#like shes not supposed to look inhumanly big

[leoleolovesdc]

Look, I know that Marinette takes more physical aspects from her mom than her dad, but have you looked at that man’s size? He’s all huge and buff, and now I need to see Mari being big and buff just like her dad. I want her to be taller than Adrien and most of the other kids from her school, I want her to have a square/rectangle body type, I want her to be able to pick her friends up and lift them from the ground when she’s hugging them, I want her to look like a gigantic fucking teddy bear and when she embraces you it’s like you’re being swallowed by a big soft godzilla

[thisisnotawebsitedotcom-com]

Computer Code: PLATINUM PAZ

A story of a nightmare of Pacifica will be shown.

The text says:

Pacifica stormed into her palatial bedroom and slammed the door so hard her chandeliers shook. (There were at least 3 chandeliers in Pacifica’s room, including a teensy chandelier over her nightlight.) She buried her head in a velvet pillow and screamed for an inhumanly long time, then flopped over and stewed at the painted cherubs on her ceiling. It wasn’t FAIR. After everything she did for her parents- get up at 5 for fencing lessons, beauty pageants, fox-hunting, butler-hunting, cleaning up the black feathers after dads weird “grown up masquerade parties”- THIS is how they repay her? HER! PACIFICA ELISA NORTHWEST?!

It had been a rough summer for Pacifica- first she came alarmingly close to losing a Party Crown, then her golf skills were called into question, and now her parents grounded her for literally saving the entire family from a Category 10 ghost and shut off the spigot on her caviar tap for rest of the year. What was she supposed to eat now? Dog Food? She angrily opened her mini-fridge and pulled out an UpperCrustablesTM brand snack pack and angrily spread the caviar on the tiny baguette. “Ugh, why does it come with this dumb little stick? The caviar always gets stuck in the CORNERS!”

She looked at a napkin where Dipper had written the shack’s phone number in case killing the ghost might have created a “double ghost.” Ha! As if she would put HIS number in HER phone.

Everything in her life used to make so much more sense before those PINES twins came along and screwed everything up. That stupid Mabel and her baffling, undeserved confidence. That know-it-all sweat stain Dipper who’s giant head was always butting against hers. Something about Dipper’s words had knocked over a domino in her mind that started a chain reaction that was causing her whole identity to come crashing down. He told her she had potential to change into…a better person? How do you become a better person when you’re already the best person? It didn’t make sense!

Thinking about it exhausted her, and soon, her eyelids began to droop.

Soon she was...

Zzzz...

In Pacifica’s dream, she was freshening up at a party washing her hands when she noticed something... red swirling in the drain.

In horror, she discovered her hands were covered in blood, and no matter how hard she scrubbed them, they wouldn’t come clean. On the mirror, words slowly started two write themselves on their own, as if by an invisible hand…

BLOOD ON YOUR HANDS

“NO, NO, IT’S NOT MY FAULT!”

An overpowering sense of guilt swelled inside as she fled to the ballroom for help, where she spotted her friends gossiping by a tapestry. She tried to flip them around, but when she grabbed their shoulders, they fell over, flat, They were... cardboard? She turned to her parents, and they fell over flat too. The entire party was filled with flat, 2D people, everyone was fake. Blood began to fill the ballroom, pouring from the clock, from the paintings, from the ceiling. Why was this happening?! She raced through her manor in a blind panic, when she discovered she was no longer in the mansion, but outside in Gravity Falls. When she looked down, she realized she was now 100 feet tall, and every step she made was wrecking the town. She knocked over the mudflap factory, polluting the river. She knocked over the orphanage, sending coughing soot-covered children out into the cold.

She kept apologizing, but she was too big, too public, every step hurting more and more people. Everyone could see that the town’s problems were her fault. She was a monster. She always had been. She always would be.

Pacifica started sobbing and suddenly, she was a little girl again, hiding behind the vine-covered tombstones in the graveyard behind the Manor after another one of her parents fights. The graves of her ancestors loomed above her like gargoyles, great Northwests in history. What would they say if they could see her like this?

One of the statues slowly turned to face Pacifica. It was Nathaniel Northwest.

“Get a hold of yourself. You’re a Northwest, people can’t know you leak shame-water.”

“You’re right,” Pacifica apologized, and hastily took out her compact to clean her smeared makeup. She cursed as she saw how dishevelled she was.

The statue watched her like a cat hungrily watching a mouse.

“You have a lot of anger, don’t you.”

“Anyone whose not angry is an idiot. There’s so much to be mad about.”

“Yes. Anger is good. Anger is useful. Who are you angry at, Pacifica?”

“Everything was better before the PINES came to town...”

“You know, I might be able to help with that... there’s something I want. The Mystery Shack is going to be getting some new merchandise very soon. A small snow globe, nothing anyone would miss. If you could shoplift it for me, I could guarantee things would change. You’d never deal with the Pines again...”

Pacifica closed her compact. Would that fix everything?

“It would be so easy... all you have to do to get your old life back is shake...my...hand”

The statue extended its stony hand. Thunder rumbled in the distance.

Slowly she reached out to shake- then abruptly stopped. Something was off.

“My old life... wasn’t really mine, was it? All I ever did was follow my mom and dad. Maybe... it would be better to...make a new one.”

The STATUE BELLOWED with RAGE.

“MAKE? HA! YOU INHERIT. YOUR FAMILY LEGACY IS ALL YOU’RE WORTH. YOU MAKE NOTHING. YOU CAN’T EVEN MAKE FRIENDS.”

This had always been true... in the past.

His hand extended toward her. Looming. Trembling. She remembered a time when a hand extended toward her, offering a free snack in the back seat of a car.

“MAKE THE DEAL YOU LITTLE FAKE BLONDE IMPENDING PATERNITY TEST”

Pacifica’s face relaxed. She knew it was cliché, but she knew she had to do it. She slowly extended her hand. Just as the giant lichen-covered hand was about to close around hers like a cage of stone fingers, she swung her arm up and behind her head.

“Sike.”

“WHAT?!”

“Too slow!”

“YOU WORM!!!! YOU WORTHLESS WASTE OF STOLEN INCOME!!!! YOU’LL NEVER AMOUNT TO ANYTHING. I SEE A FUTURE WHERE YOU’RE PENNILESS, WORKING AT THE DINER, YOU’LL HAVE NOTHING, YOU-”

The statue shook with rage, sending cracks from its hand all the way up to its shrieking head. It crumbled apart in front of her, screaming in pain.

GONG!

Pacifica awoke with a start, panting. The clock in the hallway had struck 3 AM. She was covered in sweat. What had she been dreaming about? She couldn’t remember. She didn’t want to remember.

She wasn’t quite sure why, but she removed a tapestry that she’d always had on her wall. Something her family had no doubt looted ages ago- of a glowing triangle over the mountains. She rolled it up and put it in the closet and locked the padlock. Maybe she should hold onto Dipper’s number just in case. She entered it into her phone and felt an odd sense of calm suddenly wash over her. It was quiet once again in Northwest Manor.

Pacifica slept better than she had in years.

There is a hidden cipher below all the text:

VWDB DZDB IURP KHU FLSKHU. VKH KDV WKH SURWHFWLRQ RI WKH OXPEHUIRONV VSLULWV.

[duskyashe]

NaNoWriMo Day #27

[masterlist]

Prompt found here

Thanks @stealingyourbones and @newdog14 for the prompt!

=============‹«⟨∆⟩»›=============

"—the door will remain locked and sealed, with a small amount of anesthetic gasses pumped into the room at ten minute intervals, until either you're rescued or one of you answers my riddle! What... Does the sign at the cemetery say?" The Riddler asked through the speaker above the door.

"Do not pass."

The answer was out of his mouth barely a second after the riddle was said; though, to be fair, it was less of a riddle and more of a pun—a death pun at that, which he'd spent the majority of his teens researching and creating more of. Jazz had said it was his way of coping with his accident, and, well, she wasn't exactly wrong, okay?

Danny's stomach dropped to his knees in realization. Three simple words, spoken reflexively and without intent, had just destroyed everything. He was supposed to be keeping his head down, not drawing attention to himself, and here he was, throwing three years worth of hard work down the drain. He was screwed. Jazz was going to be so disappointed in him, he knew it.

He was starting to worry he'd been wrong, and his fellow hostages were about to see him get shot or something equally traumatizing, when the light on the lock turned green. He breathed a sigh of relief and cautiously opened the door. Riddler could usually be trusted to keep his word, but Danny wanted to be safe. He didn't want to put his faith in the man relying on a single riddle—a pun at that—for his entire plan. The universe just wasn't that kind to him. But no, there really had only been the one pun locked door between unconsciousness and freedom. Danny sighed. This just wasn't his night.

