

We feel so tired, my heart and I.

VII.

Yet who complains ? My heart and I ?

In this abundant earth no doubt

Is little room for things worn out :

Disdain them, break them, throw them by

And if before the days grew rough

We once were loved, used, — well enough,

I think, we've fared, my heart and I.

-Elizabeth Barrett Browning, who knew what she was talking about

My Dearest Darling,

You call me a lot of things but, to be perfectly frank (not Ernest), Lemony, I think I’ve always liked that one the least. There was that summer where, among other things, Bertrand was trying to come up with nicknames for us in that charming way of his, and he came up with a real mess of awful nicknames and then I came up with the list we could Never Repeat In Public (capitals necessary) and then you said something very sweet to both of us, and anyway, we know what happened there, but the point of this is that you held us close and said, very seriously, that you would never ever ever ever ever (for the span of what I’d figure would be maybe two pages, short but evenly-spaced), no matter what happened, call Bertrand ‘Bert’ and that was damn good of you because Bertrand is not a Bert and never will be. We were right to veto Bertie, as well. He is a Bertrand, through and through. The other point was that you wound up calling us nicknames too but dearest darling was maybe the worst of all of them. Bea was my favorite. I liked the way you said it and I liked the way it sounded and I felt noble perfect unstoppable invincible worried fragile good when you said it. And that was good.

Speaking of, right now, Bertrand is with Kit, and don’t worry, they’re not talking about you (I know how you worry). They’re talking about boats and maps and cooking spices and Widdershins will probably come by later to give them both his version of A Stern Talking To (capitals debatable) about open water expeditions, which will probably be something like, ‘Fire this harpoon at anything suspicious! Aye! Shoot first and ask questions later! Aye!’ and it’s a real miracle that man doesn’t have a whole boatload of albatrosses hanging around somewhere. (Unless he does, and I just haven’t seen it.)

Bertrand and I—well, we’ve kept the house up. Even though he has that thing for natural light, you know what I mean. But we’ve managed to decorate it nicely. I got the Gothic Furniture (capitals required), he got his large windows, there is a last unopened root beer bottle in the fridge because every time we look at it both of us think about how you said it’s impolite to take the last one, and I thought, maybe I’d save it for when you came back but I don’t

The last thing I want is to

Bertrand and I, we’re going out to dinner tonight, because we’re still not all that comfortable with the kitchen yet. I mean, why did we get such a fancy kitchen? I’m sure one of these days I’ll come around to it and it’ll be fine but right now it’s, it seems a hassle, I guess. So we’re going out and I’ve already decided that I’m going to order this truly egregious amount of pasta and no one will stop me!

We don’t really have any plans for tomorrow. As it stands right now. We’ve both been sort of taking things as they come lately. Bertrand, Bertrand’s been very busy. Both of us have been busy, but I think he’s been trying to keep his mind occupied. A lot of us have. Even Hector looks more concerned than he usually does. I saw him the other day—not here, in town—and I didn’t think it was possible for Hector to look that harried. So much has been happening lately, I feel like even I haven’t had time to catch my breath, even in this part of the city. It’s like everything’s been going a mile a minute, taking me with it, and the moments where it stops, the moments where I have the time to think, are unbearably, agonizingly slow. But most of my life has been like that, you know.

And I know, I know you are too. Busy. And concerned.

I know.

When you

Did you

The last performance of our play was three days ago. Since the Daily Punctilio doesn’t have a theater section anymore, Bertrand and I haven’t been reading any rave reviews but we were rereading but, what can you do. Geraldine’s moved on to some other column now too, something about, I don’t even know, tax evasion? Shoes? I can never understand a single thing she writes. Even that ‘Secret Organizations You Should Know About’ thing didn’t even pan out, can you believe that? All she did was write about Esmé! All that trouble for

It looks like it’ll be the last play for a while. I know they wanted us to go on longer, but, well, that’s how it has to be. Don’t know what I’m going to do with myself without a script to lug around, but I’ll probably memorize something for kicks. Gilda Farrell’s lines, maybe, that’d be fun.

But it’d be better if you

This is really the first time I’ve had one of those unbearably slow moments in a while, and of course the first thing I think of is you. You and Bertrand have always filled those gaps for me, but now it’s different. It’s just

I saw Jacques the other day and he

Ramona’s the only one who hasn’t been so

I want to see you so much, Lemony. With everything I have, I want you with me, and I keep hoping that if I close my eyes, when I open them again, there you’ll be, alive and well and next to me and real. Or I’ll walk away from my desk and this letter and when I look back it’ll all have been a bad dream, the worst nightmare I keep stopping and hoping and when you’re not there and I’m still here I

I don’t know how to do this. I can’t

I didn’t want to do it like this.

I don’t want you to I’m, burying the lede, or doing any of this on purpose or anything, because by now you’ve definitely noticed how long this is (although, personally, I’m only at the beginning, but I have a feeling this is going to get long—I know I’ve said I could run laps around the city in the time it takes you to finish a single metaphor but between the two of us we both know I could go on for much longer and will), and you have a vague idea, or a concrete idea, or an idea you don’t want to think about, of where I’m going to go with this. If it was something simple it wouldn’t be like this. If I was just, telling you the news, I wouldn’t need so much time, and I need so much of it. I’m setting the stage trying to making sure I wanted to I can’t just

I am a weak woman, Lemony Snicket. And that is a complete lie, you and I know, but I am a weak woman and I don’t want to be but my hands are shaking.

You and I. You and I know so many things.

So why should we

We both know how to make Ramona laugh, and the right amount of sugar for Olivia’s tea, and where Jacques will be on Tuesdays even though he pretends he doesn’t keep a regular schedule, and where Monty has his keys stashed in his garden, and everything possible about Bertrand, including what book he’s reading right now even though you haven’t been home in two months (it’s still that cat book because he says he wants to see the look on your face when he reads it out loud after dinner) (it’s still that cat book), and what kind of records Kit wants for her birthday even though she never has the time to play them, and even what Esmé is going to eat tomorrow because would you believe that herring is still in, to her continued consternation. She can talk all she wants about how good herring is but I still see that look on her face when she eats it! Every meal, Lemony! I’m giggling as we speak and I wish you could see her because it is one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen in my LIFE

Maybe those things are superficial, but they’re things we know about people, about ourselves, and that counts, doesn’t it? And—and I know what you look like when you wake up and I know what you look like when you’re fixing your typewriter and I have to help and I know what you look like when you think I’m not looking at you, and there was a time where that meant you didn’t look like everyone you knew had just died. You know what I look like at my worst, the worst I ever let you see. You knew it anyway. You It was enough.

And Bertrand. I know I’ve said it before but, you and I were so lucky. Lots of good things came from of this, right? The three of us, you and me and Bertrand. Our apartment and that wallpaper we took down in Bertrand’s when he moved out of his, with those horrendous yellow stripes. The cat we pretended to have and the elaborate medical history we made for it so we’d all have an excuse to go home early. (That poor cat, though. I don’t think it would’ve been possible for it to really survive like that. We should be better to our imaginary pets next time in the future.) Watching Bertrand dance to my records, which was terrible because we hadn’t taught him to dance yet. Trying out those new recipes. Keeping the windows open in the summer. The diner down the street, the ice cream shop on the corner, that night it rained and we all stayed outside and got soaking wet because why not? Bertrand making that excessive amount of soup the next day. You telling us we were the only things that mattered. Bertrand would push your hair out of your face when you were sleeping and I wanted to watch that for the rest of my life. I wanted it to be the last thing I ever saw.

Those moments, every moment. Reading in the dark, losing my glasses, you stopped dead the first time we were out with Bertrand and he was under a streetlamp and you both looked so beautiful and you kissed him for the first time and you didn’t even remember to be nervous.

And those million citations Jacques didn’t give us for public indecency during that spring he was disguised as a police officer. (He was definitely kidding when he brought it up. There was no way he could’ve seen us.)

It makes me so happy, to think about all that. I love you and Bertrand so much. I

Oh Lemony. I don’t think I can do any of this.

-------

In other better happier general news, Gustav let Bertrand and me see the pictures from the wedding, and then he archived them, because we agreed that was for the best, and Bertrand figured you’d probably say the same. I look absolutely stunning, and Bertrand looks incredibly handsome even though he finally admitted he agrees with you, that hat was not his style, and you, Lemony, in that white suit that matched Bertrand’s with those peach-colored flowers because peach is a better color than I ever gave it credit for and it looked so good in the spring because it was the color the wall in the living room turned when the afternoon sun hit, you look

It was such a beautiful day. Still spring, and right after Bertrand’s birthday. Us, Kit, Jacques, Ramona, Olivia, Dewey, Hector. Jerome was invited—or he was supposed to be, who knows what happened there. We barely saw Gustav the whole time too, since he kept climbing up into trees for better angles. The smallest place we could find that would hold all of us and be so out of the way. The cake Kit made, against everyone’s expectations. Ramona cried, because of course she did. All those flowers, no one could move the whole time for walking into at least six bees, but no one minded. So much love. It was palpable, and my whole body was alive with it, with such a soft warmth I could barely breathe. I don’t think I ever stopped smiling, not while dancing or singing or kicking my shoes off because such mortal trappings cannot contain me, or when you and Bertrand danced and you cried, or when a crow flew overhead and we all stopped, just for a single second, before every one of us decided not to care. For a few hours one glorious afternoon.

You look happier than I’ve ever seen you before and now I don’t know if I’ll ever see you like that again or forever and I’m sorry, I was right, I can’t do this, I can’t do this I can’t do this I can’t do this

-------

I’ve taken a few deep breaths and I’m ready to

Oh who am I KIDDING

Lemony I love you so much and I need you so much my heart is going to break with it

justice does not need eyes to see,

but truth built himself eyes

in the porcelain patterns of his world

and let them do the talking

in the skies he

so kindly

let them see,

with the eyes he gave them,

one after another

after another

i was something else

but i lived so close beside

that they could not accuse me

of being blind

but i could’ve seen everything

if i could see with every eye,

one after another

after another

after another,

every eye

a certainty,

every eye

the truth,

every eye

mine alone.

You told me when we were younger that I should give rhyming verse a try and, well, Lemony, not everything you said was good advice.

-------

I do, though. I love you a great deal. I think it confuses people. Besides the fact that some of them never understood our relationship with Bertrand (cowards), I get the impression some of our associates don’t know why I love you. Which is just stupid of them, and I don’t owe them anything, none of them are going to read this. It’s not their business why I love you, it’s ours. And I love you because

How can you explain why you love someone? Someone can say ‘they make me laugh’ as much as they want and sure it’s true but is that really why? Can you ever really say why? Isn’t it enough to love somebody, with everything you have? To say, that’s the one I want, for the rest of my life? Who could I possibly need to defend myself to?

I love you because I love you, because I look at you and think I love you, because I inhale and exhale that I love you, because every part of me only feels right with you.

I love you because you embarrassed me but I thought you were kind. I love you because I didn’t ever have to explain anything. I love you because you always came back to me. I love you because you made me happy. I love you because you didn’t let anything stop you from loving me. I love you because you loved me. I love you because when you took my hand I thought I could do anything with that love.

I love you because you were mine. I love you because you looked at me. And I love you because it was more than that, it always was.

I love you because of the records you played. I love you because of the time we taught Bertrand to make root beer floats. I love you because you’d rehearse our lines with us even though you can’t act. I love you because of the way you would stand in the kitchen and wonder what you should make for dinner. I love you because you said you’d plant strawberry bushes in the backyard. I love you because you could never stand Geraldine Julienne. I love you because we would all sit around the table in my apartment and critique the newspaper articles together. I love you because you’d never take the train. I love you because Bertrand and I found every shortcut in the city for you. I love you because you and Bertrand would knit me the ugliest sweaters on purpose. I love you because you would take care of the bats for me and you were terrible at it.

I love you because you were wonderful where it counted. I love you because we’d stay up late and watch movies. I love you because you would hold Bertrand like it was the most important thing in the world. I love you because you would furrow your brow when you read something you didn’t like. I love you because you’d take me to the beach when it was cold. I love you because we went on picnics in the summer. I love you because when I walked into our apartment and then when I walked into our house it always felt like home. I love you because we made up that cat. I love you because you’d sing with me. I love you because Bertrand would take us bird-watching and name the birds with us. I love you because you bought me flowers.

I love you because you told me what happened. I love you because we went back there with you. I love you because I went into the lighthouse. I love you because I wasn’t going to not go. I love you because no one else would’ve gone. I love you because we let you walk out the door there and I knew you would come back.

I love you because we used to make out in the back of the movie theater and we’d take turns with Bertrand and then try to piece together what even happened in the movie when we got home. I love you because you used to sit in dark rooms with me and pretend we were ghosts and scare the other volunteers. I love you because we could just read for hours and not say a word. I love you because you let me cry in the bathroom. I love you because you would make up songs on the accordion when I was upset. I love you because I would whistle along when you did songs I knew. I love you because you would go out of your way to buy crackers. I love you because you would say things like “when we first met, you were pretty, and I was lonely” and you let me laugh. I love you because you would write me notes during class. I love you because you looked the same way I did the first time we saw Bertrand—shocked, and then a little impressed, and then irritated, because who did he think he was? I love you because who did any of us think we were, really. I love you because we grew to not care. I love you because we became people I was proud of.

I love you because you would feed that cat in the back alley on your way home and I would watch you from the window. I love you because that cat followed us to our house and then we had a real live legitimate cat until someone across the street put out better cat food. I love you because of the way you would read out loud, because you couldn’t act but when you read it was like seeing the sunrise for the first time. I love you because the one thing you did that was better than Bertrand was make tea. I love you because you taught me all your cookie recipes. I love you because we got you to sleep in the middle so we could protect you. I love you because they couldn’t take that away from me.

I love you because I’m here in an otherwise empty house, some boxes still unpacked, letting the dust settle, pouring my heart out when I don’t want to, because I do love you with everything I have, every part of me, every bone and every sigh and every drop of blood, and that’s the end of that. That’s all there is, I love you. That’s what it comes down to, I love you. That’s the only thing I want to say, I love you.

I do, I do love you. Lemony, please believe me.

-------

I know Bertrand has his own thoughts, his own opinions. He doesn’t want to admit that he does, but he gets this, look, on his face. Like he doesn’t know what to do with himself, he doesn’t know what to do with his hands, like he’s lost something special but it was there a moment ago, wasn’t it. He thinks I haven’t noticed. After all this time, he thinks he’s not supposed to be here, and you it hurts, is all.

And as much as Bertrand is a part of us, indelibly, forever, just as you are, both of you so a part of me that I ache with it, this letter is between you and me. Not because it was the two of us first. But because you know, for as much as I don’t want to, I’ll say the things Bertrand won’t.

That’s how this has to be.

-------

So.

Olaf’s started talking to me again, which I didn’t think would happen in a million years. Although maybe I shouldn’t call it talking? More like, he sort of shows up if he knows I’m at headquarters (which is far and few between anyway so, really, what the hell?) and lounges in doorways with these big smiles and says these dramatic things at me instead of to me, which he can’t possibly expect me to believe. How stupid does he think I am? Because I’m not. He keeps going, hey Beatrice, have you read the Daily Punctilio? And I don’t say anything to him, even though yes, I’ve read the Daily Punctilio, dammit.

You and I both know what’s in the Daily Punctilio, and for a while I thought, maybe you were writing those articles yourself, part of another fragmentary plot, and that you’d tell me about it later, and you’d explain it to me, even though I wouldn’t need it to be explained, not really. But you didn’t. Not that you didn’t explain, you just, you just didn’t tell me anything. And you were gone and I couldn’t even see you anyway and that was what really made it hard? It wasn’t like I doubted you. I didn’t. I didn’t doubt you. I knew you wouldn’t do any of those things.

But everyone looked at me and they looked so damn pitying, like, oh it happens to the best of us, only he’s not the best of us. Maybe you should’ve seen it coming, well you know what he’s like, as if nothing had ever happened? As if we hadn’t grown up together? As if we wouldn’t have followed you to the ends of the earth because we believed in you? It’s not everyone, but it’s enough. Like some of them don’t owe you their lives.

Bertrand says that people deal with things in different ways, and saying those things about you is probably just another way they’re dealing with everything. Don’t you think it’s harder, it’s gotten harder, as we’ve gotten older? But they don’t have to throw you under the bus to do it. They don’t have to vilify you to make themselves feel better. They don’t have to look me in the eye like that, like I’m some, some poor miserable thing, or like I have to be protected, or like I don’t know what I’m doing, or like they can’t even trust me.

But what does that make me?

And Olaf would grin at me and I would hold my head high and look him back and spit in his face. I wasn’t going to let it get to me. It had only been a month. How long is a month, in the grand scheme of things? What does a month matter, against the beginning of a lifetime? And when a month became two, what did that matter?

-------

I wouldn’t say that Hector and I were ever particularly close, but I’ve actually seen a lot of him lately. We meet up for tea because he keeps saying there’s something he wants to talk to me about but mostly he sits there and looks at his tea and I pretend I’m not super uncomfortable. And then he insists on paying the check, in exact change.

When I see Hector, I think about Haruki. I know how close they were. And Haruki respected you so much, more than anyone else. As in, he respected you more than he respected any of our other friends, but also more than maybe anyone else respected you, because that was how Haruki was. Loyal, the best of the best, and so fierce about it. I wanted him there at our wedding.

Haruki was really the first person we lost, I guess. And I hate how we’re never going to know how it happened, because they say no one else was there, and the one person we do know was there, he’s never going to say a damn thing about it, and we all know that for sure. But I remember everyone gathering around to write Haruki’s obituary and how little we had to say. Not because we didn’t know him. But because, what were we going to say? What did we have left to say, who did Haruki have left, besides us? And what were we?

Hector looks at me and I don’t know what to say to him. He doesn’t know what to say to me. I’m terrified he’s going to tell me I should’ve known better too because then I won’t be able to stand it. But he just looks at me and I try not to cry and I’m trying not to cry now because he’s feeling it too, this awful business of feeling like things are starting to break. Sometimes I feel Hector is going to disappear, too.

--------

I guess the question I started to think was, how long was I going to wait. Bertrand and I had waited for longer, and then there were times where we never waited, and hadn’t we reached a point where we weren’t supposed to, anymore? But then, when you’re married, aren’t you supposed to do whatever you have to?

But doesn’t it go both ways? One half can do their part but doesn’t the other half have to do something too and how much is it before you’re asking too much but how long is it before you’re not doing enough and when you’re married aren’t you supposed to know the answers to all the questions, the right and the wrong ones, you’re not supposed to care and you’re supposed to be there and it’s all is supposed to be okay, and

We never did do anything traditionally, though, did we?

-------

I saved the article. I didn’t save all of them, but I saved this one.

-------

UNIDENTIFIED BODY IDENTIFIED

The unidentified body recently pulled from the downtown river has been identified as local ex-theater critic and renowned person of interest, Lemony Snicket, who was last seen surveying the river and saying, “How deep do you think it really is?”

“For the record,” said the local police, who preferred to remain nameless and sent in their response by postcard from three towns over, “it was three feet.”

Mr. Snicket was identified by a source who was also unidentified, but proved their credentials by singing a variety of showtunes for the newspaper staff, to great applause.

“Yes, I suppose that’s him,” said the source, when asked to identify the photo of the river, which was presented to them while they were drinking a glass of water, because they were parched after the showtunes. When the glass of water spilled on the photograph, the source went on to say, “Oh, that’s definitely him.”

The body in question disappeared as soon as it was found, but the police have no reason to suspect foul play, as no livestock was found at the scene, the morgue, or the local bakery, and neither does our source.

“Can I leave now?” asked the source. “I need to go pick up my glasses.”

Mr. Snicket has recently been the suspect in a number of crimes, including arson, lockpicking, theft, and jaywalking without a license. He has been described as “that’s not what I would call a grey suit, it leaned closer to charcoal.” There is no planned funeral service at this time.

-------

Bertrand and I laughed a lot, because it was the most outrageous article we’d ever read, and we kept talking about what sort of bakery would even allow livestock inside, and of course we knew it was about you, but of course it wasn’t you, because we didn’t know where you were but we knew you were alive. You were alive, so no matter what we read or what anyone told us, no matter who wanted to believe what, we knew the truth.

And, again, Lemony, it wasn’t that I needed you to explain. It was that I wanted you to tell me. I wanted you to let me in on it. I wanted you to call or come by and tell us, your husband and your wife, hey no big deal but I’m gonna fake my death for the foreseeable future, is that okay? And instead I have to find out from Olaf waving it in my face? I have to find out from some absurd article I shouldn’t have even looked twice at? I have to find out from people I thought were my friends telling me I should have known better?

I sure don’t need to tell you, but, we just got married, Lemony! And we had a house and a life and plans and no matter what happened, no matter what else we had to do, because there was no way we were ever going to give this up and we knew that, we were going to stay together, we were going to do this, what we promised, not to other people but to ourselves, and each other, and

Sometimes I want to think that you planned it like that, that you sat down and thought to yourself about the best worst way to do it and you thought, leaving us alone like this and faking your death and not saying a single word was the greatest way to break our hearts, especially after marrying us, that would hurt the most, you wanted to do it so you did it and you got away from us for good like you always wanted because you were never going to stay and you knew it, because then I can hate you like I’m supposed to and stop thinking of the way you smile at me

I hate that you aren’t a cruel person, I hate that you didn’t do it on purpose, I hate that the real true human tradition is that people are human and nothing else

How am I supposed to do this?

a bird up in her chamber

eats love for breakfast lunch and dinner

and steadily gets thinner

sings songs she won’t forget,

in the darkness by the lamps

says the shapes of lonely words

said by lonely people

in lonely rooms

to feel better about

being

what is a life with this alone

what is a life

like this?

“when we grab you by the ankle, where your life is ours to take

you’ll soon be doing wicked things, they’ll keep you long awake

when your whole life is a secret then you’ll be a volunteer

and you’ll scream a long time later, for

the world was never quiet here.”

-------

Bertrand has been making lists. You know his tendency to organize, but the funny thing is he just keeps leaving them places. I’m sitting on like, three of them.

To Do

-Check maps

-Apologize to D

-Extra key

-Secure boat

-Study family trees

To Buy

-Thick, sturdy rope

-Do they make portable record players?

-Paintbrushes (for then and now, so get extra)

-White curtains? Will they match? Check ‘To Think’

-Extra wires, no candles!

To Think

-Ask Kit about Bernadette

-Examine garden for hiding spots

-Turtles or foxes?

-What if it turns out to be true?

-Or birds??

Definitely not birds.

-------

You know, I haven’t seen Jerome in a while. Maybe it’s also been two months, I’m not sure. I feel like, even before the wedding, we weren’t seeing much of him—although it wasn’t like Jacques paraded him around or anything in the first place—but since then, I don’t think Jacques has even talked about him.

This means Jacques’s Tuesdays are open now, although you’d never know it. He still only shows up when he wants to. And if he doesn’t want to, then you have as much luck finding him as finding a grammar rule Jo doesn’t know. It must run in the family. I hate to

I had Kit get ahold of him for me. Sometimes I feel like I don’t know what to say to Kit anymore, which is unsettling, but Kit acts like she always does. She comes over and makes herself at home and talks to both of us like this is average everyday Kit business for her. I don’t know if I admire her tenacity or if it’s going to be something else I can’t stand down the line. I don’t know yet. She hugged me when she left, though. That’s just how Kit is. And I don’t really want to lose that.

I wasn’t sure if Kit would know, the thing I wanted to ask Jacques. I guess it wouldn’t surprise me if she did, but when I saw her I thought, maybe she didn’t know. She didn’t talk about you at all. And it wasn’t the ‘I’m Kit Snicket and I’m Being Purposefully Vague For Reasons, Now Deal With It’ sort of silence, it was the ‘I’m Kit Snicket and I Refuse to Admit I Don’t Know This Piece of Information, So I’m Going to Rearrange Your Bookshelves’ sort of silence. Still don’t know where she put T.S. Eliot. I think she took it with her.

Jacques didn’t want to talk to me. He’s too polite to say it, but I could tell. He kept making excuses, and by the time we finally got him to come here, he was uncomfortable and I was on edge. He came right out and said he couldn’t stay long. He knew why I wanted to talk to him and he told me straightforward that he couldn’t tell me.

I’m not proud of what I said to him.

-------

If it was the last day, but it probably was but Lemony, I don’t I sure didn’t know.

I will remember every second until the day I die.

We waited until after the wedding to move into the house, especially because the only honeymoon we wanted was for the three of us to be there together, alone, for a little while. It was on the outskirts of the city, away from everything else, and we barely told anyone. We didn’t even tell everyone from the wedding.

I watched the sunrise, the soft shadows sliding along the sheets on the bed, catching on the suitcases we still hadn’t unpacked all the way, you and Bertrand warm beside me, and I didn’t want to get up. We put the best bed in the whole world in our room, and rightly so. High bed posts but no canopy because Bertrand was worried about dust. Crisp white sheets and I was so excited to look when we finally got up and see the wrinkles mashed down in them from where we slept because that meant it was ours for real. That rich wine comforter that it was too hot to use the first night so we still had it folded up at the foot of the bed, but you had this look in your eyes when we spread it out like you couldn’t wait for winter and when we’d be squished up against each other underneath it for warmth.

That morning, I just wanted to lay there and savor it. It wasn’t like we’d never been in the same bed before, or that we even needed to be married, but! To know I could hold it in my hands, that’s what it was.

And then Bertrand rolled over and got an elbow into my side somehow and you mumbled something about Wedding Pancakes (capitals implied) and then we had to eat breakfast.

I checked. The wrinkles were all there.

-------

Bertrand and I.

We haven’t

We’ve been

We’ve been angry at each other.

And you know Bertrand, he doesn’t get angry, really, he gets, more disappointed than anything, but he’s. He’s been angry. At me. I know.

I get scared, because I don’t know what to do, so I, I can’t hold a conversation without yelling at somebody, and it’s usually Bertrand, and I hate yelling at him and sometimes he starts to yell back.

We’re not. Okay. Right now.

We weren’t supposed to do this without you and I don’t want to find out that we can’t, Lemony. And I know we can but I know it’s also not a matter of doing it with or without you, because that’s awful, I just keep wondering what if you were what held us all together and if you’re not here how are Bertrand and I supposed to go on like this. Saying the wrong things, avoiding each other, not coming home. I guess that’s how we’re ‘dealing’ with it but that’s sure some sick way to do it.

I don’t want to lose anybody and fighting for them means that I want to keep screaming until everything stops.

-------

Jacques said you’d be back soon enough.

I told him I needed to know how soon was soon.

He said soon enough.

I said that wasn’t enough.

I never though of Jacques as one to yell. And he didn’t really yell, he mostly raised his voice, like I couldn’t hear him. I mean I was definitely talking over him but it was because I could hear him and I didn’t want to.

No one can tell me anything I don’t know. I know they think I haven’t felt the same worries as everyone else but that’s because I never wanted them to think that I did. And I did too good a job, apparently. I know we live hard lives, Jacques. I know it requires sacrifices, Jacques. I know there’s no guarantee, Jacques. I know there’s things you have to give up. I know you can’t be childish or selfish in this business. I know we knew what would happen. I know sometimes no matter how hard you try, you’re just going to fail.

He told me to wait for you.

-------

After breakfast, we organized the library, because we still had so many things in boxes but we agreed we had to get that done. We put everything in, every repeat copy and every notebook because we actually had room for everything instead of trying to cram it all into smaller bookshelves. The library was the biggest room in the house and had that beautiful windowseat. (It still does. We’re still in this house, after all, but this moment, this day, just isn’t right now.) I’ll admit I spent more time lounging on it than I did organizing books, but, you sat on that windowseat with me, you knew how comfortable it was. I loved those windows and how bright the sun was (really.) and how good I knew it was going to look when it was raining. And you agreed, and Bertrand rolled his eyes at us, and I told him, he got his natural light, what more did he want?

For two people to stop lazing around and figure out if we were going in alphabetical order or by genre or by which ones most recently made us cry over lunch, Bertrand said.

It was alphabetical, of course.

We forgot about lunch, because we put the record player in the library until we could find another place for it and started playing our favorites. Bertrand could dance by then, obviously, we wouldn’t have married him if he couldn’t. We were very good at dancing together, after practicing for so long. No one was ever going to do a better three-way tango and we all knew it.

We picked through the fridge and some of the wedding gifts, once we got hungry and tired of dancing. We found out Jerome somehow still sent us at least thirty coasters, and learned that he apparently wildly overestimates our social life, because there was no way we were going to be inviting thirty people at a time over anymore, or at least, not for a while. You and Bertrand stacked them in the dining room in a cabinet, and those you organized by color. Then we stood at the window there and looked out into the garden (the best view of it was from the dining room) and talked about the flowers we were going to plant, and how Ramona was going to send us (express) a clipping from one of the rosebushes in her garden, the ones we’d look at during her family’s masked balls.

We went to the corner store down the street and you and Bertrand pretended to fuss over tomatoes while I was looking at loaves of bread and when I turned around you were buying flowers for me, red and bright and beautiful. We put them in the kitchen while we all made dinner (salmon, with cherry tomatoes). Somehow I found the time to make sorbet for dessert and it was only then we realized how late it was and we laughed a lot that day and laughed a lot then because we didn’t need to care about things like that. Our house was barely put together and we tried to find a way to use every single coaster from Jerome and we hadn’t had words with the city about the electricity yet because there was so much we’d had to do beforehand that we had to use candles. We all had matches, and we weren’t naive enough to think we wouldn’t have them.

I can’t tell you how powerful I felt, lighting those candles, because I know you and Bertrand felt it too. This was our doing and ours alone. This space was ours. We looked at each other over the candles, the shadows on our faces, and we’d never looked clearer.

We could’ve lived forever, in that moment.

-------

I called your brother a coward and I told him that whatever happened to Jerome now that he wouldn’t protect him was his fault and his alone and if he could live with himself that’s fine but I couldn’t if I didn’t try to do this and if he didn’t tell me where you were I was going to kill him where he stood and he shouldn’t even think for one second that I wasn’t capable of doing what had to be done and if that meant I had to kill for what I wanted then I would.

-------

You kissed us in the morning. You smiled. You walked out the door and then came back because you forgot your hat and Bertrand and I were still laughing even as the door shut behind you.

And then you were gone.

-------

Kit came by again, after.

We sat in that silence.

She told me that it was the one thing they hadn’t told her. She hadn’t known, until I asked Jacques. We don’t have anywhere else to go, she said, in a moment of unprecedented candidness. So we always come back.

“I underestimated him,” she said.

I told her she could keep The Wasteland, since it was practically hers because it had been yours. Kit smiled. She didn’t say much else.

-------

Bertrand and I aren’t the only ones losing someone here and I forgot that.

Jacques and I looked at each other for a long time. I tried to apologize and he kept shaking his head. He told me where you were. He told me he didn’t know when you’d be back—or if you would at all. He told me he was the one writing the articles in the Daily Punctilio. He turned away from me. Then he gave me his handkerchief, and put his hand on mine, and got up and left.

-------

What it feels like, Lemony, is like you

It feels like you picked

It feels like we didn’t matter and

And it’s not like we could ever choose or have one or the other I know I know I know but

We’re never going to be without it but I thought that

WE GOT MARRIED, FOR FUCK’S SAKE, LEMONY SNICKET

You picked an idea of nobility that you spent the past ten years struggling with and denouncing and promising you’d never

It wasn’t like we ever set out to save you anyway I

At the end of the day, that’s it. You picked the organization over us. And I didn’t think we were going to have to draw lines like that. At least not now. At least not right now. Because that means I have to make a decision. Because it means I can’t only think about me. Because it means I can’t keep waiting. And even if I could, I wouldn’t want to.

-------

I found out the other day.

I had a feeling, though. You just, you either have the feeling or you don’t, right? And I did. And I keep thinking about what your reaction would be. What you’d say. I keep thinking about your eyes, bluer than blue. I keep thinking about the world we said we were going to make when we were kids, the people we said we’d be. We were tiny and young and idealistic and you’re really only that way once in your whole life and when you’re not anymore, you can’t go back.

-------

We can’t go on like this.

stripped off my dress like a skin,

peeled

so you could see everything

not only then,

but always.

didn’t know i was doing it,

guess i never really ran out of clothes.

you took off you shirt

and I was jealous.

you only needed to do it once and there you were.

I thought.

but now I keep finding shirts

in the places where I found you

and I can’t

find anything

that was mine

to put back on

I really can’t do anything

-------

Enclosed you’ll find the ring. I know it’s not just the ring I married you with, but the ring I married Bertrand with, but whenever we look at it we think of you and I’m the one who has to wear it all the time and I can’t.

But I don’t want to give it back because what if it’s the only thing I get to keep of you? But it wasn’t ever mine anyway, or yours, and who knows, maybe Ramona will marry Olivia with it someday, and maybe you’ll be there, only you wouldn’t be if you got the ring back, you’d never show your face again.

And that’s not what I want, I don’t want you out of my life, Lemony, but if I give it back then maybe I do. Maybe that is what I want. Maybe I never want to see you again like this.

-------

Okay, I have to ask. I have to, because Jacques kept his mouth shut about this.

The last time you saw us. Not the day, but the morning, walking out the front door. Did you know you weren’t coming back? You just left like you always did, to go to the newspaper, before Bertrand and I went to the theater, and as far as leaving someone for good goes that’s so

Did you meet up with Jacques, or Hector, or Jo, or even Kit, and did they tell you? Did headquarters address you personally? Did you take an assignment from someone else? Did someone corner you and were you trying to protect us? Was that the only way you could do it, going into hiding and faking your death? Who else was involved, besides Jacques? How long was it going to go on for? Did they expect you to do it by yourself? Did you have a plan, did any of them have a plan? What fragmentary plot was it even a part of? Did you know you weren’t coming back? Could you even come back? Did it even happen right away? Did it start out as some mediocre assignment you were going to tell us about later and then what happened so that I was reading the paper and there you were being accused of things I knew you’d never do? Why didn’t they ask me? Why didn’t they ask Bertrand? Why didn’t they ask us? You knew we’d do it together, we swore we’d do it together, why didn’t you tell us? What made it so that you couldn’t?

Or did you really decide for yourself that that was it?

I don’t want to believe that. I don’t, Lemony. I want to believe that it was one thing and then another but do you know why I can’t, why I keep asking? Do you understand why I need to know the truth? Why I need to be able to put it together? Why waiting and trusting isn’t enough anymore?

--------

No one could ever extinguish my love, Lemony, no one, nothing, not a single solitary thing ever, nothing could do it, but my trust is a different matter. Loving someone and trusting someone are two different things and I know you know that as much as I do. You. Knew. All. Of. This.

-------

You know. If it had ended at the article. I might’ve been okay with it. I might have. Not making any promises, because we both know better than that. But I might’ve. I could’ve.

It didn’t end with the article.

Olivia had a short-lived assignment working the telegrams recently. She gave Ramona a very specific telegram. Olivia was honestly surprised it had come through at all. That something like that would be sent over such an insecure line. And of course she showed Ramona. They didn’t show it to anyone else. Which was lucky, because you know Olivia. She wanted to do whatever she could.

Ramona sent it to me. Right away. I got it yesterday. She said she’d never felt worse in her entire life. She said she was sorry. She’s the only one who didn’t sound patronizing about it.

J.S.,

AS WELL AS CAN BE EXPECTED STOP GOING ON FULL STOP

M.K.

I never liked Monty Kensicle all that much as a name either.

-------

Lemony I can’t help but think that you’re sick of me, sick with me

It wasn’t like I ever—like I did it to be similar, I would NEVER, because both of us had our reasons for why we did what we did, you on that train, me and Bertrand at the opera. We knew what we were doing. Did we regret it? Enough for it to hurt, on the wrong days. Not enough for it to matter, in the long run. But enough for it to stop me every once in a while, in the way I know it stopped you.

But, but did you think, you couldn’t love someone who

Which would be, extraordinarily hypocritical of you, not to mention

I know you still think about it and I know how much it

I paid my price for what I did, Lemony, and so did you, and I didn’t

Is that how it works? Is that what happens? Is this what else I have to give up, for some shred of nobility, is my life going to be one mistake after another because I followed an order and I though they were right enough? Not even right, right enough, how stupid—is everything that happens to me going to be because of that? Am I losing you because it’s what I deserve?

Don’t I deserve good things? Don’t I still deserve happiness, and stability, and love, and a family, and all those things I worked so hard for? Because nobility wasn’t the end of it for me, this was what we wanted, something better, something for us, something we deserved, and this can’t be it, this can’t be the only thing we get for all of that, there has to be something else! And if I lose everyone close to me because of this organization Lemony I swear I don’t know what I’m going to do I feel like I’m going to lose my mind like this

--------

I think of you out there, alone, and probably cold because you never bring a damn jacket with you anywhere. It’s summer but I’m imagining you as being cold, but I think that’s just because it’s sort of what you do when anyone thinks of someone as being anywhere alone.

Or, I’m just—I’m thinking of you out there, alone, for sure. I’m doing that. I’m thinking. About you. Alone.

I’m

thinking.

I think of you. Out there. Letting Jacques know, letting Olivia know, because you had to know who was working the telegram, otherwise you wouldn’t have sent it, I think of you going out of your way to tell your brother and not me and Bertrand and maybe you thought they’d tell me anyway but I had to pull teeth to get it from Jacques and if it had been anyone else! No one but Olivia would have said! You got lucky! But not enough! Because you still didn’t tell us! You went out of your way to not!! You! I think of you! Doing that instead of having the nerve! The decency! To tell us first! You!

How could you

-------

I think of you, out there—hiding in the middle of nowhere with only the occasional newspaper for company, which, let me tell you, Lemony, is a very frustrating existence. You know what? I keep wanting to hope that you are dead because somehow that would make this easier, I can be angry at a dead man. But I can be angry at anyone, can’t I. Dead or alive, it doesn’t matter. I can be angry.

I want to hope that you never sleep comfortably again. I want to hope that every sea is too uneven and every desert is too hot and every mountain is too cold and everywhere you go it’s too much. I want to hope that you try and come back and see how good and happy Bertrand and I are without you and you have to realize, you really did mess up. I want to hope that your boat goes down in the middle of the ocean and I know for sure! I want to think that you’ll be so miserable without us and it’ll never have been worth it!!

You’re out there, without us. Without me.

I hope it was worth it.

-------

What am I going to do?

I’m not picking. It’s not—I’m not capable of that, picking between you two, and I know you both had this ridiculous fear that I was going to, but I wasn’t, and I’m still not. I am selfish and clingy and I know what I want and I love what I have, and I love both of you and Bertrand loves both of us and I was ready to stake my life on the fact that you loved both of us too.

And I hate that I have to say it! Because I do! Apparently I do have to, Lemony! If it comes down to, who would I rather do this with, who would I raise a family with, who would I trust more than anything, and you made me make this choice, I’m sorry it can’t be the man who ran away from me! And part of me keeps thinking I’m not even me for saying that, I’m not, I’m not the Beatrice that was going to tear a room apart with her bare hands to get what she wanted, who would scale walls and climb buildings and shoot a gun and could ski and fence by fourteen, I’m not, taking risks, I’m not doing whatever I have to, and that everyone who told me Bertrand was boring (because there were people!!!) and safe and uncomplicated was right and that I’m betraying some fundamental aspect of myself by not even trying, and that I’m hurting Bertrand especially for making him a damn pawn in what I think my life is

But it’s not like I never did! It’s not like I didn’t spend years and years of my life trying to be a good person, trying to create the life I wanted, all of this is me, every ugly thought and every bad decision and every unfinished book and every theater script I keep leaving around places and every single page of this as I try to figure out where I want to go from here! And it just comes back to one thing, Lemony, just one thing! That we can’t do this! That I can’t have you in my life like this! That I didn’t believe it would happen but here it is, it’s happening!! I can’t avoid it! You walked away from me and expected me to be okay with it! You expected me to wait! You expected me to do it! You expected EVERYTHING from me and I only have so much to give, I’m only so much, I CAN’T DO EVERYTHING

And do you know what I am? Do you know what I am, really, when I get right down to it?? I am this, this awful woman with blood on my hands asking you for something that even I could never give anybody, not you or Bertrand or myself and I’m so sick of everything, I’m so sick of myself, I hate everyone and myself most of all, for being like this, for turning into this person, I hate hate hate hate hate all of this and how we were raised and what our future is going to be and what I’ve done and what is it going to take, for things to be better, for me to be better, for—what is it going to take, Lemony, for you to walk back through that door again and not do it over and over and over and I can’t keep letting you do this, I can’t, not to me or to Bertrand, I can’t keep hoping you’ll be there when I wake up and I can’t keep dreaming we’re going to die and I can’t keep pretending that anything about us has ever been okay or ever will be okay! Nothing about this is okay and how am I only realizing it now? How long have we been fooling ourselves into thinking that we could do this? How long do I have to be kind about this? How long do I have to play nice about you and this?

I’m UPSET and I’m ALLOWED TO BE and I

don’t

know

can

forgive

you

I don’t know if I want to. I don’t know if I can look at you anymore.

I don’t know.