=============‹«⟨∆⟩»›=============

When Danny had finished with his report, he wasn't surprised in the least to get called to Gordon's office. He hadn't been there since he'd been offered his promotion, which he was coming to regret accepting in spite of the serious boost to his paycheck. Ever since he'd been promoted to Major Crime, he'd been having more and more run-ins with Gotham's rogues, both on and off the clock. He'd known it was only a matter of time before he caught the wrong kind of attention, the kind of attention he'd been hoping to avoid for as long as possible. He could handle rogues, he could handle some extra scrutiny from his co-workers for how often he got away from said rogues unscathed, but the Bat? He had wanted to avoid him for as long as humanly—and inhumanly—possible, but after tonight's events... Let's just say he hoped he'd be able to transfer to another city's police force once Batman was done with him.

"Nightingale, you up for some old fashioned stair climbing tonight?" Gordon may have phrased it like a question, but Danny knew it wasn't.

"Yes, sir," he replied with a sigh. Oh well, might as well get this over with. And besides, he kinda wanted to see the bat signal up close and personal before he was outed as not human.

=============‹«⟨∆⟩»›=============

On the roof of the police department, Danny glanced at Gordon before he walked over to the giant spotlight that had become so iconic. The bat symbol in the center of the unlit light provoked such a sense of relief and respect in the normal Gotham citizen when it was seen, but Danny could only see his visions for the future go up in smoke.

"I'm assuming I'm up here to meet the big guy?" Danny asked without looking back at his boss.

"He said he had some questions for you. Hope you don't mind."

He sighed but shook his head. "Not really, I actually was kind of expecting it at some point, considering my track record so far." Danny heard the soft sound of someone carefully landing on an asphalt roof and took a bracing breath.

"Daniel J Nightingale, twenty-four, from a small town in Illinois, one sister, one cousin, no parents on record. Your records are good, they nearly had us fooled, but Oracle found something you missed when falsifying them."

Danny turned to face the dark knight. He leveled the man a challenging look. "What are you going to do about it?"

The man slowly stalked toward Danny until he was within arms reach. "I'm going to do what I should have done a long time ago," he said. Danny blinked and suddenly, Batman's arms were around Danny's shoulders and he was being drawn into a hug. "I'm sorry I never knew about you. I'm sorry I never looked." After a moment to process what was happening, Danny melted into the hug and returned it.

"It's okay. You couldn't have known. I forgive you, dad," he whispered through his tears. Well, that wasn't as bad as he'd feared it would be.

=============‹«⟨∆⟩»›=============

Sorry for not posting anything at all yesterday, as you may know, it was my birthday yesterday, and life got a bit hectic (⁠´⁠-⁠﹏⁠-⁠`⁠；⁠) and not in a fun way. We had some bad news come in from a family member out west, and it threw all our plans into chaos and disarray. Today was better, no bad news bombs got dropped on me today, though it was very exhausting, so I'm not sure how well this ficlet turned out, sorry (⁠^⁠～⁠^⁠;⁠)⁠ゞ

I'm probably going to play a bit fast and loose with my personal NaNoWriMo rules for the rest of this week, cuz I've been struggling to find prompts I'm actually interested in writing (⁠；⁠^⁠ω⁠^⁠）hopefully I can get a few sequels or third parts out before the end of the month!

Have a good morning/day/night!

[deadly-espresso]

(OC: Maggie)

Remember that boogeyman that I said was haunting my OC Maddie? Well, this is her! This little disappointment is basically what you'd get if you put a delinquent, probably hormone-addled teenage girl in the body of a sleep paralysis demon. She does want to scare people (it's in her blood, I suppose), and she probably does have some spooky hobbies but otherwise she's harmless (at least as harmless as a boogeyman can be) and just wants to have some fun and make some friends in the real world and the dream world.

Some fun facts about her:

*Her voice sounds... bug-like. Her voice is like a cicada's song, except it can sort-of enunciate actual words. As one might expect, she isn't all that intelligible unless she speaks very carefully, so sometimes she opts to communicate with Maddie by leaving notes in her bedroom instead. (For the lore, I ended up deciding that most boogeymen had some sort of strange speed impediment, like some would have inhumanly low-pitched or high-pitched voices, or they'd have some other kind of audio distortion)

*Her hair is prehensile and can function as extra arms. The two big hair flicks on her head (not counting the cowlick) are actually antennae, so they can be used for smell and chemoreception. The tips of her fingers also have taste receptors on them (similar to the taste receptors that insects have on their legs), and in fact they're better at tasting things than her own tongue, which is highly acidic and specialized in breaking down food. (Funny enough, I had given her proper insect antennae in early sketches I had of her, but having her antennae and hair be different colors didn't look right)

*I was originally thinking her real given name would be Marjorie, but I ended up changing it to Magory because I thought that name would be an easier name to get the nickname "Maggie" from. (It's not a real name, but it does bring to mind names such as Mallory and Margery)

[iwritenarrativesandstuff]

Trimax Thoughts Vol. 2 Pt. 1

Miscellaneous stupid little thoughts for this volume again! Yippee!

...dude kills people with a saxophone. Okay then. Sure. I will incorporate this into my belief system.

This guy actually tried to warn them... the Gung-Ho Guns are actually really interesting. I hope to see some expansion on their individual motives.

LEGATO WTF. WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT.

I swear he gets cuter in every volume. Look at him.

I would love to know where the GHG get their outfits from... are they like. Coordinating? Is leather in style? Ok, really though, I'm fascinated by the way Knives has... well... knives (or maybe spears?) that almost look like they are piercing his neck, and a big one that looks like it runs straight through his chest. Pointy bits to keep people away from his vulnerable throat and heart, I suppose? A mask to cover his face? Idk. His outfit is certainly a look.

"I just can't catch a break," Midvalley says, in what is a very normal reaction to being forcibly contorted in half on the floor.

They are such idiots together. Bless.

You walk up to someone, he tries to kill you with a sword then tells you he and his beleaguered assassin coworkers are there to cause you eternal suffering. Wdyd?

Hm. That's called sunk cost fallacy, my dude. (Also probably has a bit to do with maintaining honour or pride associated with sword technique... maybe.) Hey have you noticed that the assassins here tend to have one technique they've spent a lifetime mastering and then as soon as Vash manages to counter it that's... just kind of it for them? Monev spent 20 years training and then was nearly killed and just... stopped. EG Mine got his weird hamster ball destroyed and was basically useless after that. Dominique's trick was discovered and she chose to die by jumping rather than wait to be killed. And here, Rai-Dei sees his technique has been bested and immediately abandons his honour to try and stab Vash in the back. I need to take a closer look at this as I'm reading about the rest of them.

Yayyy girls! I love them.

I really appreciate Jessie btw. She sees that Meryl and Milly consider Vash a friend, and despite the fact that all she would've heard of him are the July and Fifth Moon incidents and rumours about his dangerousness, she decides purely based on how much the girls are excited to see him again that he's probably not a bad guy at all and she wouldn't mind meeting him. It's just nice to see random people in this world (that we've been shown over and over again is extremely inhospitable) giving people the benefit of the doubt.

Wolfwood's nightmare sequence. painpainpainpainpain

Vash concussion arc. Lol. (Also I have a lot of thoughts about the theme of protecting one's home that's coming up here... but more on that later)

AUGH???

"The models were dissected while alive" HOLY FUCK. WHAT. EVEN THE BABY? WHAT THE FUCK

The fact that Rai-Dei couldn't feel a single trace of death when challenging Vash but now both Leonof and Wolfwood are terrified because Vash is literally radiating death and pain at the loss of these people. Something something suppressing the force and overwhelm of his loss, which he's carried around inside him for such an inhumanly long time that it is literally overpowering and incomprehensibly terrifying. Something something he cares so much about his family and so very little for himself. Ha. I feel so normal about this.

Well, this was cheery.

If you're wondering why I said hardly anything about Wolfwood here... stay tuned. There will be a part two. :)

[those-arg-decoders]

platinum paz

Pacifica stormed into her palatial bedroom and slammed the door so hard her chandeliers shook. (There were at least 3 chandeliers in Pacifica’s room, including a teensy chandelier over her nightlight.) She buried her head in a velvet pillow and screamed for an inhumanly long time, then flopped over and stewed at the painted cherubs on her ceiling. It wasn��t FAIR. After everything she did for her parents- get up at 5 for fencing lessons, beauty pageants, fox-hunting, butler-hunting, cleaning up the black feathers after dads weird “grown up masquerade parties”- THIS is how they repay her? HER! PACIFICA ELISA NORTHWEST?!

It had been a rough summer for Pacifica- first she came alarmingly close to losing a Party Crown, then her golf skills were called into question, and now her parents grounded her for literally saving the entire family from a Category 10 ghost and shut off the spigot on her caviar tap for rest of the year. What was she supposed to eat now? Dog Food? She angrily opened her mini-fridge and pulled out an UpperCrustablesTM brand snack pack and angrily spread the caviar on the tiny baguette. “Ugh, why does it come with this dumb little stick? The caviar always gets stuck in the CORNERS!”