Do you know how it was, Lemony? It was us first. You and me. From the second we saw each other in that green-walled room, it was you and me. Lemony and Beatrice. Root beer floats and being purposely mysterious to each other when we talked and being too clever. And I thought that meant we could do anything. We could die and I’d be happy because I was with you. As long as I had you.

And then there was Bertrand. And life felt different. Bertrand made it different, Bertrand made life different, he made it worth something else. And the bond that you and I had? Irreplaceable. And what we created with him only made it better. We had room in what we had for something so good. It really was Bertrand. I don’t know what would’ve become of us if it hadn’t been for him. And I saw that in you, too. You thought it too.

That was when I worried. When I started dreaming about terrible things happening to us. To you. I kept running from it because I didn’t know what else to do. I just didn’t want to lose you. I didn’t want to lose.

I’m scared to do anything. I’m scared to be wrong. I’m scared to know anything else.

I’m scared to die.

I don’t think you are.

I’m not sorry.

-------

Here are some questions. Here are some facts. Here are some things.

1 – I’m tired.

2 – I can’t even wonder if we should have done things differently anymore, right after that moment we met. In that room, I never imagined any of this.

3 – Sometimes I do think you lied all along. And that’s not a reflection on our associates or anything but just, see question/statement 1.

4 – You had to have thought about what would happen.

5 – How could we have a family like this?

6 – Did you think you could run all your life? Did you think that would work out? That Bertrand and I would be satisfied with that?

7 – Did you want me like that?

8 – What am I supposed to do?

9 – How long did you think we could keep this up?

10 – Was I wrong?

11 – What did you want?

12 – I know you’d thought about what a family with us would look like and I didn’t think you’d let anything stand in the way of that and maybe that was where I was naive.

13 – What would you say if I asked you this in person?

-------

After all this, I—

Bertrand has asked me if I have any spare pens.

-------

Lemony—

A long time ago, I sat in the diner near your apartment. We’d all known each other for a while, and you and Bea were very much together, and I didn’t quite feel like a third wheel anymore but I also didn’t feel like I was a part of everything yet. We were still dancing around each other, and I was doing it truly, incredibly badly.

I was in the habit of meeting Jo on weekends, when we would go over our reports together because we worked in similar places. We’d meet in the diner. I would arrive early and take a seat near the door. It had the best view of your window. You never turned the lights on, but I would look at it and think about you and—I’m completely serious—write the worst poetry ever to exist. You and Bea have always been much better at it. Jo would take it upon herself to help and suddenly they were these grammar-specific poems, which meant I definitely was not going to send them. Jo is many things; Jo is just not particularly a writer of romance.

I never told you or Bea, because it didn’t seem noteworthy, once we were together. But, things happen in your life and you wish you’d been able to say so much more than you did. I wanted to tell you about the face Bea makes when you aren’t there. She bites her lip and frowns around the kitchen when there’s a lull in the conversation in the spots you would usually say something clever. I wanted to tell you how the bed doesn’t feel the same when you aren’t in it. Bea says the wrinkles don’t set the same, and I feel like it’s emptier without you. I wanted to tell you that the hottest summer days—and I feel like there have been an endless amount of them so far this summer, humid and muggy and not the least bit sultry—even they feel cold when we can’t see you. I wanted to tell you that every time I do the laundry, I remember how you can’t fold socks. I wanted to tell you that I’ve stopped folding socks altogether, which has become quite the problem. Bea and I have stacks of socks in the bedroom now, which is just silly. I wanted to tell you that I love watching you put your hat by the door when you come home, resting it on the table as gently as possible, giving such a small gesture has such a big importance.

I took those things for granted. So much of my life, I’ve thought that loving things so fiercely and so determinedly could be enough, and I’ve relied on that love to get me through what we had to do. Even when the three of us weren’t together, I think I would’ve been happy to stay that way, because I could still love both of you regardless, and just that would’ve been enough. Just to be able to love you, and have your companionship. I would have cherished that always.

I’m the one who’s been so lucky, Lemony. When we all got together, I felt like my life began. I felt like you and Bea pulled me along into something beautiful and breathtaking and nothing would ever compare. I felt like it would always be there, for the rest of my life.

And I’m—

I don’t hate you. I could never. You need to know, that no matter what happens, I will never hate you. I can’t promise to not be upset with you, because I am, and a little angry, and a little disappointed, and a lot sad. But I don’t hate you.

You and Bea have such beautiful ways to say things, and I’ve always been so jealous of the way you two write. You told me that both of you were jealous of my tendency to be a little more forthright, at least when I got down to it, because let’s not forget, I did spend two months coming up with nicknames for all of us instead of just telling you how much you meant to me. But I don’t have lengthy or passionate ways to say certain things, is what it is. Actions, definitely. But when I have to say it, it comes out.

I love you.

And I wish you were here.

I never wanted to think about it, I guess. I’ve done a very good job of not thinking of things I didn’t want to think about. We do difficult things and live difficult lives. It takes its toll, and I’ve watched it happen. I thought if I held on tight enough—to you, to Bea, to myself—that we could escape some of it, no matter what we’ve done. And we’ve done a lot. We’ve been kept up in turn by sleepless nights and bad dreams and wondering too much. We’re not going to leave—not for good, and each of us know that—but it could be more manageable, together. We would figure it out, when we needed to. Perhaps I was a bit too optimistic about how well I could do it.

I hate to think it was something we did, or something we didn’t see. I hate to think that you gave up on yourself or on us. I hate to think I didn’t do enough. I know it’s not necessarily anyone’s fault. I know Bea keeps telling me I’m too kind for my own good, and I think it’s because I’m afraid to really feel anything. Feeling it makes it too real, something I have to actually contend with, and I don’t want to. I really don’t.

I want to say—I don’t want to tell you, I just want to say it—that I’m more hurt than I’ve ever been, and I don’t feel like I belong here without you, and that I think, you didn’t want to do it, but you knew what you were doing, and you did it because some things just sound easier, or hurt more but hurt less than others, and that I despise the people that we’ve become. I despise the things that we’ve been made into, and I don’t know how much of it we did to ourselves. I don’t know how much I can change.

I won’t lie, Lemony, because I’ve never been much of a liar. It’s been hard without you. Bea and I haven’t been talking very much, and we get into arguments when we do. We’ve been avoiding each other. It’s hard to avoid someone you live with, for a lot of reasons. But we’ve been managing to do it. I’ve been hiding at the Denouement. Absolutely, definitely hiding. Dewey’s not pleased but he doesn’t say no to the help organizing the archives. Bea’s been going to the theater, even though she’s technically off-duty for the next seven months (it was self-imposed off-duty, which I’ll admit was surprising). When we do talk to each other, Bea has a tendency to raise her voice, which I don’t mind, necessarily, because I understand why she keeps doing it. I have a tendency of late to do the same, which I’m not proud of. Taking it out on each other isn’t good or responsible of us, but it’s where we are right now. It is a miserable place to be.

Bea assumes I’m upset with her, but I’m not. I’m upset with myself, mostly. I keep thinking that none of this would have happened if I wasn’t here, that I made things worse. If you and Bea had just gone on by yourselves, maybe there would be so much less unhappiness. Maybe I was what made it hard for you to stay. Maybe I pressured you, maybe I pressured myself. Maybe this is my lot in life. They’re awful things to think, but I’m thinking them. That’s what people do, when upsetting things happen. We try to figure out where we went wrong. We don’t come up with any answers, but it’s better than sitting around feeling sorry for ourselves, which we do enough of too. I know eventually we’ll stop hurting each other, Bea and I. It just feels a long way away right now. A lot of things feel that way. You, myself, my friends, anything I thought I knew or had.

I’m being very unkind, to myself. That’s not your fault. It’s just something I’m realizing now. I’ve spent a lot of my life being unkind to myself. I don’t know how not to be. There are many things I don’t believe that I deserve, a sentiment I know you understand. It’s hard to feel like we deserve anything, even what we love. The more I think about it, the more I think, maybe that was why. And that breaks my heart and scares me so much, Lemony, that we—you—are capable of feeling such sadness.

Honestly, part of me wants to keep waiting. The part of me that is a fairly patient person is probably willing to do so. But the other part of me that is less patient and a husband to both of you is the part that hurts, and the part that reminds me that I am allowed to say that there is only so much I can take. I want you here more than anything, but I know for sure none of this is ever going to be that simple again.

But going forward from this, I want to feel like I deserve things. There’s only so much time I can spend regretting, or hating myself, or wishing that I had done something different. It’s easy to get caught up in all of that, and I think I still will be, for a while. I think I’m going to keep thinking miserable things for some time to come. But on the other side of that is something else. Not necessarily a happiness, or a satisfaction, but a certain kind of existence. Or, I guess, a kindness.

I love you very much, Lemony, and I can’t imagine doing this without you. I still don’t want to.

But if you have to—Bea and I aren’t going anywhere. We’ll still be here. I can’t promise in what way, but we’ll be here, if or when or anything at all. I hope you can meet us in that something else one day.

Until then, with all my love,

I wish you bluebirds in the spring,

to give your heart a song to sing,

and then a kiss, but more than this,

I wish you love.

And in July, a lemonade

to cool you in some leafy glade,

I wish you health,

and more than wealth,

I wish you love.

My breaking heart and I agree

that you and I could never be,

so with my best,

my very best,

I set you free.

I wish you shelter from the storm,

a cozy fire to keep you warm,

but most of all,

when snowflakes fall,

I wish you love.

Bertrand

face the sun

in the night,

find it in the night

in the pieces,

dig for it,

dig it out with my hands alone.

yes.

what I left –

fragments,

every last eye,

unwelcome.

piling it back in.

new sunlight.

-------

So—the sad truth is that the truth is sad. The real truth is that I never wanted to believe you were right about that. I thought I could get by on good looks and sheer force and well-hidden optimism and believing I was right. I was wrong. We were all wrong, some of us more wrong than others.

Where you went wrong is thinking that we—that I—would be okay with this. And that was where I went wrong too, I admit. The blame could be with all of us.

What I do know is that we can’t be together like this. Not like this. This is where it ends.

I don’t know what will happen tomorrow, or the next day, or the day after that. I don’t know what Bertrand and I will do. And the two of us—Bertrand and I—can figure that out. In whatever way that is. Whatever you’re doing, I leave you to it.

You will—always, always, always—be (somewhere) in my mind, and (deep) in my heart, and wherever (wherever.) (parenthetical required.) you are. Be it a boat, or a cave, or the city, or a grave, true or false. That’s the way you want it. That’s the way I will accept it. Good luck.

Beatrice

#asoue #a series of unfortunate events

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inlovewithbuddyaurinko · 4 years ago

Text

Vesbud First Meeting

“Aurinko. You’ve got something of mine. I’d like it back. How about you toss it here and we forget this ever happened, besides, didn’t anyone ever tell you it’s not nice to steal from the less fortunate?.”

Everyone knows and loves a meet-cute, but our favorite space lesbian moms had a meet-violent. For femslash February, an elaboration of the scene described in Vespa’s wedding vows with some of the author's artistic license thrown in.

co-written with @chobiwolf

It had been a rough day for Vespa after a rough couple years. She’d managed to get a good steal in and had enough of a score in her pocket to drink the next two nights away without any concerns. It beat the previous few months of staying out of the way of any law authorities, it definitely beat being thrown in prison, only to be released by that...she shook her head, she couldn’t get caught up in dreaming about that near-magical laugh that would creep into the corners of her mind at any moment she wasn’t otherwise occupied.

The bar was nice, nicer than Vespa had any right to, but it was the only place that had a transport lift and at the moment, Vespa was out of any mode of transportation sturdier than a hijacked hovercycle. The number of people packed into the room, the walls practically shaking with the beat of the music being blasted over the hidden speakers hid the gangly woman easily out of the way in a corner to avoid judgemental glares of patrons dripping in the finest of venusian silks and velvets.

Buddy Aurinko thought she'd find her mark here, or a drink at the very least. Even though it had been years since the prison break, Buddy spotted her the moment she walked into the bar. Vespa Ilkay looked the same. It was like years of crime and a hard life hadn't done a thing to knock her down. This was a whipcord of a woman with a shock of razor cut green hair. She may have been huddled over a drink but she radiated fierceness. That quality was exactly what Buddy was here for. That... or a large sum of money and a drink with a cute girl. This was really win-win for her.

She slid into the seat beside Vespa, a drink in hand already. "Can I buy your next round, darling?"

Vespa jumped, face heating up when she realized that someone had managed to sneak up from behind, her hand going to a knife at her side before she laid eyes on the most beautiful woman in the whole damn galaxy. That same woman placed a tentative hand on the arm that had started to shift back to what was, undoubtedly, a knife.

“Oh uh, you don’t have to do that, I can pay my own way even if I don’t look like it.” was the stuttered reply, flicking her eyes over the frankly impressive form sitting next to her. “But I wouldn’t be opposed if you were to join me?”

"No, no, I won't hear of it, and I never repeat myself so don't make me ask again." Her demeanor was not overly friendly. But she angled herself towards the woman in a way that put their shoulders close enough to feel the heat coming off of eachother. "Why, I'm of the opinion that a dashing woman such as yourself should never have to buy herself a drink again." With her smile and the near panic in Vespa’s eyes, Buddy realized she would have to try and smooth things over quickly to prevent a bolt from the bar.

"So what do you say to one round? Your drink looks a bit more like salad than alcohol and I happen to know a few good options around here." She did a once over of the bar seemingly opening herself to a blindspot and making her appear a bit more genuine, though most of what she said was exactly the truth. Oh the trouble she could cause with this one… "Bartender!" A grizzled person who looked like they had less compassion than a swarm of rangian mosquitoes took her order, "Yes, and two of those please, one extra strong for the lucky lady. Oh, and in case it’s not clear: mine should be the strong one since I do seem to be a very lucky lady." She winked at Vespa.

Vespa should’ve kept a higher guard up. She shouldn’t have so readily allowed this woman to completely disarm her, but boy, this woman, this woman was the prettiest, fastest talking, most vivacious human she had never seen. The blush never quite left her face.

"So what brings you to this fine establishment?” Buddy gestured a bit vaguely to their surroundings.

Vespa’s hand didn’t quite leave her knife, but her shoulders lost the tension that had been carried there since she first sat down hours ago. She wouldn’t consider herself one for romance, but this woman....this woman could convince her that maybe a little wouldn’t be too bad. She’d never gotten a drink bought for herself before, and stared with eyes wide in surprise. “Uh just, you know, a place to hang around. What about you? You look like you belong here more than I do. Like I should be watching you in a stream, not, not have you next to me here.”

A bright laugh bubbled out of Buddy. She had never been a stranger to compliments, but she turned quickly to grab their drinks as a distraction from the slight heat she felt flush in her cheeks.

"Here we are! And who knows maybe I am on some stream somewhere," she smiled knowing it was likely Neptune's most wanted or something to that effect, "but I've certainly found this place just as cozy as you have.” The bar was probably the opposite of cozy, it would be listed in the dictionary with the word ostentatious.

“Perhaps even more so since there definitely wasn't a pretty girl at the bar when you came in." She put on a bit of drama, "Oh my, unless there was! Look at me: I've known you for 10 minutes and already a homewrecker. The shame of it! Well, I say shame but I can't actually find a single iota of it in me. So tell me, are you, in fact, here with someone, darling?" She paused to take in Vespa desperately trying to keep up with her manic speech. Buddy sipped from her drink to keep herself from talking more. Maybe she was a bit more nervous than normal. Marks weren't normally this— well this adorable, this dashing, this capable! That last one she was about to test.

Vespa cleared her throat, voice suddenly raspy with nerves. “No. Uh, no, just, just me here.” This woman really did talk a lot and her own head was slightly spinning. “I think I prefer the seat occupied by you instead of it being empty.” She attempted to flirt, cringing slightly at herself at how awkward it sounded. “Uh, Sorry, I didn’t catch your name. It’s gotta be as pretty as you?”

Buddy flashed a smile at her, wide and genuine at Vespa's incredibly honest way of flirting. "The name's Buddy," here she leaned in close and whispered, "and since you aren't here with anyone at the moment, would you like to be, miss…?" she trailed off hoping the other would also supply her name. By now the two of them had slid much closer and the hand she originally had on her knife arm had moved up to the woman’s far shoulder.

“Ilkay.” Vespa blurted out, cheeks tinged a deeper pink still. “Vespa Ilkay. Nice to meet you Buddy.” Her skin was covered in pinpricks where Buddy’s arm was around her, like every single nerve was standing on their head. She felt hot and hoped that she didn’t seem as nervous as she felt. Buddy was leaning in so close that it was like there were only two of them in the whole world.

"Vespa Ilkay…" Buddy knew that name, and she knew ultimately why she had come to 'run into' her, and yet here, face to face, she felt a nagging almost-girlhood crush from her 'tag along with dad to work days'. None-the-less the words slipped off her tongue like silk and she found her drink abandoned as she focused on the woman's face. All harsh, strong edges, and softening honest blush. Hair knocked loose from its gelled, spiked style by the constant shaking head and flustered denial of compliments.

She just couldn’t help herself, what was a little more distraction for one night after all? She brushed Vespa's hair out of her face and tucked it behind her ear. Her other hand had come to rest comfortably at the middle of Vespa's back now, trailing lazy circles with her thumbnail. "Why, darling you look positively feverish!" For emphasis she put the back of her hand on Vespa's forehead, "Hm, well I'm no doctor, but maybe another drink would cool you down? Or… maybe you want to get out of this place with me? I could show you an exciting time to be sure.”

Vespa would have passed out right then and there, Buddy's voice like a purr in her ears. She could’ve died and been perfectly happy. The hand on her back felt like it was shooting electric currents into her spine. The only way to make sure she didn’t melt into more of a mess was by running through in her head all the most easily breakable bones in the human body. She ran a hand through her hair, unable to imagine that this was real, it must be impossible, she had to be dreaming.

“I’m fine, I’ll just need a moment.” She straightened up her back, going-anywhere with Buddy sounded amazing. But no, she couldn’t. That was too much. “I’ll get out of here eventually.”

Buddy leaned back and the previous closeness had her wearing quite a dark flush herself. She felt the heat in her face and rather hoped it didn't clash with her hair. A ridiculous thought, one that made it clear that she was flustered herself, though she'd never admit it. She reeled herself in. She was a bit dismayed the rest of her night would not be spent with a companion, but the evening was not a total loss: there still was the money she was here to steal, now, there was just the matter of actually taking it.

Buddy breathed in and looked around trying to feign a bit of embarrassment, eyes cast down with a demure flutter of eyelashes. "I hope you'll forgive me for being so forward. It's not often I come across a lady like you." She looked up, making purposeful eye contact with a visibly flustered Vespa.

"Miss Vespa Ilkay, I do hope we see each other again." She leaned so far forward she saw the panic from the other that this was a kiss. It was not. Her lips brushed the other woman's cheek and she whispered, "Sooner rather than later if you can." She did then press a chaste kiss to Vespa's jawline as she slid out of her seat leaving a hint of brilliant red in her wake. The close contact made it easy to slip the card from Vespa's pocket into her own hand. She stood up fully and cleared her throat. "I do believe I may need to go to the powder room though, so... dear?" She turned Vespa's face to her own delicately, "Do take care of yourself."

Buddy went to the restroom of the bar that she knew had a broken window and a solid escape plan. She had left behind merely one thing besides the lipstick on Vespa's face. One thing in the form of a note written on a napkin. It would probably take Vespa a while to notice it if she noticed it at all. But it read as follows:

Wonderful doing business, darling. Sorry those drinks ended up being so expensive for you. But I did not lie to you, I do want to see you again…. If you can catch me.

--Buddy Aurinko

Vespa Ilkay was love struck. There was no other way to put it. She sat with her drink in her hands, once again staring down at the countertop, but this time, with a fond little smile on her face.

She was convinced that never before had anyone captured any heart so quickly as Buddy had wormed her way into her brain. There wasn’t anything more Vespa wanted than to drag her off to that damn washroom she said she was headed and kiss their brains out against the door, an activity she hadn’t felt motivated to do with anyone before. She looked down at her hand where it had dabbed at the mark on her cheek, a perfect mirror of Buddy’s lips in the palm of her hand. The red lipstick seemed to glow against her own skin.

20 minutes later and the bartender was glaring at her and making snarky comments about buy another or get the fuck out.

Vespa wasn’t particularly looking forward to going to find some dark corner to fall asleep in, but if it had to be done it had to be done. She reached into her pocket for her score to pay for all her drinks and she froze. It was gone. All of it. All that was left was a damn note. She cursed aloud. Scanning over the note, she then cursed her dumb heart for stupidly skipping a beat, dammit, even Buddy’s damn handwriting was gorgeous. Thankfully, there were just enough creds to pay for both their fucking drinks stuffed into her boot she could use. It now meant though that she would have no safety net if something were to go wrong, or even another way off the planet.

She stormed out of the bar, figuring that damn woman couldn’t have gotten far. She went towards the more crowded, better lit part of town. Aurinko clearly knew what she was doing. And someone as fabulous as her could blend in among a crowd more easily than in the dark and shadows. Finally, after what felt like forever of running, she spotted a shock of bright red hair at the opposite end of the street and started to push people out of her way as she was running towards her.

Meanwhile, Buddy slipped through the crowds like a fish through water. She flipped the card a few times in her hands before pocketing it in a holster on her thigh. Sure she turned a few heads here and there but she knew how to disappear when she wanted. Right now she was a bit careless though, having just wooed a pretty lady and gotten the score of the decade, and with barely any work on her part.

Suddenly, she heard a disturbance behind her and glanced back to see that same vivid green hair poke out through the crowd as Vespa not so much ran as plowed her way through the crowd. Buddy smirked, my this one did catch on fast didn't she? Buddy broke into a sprint and rounded a corner into an abandoned alleyway. She only stopped there briefly to remove her heels to make her tracks harder to follow as she crossed through to another backstreet.

The alley Buddy disappeared down of course connected to another side street that Vespa cursed out everyone who had ever worked on it from their first to last breaths of their lives. Her thick boots kept her from completely falling over as she made the sharp turns necessary and though she lost easy sight of the red hair that she had before, she managed to spy it again part way down the next street. “AURINKO!” She shouted off after Buddy, heads turning to look at what the commotion was. A sober Vespa would not have brought so much attention to herself, or to her target. A sober Vespa could slide between people and shadows with not so much as a whisper of clothing brushing against each other. Knives could disappear into backs before the glint of steel was seen, bodies would hit the floor, dead from poison before taste was processed by the tongue. But now, Vespa Ilkay was on a manhunt, willing to slash and burn in a fight against Buddy Aurinko. So,it was normally not a very good thing to draw attention to oneself if you were trying to stay unnoticed, but she wasn’t letting her get away with her score and only way off this miserable planet.

Buddy smiled to herself as she turned another sharp corner into an alley that would take her up a side fire escape and up out of Vespa's reach. But when she got there the stairs were out of sight. A quick glance around showed her their charred remains clinging half-heartedly to the building's side above her. She heard Vespa yell her name and knew she had no time to escape.

“Shit."

Profanity did not become her and she certainly would refrain more were she in anyone's company, but as it was she had no one around to hear her… Thank goodness for that. Though that would not be the case soon. She didn't have a blaster on her and she really would rather not use that on Vespa anyway, so she drew her knife from one of her many thigh holsters and readied herself for a fight.

Turning the corner, Vespa skidded to a stop, knife drawn already and barely caught herself from falling over from the sudden cease of movement when she saw Buddy trapped there at the end of the alley. She grinned, the expression dark and proud, teeth looking more like razors. This was a woman who had fought through blood and liked it.

“Aurinko. You’ve got something of mine. I’d like it back. How about you toss it here and we forget this ever happened.” Buddy looked to be illuminated from the shaft of light spilling over the buildings around her, making her hair look like flames. She still looked strong and steadfast, Vespa knew that this fight wouldn’t be as easy as it may have appeared to be, and only one of them would be walking out of that alley. And Vespa was willing to place money that it was going to be herself.

"I'm afraid that won't be happening today, darling." Buddy flashed a grin of her own, winsome and daring. She took the opportunity then to throw her heels at the woman who not only held an impressive dagger but was glaring them at her as well. Vespa rushed at her. Despite the small space, Buddy was able to parry and roll to her left, deftly avoiding the attack. This was certainly the most fun she had had in years.

The heels were certainly a clever ruse, but Vespa ducked them, internally tsk-ing that they were going to get scratched, Buddy didn’t seem like the kind of person to do that to her clothes, not that Vespa cared, of course.

The run at Buddy still left Vespa with her back to the entrance, she wasn’t born yesterday of course. But she couldn’t help but admire how cleanly Buddy dodged her knife. Nothing that could be considered aggressive was being done yet, they were still circling, feeling the other out.

“Those are my creds, not yours.Didn’t anyone ever tell you it’s not nice to steal from the less fortunate?” She made another quick swipe at Buddy’s bust line which forced her to take a hop back, though still with plenty of room between them.

Buddy laughed breathlessly at the exhilaration of their fight. They were both so evenly matched that it was more dance than confrontation. She hadn’t felt like this since the day she ruined her fathers prison, just because she could. The day she had first seen Vespa Ilkay.

In her distraction, Vespa got the drop on Buddy and tackled her. Getting the wind knocked out of her chest stunned Buddy enough that when she regained her concentration a split second later, Vespa’s very sharp blade was at her throat, and she felt a small trickle of blood run down the nape of her neck. She still had a hand on her own knife though, and she angled the blade up towards the woman on top of her. She couldn't help but start laughing again, breathless, overtaken, and evenly matched. She looked into the woman’s eyes above her as she tapped the blade to her abdomen.

Vespa was about ready to drive the knife through her, not enough to kill her, someone so beautiful didn’t deserve that. But it was just so she could take her creds and go, but that laugh. It floored her.

She knew that laugh. That was the laugh that saved her. The fiery shock of red hair she only managed to get a glimpse of when she ran.

The starstruck woman didn’t even notice the knife running along her side, a dangerous position she would never allow anyone to get her into in any other situation. The thin blade lightly skimming over her shirt next to her skin sent shivers down her spine. Just, Buddy’s eyes. They were like pools she could get lost in.

It was the most unattractive, ungraceful thing that. Just-just staring down at the woman beneath her, mouth agape. “You-you were the one at the prison. You saved me.” Vespa collapsed one side to roll off of Buddy, still staring at her in shock, unable to process what just happened.

Buddy breathed a sigh of relief as Vespa rolled off of her, and they both lay there on the dusty ground of the alleyway, staring at an alien sky.

“I suppose I was, and I did.” Her voice was nostalgic and drawn out.

She pulled the card with Vespa’s score stored in it from her hoster and held it up above them, an outlined rectangle dangling from elegant fingers standing out against the artificial atmosphere, “Well, we seem to be doing all right for ourselves solo, but don’t you think we’d be better as a pair?” She smirked. Buddy turned her head to face the other woman and smiled at her, no wit, no false charm, but completely genuine and a little vulnerable.

Vespa’s heart still sounded like it was beating in her ears, dazed. Her eyes flitted to the card held in the air above them. She could just reach out and take it, but she didn’t want to, it was like it would break the dream she was in. A minute passed, no sound was heard but their still heavy breathing and the faint sounds of people talking, a car driving by, the headlights casting shadows down the alley. “So?” Buddy asked again, “How about that offer to get out of this boring old dump with me?”

Vespa squeezed her eyes shut, making sure she wasn’t dreaming for the second time that night when her brain caught up to her ears. “Yeah. Yeah that sounds— that sounds great.” Vespa’s eyes opened and she turned her head to look back at Buddy. Somehow, Buddy looked even more radiant than before. Just so hopeful and full of life, like with her, the two of them had the entire universe at their fingertips. “I think a partner in crime could be good.”

#tpp #the penumbra podcast #the penumbra fanfic #vesbud #vespa ilkay #buddy aurinko #season 3 spoilers #based off of vespa's wedding vows in what lies beyond part 1 #look #they're gay #precanon

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aforrestofstuff · 5 years ago

Note

Okay! I have a burning question for you, my dude. Music is my life, and I wanna know what kind of music the OPM casts listen to. Thanks, my guy!

I had a feeling this would be inevitable lol. I don’t really know a whole lot about music or genres or anything like that so I’m just gonna give you a rundown of each character individually and some song recs along with that just to smooth things out a little. Thanks for your ask, by the way! ❤️ Now my playlists will be put to good use.

A Brief Rundown of the Major OPM Characters’ Music Tastes:

Blast: hc that he doesn’t even have ears since he never fucking LISTENS

Terrible Tornado: Stuff that makes her feel powerful. Loud vocals and good instrumentals. Also, she’s a little angsty since she’s saltier than the gotdamn Pacific almost all of the time. (Recs: Florence and the Machine - How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful, Susanne Sundfør - Delirious, Florence and the Machine - What Kind of Man, Kali Uchis - Dead to Me, Let’s Eat Grandma - Falling Into Me)

Fubuki: some of that real classy shit. Slow songs that are nice to just have a cup of tea with. Nothing too meaty or fast-paced, she enjoys taking a moment to breathe every once and a while since life gets pretty hectic when you’re managing a gang of some 30 hooligans. (Recs: Wes - Midnight Low, any song from Lana Del Rey’s entire discography lol, Florence and the Machine - Grace, The Marìas - I Don’t Know You, Yellow House - Ain’t Gonna Call, Feng Suave - Toking, Dozing)

Silverfang: Stuff from his time. I hc that he was a bit of a party animal back in his prime so he’s gotta have those grooves. Disco to the extremo. Also, another hc: Garou absolutely hates his music. He would play it during training and Garou would contemplate homicide. (Recs: Frankie Valli - Grease, The Edgar Winter Group - Free Ride, KC and the Sunshine Band - I’m Your Boogie Man, Matthew Wilder - Break My Stride, The Main Ingredient - Everybody Plays the Fool, Andrea True Connection - More, More, More)

Bomb: save as Silverfang, although I hc that Bomb was a little more of a nerd growing up. Still, he never missed out on a good party. (Additional Recs: KC and the Sunshine Band - Get Down Tonight, The Trammps - Disco Inferno, Tierra - Together, Cornelius Bros and Sister Rose - Too Late to Turn Back Now)

Atomic Samurai: Old shit. Shit older than Silverfang. He’s really not that old, but his soul is fucking ancient and he’s got that classic “grrr music these days sucks” kind of shithead attitude. (Recs: Jim Croce - Time in a Bottle, Dion - Runaround Sue, The Carpenters - The End of the World, The Band - The Weight)

Child Emperor: Upbeat synth. Stuff to listen to while he’s working on his machines and whatnot. Probably has meaty beats to keep him in tune with what he’s doing, like working around a clock. Probably some groovy citypop in there too. (Recs: Taeko Ohnuki - 4:00 AM, Junko Ohashi - Telephone Number, Tatsuro Yamashita - Magic Ways, Hiroyuki Sawano - NEXUS, Superfly - Kakusei, Mariya Takeuchi - Plastic Love)

Metal Knight: Intrumentals that Disney villains listen to. Deep, dark shit that makes you feel sad. He probably feeds off of negative emotion. What a toolbag. (Recs: Lucas King - Sociopath, Abel Korzeniowski- Table for Two, Max Richter - Never Goodbye, Max Richter - She Remembers, Evelyn Stein - Quiet Resource, Mac Quayle - Adagio in G Minor)

King: video game soundtracks, obviously. Might be some electro funk in there too, as a treat. (Recs: Metal Gear Solid 3 OST - Snake Eater, Mick Gordon - Rip and Tear, Xenoblade Chronicles OST - Main Theme, Persona 5 OST - Last Surprise, Daft Punk - Verdis Quo, Toby Fox - Hopes and Dreams, Disasterpeace - Prologue, iamthekidyouknowwhatimean - Run, Darren Korb - Old Friends)

Zombieman: Dad Music. Old rock that makes you wanna rail some lines of white thunder and dance on top of a car. He’d be reluctant to try out new stuff but does so nevertheless. Just a little bit of weird alternative here and there. (Recs: Poison - Unskinny Bop, Mötley Crüe - Dr. Feelgood, Black Sabbath - War Pigs, Def Leppard - Animal, CRX - Walls, MGMT - Little Dark Age, Pink Floyd - Money, Queens of the Stone Age - Villains of Circumstance)

Drive Knight: Dark synth, obviously. Need I say more? (Recs: El Tigr3 - She Swallowed Burning Coals, Trevor Something - Enjoy the Silence, Greg Drombrowski - Devour, GUNSHIP - Woken Furies, GUNSHIP - Thrasher, Carpenter Brut - Invasion A.D., Kavinsky - Nightcall)

Pig God: this guy probably just listens to ASMR of people eating food lol.

Superalloy Darkshine: Upbeat stuff that’s good for exercise; loving those new jams along with some of the old. He’s got a pretty groovy style. (Diane Ross - Ain’t No Mountain High Enough, Saint Motel - Puzzle Pieces, CRUISR - All Over, Barry White - Never, Never Gonna Give Ya Up, Sade - Kiss of Life)

Watchdog Man: 10 hour loop of wolves howling on a summer night.

Flashy Flash: classical. Some nice instrumentals to listen to while training. Stuff that preferably doesn’t have any or very little lyrics so it’s not too busy on his ears while he’s fantasizing about killing someone. (Recs: Vaughn Williams - The Lark Ascending, Debussy - Rêverie, Grieg - Peace of the Woods, André Laplante - Une Barque sur L’Ocean)

Metal Bat: Modern alternative. A little bit harder than say, Mumen and Kama, but not as hard as Zombieman or Death Gatling. He’s that middle ground where he’s still got some real bangers, but Zenko can listen as well. He’ll play this stuff loudly as he’s doing chores and working out, no headphones ever. It gets pretty annoying. (Recs: Foals - Exits, The Blue Stones - Black Holes, Solid Ground, CRX - Broken Bones, Jungle - Happy Man, The Strokes - Reptilia, We Are Trees - Girlfriend)

Genos: synth. But not just any synth, some heavy, fast-paced synth that’s just like him: speedy, relentless, and powerful. He listens to shit that’ll make you wanna get up and start killing Terminators. Probably. There’s some other synths in the mix too because we love a three-dimensional king. (Recs: Carpenter Brut - Division Ruine, The Protomen - I Still Believe, Carpenter Brut - Leather Teeth, Gunship - Tech Noir, TWRP - Phantom Racer, Le Castle Vania - Red Circle)

Tanktop Master: Dad music but the type of dad music that makes you think your dad was a sappy nerd back in the day. Long tracks that are good for workouts. (Tears for Fears - Woman in Chains, Pink Floyd - Us and Them, Duran Duran - Ordinary World, Billy Idol - Eyes without a Face, A Flock of Seagulls - I Ran, The Alan Parsons Project - Eye in the Sky, Tears for Fears - Sowing the Seeds of Love)

Puri-Puri Prisoner: Pop. Dance music. He doesn’t really get to listen to a lot of music in prison, so he holds on to whatever he can and savors every second of it. (Coldplay - Talk, Bruno Mars - Runaway Baby, Lady Gaga - Bad Romance, Flo Milli - Beef Flomix, Doja Cat - Say So)

Mumen Rider: Hes a lighthearted, soft boy. Likes some fluffy indie tunes. It helps to motivate him when working out or doing hero stuff. He might need to cry every once in a while though, so there’s some sad songs in the mix too. (Recs: Varsity - The Dogs Only Listen to Him, The The - This is the Day, Amarante - Don’t Look Back, Alvvays - Saved by a Waif, The Monkees - As We Go Along, Acid Ghost - Hide my Face, Mogwai - Take Me Somewhere Nice)

Sonic: same as Flash. He’s a little more hip with the times however, so he’s got some more groovy, electronic instrumentals to listen to in addition to some elegant stuff and isn’t opposed to having a little bit of lyrics sprinkled in there as well. In fact, he’s not opposed to uppity pop either. He thinks dancing is frivolous but he secretly does it when he thinks nobody is looking. (Additional Recs: Odesza - Bloom, Pretty Lights - One Day They’ll Know [Odesza Remix], BØRNS - Electric Love, Hembree - Culture, The Cinematic Orchestra - Arrival of the Birds)

Garou: same as Metal Bat. Bang let him have a little MP3 player during his time at the dojo and has since collected a few songs on there. They’re very near and dear to his heart since it’s one of the few good things that came from his absolute disaster of a childhood. (Additional Recs: Foals - Inhaler, CRX - Slow Down, Deep Sea Arcade - Close to Me, Gorillaz - Empire Ants, The Fratellis - Chelsea Dagger, Glass Animals - Take A Slice)

Death Gatling: Shit your old Vietnam-vet grandpa would blast on the back of his F150. He gives me self-righteous asshole vibes, if I’m honest. Like, don’t get me wrong, I like Death Gatling, but he seems like the type of trailer park-dwelling sewer rat to carry a revolver into a Walmart for “self defense” and that’s probably the type of music he listens to, too. (Recs: Megadeth - Trust, Megadeth - Angry Again, Creedence Clearwater Revival - Fortunate Son, Glen Campbell - Southern Nights, Mötley Crüe - Kickstart My Heart, Quiet Riot - Cum on Feel the Noize)

One-Shotter: I hard hc that he had an emo phase he never quite grew out of. He doesn’t quite listen to emo anymore but he’s still into that alternative shit. Homeboy also likes some slow tunes every once and a while because he’s an emotional dude who’s not afraid of a good cry. (Recs: Anything from Blink-182, Arctic Monkeys - Do I Wanna Know?, MGMT - When You Die, Mazzy Star - Fade Into You, Cigarettes After Sex - Dreaming of You, Yon Ort - Other Matter)

Lightning Max: Same as Genos but without the terminator-killing. Fast-paced stuff because he’s a fast lightning dude. A little more upbeat because he’s not as much as an edgelord as Genos, however. (Additional Recs: Carpenter Brut - Hang’em All, The Flaming Lips - Do You Realize, Worn Tin - Sensitivity, B.E.R. - The Night Begins to Shine, Martin Hall - Different Kind of Love)

Stinger: he’s all about that FUNK! Stuff that gets him moving! Stuff that makes him wanna dance! (Recs: Daft Punk - Doin’ it Right, TWRP - Body Image, Wild Cherry - Play that Funky Music, Chemise - She Can’t Love You, Saga - Wind Him Up, Saga - On the Loose, TWRP - All Night Forever)

Okamaitachi: they give me electro vibes! New, modern shit that’s good to dance to or to just sit down and have a listen! Also, some shit that’ll probably play in a coming-of-age teen movie or something. They don’t really vibe with heavy music and that’s alright, babey! Keeping it light and bouncy. (Recs: Tei Shi - Bassically, Varsity - Must Be Nice, Class Actress - Weekend, CHVRCHES - Richard Pryor, Alvvays - Marry Me, Archie, Sobs - Telltale Signs, Goth Babe - Sometimes, ALASKALASKA - Meateater)

Iaian: Nice, low tunes that are good for meditation and to be used for background noise during training sessions. He never really sits down to listen to music, it’s always in the background of something else he’s doing so he prefers to have some soft beats that don’t really interfere with his senses. Tunes so quiet, he sometimes uses them as lullabies; especially since the trauma of losing his arm has since made it hard to sleep. (Recs: Boy Scouts - Saddest Boy, Susanne Sundfør - Mantra, Vashiti Bunyan - If I Were the Same but Different, Starman Jr. - Blue Fairy, Patrick Watson - Je te Laisserai des Mots, Sibylle Baier - I Lost Something in the Hills)

Bushidrill: same as Atomic Samurai just without the shitty attitude. He’s happy to listen to some newer stuff, he just doesn’t like it and that’s okay, baby! Probably some classy shit your wise old grandpa would listen to. (Recs: Dean Martin - Volare, Dion - The Wanderer, Peppino Gagliardi - Che Vuole Questra Musica Stasera, anything from Luis Miguel lol, Franco Micalizzi - Sadness Theme)

Amai Mask: probably just listens to his own music like a putz. If not, he’s listening to the sound equivalent of glittering diamonds. He’s probably got this shit playing at the end of a long day while he’s chilling in a hot bath or something. (Recs: Fergie - Glamorous, Rita Ora - Hot Right Now, Lana Del Rey - Freak, Lana Del Rey - Art Deco, Tame Impala - Feels Like We Only Go Backwards)

Saitama: He doesn’t listen to music much anymore, sadly. He did, however, have a killer motivational mix to get him through his vigorous training prior to becoming a hero. (Recs: Paul Engemann - Push it to the Limit, Journey - Don’t Stop Believin’, College & Electric Youth - A Real Hero, Joe Esposito - You’re the Best Around, Survivor - Eye of the Tiger, The Bee Gees - Nights on Broadway)

Here’s the playlist with all of these songs in order (mostly):

It’s on YouTube because I’m allergic to Spotify. I’ve got a doctor’s note. Also, all of my other playlists are on my little profile thingy so if you want to listen to my pile then go right ahead.

Thanks for your ask, my dude! ❤️ this took up ALL of my energy lol but it was fun.

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yokelish · 4 years ago

Text

Heart of a dog.