She looked at a napkin where Dipper had written the shack’s phone number in case killing the ghost might have created a “double ghost.” Ha! As if she would put HIS number in HER phone.

Everything in her life used to make so much more sense before those PINES twins came along and screwed everything up. That stupid Mabel and her baffling, undeserved confidence. That know-it-all sweat stain Dipper who’s giant head was always butting against hers. Something about Dipper’s words had knocked over a domino in her mind that started a chain reaction that was causing her whole identity to come crashing down. He told her she had potential to change into…a better person? How do you become a better person when you’re already the best person? It didn’t make sense!

Thinking about it exhausted her, and soon, her eyelids began to droop.

Soon she was...

     she was...

In Pacifica’s dream, she was freshening up at a party washing her hands when she noticed something... red swirling in the drain.

In horror, she discovered her hands were covered in blood, and no matter how hard she scrubbed them, they wouldn’t come clean. On the mirror, words slowly started two write themselves on their own, as if by an invisible hand…

“NO, NO, IT’S NOT MY FAULT!”

An overpowering sense of guilt swelled inside as she fled to the ballroom for help, where she spotted her friends gossiping by a tapestry. She tried to flip them around, but when she grabbed their shoulders, they fell over, flat, They were... cardboard? She turned to her parents, and they fell over flat too. The entire party was filled with flat, 2D people, everyone was fake. Blood began to fill the ballroom, pouring from the clock, from the paintings, from the ceiling. Why was this happening?! She raced through her manor in a blind panic, when she discovered she was no longer in the mansion, but outside in Gravity Falls. When she looked down, she realized she was now 100 feet tall, and every step she made was wrecking the town. She knocked over the mudflap factory, polluting the river. She knocked over the orphanage, sending coughing soot-covered children out into the cold.

She kept apologizing, but she was too big, too public, every step hurting more and more people. Everyone could see that the town’s problems were her fault. She was a monster. She always had been. She always would be.

Pacifica started sobbing and suddenly, she was a little girl again, hiding behind the vine-covered tombstones in the graveyard behind the Manor after another one of her parents fights. The graves of her ancestors loomed above her like gargoyles, great Northwests in history. What would they say if they could see her like this?

One of the statues slowly turned to face Pacifica. It was Nathaniel Northwest.

“Get a hold of yourself. You’re a Northwest, people can’t know you leak shame-water.”

“You’re right,” Pacifica apologized, and hastily took out her compact to clean her smeared makeup. She cursed as she saw how dishevelled she was.

The statue watched her like a cat hungrily watching a mouse.

“You have a lot of anger, don’t you.”

“Anyone whose not angry is an idiot. There’s so much to be mad about.”

“Yes. Anger is good. Anger is useful. Who are you angry at, Pacifica?”

“Everything was better before the PINES came to town...”

“You know, I might be able to help with that... there’s something I want. The Mystery Shack is going to be getting some new merchandise very soon. A small snow globe, nothing anyone would miss. If you could shoplift it for me, I could guarantee things would change. You’d never deal with the Pines again...”

Pacifica closed her compact. Would that fix everything?

“It would be so easy... all you have to do to get your old life back is shake...my...hand”

The statue extended its stony hand. Thunder rumbled in the distance.

Slowly she reached out to shake- then abruptly stopped. Something was off.

“My old life... wasn’t really mine, was it? All I ever did was follow my mom and dad. Maybe... it would be better to...make a new one.”

The STATUE BELLOWED with RAGE.

“MAKE? HA! YOU INHERIT. YOUR FAMILY LEGACY IS ALL YOU’RE WORTH. YOU MAKE NOTHING. YOU CAN’T EVEN MAKE FRIENDS.”

This had always been true... in the past.

His hand extended toward her. Looming. Trembling. She remembered a time when a hand extended toward her, offering a free snack in the back seat of a car.

“MAKE THE DEAL YOU LITTLE FAKE BLONDE IMPENDING PATERNITY TEST”

Pacifica’s face relaxed. She knew it was cliché, but she knew she had to do it. She slowly extended her hand. Just as the giant lichen-covered hand was about to close around hers like a cage of stone fingers, she swung her arm up and behind her head.

“Sike.”

“WHAT?!”

“Too slow!”

“YOU WORM!!!! YOU WORTHLESS WASTE OF STOLEN INCOME!!!! YOU’LL NEVER AMOUNT TO ANYTHING. I SEE A FUTURE WHERE YOU’RE PENNILESS, WORKING AT THE DINER, YOU’LL HAVE NOTHING, YOU-”

The statue shook with rage, sending cracks from its hand all the way up to its shrieking head. It crumbled apart in front of her, screaming in pain.

GONG!

Pacifica awoke with a start, panting. The clock in the hallway had struck 3 AM. She was covered in sweat. What had she been dreaming about? She couldn’t remember. She didn’t want to remember.

She wasn’t quite sure why, but she removed a tapestry that she’d always had on her wall. Something her family had no doubt looted ages ago- of a glowing triangle over the mountains. She rolled it up and put it in the closet and locked the padlock. Maybe she should hold onto Dipper’s number just in case. She entered it into her phone and felt an odd sense of calm suddenly wash over her. It was quiet once again in Northwest Manor.

Pacifica slept better than she had in years.

[comfort-charrie-berry]

TimeCrossed (Portal fic) Chapter 4: The break room

Word count: 938

Warnings: None!

Enjoy! -Berry🍓

Chapter three here!

The week went by slowly, as it always does when something exciting is coming up. 

Whenever Chell had to bring something to his area of offices she’d come discuss with him how his mother was and if she should bring anything with her. 

Richard caught on immediately and grilled Wheatley until he had to tell him the full story. 

“Bird watching? Not a fancy dinner or a trip to the pictures?” 

Wheatley shrugged, keeping his eyes on work. “It’s not a date, mate. She’s just, just visiting.” 

“To meet your mom?” 

“Yes?” 

“And see your house that you grew up in” 

“…Yes?” 

Richard gave him a look. “Buddy, that’s a serious date you have on your hands.” 

Wheatley blushed. “She’s just popping by to watch birds with my Mum. If anything she’s only coming to see my Mum.” 

Richard shrugged and went back to work. “If you say so lover boy.” 

On his break he walked into the business kitchen to grab his lunch. 

There stood Chell, holding a small child.

She smiled. “Hello. You on lunch break?” 

He nodded. “Y-yeah. The one time in the day I can stretch my inhumanly long legs. Who’s your friend there?” 

She hoisted the young boy higher on her hip. “This little guy is my cousin. Dad invited his brother and son over to see the place and they left the son with me for a bit.” 

“Ah okay. Understandable. You seem great with…um children.” 

The little boy opened his amber eyes and looked at Wheatley. 

Wheatley waved at him and smiled. 

The boy hid his face in Chell’s hair and giggled. 

Chell smiled. “Sorry, he’s shy.” “No it’s okay. I am as well, of course. I understand you little man.” 

She swayed a little to help lull the boy to sleep and Wheatley felt an odd warmth in his chest. 

“He had a busy morning. Was so excited to see his uncle and ask if he could go to space.” 

“Space?” 

Chell chuckled and rubbed the boy’s back. “Yeah, it’s his dream to go to space. Scientific dreams run my family I suppose.” 

Wheatley’s boss and another well dressed man entered the break room. Wheatley backed up instinctively and watched them. The other man walked to Chell and took the now sleeping child from her. 

“Thank you hon. How’d you get him to sleep after all his excitement?” 

Chell smiled and then looked to her father who answered, “What’d I tell you? Chelsea is as good as they come. She’s going to do many scientific breakthroughs in her time, just you wait.” 

Wheatley busied himself by trying to look for his food and act like he was not listening, but out of the corner of his eye he noticed Chell’s expression become more forced.

She nodded and stood straighter. 

Her uncle checked his watch and sighed. “Well I hate to cut this short, but I gotta get home. The wife is making a big lunch for us and we don’t wanna be late!” He leaned over and gave Chell a side hug. 

She smiled and hugged him back. “Good to see you Uncle Joseph.” 

“Good to see you too honey. And don’t let your dad overwork you okay? If he causes any trouble you call me and I’ll give him a stern talking to.” 

She chuckled and nodded as the two men shook hands and bid their goodbyes. 

Wheatley tried to sneak out of the room around Chell’s father but he was stopped. 

“Wheatley! How’s my favorite records boy?” 

The man pat Wheatley on the back hard. 

Wheatley tried to get air back into his lungs after the blow. “I’m in accounting, sir.” 

“Ah accounting, records, same thing! Hey listen, I heard you were on a call with my daughter recently?” 

Chell’s face grew worried and Wheatley looked at the man, trying to stay calm. “Yes, I had a question about the latest delivery but I didn’t want to bother you.” 

She looked at her father, wondering if he’d fall for it. 

“Working on a weekend are we, Mr Wheatley?” 