An OC for BSD no one asked for? It’s more likely than you think. A day in life of an original character by Yokelish no one asked for? Absolutely. I don’t have to, I know, but Misha has been on my mind recently, which worries me. Mostly, worries me about me. Anyway.....Here he comes. I just want to make sure for myself that I can tweak my writing style a bit. I am very humorous.You can read it, of course, and you can take it as an example of how not to write an original character.

Anyone, here’s a thing I made for my kouhai, check that if you are more interested in canon characters.

✏ Universe: Bungou Stray Dogs ✏ Characters: Mikhail Bulgakov OC ✏ Word count: 3,094 (too many tbh) ✏ Warnings: mentions of alcoholism, drugs, smoking, and a dead animal.

Heart of a dog.

If there was a god above, then he must know how awful it felt to wake up in the morning. There was nothing as worthy of collective loathing as mornings. Extra sprinkles of revulsion get the mornings involving work. Mikhail covered his eyes when picking up the ringing phone. The light hurt him just as much as the idea of getting up from the bed. The ringing was tenfold louder and more annoying in his head, hitting the walls in his skulls like a smith’s hammer. Every sensation felt like an assault on his already shaky sanity.

“You have a patient in an hour,” said familiar voice on the line. Misha groaned. It wasn’t her voice that grinding on his nerves, it was the idea of having to do work today. The woman on the phone sighed with deliberate loudness just to let him know all about her frustration. She was the only person who could stand having him. Mostly because he payed her a pretty sum but that wasn’t the only reason.

“You have no option,” Nadejda reprimanded. There was a sound of typing on the other side, but it ceased quickly. “It’s Olga Danilovna.”

He took a deep breath. There was no mental exercise to prepare for that. “Dear, I don’t pay you for ruining my day the moment it begun.”

“Right, you pay me to do my job,” she spoke sternly. “And if my job ruins your day the moment it begins, I’m sorry, get a better life.”

“Understood, the blame is mine. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

“You better be here in an hour.” Nadya hang up the phone first. The annoying sound of a call ending assaulted his hearing. The sensations of the outside were coming on too strong, they were attacking, they were frustrating. Everything was too sharp, too bright, too loud. His head was pounding with the reminders of how Misha had spent the last three days. It was nothing close to productive.

Mikhail got up from the bed with a groan of a man who was drinking for days straight. He wasn’t dry for an hour, as the saying was. He sighed, and groaned, and regretted the drinking. He would do it again. The clothes on the floor didn’t bother him. There was never anyone to pass judgement. There was never anyone to tell him to get his life together either. There was simply no one. Barefoot he walked across the room, picking up and collecting articles of clothing that would go in the wash now. There was an hour for him to get to the office, which wasn’t impossible, but it meant he had to move around his small apartment faster. And he doubted his mind and body could comprehend moving faster without sending the surroundings spinning. Everything was too overwhelming now. It wouldn’t get better for a while.

The cold water splashing against his face brought some sanity back. It felt good to be reminded the drinking had yet to kill him. It was nice to be reminded he had a job only he could do. It felt good that he was alive and capable of doing something. It was all a comforting lie to get over himself and his hangover.

The cold air of the outside smelled like that of a big and polluted city. The sounds were loud but distant, multiple but common. Nothing new was added to the picture he witnessed day after day. It’s an old painting he studied for hours, every stroke, every shade, every perspective too familiar. Nothing about it was new or surprising or remotely pleasant. It simply was and it was only ever changing in ways that didn’t matter. The city he got too familiar living in. The air, the sounds, the broken pavement underneath. The sun was hiding or finding comfort in the heavy grey clouds foretelling rain. The sun, too, didn’t want to see the city. This weather was for the better. The bright and shiny would sulk the mood. That would go against his already ruined day. Bulgakov stopped walking only to get the cigarettes out and start one. The smoke felt good in his lungs. It smelled better than the city too.

Fortunately, it didn’t start to rain while he was trying to get to his office on time. Doctor Bulgakov appeared in a somewhat acceptable state in. Unfortunately, he didn’t make it within the given time frame. And, unfortunately, there were no excuse for him available either.

“Late.” A stern, annoyed, but factual statement. The voice belonging to the woman of the hour. Mikhail shook of his coat and carelessly hung it. Nadejda was sitting at the receptionist table looking very annoyed herself, staring daggers at the other woman. Such were the days featuring Olga Danilovna.

“Hey there, Dan. It’s been a while,” Mikhail shifted his attention to the child in a wheelchair. He was a blonde boy, aged eleven, with a pet cage on his lap. The cage covered up with a blanket. By the size of it, Misha would guess it was fit for a rabbit.

“Hello, Doctor Misha,” the boy replied slowly, patting the blanket-covered cage as if the animal could feel it.

“I guess it’s your leg this time.”

“It hurts.” As honest as a child could be. Nothing wrong in admitting being in pain. Danila was staring at the wall mindlessly, repeating the same motions with his hand.

“Just hold on a little longer,” the doctor assured. “It will be over soon.”

Bulgakov unlocked the door to the examination office. It smelled the same as always: sickeningly familiar smell of disinfectant that turns sweet to senses over time. It smelled more like home that anything else. Nadya was always a good keeper. She kept his office as pristine as she kept his dirty secret. Well, the secret wasn’t awfully dirty but, as all secrets are, problematic to keep in check. It had to be controlled who knew and who didn’t. If too many people knew about it, life would become very uncomfortable very quick. And Mikhail was a person of comfort.

For the sake of formality, he put on white medical coat over his sweater. He took the cage off the boy’s lap and placed it on the table. Danila barely reacted to the change, dropping his hand on his lap the moment the cage was gone. Bulgakov peeked inside. Inside was, indeed, a rabbit.

“You really like animals, Doctor Misha. Where do you keep them all?” Danila asked. It was a gift of being a child to be so oblivious to the obvious.

“Me? No. I have a friend who lives on a farm. He adores them,” Bulgakov lied and did so naturally. At some point, he even thought of a name for said friend, how big the farm was and what animals lived there now. A well-repeated lie was a believable lie. The more it’s told, the more it turned into the truth of things. It wasn’t a stretch of intellectual thought to count all the pets that came into his office along with the patients and conclude a remarkably simple outcome: those pets never went home with him. But he wouldn’t break a child’s heart so cruelly. In six weeks, Dan’s leg would be perfectly healed. And the rabbit would be six weeks older. But six weeks is too long for his mother to wait. A broken bone is a note in the medical history of an upcoming sports star. Mikhail never bothered to remember what exactly Danila played.

Mikhail came to inspect the boy’s leg. The safest bet in his line of work is to assume the worst possible injury: broken. But on the plus size, it seemed to be broken only in one place.

“Put your arms around my neck and hold on as tight as you can,” he said to the boy. Tiny hand grabbed around his neck without much force behind it. “On a count of three. One.” He carefully hooked his arms under Dan’s legs. “Two.” The doctor mentally braced himself. “Three.”

It wasn’t terribly difficult. It was only the weight of a child, after all. But Misha was having a terrible hangover and, thus, everything seemed more difficult than it should have been. Danila was now sitting on the exam table. Not that there was anything else to examine. And even if there was some injury unseen to the naked eye, he hardly had the equipment for it. Taking care of the child was a job for the mother. Bulgakov offered the headphones to the child. A useful thing to protect the child from a conversation that a child should not be privy to.

“Well, you know the drill, Dan,” Mikhail said, helping the boy to lie down comfortably on the table. “Headphones on, eyes closed, full relaxation.” The patient nodded, putting on the noise cancelling headphones on without questions. Danila was a good child just not equally blessed with good parents.

After making sure that Dan couldn’t hear a thing, Bulgakov returned to the rabbit in a cage. Lovely animal: calm, big, with a shiny fur. Misha took the rabbit in his arms and started to gently stroke the animal to calm it. It was warm, and alive, and completely defenseless.

“You look like you’ve been drinking for two days straight,” Olga Danilovna observed. Misha couldn’t tell if she was judging or simply stating. Not that he cared for either of those things, it was mere curiosity. He rarely could decipher any emotion within her unless it was anger and irritation.

After a quick mental math exercise, he forced a smile on his face. “Actually, it was three. I’ll take it as a compliment.”

“You think you are funny,” she mocked him. “Nothing worse than a man thinking himself funny.”

“I thought there was nothing better than a man acting like a clown,” Misha replied, grinning. “And nothing worse than a man thinking himself awfully charming.”

Olga shook her head, fake blonde hair perfectly styled with too much spray, and rolled her eyes. And that was the end of that conversation. However, there was something else on Bulgakov’s mind, something he doubted was worth mentioning. After all, it wasn’t any of his business. The last thing he needed to do is to pass any judgment on people who paid him. It was an excellent advice, most importantly, it was an instruction he gave himself. He couldn’t be wrong about that. And so, he didn’t listen.

“You drugged him,” he stated simply. There was barely any judgement in his voice. There was no point in judging a client, least of all, a client that wouldn’t listen. But a warning wasn’t something Olga Danilovna would accept either. A challenge, however, she could listen to.

“I gave him painkillers, yes,” replied Olga.

“No, I expected painkillers, that’s why he wasn’t crying by the time I showed up. I am saying you drugged him. I noticed the slowness in his reaction time. I saw his eyes up close.”

“What did you expect me to do? He is still a boy and can’t handle pain very well.”

Bulgakov sighed. What was he expecting to get by starting this conversation, anyway? Danila was his patient and nothing more. And the only reason the kid even was a patient was because his mother could afford to pay. It really wasn’t any of his business. He should forget about it. Mikhail continued to stroke the animal in his arms, offering whatever little comfort he could. And taking in all the comfort the rabbit could provide. It was alive, and warm, and with a soft fur. It felt lovely to hold a rabbit in his arms.

“I have to ask, though,” Olda Danilovna started to speak again, “would you be able to treat a concussion?”

“A concussion? Are you serious, Ol’?” he could even tell why he was getting riled up. “He’s eleven. Get him into swimming or some other Olympic sport.” Never mind, after some quick digging, he remembered that he had a personal dislike towards Olga Danilovna. Money can buy a service; it cannot buy positive personal bias unless for testifying in court.

“And what of it? Even if he wins the Olympics and brings home gold, he will peak before he’s twenty-five and then what?” Olga crossed her arms on her chest. Cold-blue flame flickering in her eyes dangerously — a warning. “Be a PE teacher? A swimming coach? No, thank you. And answer my question, damn you.”

“Sure, I can,” Mikhail answered, giving up. Arguing with a woman such as herself would only bring headache. Her voice was as sharp as her glare. And he was still recovering after a hangover.

“Would a rabbit suffice?” she continued to question.

“Depends on the severity,” the man shrugged. The rabbit in his arms was acting like a perfect companion. Perhaps, whatever little comfort he could offer was just enough to keep it calm. “If there is an open wound gushing out blood from his head, then no, you’ll have to find something bigger.”

“Like what?”

“Well, there are plenty of stray dogs on the streets.”

“Screw you.”

“Understandable.”

Cutting the conversation short, Bulgakov took his seat behind the table. The rabbit still cradled in his arms. He knew the pain that would follow render him useless, he’d collapse on the floor and then live with the embarrassment of such memory. Not that he cared for it, but for the sake of formality. The pain intensified and was only made worse by the remains of the hangover. If it made his head pound and body feel weak, now he could safely say he knew exactly what getting hit by a car felt like. It was a pain to the tips of his fingers, clouding his mind, rendering him mute and weak. The only positive about this state was that he was familiar with this. It was a pain that never got better; it never got worse. It was stagnant and familiar, which means he got used to it over time, with each use. He learned to live with it. Today just happened to be a little worse due to careless hangover. His hand rested on the still warm rabbit’s fur.

“You can take him, Ol’,” Bulgakov rasped as if dying from thirst. “Nadejda Andreevna will process the payment.”

Olga Danilovna didn’t waste a second more, running up to her son and getting him up from the table. In a hurry she could pass for a warn and loving mother, she even examined the previously broken leg. She asked if anything hurt. Olga could pass for a caring mother and not a woman who wanted to live out her ambitions through her son. With his leg perfectly healed, Danila wheeled the chair himself.

“Thank you, Doctor Misha,” the boy said with a smile before leaving the room. His reactions were a little faster this time around.

Mikhail, however, barely had the mental capacity left free from the pain to comprehend the words and offer a reply. Nonetheless, he managed. “Be careful next time, Dan.” He offered a feeble wave of his hand before the boy left. When the door closed, Misha slouched on the table, resting his forehead against the cold wood. It was offering no relief whatsoever, but it felt grounding. A sensation to tether him to reality, otherwise, he would allow himself to drift away from it. The rabbit’s fur felt less warm. That was even less of a comfort. It stopped mattering the moment he picked his phone this morning.

It was all a little useless. Nothing but a play of a repentant man. One actor theatre: he is on stage and is the audience. He didn’t count seconds, cared not for minutes it took for Nadya to come in through the door with a glass of water. He heard the door opening, her light steps, but didn’t want to raise his head just yet.

“You’ll survive, right?” Nadejda asked with amusement in her voice. He was rendered useless, true, but not helpless.

“Bastards live a long life.” A glass was placed on his table. Mikhail chuckled, amused by the thought that rushed through his pounding head. “Careful, dear, I’ll start to think you are a warm and caring human being.”

“That will be your grave mistake,” she replied.

“Doesn’t sound so bad.”

“Take your pills and, please, with water. It’s not in my interest for you to choke on them.”

“I shall.”

“You want me to take care of that?” she asked coldly, uncaring. That was why their arrangement was most perfect. That was why he hired her and why she remained by his side. There were few reasons why she could stand to work for such a horrible, irresponsible boss. Not only because he could pay her a pretty number. Not only because they were legally bound by a contract, preventing Nadejda from getting her hefty paycheck in case of Bulgakov’s strange death. It wasn’t only because she could keep her pretty mouth perfectly shut. But because Nadejda was aware of her self-serving nature and did not care. Nadejda Andreevna did not, in fact, care for anything but herself.

Mikhail placed the rabbit on the table and took out a cigarette from inside his pocket. He put one in his mouth. Nadya wordlessly offered a lighter. The smoke felt good inside his lungs: warm, calming, and perfectly harmful.

“No, it’s fine. I’ll take care of it,” Mikhail replied, evenly breathing out cigarette smoke. He reached in the drawer to get the pills out. Something to dull the pain, something to bring more senses back to life. Nadya was leaving the room in her usual catlike steps.

“You’ll lock up, right?” she asked, stopping in the doorway.

“Sure,” Misha nodded.

“See you when I see you.”

“Right back at ya.”

The door closed behind her. Soon, the office would be completely empty. He would leave, locking up for the day. Soon, the pain from his body would disappear completely, gone without a trace. His state would return to what it was when he woke up. Soon, there would be nothing bothering him but the hangover. The pounding would get less intense as time passed. By the end of the day, he should fell relatively fine. Soon, he would be heading home where he’d get to be as miserable as he felt like to be. Soon. Right after he would bury this obviously very dead rabbit on the table.

#yokelishtorturesenglish #BSD OC #bsd fanfic but OC so....#if you read it.....do you have questions? something you noticed?#yo is always happy to talk about them shitty creations

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thespiralgrimoire · 4 years ago

Note

Would you consider posting your thoughts on the Twilight series? Because the bits and pieces I catch on your main are HILARIOUS though maybe it’s just because I find salt hysterical LOL

Oh good grief

Under a read more for my sake if not anyone else’s

The year was 2007. I was 11 year old, in 6th grade, nursing a substantial superiority complex over my classmates, and idolizing the 7th grade girls. This is where my story begins.

Now I won’t get into all the semantics as to why I was such an insufferable little garbage person in middle school, but I will tell you that I was convinced that I was not like other girls. While this proved true, my reasons as to why were completely off the mark in my tweens. Back then, I thought it was because I was smarter, wiser, and more mature than any of the other 6th grade girls in my class.

But not the 7th grade girls. The 7th grade girls were it, man. Nobody was cooler or smarter or more creative than the handful of ladies who were blessed with the patience to put up with my nonsense in middle school. So naturally, when they read Twilight, I read Twilight.

Twilight, if you have the good fortune to not be intimately aware of it by now, is about the Bella Swan, blandest girl in the entire world, moving to a small town to live with her emotionally awkward father, where she meets the Cullens, a clan of vampires who don’t drink human blood, because they’re trying to be morally upright. Her scent is irresistible to one of the vampires, (the only single one among them because the rest are dating each other) named Edward. Edward has the ability to read minds, and Bella is the only person he’s ever met who is immune to this power. I must stress again that she smells so good that he has to physically restrain himself from eating her, and murdering all witnesses. For reasons I can��t really remember now except “because that’s what the books are about”, they fall in love.

Here’s the thing about these books: Even as I was reading them, they gave me the creeps. Something in my little baby mind was vaguely aware that Edward was a messed up motherfucker, and Bella was a one-dimensional stand-in for the reader, and everything interesting in this story was happening on the fringes, facilitated by the far more interesting side characters. There were parts of these books that were uncomfortable to read. There were parts that made me seriously question why these books were so popular. There were parts that made it physically difficult to keep reading. About 3 things happen in the entirety of this series that feels good and satisfying, and none of them are things that the author, who I will derogatorily refer to as Smeyer, meant to be satisfying.

Two things kept me reading these books. The first was, obviously, the 7th grade girls, and my other friends in other grades who quickly caught the hype wave.

The second. Was the fact. That the writing style of these books, despite being the modem for a story that is absurd at best and a giant, flaming, stinking dumpster fire of bad takes, racism, and sexism at worst, is HYPNOTIC. A lot of my opinions about this series have changed drastically over the years, but this is one that I was acutely aware of even as I was reading these books. No matter how stupid or frustrating or repulsive the things that Smeyer is writing are, her writing style will not let you put the story down once you’re invested. And since I was reading these for social clout, I was invested on page 1. I want to believe that this was a trick played on my young mind, but after reading the first chapter of Midnight Sun (the newly released book that is literally just Twilight from Edward’s POV instead of Bella’s), I can confirm that this woman’s style is genuinely Like That. I enjoyed maybe 6 sentences of the 15-page chapter and I am still frothing at the mouth to read more.

So now that I’ve justified why I subjected myself to this shit in the first place, let’s get to some feelings about it.

Edward is a CREEP. He knows this. His family knows this. His love rival knows this. The only person who does not know this, rendering the fact completely inconsequential to the events of the story, is Bella. I’m not really willing to talk about how Edward is such a disgusting model for what young girls should expect out of a partner that there was discourse for MONTHS over Fifty Shades of Grey, but.... Edward is such a disgusting model for what young girls should expect out of a partner that Fifty Shades of Grey exists. It’s literally Twilight fanfiction. Fact check me. I wish I was making this up.

Bella is, as I said before, a cardboard cutout of a human being. The book is from her point of view, and includes copious amounts of her thoughts, and yet it’s still clear that she has absolutely no personality. She is supposed to be your Jane Everywoman, and yet there is not a single relatable thing about her. Her three personality traits are Brown Eyes, Clumsy (but not in a way that matters often), and Likes Edward. That’s it. This girl has nothing going on, which only draws more attenton to the fact that literally everyone else in the story has a rich and interesting backstory. But they’re side characters and this is about Stale White Bread Bella over here, so go fuck yourself if you want more information on Rosalie using her vampire abilities to get revenge on her fiance and his buddies, who assaulted her to the point of near death, or Alice, who sees the future and spent a good chunk of her life in an asylum, or Jasper, who was a Union soldier fighting the Civil War which was ALSO the vampire war???? Fuck off with that shit, this is about Bella.

But you know who the best characters are? The werewolves. But not REAL werewolves. These are Native Americans whose initial transformation is triggered by the proximity of the vampires, because vampires once terrorized their people and now this ability to turn to wolves is hereditary to protect themselves. The fact that these fellas are not REAL werewolves, and that there are real lycanthropes of lore, is mentioned in passing in the last book and never mentioned by anyone ever again.

One of these wolves is Jacob, Bella’s childhood friend and, for the first two books, an absolute sweetheart. Just a big goofball who’s a couple years younger than Bella, and all he wants is the best for her. Real wholesome shit. When Edward leaves her because he thinks that she’s too attached (SHE IS), Jacob literally talks Bella back from the brink. The wolf pack, and the Native American tribe, welcome her as one of them. They’re adorable. I can’t stress enough that they would have also been an excellent candidate for the focal point of this shitshow.

But it doesn’t last. Edward does some real dumb shit in Italy and Bella has to go rescue him, which tips off the Vampire Illuminati that Edward was trying to get killed by (i.e. the real dumb shit). They don’t like that Bella, a human, knows about them, and demands that she be turned. Edward’s family is divided on this. Eventually they decide that they got time because the Vampire Illuminati are ancient and don’t have a good enough sense of time to hold them accountable immediately.

So Bella is fine and Edward is fine and everybody is back in the same town and they’re dating again and literally everyone in the town is like Bella what the FUCK. Nobody likes Edward because they think he’s no good for Bella. They are written like the bad buys. Jacob especially, becomes a huge asshole. Because he decides that he’s in love with Bella now. Because werewolves can imprint on people, which is just a sloppy soul mate mechanic used for absolute evil in this story. He wants to fight Edward over her. Edward is chomping at the bit to throw down, but pretends to be the bigger person even though he’s just as big an asshole about all this as Jacob is. This is as misogynist as it sounds. From this point on Jacob is now also a creep.

Oh, but it gets worse!

I gotta talk about the last book in the series now, Breaking Dawn. Because this shit was so awful that it made me regret, instantaneously, ever second I spent enjoying Twilight.

Bella and Edward get married after they graduate high school because Edward is a religious virgin and Bella is HORNY. They go on their honeymoon. Bella gets pregnant. This is Not Something That Is Supposed To Happen.

Smeyer tells us WHY this happened post-canon. Edward, the virgin, has never nutted. Because of this, he still has living sperm in his balls. So when he boffed Bella, his 80-year-old sperm made it count. I wish I was making this up, y’all. I’m tearing up thinking about it.

Bella is now pregnant with a half-vampire baby that is destroying her body from the inside out. It is growing at an exponential rate. She’s eight months along after three weeks. Edward can hear its thoughts. It loves Bella. Bella has to drink blood or die. Jacob is like What the Fuck. I am also, pretty thoroughly like What the Fuck. A couple members of the Cullen family are, very quietly, like What the Fuck.

Queue the most forced and ineffectual pro-life discourse you’ve ever read in your life.

All is well and good until it’s not. Baby suddenly wants to get out of Bella RIGHT NOW IMMEDIATELY and thrashes so violently that it shatters every bone in her body between her ribs and her femurs. Edward has to rip her uterus open with his teeth. Baby is out. It has a full mouth of teeth. It bites Bella. Edward whips out several syringes full of his own saliva and injects them into Bella all over to make her change into a vampire. This is all written in disgusting graphic detail that still makes my skin crawl to think about. I cannot fathom why Smeyer was not made to tone this scene down.

So it takes a few days for Bella to change into a vampire, during which time the Cullens (and Jacob) have to look after her hellspawn of a daughter. Jacob decides that he must kill her, because she basically killed Bella. But--- surprise! He wasn’t in love with Bella! He was in love with the eggs in her womb-- particularly this one egg that is now a baby! No more crush on Bella! No more beef with Edward! He’s just in love with a newborn infant. I am, at this point, wondering in my little 12 year old mind, how this was allowed to be published.

Bella wakes up a vampire, and in her first display of rational thought through the entire series, does not like this. Don’t worry though, that’s quickly cancelled out by her naming her baby daughter Renesmee.

Renesmee is clearly supposed to be a sweet and gifted little angel that you’re meant to love, but frankly, all I can picture is the Chucky doll but quieter. She does not talk much, because she has the ability to share thoughts by touching people’s faces. She also grows super fast. In a few days she’s toddler age. Nobody knows what the fuck is going on and nobody has time to worry about it because the vampire Illuminati found out about this (a vampire friend of the family snitched) and they’re coming to fuck up the whole family.

There is a reason why they want to do this but it’s stupid and frankly I’m not going to explain it.

So the vampires mobilize. They call all their vampire friends because their plan is just to fight the thousands-years-old vampire Illuminati over this horrible child. For some reason dozens of vampires agree to this. They’re all smitten by Resume I guess.

So the illuminati comes, the family tells them that Ramune isn’t the problem that they think she is, and they leave.

That’s it. That’s the climax.

And then everyone gets their off-putting happily ever after: Bella and Edward can now fuck as much as they want because neither of them can die. Bella abandons her human life without so much as a second glance. Resonate will physically be an adult by the time she’s 7, which means that Jacob can start fucking her then. Bella’s dad sort of knows what’s going on, but doesn’t. For some ungodly reason I don’t make a bonfire out of these books.

You may notice, if you have any knowledge of Twilight, that there are whole plots that I didn’t talk about. That’s because I’ve surely forgotten things. While I read these books with what I can only describe as a manic fervor in my youth, I could never bring myself to reread them. On God, I tried. Multiple times in the last decade I have pulled my box set, hard covered Twilight books off my shelf, and opened them up. But I never even make it through the first chapter before I am so put off that I have to put them back. The plots are flimsy. The main characters are made of sand. The secondary characters are treated like garbage. The lore is disturbing.

And yet as soon as I heard that Midnight Sun was coming out, I knew that I must read it. I’ve made it through the first chapter. I do not know when and how I will make it through the next, but I know, for little middle schooler Theo’s sake, that I must.

Twilight? Horrible. Twilight Fandom? Geniuses.

Thanks for coming to my TED talk.

#twilight #spinda tea #shinyshammie #this took a lot out of me #it's not even funny #we never really escape who we were at 12

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mcrmadness · 4 years ago

Text

CW dental stuff:

Still 1,5 weeks to go until I get to go to the dentist. So weird to say that I can't wait for that, I am quite afraid of dentists to be honest and now I can't wait??? But I guess even that is better than living with a mouth like this.

I just keep having anxiety attacks every day. They change from just regular sensory overloads to health anxiety which pretty much looks like “OMFG what if it’s something serious and I’m gonna die now???” and I just want this done asap, but still have to wait 1,5 weeks and it’s not over then. Pretty sure it will be painful for a few days after that before it calms down again and then I need to go to the dentist one more time, because it’s root canal therapy I’m going to get.

Also, there’s cavities on a few teeth and those need to be done too but those are not that bad. I’m just wondering how I’m gonna eat and what if she does both at once, or maybe I’ll ask for her to do the right side on the second appointment as these others are not really bothering me but just that one root canal therapy tooth (at the left side) is. Right now I was just minding my own business and doing things and suddenly I had this anxiety attack because I “didn’t remember to worry about my tooth enough”. Like, fuck you, brain! I was finally being distracted from it after having anxiety attack and then you go like “WAIT the TOOTH!!!” I actually try to distract myself from it so that the time would go faster and April 13th would be here finally.

The tooth itself isn’t really painful unless I touch it with my tongue more, mainly I just can feel it existing and it keeps sending some sensations to my lower jaw (it’s an upper jaw tooth) and sometimes I can feel that in my cheek bone too and that’s what gives me those anxiety attacks. The lower jaw then gives me sensory overload.

Right now I’m also feeling extremely tired. I showered today at least but I also really meant to cook for myself but it’s almost midnight and I just feel so exhausted. I really need some food tho so maybe I try to do that anyway, it won’t take TOO long to be finished, after all... I also feel a bit dizzy? Like I was sitting on a boat. That is often caused either by oncoming migraine or stiff neck. Or maybe it’s just anxiety and me being lightheaded.

Gosh, every day really is like torture now. But it’s my brain that is torturing me, mentally. Now also my dreams from last night are coming back, I don’t remember much anything from those but I just remember there was some bathroom pipe leaking and it was giving me anxiety because I’m ACTUALLY afraid of water flow that I cannot control, like a pipe breaking down or something like that.

I think I’m just tired and should go to sleep - but: I still need food. Not eating anything but bread (and a can of tuna) in 4 days is not good at my mental health at all, but it’s just so damn difficult to get myself to do anything right now. This is also what’s giving me anxiety. I don’t know if I’m so tired because of anxiety or because there’s something off in my system. Like, I keep worrying that I’m sick and that I don’t know it because I don’t feel sick at all. Sometimes I also worry if these are “post-covid symtpoms” altho I’ve never even had covid. I’ve never had any covid symptoms. Last time I had a common flu was in 2017. *knocks on wood*

Maybe I should actually do what I have been meaning to do for a few weeks now and stay overnight at my parents’ place at some point. Maybe even this weekend. Then I would only have 1 week left, and after that therapy on Monday, and finally the dentist’s appointment on Tuesday. I really try to survive until that because she seemed like a nice dentists and I don’t want to cancel it and try to find another dentist when the appointment is ALMOST here already.

It’s just weird how I keep having major mood swings and it can change in matter of seconds. I can be extremely happy about everything and the next moment I’m rolling in anxiety and texting my mom about how I might come over at night. Then I don’t because it goes away and I go to sleep. I’ve also been really excited because finally I’m gonna get this tooth fixed and when the root canal therapies are over, HOPEFULLY I don’t need to do anything about that anymore. I mean, I have been living with a temporary patch since 2017. I haven’t really used the left side of my mouth for eating since my tooth started hurting for the first time in... maybe 2015 or something like that. I don’t even remember when was it but I literally have been chewing everything mainly on the right side of my mouth for FIVE YEARS. And I have constantly been thinking about how I wish this was fixed already but didn’t want to go to a dentist because I was afraid they’re gonna say it needs to be removed. I’m actually still worried that they’d say that, and the longer it took me to book another appointment, the bigger the fear grew. I was so afraid that I took so long with all and that it needs to come out and if I just went to a dentist earlier, it could have been saved. Fortunately it seems that the canal root therapy is possible so I don’t need to worry, but I still worry about what are they gonna find from inside that tooth. I’m not a dentist so I’m afraid of everything because I don’t know anything about anything. But I guess it’s still empty because the temporary patch is still there and it apparently was empty in the röngten images...

But yeah, some days I’m just so excited that maybe after a month or so, I can finally use my mouth’s left side for chewing and I don’t need to worry about a patch coming off anymore. And hopefully all the sensations and mild “pain” after cold or hot foods or liquids will be over. At this point 1,5 weeks just feels like another 5 years.

#mcrmadness' random stuff #tw teeth #tw dental stuff

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rpmemesbyarat · 4 years ago

Conversation

RP Meme from Netflix's "A Series of Unfortunate Events: A Bad Beginning: Part Two"

I'm sorry to say that the alleged entertainment you are watching is extremely unpleasant.

From the beginning of this miserable tale to the last melancholy scene, I cannot think of a single line, a single word, that does not chill me to my deepest bones.

"Why?" you may ask.

Do you know what the question I'm asked the most is?

Will you please leave the premises?

Why do I do it?

Why respond to the siren song that the Spanish call 'El Theater'?"

For fame and fortune?

For the costumes!

Where are the costumes?

Stay in the car.

Well, we've got to reach them. Try Peru.

I'm keeping an eye on things best I can

I present it to you now in the hopes that the police inspectors, concerned citizens and television executives might finally leave me alone.

I have an appointment for a haircut right now.

Well, in that case, we're going to need a map of the city.

You'll never get away with this.

I already did get away with it.

Put some elbow grease into it!

Who knows what would happen to us on the street?

At least here we have a roof over our head.

Can I warm that up for you? And also give you some very bad news?

When I was a little boy, I would have given my eyeteeth to be raised by an actor.

I have terrible friends.

It sounds like Latin.

Now, I'm sorry if I have to usher you out posthaste, but I've got work to do.

I'll have my new secretary give you a ride home as soon as he's finished typing up that report.

Shall I let them off the hook?

I spent all morning making these cupcakes for you.

They're store bought!

Aren't raspberries delicious?

I'm afraid I may have acted a bit standoffish.

I want you to participate in my next play.

It tells the story of a very handsome and good-looking man, played by me.

A pretty girl like you shouldn't be working backstage.

It's a very important role

What did you call me?

I'm not sure I'm talented enough to perform professionally.

I would prefer it if you participate voluntarily

The point is, I can order you to participate, and you must obey.

I can't stand looking at you anymore.

Killing us will do him no good.

I have never been married myself.

Are you here to continue your research?

I have quite the interest in theater, you know.

I would give up every last wig just to wear a costume.

I'm actually considering a career in law. I find those books quite fascinating.

There are countless types of books in this world, which makes good sense because there are countless types of people.

[NAME], what's happened to your face?

No, no, no, it should be delicate! Fetching!

I just think, even in changing context, that marriage is an inherently patriarchal construction

Are you leaving?

Oh, there we go, sweet girl.

Does that mean what I think it means?

It means you're going to be a star.

You have got the star quality necessary for a small walk-on role

Now, you can see it.

It's a very important part, although you won't be listed in the program.

All my life I wanted to be a bride

It's almost too good to be true.

Spend some time with your new father.

Seize the children!

I have three kinds of butter cream icing here for you to sample. One's vanilla, one has a hint of nutmeg and the other's a little lemony.

I told you never to say that word.

We'll order takeout.

Let me eat cake.

You can't just keep us in here.

What do you think will happen to you then?

I'm gonna stay up all night with a book.

The book was not at all interesting. The book was long and difficult.

What are you doing here? You're supposed to be in your room.

I was in my room all night, and I know what you're up to.

Me? I'm just having my morning coffee

If you use fancy-pants words first thing in the morning,

you're going to end up a very lonely man.

I figured out your scheme.

You don't know the difference between figuratively and literally, do you?

I'm leaping in the air because I'm very happy.

I'm so happy I could jump for joy, but I'm saving my energy for other matters.

This play won't be pretend. It'll be real and legally binding.

A man like me can acquire any number of beautiful women

What's in it for me?

Can you name me a language that was spoken by ancient Romans and is still spoken by very irritating people today?

Whatever will we do?

I guess that proves reading really is fundamental.

But I'm not old enough to get married.

It certainly is so strange to find a child missing, and one so small, so helpless.

When did you see her last?

Did you hear that? It came from outside.

Oh, you're not looking in the right place.

Oh, don't look so down.

Let her go. She's done nothing to you.

Please, she's just a baby.

Just don't harm her.

I would never, ever marry you.

Any animal owner will tell you that a stubborn mule will move toward the carrot because it wants the reward of food and away from the stick because it wants to avoid the punishment of rump pain.

Would it be so terrible to be my bride, to live in my house for the rest of your life?

You're a terrible man.

I may be a terrible man, but I have concocted a foolproof way of getting your fortune.

What have you done?

I wish I had an inventor here.

You came.

You sent for me.

Things are disastrous. Everything's gone wrong.

What went wrong?

Why would anyone listen to a consultant?

Are you free Friday night to attend the theater?

But what shall we do until then?

Could you cut these ropes for me?

You should get some sleep.

It's my turn.

I didn't help us.

You just didn't finish the job.

Let me keep my promise.

Having a brilliant idea isn't as easy as turning on a light.

But just as a single bulb can illuminate even the most depressing of rooms, the right idea can shed light on a depressing situation.

It's so wonderful that, in addition to your many talents, you have a marvelous eye for fashion.

Tell me if this is too much.

How pleasant that you could join us.

What are you gonna do with me?

It was a grappling hook.

I understand she's yours.

I'm not his bride.

You know, some people say that the hardest job in the world is raising a child.

I'll touch whatever I want.

What happened? Why are we up here?

It's so high. You must have been terrified.

I'm sorry it didn't work.

The invention worked fine. I just got caught.

You're gonna need to flip it a couple of times, like, okay?

And don't touch the baby!

Do you think you could invent something to help us escape?

I am certain that over the course of your own life, you have noticed that certain rooms reflect the personalities of the occupants.

If we had kerosene, we could make Molotov cocktails with those old wine bottles.

What are Molotov cocktails?

They're small bombs. If we throw them out the window, we could attract attention.

It's time for the big event.

Taking the role of a handsome man is certainly a brave choice.

Is it a stretch for you?

I think live theater is a much more powerful medium

than, say, streaming television.

Evil plot?

The wedding will be around 10 PM, followed by champagne toasts, reception with cake and finger food, then the after-party at the Mexican place.

All my anxieties are put to rest.

Don't distract me with idle chatter.

Get it absolutely right.

Change of plans. Sit here. Don't distract her.

Don't suppose you know how to play poker.

Would you like to deal?

I am very handsome, but I am only one man.

He's so handsome.

If I can't have him, my heart will literally break.

That can't be true!

But that piece of paper's not an official document.

I think you'll see that it is figuratively real.

I'm afraid this marriage is entirely binding.

This is absolutely horrendous. I won't allow it!

I'm afraid there's nothing you can do.

You were easily tricked!

It was child's play, winning this fortune.

You promised to let her go!

You idiot! What are you doing?

So, you escaped, you little dishrag.

Well, that doesn't count.

You're just being a sore loser and trying to ruin my special day.

You should never be afraid to admit that you don't know something.

This is a very complicated case.

It would take a formidable legal scholar to solve it.

It was thoroughly impressive and utterly convincing.

I'm even considering firing your associate

I was kidnapped

I'll get my hands on your fortune if it's the last thing I do.

You have to capture him! You have to go after him!

You let the authorities worry about that.

Sorry, but the children must come with me.

Some things in life are difficult to understand, even after years and years of thinking about them while wandering alone through desolate landscapes, usually during the off-season.

The world is quiet here.

As with so many unfortunate events in life, just because you don't understand it, doesn't mean it isn't so.

Things are worse than we thought.

Then we don't have a moment to lose.

What's a woman like you building in a place like this?

Leave no stone unturned.

#rp memes #rp meme #roleplay memes #roleplay starters #roleplay meme #a series of unfortunate events

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irandrura · 4 years ago

Text

Third and final post: what were my other thoughts?

Let’s talk about the game’s mechanics first.

I am overall very pleased with the battle gameplay. On the battlefield itself the gameplay is more-or-less unchanged from the past, but the character advancement and customisation system is significantly improved. Moving to a single overall character level and giving every character the ability to change classes at will is a much more fluid and elegant system than in the past, and the ability to choose the specific combat arts and abilities each character takes looks like it adds a lot of depth. It’s probably appropriate for the overall ‘teacher’ theme of the game that you have much more power to mould each character’s skills and talents, but I’d like to see it in other games as well. There’s an important balance to strike: on the one hand, characters should not be infinitely malleable, and should all have their personal strengths and weaknesses. On the other, so much of the fun of the game is in developing characters and watching them grow that it’s really good to be able to specialise them.

Speaking of battle gameplay, divine pulse is great. The Fire Emblem series has always struggled a bit with accessibility, and while casual mode definitely made the series easier, it also felt to me like missing the point. Casual mode is too easy, and by removing any risk of permanent death, it felt like it removed a lot of the game’s tension. Divine pulse is a much better way to make the gameplay a bit easier and less frustrating while still keeping the same feel as classic FE gameplay. It gives you just enough room to survive a lucky enemy crit, or a small misjudgement on your part, without totally removing the need to be careful. I approve. That said, I did feel that by late-game you probably had access to too many pulses and it removed the need to conserve them. With a dozen pulses, there isn’t much risk any more, whereas if it stayed capped around three to five, each individual pulse might have felt more precious.

(Apparently Mila’s Turnwheel in Shadows of Valentia actually did the mechanic first, and I totally forgot about it. Oh dear…)

Other gameplay innovations were more hit-and-miss, for me. Battalions were fine, but I don’t think I would have missed them if they weren’t there. They helped make the battlefield seem busier and more populated, but they don’t seem to have had a massive impact on the game. Similarly, monsters were mostly fine (Cindered Shadows boss notwithstanding), but again, I don’t think I’d mind very much if they didn’t come back. They rarely actually felt like the most dangerous enemies on the battlefield, and just required a slightly different strategy, and… well, maybe it’s just me, but it feels weird for FE to have boss monsters like that. I suppose arguably it’s been a tension in the series going all the way back to the original game? Marth was supposed to fight monstrous dragons, but his entire game was about enemy soldiers, and dragons didn’t stand out as the terrifying beasts they ought to have been. Still, I’m not sure I’m sold on them here.

When I started playing I complained that exploring the monastery was tedious. You can get into a routine later on, but for the most part, I did think it could have been streamlined more. Having lunch with students or going for special training or browsing the marketplace are all fun things to do, but a bit less sprinting all over the map to talk to everyone and return lost items would have been appreciated. The lost item mechanic in particular feels like busywork. A bit of exploring is nice, but only as long as it doesn’t get tedious. It might have been lovely to explore other locations as well – Enbarr, Fhirdiad, the army camp outside Gronder, etc. – but I can understand that the amount of work required would not be practical.

Speaking of tedium, though… I really could have done with a few more maps. Maybe this is my fault for constantly choosing battles, but I found myself replaying the same forest, plains, beach, or volcano map too many times for comfort.

I might also have liked for crests to be a bit more mechanically impactful, given their important to the world and the plot. I regularly forgot which of my units have crests, and what any of the crests do, since most of them have so little effect as to not matter. The only one I did usually remember was Felix’s Crest of Fraldarius, and that was mainly because it makes him do more damage and sometimes made him kill people I’d hoped to leave on one or two HP. I don’t think crests should have been overpowering, but a little more power would still have been nice. It should not have been so easy to forget that they exist.