“Y-yes sir. You know me, always making sure that good ol’ Aperture science is running as smoothly as it can!” 

The man gave him one more hard back pat. “That’s my boy. Good job. Just, call me next time okay? You have my personal number.” With that he left the room. 

Chell and Wheatley stood silent and glanced at each other. 

“Well um, that went, that went well. I think? But I suppose lying to your father isn’t the best course of action if I want to be your friend is it?” 

She shrugged and wrapped her arms around herself. “No it’s okay. My dad can be…a lot. If you’d have told him the truth, I don’t think it would’ve ended well.” 

Wheatley swallowed hard. “U-um. Okay. Should I be worried?” 

She shook her head. “No. I’m a grown woman, I can do and see who I want.” 

That didn’t ease his fear but he trusted her so he nodded. 

“We still on for Saturday morning?” 

“Yeah, that is if you, if you still want to come?” 

She nodded and put a hand on his arm. “Are you kidding? I’ve been looking forward to this all week!” 

He smiled. “I have too! You’d not believe how much my Mum is getting ready. She’s got her bird book all ready, along with a bird encyclopedia and several books she got from the library. The woman is crazy.” 

Chell laughed. “I love her already. Tell her I’m looking forward to it just as much as she is.” 

[nemusnail]

It's actually terribly inconvenient to be caught in a superhero battle on your way to work. The main reason for this is obviously that no matter how hard you try, you will always arrive to work late, and a lot of companies are not very lenient on tardiness of any kind. Their logic being that people would start stopping to watch the superhero battles rather than hurry to work, they decided to avoid the whole worm of cans altogether and just punish their workers for circumstances out of their control. This is, of course, a bit of a problem when workers need to put together a travel schedule to get to work on time, because a schedule is based on predictable events, and superheroes don't usually thrive on predicability. Therefore, an irrational amount of extra time is added to the schedule just to be safe.

Time and time again, though, the world proves to be hellbent on mocking ordinary people's lives.

Take, for example, Ms. Marjorie Elaine Miller's current predicament pertaining to her usual 6 am train being derailed by a stray starblast from the superhero "Shooting star" (appropriately named for his penchant for shooting incredibly small, literal stars. He however lacks the luck his name indicates he should grant should he be seen. He is in fact not often seen, though his mess certainly is, and if you managed to be caught in the same area as him, you would not, in fact, be lucky).

Ms. Marjorie Elaine Miller was not badly injured in the train accident, although she most likely had a slight concussion, but her travel schedule certainly took a hit.

This was not only terribly inconvenient, but also pretty bad. Marjorie had been very unlucky the last year and racked up many write-ups for arriving late due to traffic and superheroes, even despite her early train. "They do say that crime never sleeps, so I suppose it wasn't improbable that it would also be up at 6 am," she tried to reason with the manager after a train crash earlier that year, but he was not amused. (Which was a shame, really. He seemed exactly the person that desperately needed something to laugh at.)

As a result Marjorie had started taking an even earlier train, but there is a limit to how much one can do when you're dangerously low on sleep, and after coming particularly late home the day before, she unintentionally slept in and missed the train. Therefore, she had to gamble on her usual train.

If her luck that day was any indication, we can assume she would have made a terrible gambler.

At long last, she arrived at work twenty minutes after she was supposed to.

Entering the door, her coworker's eyes darted up at her almost inhumanly, watching her intently as she quickly and quietly walked to her desk. Some snickered, but most knew the look on her face, and as they glanced at the time, they too adopted a similar expression out of empathy.

She sat down at her desk. The floor was dead silent apart from the clacking of keys on computers. Then, the storm came.

The storm, legally named Hugo Bartholomew Kelman, actually fit his real name slightly better than his nickname. Storms usually have the connotation of something big and majestic, but Hugo was just a lanky and awkward middle-aged man that could make a huge racket. And that was exactly what he had come to do.

"Ms. Miller," he said with almost too much of a smirk, bordering on actual enthusiasm. "Did you come in late again?"

Hugo lived a block away. He took his pretentious electric scooter to work. The scooter had flames on its sides. He had painted them himself. They weren't proportional to each other.

Marjorie took a deep breath. This could only really go two ways, and a 50% chance of a bad outcome, usually means it will go bad. That's just math. At least Marjorie's math.

Just by looking at Hugo, you could tell: he thrived on others' suffering. That is why Marjorie decided she would not give him the satisfaction of having the truth and then crushing her. She would rather lie.

"Actually no, there was a time travel mishap and they had to reset the clocks this morning, so I'm thirty minutes early. You should try knowing what's going on every once in a while, keep up with the times, you know?"

Though he was about to take her job, that retort made her feel better than she had felt in several weeks, even though she would probably have felt much better if she wasn't aware that Hugo was about to take her job.

Well, technically, Hugo couldn't take her job, as he was not the manager; he was just annoying. But there was one thing this annoying bastard could take: the manager out to lunch and tattle like his life depended on it (which it probably did. Marjorie had never seen him work. Maybe this was the only use he had).

The manager was a solemn brick of an imitation of a man. He had no sense of humor, little to no concept of empathy, and a distinct lack of eye contact skill. Talking to a brick wall was more engaging. But, somehow, he had taken, -not a liking, it was unclear what he liked, but - a passive accepting attitude towards Hugo's presence. (Maybe Hugo's only useful skill was the one he actively used for his own gain. That fits.)

A character who's sole motivation is "I will not die, not here, not like this, and not after only having had a shitty job" and "I am not a warrior in any way, shape or form but I do actually know how to do my taxes" and "NOPE. get me out of here immediately, no prophesies, the prophecy can't be fulfilled if no one lives to hear it." She is the very embodiment of spite, does care for people but in a very not-until-they-are-mortally-wounded-will-i-show-it way. She is like *actually* not suited for the task she has been given, but forced, kicking and screaming into it...

people become superheroes by being the subject of prophecies. the prophecies aren't necessarily heroic and epic, but they impact the world around them in a way that lines up with one great prophecy (which lines up with a greater prophecy, turtles all the way down).

[soldierswar]

Kobik - Chapter I

Bucky x Reader

(Fluff, Angst)

Plot: You and Bucky's relationship is anything but ordinary. Something that you've been used to since day one. But one day when Bucky brings home an unexpected little guest with superpowers, you reluctantly find yourself thrusted into something close to parenthood much sooner than you had ever expected to be.

Notes: I've been obsessed with Kobik and Bucky's father/daughter relationship with her since I read the Thunderbolts comics. Enjoy protective dad!Bucky.

        *Ring* *Ring* *Ring*

           “I’ve got to change that ring tone,” was your first thought after your atrociously loud phone woke you up in the middle of your mid-day nap. But you always felt the need to keep it off silent when Bucky was away from you for emergency use.

           You groggily propped yourself up and picked up the phone.

           “Everything okay?”

           “Let me guess. You just woke up?”

           There were no signs of real distress in his voice. So why the hell was he calling instead of texting?

           “Mmmmm,” you groaned.

           You being an investigative journalist had just finished working on an important writing piece that took over a month and a half to write. A piece that involved multiple trips across the ocean for in-person research. So you were pretty exhausted nowadays.

           “What’s up?” you asked mid-yawn.

           “Y/N…I need you to meet me somewhere as soon as possible. At…our spot.”

           Now you began to get worried.

You and Bucky had a special secluded spot in a nearby building that had been abandoned halfway through its being built years ago. It was safe to assume that it was just another private abandoned project after the blip that was never followed up on. So you and Bucky deemed it your secret place to go to if you needed to talk about something urgent where nobody could hear or see you.

           “Are you in some kind of trouble? Do we need a lawy—”

           “No, Y/N. It doesn’t have anything to do about me…for the most part.”

           “For the most part?”

           You could suddenly hear Sam’s voice echoing in the background again.

           “How worried do I need to be, Barnes?”  

           He hesitated.

Those pauses always made you incredibly anxious, and he knew that.

           “Are you safe? Are we safe?”  

           Another pause as he swallowed nervously.

           “James?”

           “I wouldn’t have called for you to come if I didn’t think that we’d be safe.”

           You shook your head. And although he couldn’t see it, he knew you enough to know that that was exactly what you were doing.

           “You trust me?”

           “Would I have married you if I didn’t?” you sighed lightheartedly.

           “I can be there in 30, okay?”

           And before you could hang up he said those three words that almost never faltered in making you smile, even in the worst of time.

           “I love you.”

…

           Despite the fact that he said that there was nothing really to be truly worried about, you couldn’t help but feel a pulsing anxiety surge through your body. In the years that you had been together, you never really had to use your spot for any type of unexpected emergency.

           You stumbled your way to the building being careful to not fall over the chunks of broken concrete protruding from the dirt before making your way to the door that was almost completely broken off minus two feet of it from the bottom still hinged to the door frame.

           “Hey,” said a familiar voice.