Similarly, by the time I finished the game I realised that I had never used a Hero’s Relic, even once. I would like to say that this was a principled decision on my part, given that they turn people into monsters (and it looks like I was right about them being made from bone?), but it was mostly just the BUT-WHAT-IF-I-NEED-IT-LATER effect. They all have quite low durability, and while I understand that infinite durability, as with relics in previous games, was not an option due to breaking how combat arts work, it was still enough to discourage me from using them. Perhaps on a higher difficulty they would become necessary? I always feel a bit sad when for mechanical reasons I never let characters use their most iconic weapons.

Moving on from mechanics…

There is technically a shipping mechanic, with an S support for the protagonist, but it really felt like an afterthought to me. I don’t think the game would lose anything significant if you just removed all the S supports. Compared to a game like Awakening or Fates, where the second generation makes it mechanically important and the plot seems like it works best with a bit of romantic drama (f!Robin/Chrom and m!Robin/Lucina looking particularly intended), Three Houses is surprisingly chaste. I suppose picking a character to be your waifu might be part of the culture now, perhaps looking also at the growing influence of waifu gacha games, but for me it felt tacked on. I can imagine potentially rewriting the game to make romance a more important theme – perhaps talking about Jeralt and Sitri a bit more? – but to be honest I think that that would have been worse for the game overall.

In particular, it stands out to me as sitting a touch oddly alongside the teacher concept. One of the things that stands out to me about Byleth as a protagonist is the way that Byleth is in a superior position relative to the other units. You are a professor, in a position of authority, and you have more life experience. Your job is to teach and mentor these younger characters. This contrasts strongly with Robin, who I think was presented as the equal of the other Shepherds (your relationship with Chrom is that of comrade and friend), and with Corrin, who was presented as an inferior or junior (your siblings are older than you, and they start off with higher status). Because of that superior position, then, I found the game suggesting a feeling of responsibility towards them, and a feeling of pride in their accomplishments.

This might be a bizarre comparison, but in some ways a game that Three Houses reminded me of while playing was Princess Maker 2, a weird little DOS game from 1993 about raising a girl. The core loop of choosing activities to raise the stats of a character in your care, punctuated with occasional outings to fight monsters and get loot, felt quite similar. Similarly, the emotions that seemed to be evoked, to me, were emotions of care and pride: perhaps not paternal as such, since Byleth isn’t that old, but certainly the satisfaction that comes from nurturing a younger and less experienced person.

For the most part that actually worked, and I certainly applaud it for feeling less icky than Fates. If I compare tea parties to that weird Fates mechanic where you could invite characters to your room and touch their face, it is vastly less creepy. So I’m glad that the romance has been toned down.

And speaking of things that I’m glad aren’t prominent…

I’m deliberately burying this part in the middle of a long post. Tumblr is famously ruthless on issues like this, but fortunately I have a very low follower count and you’re all nice people. Basically, one of my worries going into the game was that Three Houses might be the ‘woke’ Fire Emblem game. I am glad to find that concern averted, at least so far. A person could perhaps make some pretty cringeworthy interpretations of Duscur to do with racial politics, but the game itself does not push you in that direction. Tumblr and AO3 love slash shipping, but as far as I can tell that remains as canonically unsupported as ever. Interestingly, while Three Houses has a small handful of same-sex romantic S supports and endings, as far as I can tell they’re all for Byleth and they’re all simply copy-pastes of the opposite-sex versions. It’s enough for me to genuinely wonder whether they’re in the original Japanese at all, or if they were added. I know translations of FE games have played around with character sexualities before, so it’s possible. At any rate, part of me was concerned that this might be the Dragon Age: Inquisition of Fire Emblem, and fortunately it isn’t. (I mean, I did actually enjoy Dragon Age: Inquisition, but at times it did get to be a bit much.) I’ll take this as a valuable lesson when it comes to not believing posts I see on Tumblr. You’d think I would have learned from previous games: popular fan interpretations of a character are often completely wrong. Three Houses seems for the most part to be a very traditional Fire Emblem game.

In terms of the overall series trajectory, I take Three Houses to be an overall positive sign. Awakening and Fates seemed to be taking the series in a direction that I didn’t care for as much, with heavy use of player avatar characters, much more fan service, and more trope-driven plots. Three Houses seems like a return to deeper worldbuilding and characterisation. The cast of characters overall has definitely been a high point: in Fates I sometimes struggled to build a team of characters that I felt truly fond of, but in Three Houses there were usually more characters I wanted to use than I had space for, and there were no recruitable characters that I truly disliked.

Really, the biggest disconnect between me and Three Houses, in the end, is the fact that Three Houses is built for replayability, and I don’t like replaying games very much. However, I don’t think I can in good faith call that a flaw or poor design: obviously there are a lot of people who love replayability, and considering that I got a good eighty hours of gameplay out of my first playthrough (DLC included) and enjoyed it, I’m not really in a position to complain.

So in the end, then, I think that while Three Houses is not my favourite Fire Emblem and does have some places where it could be improved, for the most part I think it’s quite a good outing and a significant improvement on the last few. It is not designed entirely to my tastes, but what is here is mostly good. Three Houses leaves me feeling much more optimistic for the future of the franchise than Fates did.

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ofmythsandmadness · 5 years ago

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i need a favour - two.

PART TWO - don’t call me baby. or, klaus always knows how to make things a little bit more tense, even without meaning to (but no one can ever hate him for it)

WORD COUNT: 3000 or so. PREVIOUS PART(s): part one

A/N: i was surprised at honestly the good response? i wasn’t considering anyone liking it, but i’m glad. i’ve got a little series tag list going on for those who requested to be updated on this - if you want to be added, just ask and I can do that :) I’m updating this at three in the morning, because I didn’t have much inspo for finishing it til now? if it’s badly written and honestly, i feel that with the ending, i’m super sorry. but on another note, there’ll be more parts if I can get my shit together, at least a couple more chapters because i want to have a proper growth session (yee haw, buckle up i guess). I’m still getting used to writing x reader things, I don’t normally even read them, but this is pretty fun and it’s something I can do. and i’m happy people enjoy reading it. (sorry for the super long a/n.)

FOR MOST, IT WOULD BE STRANGE TO SEE a teacher smiling as they went through a stack of to-be papers. Frowns, or grumblings were more common, only covered by a constant reaching for more coffee to keep them alert. But for Y/N and her creative writing class, it was nothing unusual. She largely favoured the course to teaching AP English, and most of the time enjoyed reading what the students came up with. The prompts were fun and the followup even better - no matter the spelling and grammar mistakes, the students were not without creativity. If she was being honest, it might just be the greatest opportunity a young teacher in her position could get. And she was not without appreciation for that.

The prompt that week perhaps made her marking job even more entertaining. She asked them to tell her about their childhood hero, and a large portion of the class had chosen to write about the infamous ‘Umbrella Academy’. Even if they were on the younger age and only saw the group in the later years, more than half of her students still fawned and gushed about the super-beings. The one in hand just then particularly favoured a certain Number Two - citing him as their first childhood crush, someone that their small self quite adored.

She snorted at their shy confession. If only they knew Diego like she did - maybe the mask and knives would not be so attractive.

Just before she could turn to the next page, her phone lit up and she had to place the red pen down. The number was not recognised by her phone, but she hardly spared a thought on that, sighing before bringing the device to her ear. “Hello, Y/N Y/L/N here.”

“Well, don’t you sound professional.”

Speak of the devil. She fought back a smile. “You really have to get your own phone, you know.”

“Why, so you can get even more excited it’s me?”

“No. So I know not to answer.”

“Ouch. You’d say that to the love of your life?”

Y/N transferred the phone to her other ear, pressing it into her next and jaw as she fixed her piles. “Okay, hold on. Thought you were my fake boyfriend, not ‘the love of my life’. Did I miss that in our agreement?”

“Ain’t that the same thing?”

“No,” she shot back. There was no point elaborating, she knew he was joking - and yet for some reason, the casual question did sting a little. She quickly brushed the thought away, though, and continued. “Why are you calling me? I’m working.”

“I’m calling on your break, aren’t I?”

“Sure, but you’re interrupting my paper-grading.”

She could practically see the teasing smirk on his face, imagining him leaning against the telephone booth with the device pressed up to his ear. Trying to be stupidly suave. What she wouldn’t give to trip him up. “Sorry to interrupt that, I didn’t know you were having such a great time.”

“Well, I’ll have you know I-” she cut herself short as the door swung open. Her frown quickly shifted to a polite smile and Y/N gestured for the student to come in, motioning silently to her phone. She turned back with a lower voice and new sense of urgency. “Do you need something, Diego, or are you just calling to tease me?”

“C’mon, don’t flatter yourself.”

“I’m about three seconds from hanging up-”

“-okay, sure. I do have a question.”

She shifted in her seat, sparing another glance to the waiting student just to make sure she was still there. The girl stood patiently - well, in the sense of trying her very best to pick up on just what the conversation was without being obvious. Y/N smiled a little at that.

“What is it, then?”

“They’re moving dinner to Sunday. Can you make that?”

Y/N did not have to rack her brain to know her answer. “Yeah, probably. I’ll have to bump all my plans around, but I guess I can make it work.”

“Oh, right. Cause you have so much going on.”

“Screw off, Diego, ‘else I might just be too busy to show up to dinner.”

He sobered up then, though he did force an exaggerated sigh. “Fine. Thanks.”

“Uh-huh. We can talk later about details but-” she shot another glance the girl’s way, gesturing she would just be one more minute, “-I have to actually go. Okay?”

He laughed softly into the phone. “Sure. See you, sweetheart.”

“Bye, loser - and don’t call me that!”

He hung up with nothing more as a response, leaving Y/N to sigh and slam the phone back down to her desk. She smiled apologetically at the teen. “Sorry about that, Trish.”

“Oh, no worries,” the girl grinned. The smile was sly - a look only a curious high schooler knew best. “Everything all good?”

“Oh, n...yes, yeah.” Guess she had to go along with the teasing remark - not that Trisha had been sent as a spy by the Hargreeves siblings, trying to test the validity of their very not real relationship. But it did not hurt to push the narrative. “Yeah, that’s just my...uh...boyfriend. Confirming plans, no big deal.”

Trish’s smile grew larger. “Sounds cute.”

How someone could sound cute, especially when she had not even heard him actually speak, Y/N could not say. But she just laughed it off, played the part she had dealt herself. “Yeah, he’s...great. But anyways, how can I help you?”

AT THE FIRST KNOCK, Y/N was throwing the door open, rubbing at her eyes so she could take in the situation properly. Her eyes flitted down Diego, scanning frantically for any wounds or issues that would need serious work, or just any sign in his face of what could be an urgent matter. There was no bloody giveaways on his clothes this time, though, and his face was warped into strangely, a stiff grin, instead of a look of pain.

“Well, at least you used the door this time,” she sighed, opening it wider so he could come in. She stiffened, though, as he moved closer than normally, brushing her into a one-armed hug before pulling away. Y/N’s mouth fell open to question the embrace, but fortunately her eyes fell on the answer before she could be made a fool. “Oh. Oh. Hi, Klaus...?”

“Long story,” Diego mumbled into her ear, disguising the whisper with a kiss to her temple. She tried to focus only on the word and not how the strange shiver shot down her back at his touch, no matter how she felt. “Picked him up, he wouldn’t leave me alone and I really didn’t want him wasted up somewhere bad.”

She only nodded in response and turned her arms to Klaus, wrapping him up in a hug. He felt warmer than he had the last time they hung out - a bit more meat seemed to be on his bones, too, though he was still a willowy, langly man. A somewhat sober nature did suit him.

“My darling Y/N - congratulations!”

“Congr-”

“-you managed to do the impossible - and oh! How happy I am to welcome you to our crazy family!”

Oh, right. That.

“I always had a feeling that there was something between the two of you, but I never knew that the day would come where you’d actually admit it..” Klaus’ arms slung easily around both Diego and Y/N, drawing them close to him with a ferocity neither expected. Their heads very nearly knocked together, before Diego could wriggle out of the hold. “My dear little Y/N, tying down this grumpy asshole.”

She laughed semi-nervously. “Guess that’s me, yeah.”

“You two always looked good together, so adorable,” he continued, letting them go without a second thought. Luckily, he missed her glare to her supposed boyfriend, as well as the mouthed apology, too wrapped up in his own thoughts. “And between all the pining looks and - well, I don’t think anyone should be surprised you two finally decided to bump uglies!”

If there was any water in her mouth, Y/N would have done a classic spit take right then and there. As it were, she could just choke on air and attempt to keep her exposure in the face of a bold-face lie.

Fortunately, Diego was there to swoop in - somewhat. “I did not pick you up so you could badger Y/N about our sex life, Klaus. Say your shit or get out.” He sank into her couch and Y/N did not miss the flash of pain across his face - there was something wrong. She could already feel the frown of concern forming.

“You’re the one who forced me into your car.”

“Yeah, well,” he shot back through gritted teeth, “you were gonna get yourself killed, dumbass.”

“So now I can’t go anywhere without a babysitter, simply because of a slight issue in the past?”

“You are a recovering add-”

“-the details don’t matter, Diego,” Klaus muttered, only flinching the slightest bit under Diego’s withering stare. “And it’s not my fault everyone’s now so busy with their lives. I mean, you do really show up at the worst of times, just to bust me and not to catch up on all that quality ‘bro’ time we missed out on!”

Y/N gently pushed him forward and into a seat before moving onto Diego. She fished out the little aid kit kept under the kitchen sink and sank into the couch beside him. “Show me what’s wrong. And Klaus, what about Luther? Allison?”

“Both too far,” he whined back.

“Okay...stop squirming Di...uh, don’t you have Five?”

“Five can’t legally do anything except for like, drive. And even then, is he even old enough to have a license yet?” He paused for dramatics, only to sigh when neither gave much response. “I just worry for that boy, I can’t be the only one questioning this.”

“Vanya, then.”

Klaus shook his head once more. “I love the girl, but sometimes, a bit too dry for me. We don’t have the same tastes, and I’m afraid I might be tone-deaf. Severely so. Incurably so, darling.”

“Aw, Klaus.” She poked at Diego’s side, sticking her tongue out when he tried to push her away. “Shirt up, let me see how bad it is.”

He rolled his eyes. “S’barely a scratch. Let it be.”

“C’mon, I don’t want it getting infected, let me see!” She poked again, forcing him to lift the shirt up and reveal the nasty scratch. He still fought her hands away, even when she was obviously going to win the fight. She swatted his calloused fingers off, however, and inspected the wound despite his protests.

Diego was just about to shoot another insult her way, eyes a-flashing in that sly, tired way that only came out in the wee hours, when they were both cut off.

“Oh, don’t tell me I’m going to be interrupting a moment here?”

Immediately Y/N felt herself stiffen and everything feel a little bit colder. She could not lift her gaze from his wound, too anxious to look and see how Diego was reacting to the comment.

“I can leave, if that’s wanted? I understand the whole new couple thing, believe me. Been there, done that, and I’m always ready to try and start that over again tonight!”

She bit back a groan.

In all the fuss of getting them in and dealing with Diego, she had hardly spared a thought to the night ahead. Sure, she had realised it was going to be awkward every time a Hargreeve mentioned their ‘relationship’, but not like this - not where she would be left stammering, trying to defend herself to one of her closest friends. Not even defend, but...well, she was not sure what she was supposed to be trying to do. Aside from not combust from all the hot blood rushing straight to her face.

And all she had wanted was to sleep.

But there was no way she would kick either or both of them out, not in their states. Diego would end up staying anyways just like he always did, grumbling as she fussed over him - and she would not just kick Klaus out like that. She adored the both of them and had made a promise.

So, Y/N sucked in a breath and forced a gentle smile. “You’re not interrupting anything, hush.”

“Oh, I don’t mi-”

“-you wanna stay a while, Klaus? I have a feeling Diego’s not gonna be moving, and I don’t want you wand’ring the streets alone in your state.”

Diego’s eyes immediately shot to her, but she ignored the pointed stare.

“Oh, I’d hate to intrude on your relaxation session. Truly, I’ll just go!”

Gross, Klaus, she mused to herself - the guy was injured, for hell’s sake. “Seriously, you’re not. Please, just stay. There’s plenty a’room and I had nothing going on, anyways.” Aside from sleep - but that had been thrown out the window the second the pair had shown up, anyways.

A smile broke out on Klaus’ face and he shot up, moving to awkwardly hug Diego’s shoulder - much to the man’s chagrin. “I don’t know how you managed to convince her to like a prick like you. She’s an angel - you’re an angel, Y/N really.”

“You’re too sweet, but seriously, I don’t mind the company,” she grinned, swatting Klaus’ hands away. Hers were pressed against Diego’s torso, trying to wipe away the blood already drying around the wound. It, luckily, was not too bad- though serious enough to need serious attention. “Make yourself comfortable, just please don’t touch the booze!”

As his brother’s laugh floated away, Diego groaned. “Can’t we kick him out?”

“The more the merrier,” she sang back, ignoring the glare shot her way. “C’mon, I promise I’ll make it up to you later, baby.”

Diego did not bother to even try and hide him flipping her off. If anything, he brandished the action proudly. She just grinned back, trying to fight back her beating heart and flushed cheeks. She just had to deal with this - it was what she agreed to and it was just them. She hung out with the two of them for years and years. The only difference now was that she and Diego were supposed to be ‘bumping uglies’, but she could deal with Klaus’ comments.

Right?

“YOU COULD TRY AND BE A LITTLE NICER,” she said, swatting at him with a towel. “He is your brother.”

Diego rolled his eyes. “He’s an asshole, is what he is.”

“Why, he interrupted our quote-on-quote ‘alone time’?”

“No,” he grumbled, “but I didn’t really come here to put on a show.”

Y/N wanted desperately to then ask, ‘well why did you come’, but the words just would not come out. Instead, she just shook her head and played along with ignoring the implication. “C’mon, dummy. Would you rather we kicked him out and left him to do...well, whatever Klaus does? That wouldn’t be good.”

He sighed, running a hand through his hair. Y/N watched as he absent-mindedly stroked the silvery scar carved into his head, a motion she thought probably was not even intentional. “I know. I know. S’why I brought him here.”

“So…”

“...all I’m saying is, I didn’t expect to have ‘im here all night.”

She shot him a teasing smile before twisting away, reaching up towards her top cupboards. Her fingers grazed the wood but could not quite reach the glasses pushed to the far back. How had she reached them before?

“If you wanted to just hang out with me, Diego, you could’a just said. I mean, I get it. I am irresistible and adorable in every which way.”

“I agree. You are super irritating and annoying.”

“Oh, wow, those are some big words!” Y/N gritted her teeth, stretching as far as she could forward to grab the glass - but ended up just sinking back to her toes with a sigh. “You been reading that dictionary I bought you?”

“You really just carry that teacher voice around wherever you go, don’t you,” he grinned. With ease, he reached up and brought down the glass she had been reaching for, earning a muttered ‘thanks’. “And for your information, I don’t even know where that thing is.”

“Liar.”

“Not kidding.”

“You lost my heartfelt gift to you?”

“Nah, I probably used it as target practice.”

She rolled her eyes, even if he could not see her face when focused on her hands. She poured a little more than halfway, pausing before shrugging and bringing it up to her lips. Still turned away, she swallowed. “You’re maybe the most insufferable boyfriend I’ve ever had, you know.”

“Oh, come on. That can’t be true.”

“No, I mean that. I don’t normally date people who bicker with me and lose my hard thought-out gifts like that. Assholes like you.”

“Yeah? What about Ty?”

“What about him?”

“He was an asshole.”

Y/N shrugged and focused her gaze on the cupboards opposite her. Better that than his face, right then. “Sure he was. But I think he took care and kept the presents I gave him. I mean, ‘til shit hit the fan, but still. They were appreciated.”

“You’re really comparing me to one of the biggest dicks because I didn’t value your joke gift?”

At that, she chuckled and finally looked his way. One glass of wine down and her sense of smart humour was already fleeing fast. “Can’t compare what I don’t know, can I? Though, he, he was packing, I will tell you that.”

That did not even make much sense, but her messily dirty joke still took a jab his way. Immediately, Diego’s face fell into a look of disgust - though, funnily enough, his cheeks shone red in the dim kitchen light - and Y/N could not keep her laughter in.

“Sorry, that didn’t even make any sense...”

“You’re gross,” he grinned back, shaking his head in fake disgust. “Don’t know what I see in you.”

She giggled mercilessly at him, ignoring his mumbles to keep quiet, caught up in the adorable face he made.

Wait, she interrupted, not adorable. Not in the adorable nature as - well, it was cute, but like in a little kid sort of way. Yeah. Was that a better way to look at it? She was not sure, but it still left her sobering up pretty quickly.

Her eyes fell down to the counter, tracing the swirls of wood before lifting once more. A low hum left her lips. “Nah, you’re right. He sucked. And you do too, don’t get me wrong, but not as much as Ty, or Todd. Or - pretty much all of them.”

“Well, I’m flattered.”

She grinned, but it was softer, weaker as she sipped her second glass. “Sure. Not like it’s much of a competition - I don’t think I have very good taste, sadly.”

“Sure you do,” Diego shot back, bending to pick out a bottle from the fridge. He leaned against the counter across from her, eyes slightly squinted as he took her in. “I mean, you’re dating me.”

“Ha, ha. This - this is a business arrangement, darling, not a relationship. And I didn’t even choose to be in this!”

“Well shit, tell me how you really feel, Y/L/N!”

“I mean nothin’ against you, ‘course,” she hummed. Why was she feeling awkward, all of a sudden? “It’s just not the same as actually having someone who genuinely cares about me - in the like, romantic sense.”

Diego nodded somewhat solemnly at that. “Mm. Sorry, I think?”

“Eh, don’t be. I agreed to this. And I still appreciate you, even if you aren’t interested in me past what benefits you.”

Her words were supposed to come out teasingly, a joke in the most bitter, light-hearted sense, but that was not the case. Instead, they came out all wobbly and unsure, like she had been biting them back but could not hold onto the feeling any longer. Which, was not really the case, she was not desperate for a hand to hold and certainly not from him - but she could not change the words said.

His eyes averted and hers softened, half from embarrassment and half unconsciously at the face he had pulled. She pulled away from the counter. “You still hungry? I can get you something.”

“Nah, I should - get him home.”

Y/N glanced back at Klaus’ silhouette, sound asleep and slightly snoring on the couch. “I think he’s okay, Diego.”

“Yeah, but it’s late. You’ve got work tomorrow and I got shit to get to.”

“Do you have to get to it?”

His smile was tired, like he was barely holding back a sad secret behind the pretty grin. Honestly, with a look like that? He was already half out the door and there was no point to arguing. “Who else is gonna keep this city from burnin’ down?”

She did not bother to argue with him - there was no point to giving him logical points, because he just deflected them all. Diego Hargreeves was a lot of things, but reasonable, he rarely could claim. At least not when it came to his own wellbeing.

Instead, Y/N just leant back and watched as Diego moved to his brother and in surprising tenderness, woke him up. It was rare to see him so gentle, but also a sign that made her smile - no matter what the man said, he truly loved his siblings. Especially Klaus.

“Hey, Diego?”

The man stopped, holding a half-asleep Klaus carefully upright in her doorway. She fought back the urge to smile at his lolling head. “Yeah?”

“Be safe.”

“Sure-”

“-no, I mean that,” she interrupted, “truly. You’re too reckless sometimes and it’s gonna get you killed.”

Diego grinned. “Aww. You gettin’ soft on me, Y/N?”

“Shut up,” she grumbled, trying to will her face to not heat up at the accusation. “I’d just rather not have to pretend to cry at your funeral and play the grieving girlfriend role.”

“Ha. Love you too, baby.”

Y/N did not bother to throw any comeback after his retreating figure. She was too shaken by the way those four words had left his lips - sure, they were sarcastic, but they still sat heavy on her tongue as she silent repeated them. They made her feel weird, tingly in a sense she could not quite understand.

The door slammed shut, and she let her forehead fall after it, resting on the cool wind with fists at her side and questions swirling in her mind. Maybe she could do with another glass and miss out on attempting to sleep - not like she ever could after nights like this.

She sighed and made a mental note, one she knew she was going to forget in minutes, to yell at him about calling her baby again.

TAGLIST: @rangotangomango @fandomsandmore394 @thatkidofwarandpeace @antoouu (let me know if i missed you/you wanna be added)

#i need a favour series #diego hargreeves #diego hargreeves x reader #BABY #diego hargreeves oneshot #diego hargreeves imagine #fake dating au #tua x reader #tua imagine #the umbrella academy #back at my three am bullshit

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danetobelieve · 4 years ago

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Don’t Drop Dead || Athena and Winston

When: 22/06/2020 Who: @athenaquinn & @danetobelieve. Where: The carnival . Summary: Athena and Winston try the drop ride with varied success. Warnings: None

Winston shifted their glasses and shuffled their feet. The ice cream they’d bought from one of the stands as they waited for Athena to arrive was good. Really good. It was days like this when Winston really enjoyed the summers of Maine. The weather was amazing, the sun shining, the sky a deep sapphire and there wasn’t a single cloud in the sky. There was a cool breeze rolling in from the ocean and sure there was the weird creepy carnival music but Winston could forget that. They were determined to have a normal, cool, absolutely okay time. No weird supernatural shenanigans. Spotting Athena, they waved and made their way over. “Hey, you get here okay?”

When she’d first heard about the carnival, Athena had been intrigued. If nothing else, it gave her something else to occupy her mind after everything that had happened recently. Winston was a good person to spend time with, and she found herself feeling oddly relieved that they wanted to spend time with her. Something new, but not something she was used to feeling, but she did consider them a friend and there was a small pang somewhere in her whenever they said they didn’t want to spend time together. But you didn’t invite people you hated to the carnival - or at least good people like Winston didn’t. It was a nice day - just warm enough and perfect weather to finally break out her shorts and one of her Kappa Iota Lambda rush shirts. Casual, but she knew that she still looked good. Summertime did make hiding the knives a bit more difficult, but she still had one pressed against her hip bones, covered by her shirt. No matter how possibly normal this carnival might be, it was always important to be safe. She arrived and began to make her way over, pausing as they began walking too. “I did. Nice to do normal small town things.” Athena grinned at them. “So, what would you like to do first?” She shook her head for a moment, her gaze flicking over to their neck. “Actually, no, nevermind, what on earth happened to you?”

Honestly, Winston was amazed that the wound on their neck had healed as much as it had. They shared it now. With Luce and Nell. They each had a third of the same scar that Bea did. Where she had lost her head … quite literally. Fortunately however, they had been able to reattach it and now things were looking better for all of them. But Winston kind of sucked at lying. So they did their best not to. “Oh, this?” they knew that although it was mostly healed and just a few days away from becoming a fully healed scar, “I had a run in with some undead …” it wasn’t technically a lie, “and I got cut and it’s still healing. Don’t worry, it’s fine. I was with a bunch of other spell casters and a hunter came and helped us too so we were fine in the end.” Again, none of that was a lie. But they had been very careful to not explain that something was undead because of them. They knew the taboo around necromancy. They weren’t going to risk anything happening to the Vural’s because of this. They didn’t deserve that. “You want to go on one of the rides or something?” Winston tried to ignore Athena’s legs. But they were toned, the brief glance had told them that. It was infuriating that she was so hot. It was also infuriating that she was apparently so oblivious … to everything. “I heard that they’ve got some pretty good stuff this time round but I never really came here before so i don’t have a comparison point.”

At their mention of a run in with some undead Athena felt her body tense up. That vampire back months ago? Something else? But they mentioned that there was at least another hunter there and she breathed a sigh of relief. “At least someone else was there to help you. I hope everything got taken care of.” Even though part of her felt a small pang that they hadn’t thought to call her. Maybe it had been a slayer who’d come by, who’d sensed what was wrong and had helped out because of that. She’d focus on that rather than the fact that maybe they didn’t want to call on her. They’d agreed to go to the carnival with her and that was something. Maybe they were starting to understand her perspective more - or maybe, based on the fact that she caught them looking at her out of the corner of her eye - it was just that she was pretty. She’d take either. Perhaps the shorts had been a good choice outside of sheer practicality. “Sure, we can go on a ride!” She grinned. “Which one did you have in mind? I can’t recall if I’ve been to this carnival before, but it’ll be fun to go on some anyhow, I think.” She placed her hands on her hips and looked over to them. “What sounds best to you?”

“Oh, yeah, we solved the problem and having help is definitely great.” Bea was no longer dead, but August had instead taken her place. Winston didn’t regret their decision, they just weren’t sure that their conscience felt the same. It didn’t matter, they were going to have to learn to live with it because there was no going back now. Glancing around they spotted a drop ride and raised an eyebrow at it, the lurching pit in their stomach was already there. It had been there since they’d brought Bea back. It felt like they were boiling under their skin at moments and then at others it was just a pit. So what was a drop ride compared to that right? Eager to find something that they could do together, “We could try that?” Winston asked tentatively, “I don’t know what the ride is called but I guess it looks cool?” Winston wasn’t really the type to go to carnivals and fun fairs, theme parks were even kind of a step to far. But here they were anyway, trying their best to enjoy a more normal summer.

“I’m glad. Not that I’d ever doubt your skill in problem solving.” Athena gave a small nod. “You do know how to think fast and on your feet.” She watched them carefully as they took a look around the carnival. Truthfully, she did not care what the two of them did. While she loved the feeling of how busy the carnival was, she knew that she still had to keep an eye out. “Yeah, sure - if you’d like.” She bit her lip for a moment. “I don’t know what it’s called either, but it looks like quite something.” She could hear the sound of screams as the ride cycled back up again to start. It’s just a ride, not somewhere to save people. Probably. “Let’s do it.” She grabbed their hand for a moment and pulled them over to where the ride was, before dropping it and walking up to the operator. “We’d like to go next, please.” She flashed them a small smile. Always best to make a good first impression, if possible. The operator gave the two of them a once over with a small grin and motioned to stand in line, just behind a couple other people.

“You’ve lived in White Crest long enough to realise that sometimes you don’t have any choice other then thinking on your feet.” Winston almost protested when Athena grabbed their hand, before gratefully realising that they’d not grabbed the hand with the eye in it. That might’ve hurt. They weren’t really sure, no one had grabbed it yet. “Cool, yeah, sure, cool.” Winston smiled as best they could, honestly they were still recovering from the ritual. It was hot as shit. They weren’t sure that a drop ride was really the best idea but suddenly they were being ushered into the line. Winston watched the ride wind up, lifting the members of the public strapped into their seats high into the air before bringing them down before stopping just mere feet away from the ground. There were screams of delight, terror and horror. Winston’s stomach turned and they swallowed their fear the best they could. It was a ride. These were definitely safe. The silence got the better of them and Winston couldn’t help but break it. “Having a good summer?” Winston asked as they were harnessed into their seats.

“I mean, yes. I do in fact think on my feet a lot. I like to think it’s a good skill, though the ways that I have to do so aren’t always easily discussed with the wider world.” Athena raised an eyebrow. It was nice to be able to admit that, even though Winston didn’t know the full extent of what she did. Not that she cared, nor did she think whatever she did was wrong, but there was a small part of her that wanted to keep them out of at least part of it. Even though they hadn’t seemed to have any issue with her being a hunter she knew that it was not something she was supposed to talk about in most company. It was much nicer, anyhow, to just enjoy their company. Maybe she should have talked them out of this ride, she wondered, as she noticed their face as the two of them got towards the front of the line. One of the people working on the ride glanced at Winston with a broad smile on their face and Athena flashed them a glare. Not that she was even close to being nice all the time, but there was something about the smile that unnerved her just slightly. Before she could take time to process it, they were ushered onto the ride and Winston was asking her questions. “Huh? Yeah! I am!” She grinned. “Soccer camp starts in a bit over a week, and I’m super excited to help coach that. How about you? You graduated, right? What’s it like out in the big wide world?” They’d still have a minute or two while everyone else was buckling in. “Sorry I didn’t get you anything. I’ll have to do that soon.”

Everything always circled back to the fact that they weren’t normal and they weren’t in a normal place and it wasn’t a normal time. Winston didn’t mind. It wasn’t their fault. But even now they knew that there was this constant reminder that something was different. “If you couldn’t think on your feet then I would have legitimate concerns about your survival in this place.” As they were strapped into their seat, Winston listened carefully to what Athena had planned. “Oh, nice cool, soccer camp sounds like a good way to keep busy plus you get to enjoy all of this great weather.” There was the familiar click of a buckle sliding into place and then suddenly the attendants were stepping back. “Oh, yeah, I graduate-” Winston’s words were quite literally left behind them as they were shot up into the air. From the ground it hadn’t looked quite so violent. But in that second Winston was dragged through the air, the g-force causing any loose skin to ripple from the momentum of the ride. Winston’s mouth was open and screaming some obscenity but they were convinced that any sound they’d made had been left behind. As they were dragged through the air they were just as quickly falling and as the ground came flying towards them Winston was gripped with terrror and then as quickly as it all started it stopped. Gasping in breaths of air, Winston sat in silence for a moment before turning and looking at Athena. “I don’t remember what we were talking about…”

“I’ve been thinking on my feet and been darn good at it since I was tiny.” Athena raised an eyebrow. She wasn’t afraid to admit that. Orion would have said that she thought on her feet more than with her brain sometimes, but it got the both of them out of trouble so who was he to complain about her process? “Yeah, and it’s a good way to stay active, too.” Winston was about to comment when all of a sudden the ride started and it was not the sort of rush that she liked. Not one that she got from doing her duty, nor one she felt after a good game or run. Then, suddenly they were back on the ground she unclenched her hands from the fists that had formed, nails digging into the palms of her hands. “What?” She looked over to them. “I - I don’t either. I also worry I might be sick.” She looked over at them. “I’d like to be done with this ride though. Maybe go get a slush or something? It’s hot out.” She tugged at the collar of her shirt. One of the operators was walking over towards them, glancing over at Athena - they brushed against her shoulder and when she met their gaze, about to ask them if they could please be let off of the ride all she could see was her brother, dead on the floor, body cold. “No!” She screamed, pushing against the man. “I mean,” she caught her breath, looking around. Orion was nowhere to be seen. Her hands felt clammy and she looked over to Winston, before back to the man, “I see there - there’s others waiting to go. Can you let us off?” She wasn't afraid. She didn’t get afraid. That wasn’t her job.

“Some of us are clearly just born lucky,” Winston couldn’t help the sarcasm, of course they were joking. They hoped Athena didn’t take offense to it, they just hadn’t been a natural at any of this. They weren’t sure that they were even good at it now. They felt like they were often just doing enough to keep their head above the surface and that was it. “Exactly, staying active is very important.” Yet Winston really made little to no effort to stay fit, they hadn’t returned to the gym after happening to meet Athena there. Though that might’ve been more because of how busy they had been rather then anything more. “Yeah let’s definitely not do that again,” a drink sounded like a good idea, except Athena suddenly looked pale. Winston knew she wanted to get them off and this wasn’t that difficult tech. Reaching out with their mind they focussed on the locking mechanism and sending the relevant electrical charges to the right place. Except, of course they overdid it. They hadn’t anticipated the amount of power that was going to come surging out of them and the locks exploded open with quite a lot of force. The restraints snapping open and Winston couldn’t help but blush as people yelped in surprise. “That was weird…”

“I mean, I do have an advantage in the genetics department as far as that goes.” She raised an eyebrow. Athena didn’t speak for a moment after they’d stopped and the man had come over. Rio was okay, he was alive, everything was fine. Then why did she feel a sense of unease? Why did the man look like he was about to reach out again? All of a sudden there was a sound almost like an explosion and the locks opened with far greater force than normal. She caught Winston’s blush and nodded. “Really weird.” She felt herself practically fall out of the ride, though at least her natural abilities were always there for her, and so she caught herself, readjusting her position. She stood up and began walking away from the ride, hoping Winston would follow her. “I’m sorry. I just - well, never mind. We should go do something else.” She turned around and flashed a glare at the man. At least she’d thrown him off, at least she’d had the sense to do that. “I need something to eat. We should find that slush.” The coolness of the iron against her hip felt all too appealing, but this was a public space and she couldn’t do anything right now.

As Athena stumbled out of the ride, Winston was quick to follow suit. They’d decided the longer that they spent at this carnival the more certain they were that they didn’t want to come back if it was going to be like this every time. “I am glad that was over, I don’t think that will be a ride that I ever go on again.” They were worried about Athena. It was clear that whatever had happened to her on the ride had rattled her and Winston hadn’t ever seen her like that before. “Are you okay … did something happen other then the rides nearly exploding?” Winston felt guilty about that but from the way that Athena had reacted they had tried to get her out of the situation that made her uncomfortable as soon as they could. “Defo, let’s get some food.” Winston wanted a corndog, where better place to get one at a carnival?

“I don’t think I’ll go on one of those ever again, either.” Athena half-whispered. Then Winston was asking how she was and she shook her head. “I just saw something back there. Something that there’s no way was real. I don’t - I’m not seeing things, though.” She bit her lip. “Like, I don’t know, a vision - something that I’ve only seen in the worst parts of my imagination, of what-ifs.” She forced a smile onto her lips and bumped her hip against one of theirs. Trying to at least attempt to make light of it. “Good. Maybe I just haven’t eaten enough.” She knew of some creatures - not as much detail as she should have - that could cause horrifying visions, but the idea of them running a ride made her feel ill. “I’ll buy. I should probably get myself something that isn’t just sugar. Maybe I’ll go all out and get fries or something.” She grinned. “What about you?”

Frowning gently at Athena’s description of what had happened to her, Winston sighed and nodded. “That is weird,” they didn’t know what the hell could’ve caused that sort of thing for Athena and they were pretty sure that she wasn’t the type to get hysterical or freak out and make things up, no they believed her, “let’s make sure that we keep some distance between them, it just sounds like they got to you a bit maybe?” Winston wasn’t really sure honestly what the hell they’d done to Athena but they didn’t want to repeat the performance for her. “It’s pretty hot too, we can chill out for a bit and try and calm down….” Winston honestly couldn’t have felt more useless if they had tried. “Uh, maybe a corndog or something…” they shrugged, “we could see what they’ve got?”

“Really weird. I - I’ll ask when I go home.” She shrugged off the would-be mention of her parents. Clearly they were hunters, if she was, but she also didn’t want to go down that route. Not right now, right now she’d focus on Winston. They were there. They were a solid, real person for Athena to focus on. “I guess, it’s whatever.” She shrugged. “It is hot, and I think I’m just about done with rides. We can just eat and walk around or whatever?” She looked over at them and smiled. “Hey, it’s okay! Maybe I didn’t sleep well enough, or something? I’d love to go and see what they’ve got.” She took a few steps forward and turned back to look at them. “I appreciate what you did back there, both for the sheer wow factor and for helping me out. Goodness knows I didn’t want them getting us out of that ride.”

Raising an eyebrow, Winston blushed a little bit. They had been hoping that their little incident on the ride hadn’t been noticed but of course it had been. Athena was as observant as ever, which made sense. “Yeah, well, you looked like you needed an out and I wanted to do my best to give us one without drawing too much attention.” Which they hadn’t exactly succeeded in, maybe that wasn’t that important though. No one had realised it was them aside from Athena and she knew about their magic. Had for a while. “That’s a good idea,” Winston agreed as they headed towards the stalls of food, it was your standard affair. Nothing really out of place. Nothing that you wouldn’t expect to be there. “You have something that you want specifically?”

“Well, I’ve saved you, you’ve saved me, I think I like how this is all balancing itself out, don’t you?” Athena winked at them. “Besides, you know this town, they’ll just say it was some hardware malfunction or something else and everyone will forget about it.” She offered them a soft smile. “If anything, maybe they’ll pause that ride for a while and that can only benefit everyone.” She pulled a scrunchie off of her wrist and tied her hair up into a ponytail before focusing back on Winston. “I think I could do with some fries first, at least - which you’re welcome to share, if you want. Maybe we’ll find a booth with both those and the corndog you’re looking for?”

“I don’t know if that is necessarily comparable to fighting off a bunch of vampires, but I’ll take it anyway.” Winston returned her wink with a smile. Despite everything they still enjoyed Athena’s company and she was Rio’s sister. They wanted to make Rios family work for him, but somehow they couldn’t help but think about the fact that Rio’s parents had definitely been the worst parents there were. Was Athena really entirely to blame for the way she’d turned out? “I was hoping that it would just be clocked to a malfunction or something because people wouldn’t know for sure what had happened, I think I’m safe. Besides, if anyone normal asks they’re not going to believe in magic. “Uh, we can definitely look,” it didn’t take long for Winston to locate a food truck that had both. “Do you want a slushie too?”

“Well, I think it’s plenty impressive. Besides, I don’t always fight vampires,” her tone was hushed, now. Even if other people didn’t believe in the supernatural, Athena didn’t want them overhearing, “that’s not my specialty.” She gave a half-hearted shrug. “I bet they will. I mean, magic?” Her voice was still quiet, only audible to Winston. “As if! You know these sorts of cheap rides, they’re always breaking down.” She followed their gaze to the food truck. “Oh, wonderful. I’m paying, and sure, I’ll get a slush. When in Rome, right?”

#p: athena #para #chatzy para #chatzy #wickedswriting #Don't Drop dead

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