You turned around to see your husband’s beautiful face. You hadn’t seen Bucky in almost a week, so when he wrapped you in his arms you had no choice but to feel nothing but comfort and warmth. But after a two-second tender moment, you snapped out of it.

           “James,” you said.

“What is this about? Why am I here?”

           Before he could say anything, you could hear  Sam’s voice in another area of the house. It sounded almost as though he were giving orders to someone. Which was then followed by the echoes of a little childlike voice…

           You shook your head and reasoned that you were either hearing things, or things were about to get really weird.

           “Bucky,” you said raising your voice and crossing your arms.

           “How bad can it be?”

           Suddenly the only sound in the house was the sound of little footsteps sprinting towards you followed by Sam’s voice.

           “Kobi—”

           And right before your eyes, there was a little girl. A little girl that couldn’t have been older than 4 or 5 years old. She was incredibly pale and had blonde – No, white hair in two high pigtails. But the strangest thing about her was her inhumanly glowing blue eyes.

           “Everything okay Buckaroo?” she asked seeming concerned about him.

           “Shit,” Sam said under his breath as Bucky gave him a death stare.

           “Kobik,” Bucky scolded lightly, crossing his arms.

           “I told you not to come out until I said –”

           “I know,” she said as her little face and shoulders fell.

           “But someone seemed mad at you. Are you okay?”

           She turned her gaze over to you and gave you a once-over as if she were scanning you to see if you were a stranger and potential threat to your own husband.

           Sam finally joined you guys looking somewhat embarrassed.

           “Sorry, I couldn’t stop her.”  

           Now you were staring at Sam giving him the “What the hell is going on?” look.

           He didn’t seem like he wanted to be the one to answer.

Great, now you had two men who didn’t want to answer any questions about the strangest looking child that you had ever seen.  

           “Kobik,” Bucky said.

           “This is my wife, Y/N.”

           Her intense stare immediately softened, which eventually evolved into a big smile, and waved at you.

           “Hi!”

           You were awestruck, and couldn’t even answer. You just turned your stunned gaze away from her and back on to Bucky.

           “Bucky…” you said under your breath.

“I’m gonna ask you again. Why am I here?”

…

           Bucky took you outside next to a pile of large concrete rocks to sit on which you were grateful for because you were feeling pretty dizzy, and even felt a little sick.

Who was she? Did he have a kid that he decided to never tell you about? Did he feel the need to take her for some reason? Those were all logical thoughts that any rational human could think up for this type of situation. Right? And also, why did the poor thing look like…the way that she did?

           But when you finally did get Bucky to talk, everything came out of his mouth exceeded anything that you could ever imagine. In fact, for a moment of time if felt as though you were watching Bucky say a bunch of nonsensical sentences pre-exploding brain aneurism.

           But the longer he continued to speak, you realized that he was serious. This wasn’t some type of psychiatric meltdown or a sick joke.

           You shook your head as he reached over to put a comforting hand on your upper arm.

           “I know it sounds crazy, Y/N but—”

           “Crazy? No,” you shuddered, pulling away.

           “Crazy would be telling me that, I don’t know, you had some kind of accident child with someone during our marriage and you’re just bringing her over to tell me for the first time.”

           He opened his mouth to say something but you shoved your index finger in his face to continue.

           “Crazy would be telling me that you found a literal child with superpowers and you just decided to take her to see what she’ll do. But you’re meaning to tell me that it’s not even a human?”

           “Y/N—”

“You’re meaning to tell me,” you said pointing to the door.

           “That I’m supposed to believe that some extremely powerful force of ‘cosmic energy’ formed itself into a little girl, and you decided to make the impulsive decision of just taking it with you?”  

           “It’s not like that, Y/N,” he replied.

           “I’ve known about her for a little over a year now.”

           You couldn’t lie, that shocked you a little bit.

           “A year?”

           “Listen,” he said.

           “A year and a half ago were investigating a situation in Norway. One thing led to another and we ended up in an underground science lab with two scientists observing some type of glowing anomaly in the shape of a cube that they were carefully monitoring and studying. Sam and I made it our responsibility to keep this hidden and make sure it stays hidden.”  

           “So what does this have to do with—”

           He stopped you from finishing your sentence.

           “Two months later they call us to fly over and it seems that overnight this glowing anomaly somehow formed itself into this little girl that calls herself Kobik.”

           If you didn’t trust him as much as you did, you would be calling bullshit at this point. You didn’t even know that these kinds of things were humanly possible. Granted, you also didn’t think it humanly possible for a bunch of aliens to pretty much destroy New York, or for another batch of aliens to come down and somehow make half of the earth’s—No, the universe’s population disappear. So you continued to listen.

           “A few days ago we get a notice that the lab’s been breached, and by the time we got there, the two scientists are dead. When we get there to check out the scene we find that the five grown men that broke in were also dead. And a minute later we found Kobik shaking all alone in a corner.”  

           Your heart broke for her for a split second. But then you let his words sink in before realizing...

           “Wait,” you said

           “You said the intruders were dead.”

           He nodded.

           “Who killed…”

           He knew that you knew that answer.

           “She had to defend herself,” he shrugged.

           “And how did she do that, Bucky? She’s tiny.”

           And that’s when you realized that there was even more to the story.

           “Once she took form, they made it their focus to study the extent of her powers along with her behaviors. She talks, plays, and overall acts like a child of the age that she took form in…But in the wrong hands she could be used and abused into being a powerful weapon.”

           “So why did you take it?” You asked.

“It obviously can defend itself.”

           He didn’t seem thrilled about you talking about it like it was an inanimate object.

           “We don’t know if it was a fluke or not. She may not know how to properly defend herself and won’t get so lucky the next time. Next thing you know she could end up in the wrong hands. And she was scared, Y/N. I…We couldn’t just leave her.”

           You stressfully ran your fingers against your scalp through your hair.  

           “So what now?” you asked.

“She’s going to just stay here? In this abandoned half build house?”  

“No.”  

“…So is Sam going to keep her somewhere?”

The longer he stared at you the dizzier you started getting, understanding what he was actually asking.

“Y/N,” he said softly.

“I’m the only one she trusts.”

His last words fell into the background as you suddenly leaned over and threw up the entirety of your lunch…maybe even breakfast.

He held your hair back until you finally stopped.

“Bucky, you’re not saying,” you croaked while wiping your mouth.

“Tell me you’re not saying that you want to take her in.”

“Y/N, she’s scared. And I’m the only one she trusts to be around.”

You shot up and involuntarily started shaking your head.

No. This was not happening. He was not bringing a lethal science experiment into our house.

The world began to spin again as you probably got up too quickly, but you were good at playing it off. Why couldn’t he just be normal and bring an abandoned puppy home or something?

Regardless, there was no way that this could happen. There was no way that you could let this happen. You didn’t know who was going to invade your house to try to come to collect it. Much worse, you didn’t know how dangerous this thing was. What it could do to either of you when you least expected. What if it…she got startled in the middle of the night and activated some type of lasers in her eyes and cut you in half?

So you said what you needed to say.  

“No.”    

“Y/N,” he replied sympathetically.

“I know that this may be a lot so suddenly but—”

“No!” you said again putting your foot down.

“We can’t…Not right now. It’s not a good time”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

Damn it.

“This isn’t some abandoned puppy that you found across the road, James! You brought home this radioactive weapon that people, might I add, bad people are looking for. And they’re not even the ones that I’m scared of!”

“You’re not making any sense.”

“After all that just came out of your mouth in the past 15 minutes, you really just had the nerve to tell me that I’m the one that’s not making any sense?” you exclaimed.

“What doesn’t make any sense is that your excuse is that this isn’t the right time. What do you mean by it’s not the right time, Y/N?”

“We…I have a lot of serious shit going on right now, okay?”

“I thought you were taking time off of work,” he pointed out.

“I am, okay? It’s just…”  

You paused, you didn’t know what to say or even how to say it.

“Is there something that I need to know? What does timing have to do with anything?”

“I…well…” you stuttered.

“Spit it out, Y/N.”

You sighed in defeat. You didn’t have a choice now.

“Because damnit, Bucky!” you shouted, startling yourself by how loud you were. But there was no stopping now.

“I’m pregnant.”

[crimson-mayhem-archive]

(( @sumire-bride )) ((Lez pray Vivek is good with children))

YOUNG SUMIRE- ..Uh...

[Without saying anything, the young child looked up at Vivek with very big eyes who was simply buying something from a stand, her mouth slightly opened. She was in awe by seeing a new face, or was it a new one? She looked at his features trying to remember just where has she seen this face?]

...

[She was already in a frightened mood. Being in a city was no help to that either. Including the fact she'd 'waken' up in a big mansion with a bunch of people. She blinked at him scratching her knuckles, feeling incredibly anxious by the new surroundings someone had yelled, instantly making her jump, maybe this might have been out of instinct she hugged Vivek's leg, holding onto it inhumanly tightly.]

..Mmm...

🥀 HELLO I TOOK SO LONG TO ANSWER THIS IM SO SORRY BUT SUMIRE BBY HELLOOOOOOOO 😭🥀

The man hadn’t gone out to do much. Simply ‘check out’ a few books from the library, and maybe get a coffee on the way home. While he wasn’t particularly fond of getting the drink from a stand, or café, he had run out of his own at home— And alongside water, that was one of the only drinks he could handle.

What he did not expect, though, was to run into a small child. A child who looked awfully similar to someone he had met before. He stared at the little one with a blank expression, as he found himself deep in thought.

(❛ Hn… This kid looks an awful lot like Sumire… Or perhaps I’m misremembering. A sister, perhaps? Or maybe an entirely different child..❜)

Once Sumire had grabbed onto his leg, he wasn’t sure how to proceed. Virek wouldn’t call himself bad with children, but he certainly wasn’t one who knew how to handle them either. The hell was he supposed to do in this situation? Comfort her? Move her to a quieter area?

(❛ What a pain…❜)

Hand reaching down, his palm rested on the crown of her head— Hoping to ground her in some way. It’d be bad if she were to break down in a public area, and he wasn’t game to forgo the drink he had pushed aside his own comforts for.

❝Hah… Try not to get so scared. It’d be a pain if you were to cause a scene… ❞

His words were whispered, before he looked up at the stall’s menu. The owners sold various drinks that, he assumed, were okay for a child to drink… So he guessed he could get her something to calm her down.

❝ Hey… Look up at the sign right there. I’ll buy you a drink, so pick one. ❞

[bxngchxn]

Cupid’s Arrow || A Valentine’s Special

pairing: jisung x female!reader

wc: 2.85k 

genre: cupid!au, fluff, humor

warnings: none!

description: every cupid has one job: shoot the arrow at your assigned human. What happens when someone misses?

a/n: ok so I started writing this at 9pm and it’s currently 12:46 am on valentines day so obvs this won’t be perfect but this was a cute idea so I hope you guys like it! you’re all my valentines you don’t have a choice ok mwah love u 

(ps: pls don't be mad at me for how I ended this lmao if yall like it enough i’ll write a pt 2!)

taglist:  @dom--minnie @sparklemin @minholuvs @hanflix

-

the week leading up to Valentine’s Day is the busiest day of the year for angels like Jisung-- assignment after assignment of soulmates coming across his desk as the romantic holiday looms closer. don’t get him wrong, jisung loves his job. He loves getting to watch the moment two people, fated to each other finally meet-- the soft smiles, the faint blushes and shy introductions are something that makes his entire week. this time of year, though, all he really wants is to go home for the night. 

he turns off the multiple screens on his desk, videos of intended lovers fading to black as his day comes to an end. closing the door and making sure to turn the lock, jisung sighs in relief as he makes his way down the hallway to the elevators, a few fellow cupids waiting for him by the door. 

“hey jisung! we’re taking a trip down to earth to walk amongst the humans for awhile. do you wanna tag along?” Minho, the oldest of the bunch asks. next to him, jisung spots hyunjin, changbin and jeongin looking at him expectantly.

jisung met the group of angels five years ago, when he first started his job. inexperienced and ridiculously nervous, he clung to his coworkers throughout all of his training. although a sarcastic and rather rowdy bunch, jisung was quickly accepted for his bright smile and love for..well, love.

he had always found it interesting, the concept of love. it was merely a human emotion, but at the same time something so inhumanly complex. the idea that everyone has a person that they absolutely can’t live without, and some of them don’t even know it yet? crazy to him, but oh so fascinating. 

the early days are always his favorite to watch once he’s successfully struck two people. everything is new and fun, and so unpredictable. there’s the first dates, shy hand holding, stolen glances. you never know when someone is going to finally make the first move, shyly moving closer and closer to their lover to gauge their reaction. jisung had always wondered what love felt like-- the closest he could get was his job as a cupid. he figured that would have to suffice.

when he finally reaches the doors to the elevators, he flashes a smile at the boys in front of him. “last time we went down to earth, hyunjin literally caused a traffic jam because he smiled at a dog. are you guys sure this is a good idea?” he quips, and the boys laugh while hyunjin rolls his (absolutely gorgeous) eyes. 

“first of all that's not true,” he begins, and elbows jeongin in the side when he hears a sound of contradiction leave his mouth “and we aren’t going anywhere crowded, just to a café that I saw the other day when I was working.” he says, and jisung nods his head in contemplation. 

“sure, that sounds like fun. I haven’t had a good cup of coffee in awhile,” he agrees, and with that, the five make their way into the elevator.

stepping out onto the sidewalk, jisung took a moment to feel the sun on his skin. this was one of his favorite parts about earth, so warm and so bright. of course, it’s nothing compared to heaven, but sometimes the change of scenery made it easier for jisung to relax. 

the group is quite chatty as they make their way to the suggested café, commenting on the different humans they pass. everyone is so unique in their own ways, and it fascinates the five angels, who rarely get to walk among them. Lucky for them, they look like any other human being, meaning no one will be able to tell the difference.

the café that hyunjin brought everyone to had a light and airy atmosphere. the walls a bright white, flourishing greenery all around the restaurant complimented the white and yellow tables and matching chairs. It felt like they were in the middle of a field of wild flowers. jisung absolutely adored it, the smells of coffee and pastries filling his nose as they found a nice table next to a window.

looking around, the jisung watched as a girl made her way across the café and sat close to the entrance, with a laptop in front of her and headphones around her neck. She seemed content, sighing to herself with a small smile on her lips as she opened her laptop and took a bite of the muffin sitting in front of her.

“wait wait wait, that’s one of my humans! I’m supposed to shoot her once th- oh my god! there’s the soon-to-be soulmate too! I can’t miss this opportunity!” Minho exclaims quietly while he reaches into the backpack he had brought with him. The other cupids turn to look at him incredulously.

The ‘soon-to-be soulmate’, as Minho put it, seemed rather dull compared to his supposed counterpart. He wasn’t bad looking, but there was something about him that just didn’t seem right to Jisung. this girl seemed to match the vibes of the café-- like a warm summer day, not a cloud in the sky. the kind of day that lasts in your memories for years to come, and this man...he just was not it. Hair disheveled, seemingly in a rush as he was tapping his foot impatiently at the counter. Jisung knew that opposites could attract, but he just didn’t see it in the cards for this one.

“is this why you wanted to come down here?” jeongin asked with wide eyes, knowing that they shouldn’t be meddling unless they’re on the clock. The others turn to Minho who has now gotten two arrows and his bow out from his bag. 

“Uhm….no?” he says sheepishly once he sees the stares that are being thrown at him. He takes one of the arrows and lines it up on his bow, pulling his arm back and aiming at the girl peacefully enjoying her day.

“Minho do you really think this is the best time?” jisung asks apprehensively. almost too focused on getting a good shot, Minho didn’t answer him.

He lets go of the arrow and it zips through the air, hitting the girl in the shoulder as she starts to work on her laptop. Humans can’t physically feel the arrow when they get shot-- that almost defeats the belief in soulmates. She continues on as if nothing happened, and jisung almost rolls his eyes as he watches Minho line up his second shot.

“Look,” Minho begins, “they’re supposed to meet tomorrow anyway! why not speed up the process?” he says as he draws his arm back. 

Out of nowhere, a customer in the store drops a coffee cup. The sound of the glass shattering startles pretty much everyone in the café, including the group of angels. In fact, it startles them enough that the unbelievable happens.

Minho’s arm slips, and the arrow is released...straight into Jisung’s shoulder.

The two look at each other in absolute disbelief, and Jisung wants to strangle the older cupid. A very quiet “oops” leaves Minho’s mouth.  

“Are you kidding me?!?” Jisung says a little too loudly. Everyone is looking at the two of them, including the girl that Minho just struck. 

When the two make eye contact, Jisung feels something...strange. He knows it’s a reaction from the love arrow, but is this what love is supposed to feel like? He feels like he wants to throw up, butterflies flying in his stomach as he notices the faint blush on the cheeks of the girl across the room. That’s when he really sees her for the first time, like, really sees her.

He isn’t sure how he didn't see it before. Her hair falls perfectly over her shoulders, and her eyes that are staring at him in slight confusion still shine brighter than any star he’d ever seen..and he’s seen a lot of stars.

He’s silent for a few moments, and the other boys start looking at each other with concern. “Wait, no, what the hell? Cupid’s can’t get struck! What is going on?” Changbin says as he watches the way the two are staring at each other. 

This isn’t allowed. Cupids don’t have many rules, but one of the biggest rules for any angel is: Do not associate with humans. It’s the reason why they can’t-- or shouldn't, really-- feel love in the first place. Messing with the rules of the universe could have big consequences. It’s never happened before, but there have always been enough myths that get spread around that would deter any angel from even thinking about it. Yet, here jisung is, absolutely head over heels for a human, even if it is all Minho’s fault.

“I don't know, this hasn't happened before. Oh my god, what did I do,” Minho starts spiraling. Its at that moment that the others know they need to get the hell out of there. Scooping up Jisung, who is currently still staring at the girl who has now focused on her work instead, they rush out of the café. Once Jisung is out of eyesight of the girl, he shakes his head in confusion and comes back down to earth (pun intended). 

“Ohhhh no, no no no. This is bad,” Jisung says, running his hands through his hair exasperated. “Minho what the fuck happened?!” he asks. 

Putting his hands up, Minho tries to defend himself. “I don’t know! That person dropped their cup and it threw me off!” he says quickly, and it makes Jisung want to roll his eyes.

“You dumbass, that’s why we shouldn’t even be down here in the first place! If Chan finds out, we’re dead! That’s it! We’re gonna be out of jobs and not able to pay our bills and-- oh my god there she is,” Jisung exclaims once he sees the girl exit the café, looking around confused. Turning around, she spots Jisung and starts to make her way towards him. 

“Oh no, nope. Not now, this is a bad time,” Hyunjin says while they try to drag Jisung away from the girl. He shimmies out of their grip as she approaches him.

“Uh, hi. I think one of you left this in the café?” she says. Looking down, Jisung sees his cellphone in her hand. “I saw it sitting at the table you guys walked away from, I’m glad I was able to find you when I came outsi-- Oh, wow, hi..” she cuts herself off, awestruck when she makes eye contact with Jisung. Hyunjin rolls his eyes as he watches the two of them. Jisung doesn’t know what to say. 

“Oh, yeah this is..mine..thank you,” he says as he holds out his hand. He swears he can feel electricity run through him when her hand makes contact with his. He has never experienced a feeling so strong like this before. He knew that love was dramatic but he didn’t think it was like this.

Reminding himself that this isn’t supposed to be happening, he clears his throat. “Okay well we have to go. Thank you for my phone, goodbye!” he says quickly, leaving the girl and his friends in complete confusion has he turns on his heel and starts to almost sprint in the opposite direction. The boys quickly follow him after offering a small wave to the girl, who returns it as she turns to walk away. 

“Jisung, you cannot possibly see her again” Hyunjin says once they finally catch up to him. And even though Jisung knows that, there’s something that is inevitably pulling him towards her.

When they finally make it back to heaven and Jisung gets home, he pulls his phone out to check his messages. To his shock, he finds a new contact added into his phone, with a photo of a girl who’s eyes remind him of galaxies.

Y/N, aka Café Girl

As you walk down the street, you smile feeling the warm sunshine on your shoulders. It may be the middle of February, but you seemed to be blessed with a particularly warm day. This day had been nothing out of the ordinary, but for some reason you felt lighter, walking with a bounce in your step that you haven’t had in a long time.

Your mind wanders back to the boy you saw at the café not too long ago. His honey coloured hair shined under the artificial lights in the room, and his brown eyes reminding you of the warmest hot chocolate on a cold winter day. He hadn’t left your mind since the two of you made eye contact for the first time.

It’s been awhile since you’ve found someone that caught your interest so quickly. You never believed in love at first sight, but after today you just might be changing your mind. It seemed like fate that he left his cellphone on the table in the café, and it was definitely a risk that you had put your phone number in his contacts. You’ve never done something like that before, but something was telling you that you just needed to take the chance and make the first move. 

Eventually, days and then weeks pass, and you haven’t even received a text message from him. You feel a little disappointed every time you check your phone, hoping that you’ll see his number come up on your screen. You didn’t even know his name, nor when (or if) you’d ever get to see him again. You should’ve been prepared for the sinking feeling in your chest, but you had still been hopeful.

You still frequented the café, mainly because it was a calm and quiet place to work, but also because you were secretly hoping you’d run into him again-- you at least needed to learn his name. That’s all you could think about while you try to focus on your work, but to no avail. You decided to give yourself a break, letting your thoughts swirl with chocolate colored eyes.

 As your eyesight wanders the café, you hear the front door bell ring and you’re forced to meet eyes with the man that has lived in your head rent free for the past two weeks. You almost can’t believe it. He seems like he’s searching for something, or someone.

 As he looks around the room, you get nervous. You wonder if he’ll remember who you are, or maybe he’s already deleted your number and rejected you without even telling you? Maybe he already has a girlfriend? Maybe even a boyfriend? 

The thoughts running through your head completely distract your from the fact that he’s sat down in front of you. “Uhm..excuse me?” He says quietly, and your breath gets caught in your throat when you hear his voice. 

“Oh, i’m sorry, I didn’t scare you did I?” he asks, and you shake your head quickly. “No! No not at all. I, uh..hi,” you say with a light blush on your cheeks, and it makes Jisung’s heart soar to the sky. 

He’s definitely not used to feeling like this. He’s been trying to avoid it for the past few weeks, hoping that if he had ignored it these weird feelings would go away. He searched for hours and hours for a loophole in getting struck with a cupid’s arrow, but even hyunjin couldn’t find anything. 

After nights of tossing and turning while images of you danced through his head, he knew he needed to see you. He got lucky that you were at the café, this was the only place he had ever seen you so he was hoping he’d get to catch you here. 

“You never texted me, you know. Did you delete my number?” you asked him, feigning hurt. You saw his eyes go bigger as he tried to defend himself. “N-no! I definitely did not delete it. I was just so shocked that I didn’t know what to say...how did you even know the phone was mine?” He asked, laughing quietly. Jisung won’t lie, that was a pretty bold move. He was actually impressed once the initial shock had passed.

“Oh, I definitely wasn’t not staring at you across the room or anything and saw you on your phone. Definitely not,” you say with a flirty laugh, and it immediately sparks intrigue in Jisung.

 The line rolled off your lips so easily, and Jisung is convinced that it’s an effect from the arrow. “Oh, were you now? How did I not notice someone as pretty as you looking my way?” He asks, and his eyes go wide when he hears himself speak. 

What was that? All of this is so foreign to him, but when the blush on your cheeks gets a little darker he decides that maybe, just maybe, this will be worth the consequences he might face if Chan ever finds out about this.

“Listen,” he begins cautiously. “I have...a lot of things that I need to tell you. But let me start with this: How about I take you out on a date?”

[ramblings-of-a-mad-cat]

(sees another fandom that I can ask you about and cheers) Orphan Black! Thoughts? I don't know Dr Who but Tatiana is one of my favorite actors period.

Anon you are so sweet! I'm always happy to chat about fandoms and characters and whatnot, and I will never not appreciate the majesty of Tatiana's acting. That is one of the greatest parts of the show hands down.

Orphan Black, to me, is a show that had incredible potential, but didn't really live up to the excitement it created. (Loooong post ahead.)

The thing is, Orphan Black builds a chilling mystery and background, the world it gradually creates as it goes for about the first two seasons, got be very invested and made me wonder a lot about where it was going to go and what the answers were. The setup is brilliant, right from the start with that iconic cold open of Beth's suicide. The unknown is what really helped this show get as thrilling as it was, because the actual answers behind the unknown were kind of hit and miss, and it seemed like far too often, the show just wasn't interested in telling it's story. Hijinks where the clones impersonate each other in slice of life events? That's fun at first and it really works well as they're still getting to know each other. But after a while, it gets tedious, and it seems like the show would rather fuck around and have dance parties (seriously, that scene was such a #BigLippedAlligatorMoment) than focus on the story and the threat that the sisters are facing. Virtually all of Allison's plotlines are like this, they feel like they belong in a different show, and for some reason the writers insisted on giving her one of these storylines like, every season. After Allison passively murders her own friend out of suspecting that she's spying on her, I just don't feel like an arc about her running for some PTA office position even matters. It doesn't feel right.

Speaking of that, here's another example: Donnie. Why did the end of the first season suggest that he was this secret mastermind working for Leekie? The whole idea just deflates in Season 2 and doesn't really go anywhere. He just goes back to being the bumbling sweetheart he was before. Why even have him be the spy? Maybe it should have been Ainsley. Do you want to know the exact moment that I think Orphan Black went wrong? Like, the specific scene? When Leekie was killed off. The character who had thus far been the Big Bad, gets taken out in the stupidest possible way, a literal accident on Donnie's part, and it's even played for laughs. After that point, the show really struggled to regain it's footing, though I don't think it completely went off the rails until about Season 4, and it was still generally hit or miss. Like, some stuff was really good. The introduction of the Castor clones, the development of Rachel's character (I'll get to her, trust me.) and the reveal of Kendall Malone. But it seemed like so much else was just forgotten or otherwise not resolved. Whatever happened to Cal? Sure, the show wanted to focus on the sisters...but Kira deserves to know her father if she wants to. That's just one example. It's a crying shame because this show is sometimes incredible. The metaphor that I always use for situations like this, is a card game. The show has all the right cards in its hand, they're just not being played.

The two strongest characters, at least to me, were Rachel and Helena. One of these characters was superbly written and went through a devastating arc. The other was Helena. We need to talk about her. In Season 1, she really cemented herself as a memorable presence with her trademark accent, her scars, her whole damn personality (again, hats off to Tatiana) and of course, that iconic screechy theme music that accompanied her. Which at first made us jump, but eventually made us cheer. I adored Helena, and I loved the development of her relationship with Sarah. Who went from shooting her in Season 1, to being deadset on rescuring her in Season 3, being furious with Siobhan for betraying her. (This is unrelated but Siobhan has the same " twist villain fakeout" at the end of Season 1 that Donnie does, and it's quite frustrating.) And yet, I swear, the writers just didn't know what to do with Helena half the time. They put her on a bus for long stretches, including one point where she just up and leaves Allison's house in Season 4, for no given reason. And the characters just kind of...don't care. The same thing happens when she gets arrested. No one cares to try and find Helena, even though she's unstable and often a danger to those around her. Even though she's by herself with no real ability to function in society. Even though she's pregnant. There is no excuse for this, and no Sarah, that "I'm sorry, I avoided you" scene in Season 5 is not going to cut it. It's such an afterthought.

I'm being rather critical, but I hope you can tell that this is from a point of passion. I genuinely enjoyed this show and getting to watch it. Just that sometimes it didn't feel like the show cared that I was watching. However, this was not true whenever Rachel was onscreen. Look, I'm a Merula Snyde stan, so you can probably already guess how I feel about Rachel. Despite her crimes, despite her constant slipping back the dark side, I felt so bad for Rachel at the end of it all. That scene with Kira really sums it up. "Who hurt you?" "All of them." And no scene is more intense than when she stabs out the eye cam. Like, I'm sorry, I pitied Rachel pretty much from Season 2 on. Her parents were horrible to her, and I'm supposed to think Ethan is the good guy here? He kills himself in front of his own daughter, telling her that she doesn't deserve him. And then Sarah shoots a pencil through her eye, causing brain damage and requiring a long recovery. I'm not saying that Sarah was wrong to do what she did, just that if I were in her shoes, I'd still feel a degree of guilt for Rachel's condition. In the end, I'm devastated that she was barred from Clone Club, when she made the right decision at the point it mattered. But there's just too much history there, and Sarah won't ever forgive her. (Though again, I do feel as though there's blame to share.) Rachel is my favorite character and I never expected her to be. But she's just so complex. Side note: "Enjoy your oophorectomy" is so damn quotable. I don't know why but I love that line.

So, Rachel's my favorite. Who's my least favorite? It might surprise you. It's Delphine. I'm sorry, but I just...I couldn't get on board with C*phine. Not after Season 3. I was waiting for the point that the show would push to finally redeem Delphine for her turncoat role, for all of the hell that she put Cosima through. By Season 5 though? I realized that as far as the writers were concerned? She already was redeemed. Even though she did nothing to earn it, except be presumed dead by Cosima. The way she treats Cosima in Season 3 is actually disgusting. Her reasoning for breaking up with Cosima is circular. She has to love "all the clones" in order to be with Cosima, and the way to do that is to take over Rachel's job, which means they can't date anymore? I'm not the only one who thought that didn't make sense, right? Oh and let's talk about how she stalks Cosima's date, breaks into her house, and threatens her life. Red. Flags. Cosima even says the line, "If you're not going to be with me, just let me go." I'm sorry, that should not be something she has to beg for. Delphine's behavior made me want her to stay far, far away from Cosima. Who is, incidentally, a sweetie and I absolutely adore her. I legit have trouble remembering that Tatiana's playing her because she just looks and acts so different. That said, even though I immensely disliked Delphine, I am so very glad that they made one of the clones gay. Just like I'm glad that they made one of them trans. (Though...Tony wasn't handled especially well.)

In general, I do think the earlier seasons were stronger. The Brightborn arc, while interesting, didn't really contribute much to the overarching narrative. We got the backstory on Beth's suicide and finally learned the truth about her, I suppose. Still, even though Beth is one of my favorite of the clones, and I never expected her to be either...I feel like the actual reason given for why she took her own life was rather illogical. She apparently did it because the investigation was putting the clones in danger of another Helsinki. Okay, but just because Evie Cho says you should off yourself, doesn't mean you have to. You could just, like...stop investigating. And if you die under mysterious circumstances without explaining anything to the sisters, they're not going to be put off from the investigation. They're going to look into this even more, because they don't know why they're not supposed to. The reveal that she and Art fell in love toward the end adds an extra gut punch, but it also doesn't make sense because wouldn't Art have referenced it during the period that he thought Sarah was Beth? On the other hand, Season 4 also introduced MK. And I have such a soft spot for her. I adore that sheep-masked sweetie. Everyone always asks "Which clone would you date" (because fandoms can think of nothing else I guess) and I never see anyone give any love to MK. Her death absolutely tore me apart. I am glad Siobhan avenged her even if she went down at the same time. Side note, her last word being the affectionate "Chickens..." Broke me.

Season 5 was a strange beast. In general, it seemed like we were finally getting some answers to the questions that were hanging over us. Exploring the deep mythos. But then they kind of turned it around and made it just be a Wizard of Oz style fraud twist. Westmoreland isn't really inhumanly old, he's a charlatan. I don't know why that was necessary in a science fictional show. I've seen the interviews and I get what they were going for, it just feels like it would have been cooler and far creepier if he was actually that old. The puppet master pulling the strings the whole time. We also finally get some answers for Kira's superhuman healing abilities (though we never learn how she's telepathically connected to the clones) and I'm loving it, but the trouble is, it's inconsistent. Ethan "Why is this guy so popular, he's an asshole" Duncan told Rachel specifically that Sarah being able to have children was a fluke, that the clones were "barren by design." I don't know, the whole concept of Revival and of the "magical island" was really foreboding and tied in with the earlier references to The Island of Doctor Moreau. Especially that song about "Revival's Children" just...the shudders, man. But just having it be a regular old scam is...a letdown. I know it may be more realistic, but I don't always need realism in my scifi. The finale is interesting, in that it's mostly an epilogue. I'm glad the clones (sans Rachel) got to live happily ever after, but there are two gut punches right at the end that are total nitpicks but they bother me. Helena naming her kids after Art and Donnie? And writing a memoir that she names "Orphan Black?" Those two tropes can go die in a hole. They can enjoy an oophorectomy, because I'm so sick of them.

The potential of Orphan Black was practically infinite. The results of Orphan Black fell frustratingly short.

[therenlover]

The Doctor Is In (Part Two of Till Forever Falls Apart, A Peter Maximoff/Reader Series)

Synopsis: Peter’s first few days in his new home are mostly uneventful, so he decides it’s the perfect time to dust off his running goggles and steal some shit. The building with the massive circular stained glass window seems like a great place to start! People with buildings that lavish are usually rich and weak, so what could possibly go wrong?

Tags: Pre-Relationship, Slow Burn, Falling in Love, Attempted Theft, Secrets, Suspicions, 

Rating: T

Warnings: Mild Language, Slight Sexual Innuendo

Word Count: 2800~

This work, as well as the other completed parts of this series, have been crossposted to my AO3! 

-----

To Peter’s credit, it had all started with good intentions… okay, semi-good intentions, but that was the best defense he had to offer.

One moment he’s speeding into a funky building with a cool glass window looking for a knick-knack to take home to Y/N and the next he’s falling through endless darkness, searching for anything he could possibly grab onto. It was hell. Worst of all, though, he couldn’t use his speed. The world was only emptiness and darkness for as far as he could reach. Well, it was until he hit the ground.

It was a sudden jolt after what felt like hours of captivity when Peter hit the cool tiles of the flooring below him. The bright light after total darkness burned his eyes. He winced against it, lifting his arms to shield his face. There was no time to acclimate to his new surroundings, though, which were definitely not part of the building he had been inside before he might add, because the second his vision came back into focus a booming voice rang out from behind him.

“Peter Maximoff, what purpose did you have for breaking into the Sanctum Sanctorum?”

Peter spun around quickly on the ground to find a man floating behind him. Wait, floating? He didn’t even have time to question how the stranger knew his name while he was questioning what the hell he was. Was he a mutant? The man looked furious, his red cape billowing out behind him in an almost menacing manner while he stroked his goatee, eyebrows pinched together with rage. Peter had no clue what his deal was or who the hell he was looking at but he did know he had to calm him down fast if he wanted to avert disaster.

Apparently, he was thinking too long though because he wasn’t fast enough.

“I’ll ask you one last time,” the man’s hands came down to chest level, whirring with some sort of orange power, “why did you break into the Sanctum Sanctorum? This is your last chance,”

Somewhere in the distance, a dull thud sounded against the tile, like someone dropping a purse or bag. Peter didn’t have time to think about that, though. He was too busy saving his own life. All he had to do was get to his feet so he could run off! Unfortunately, that was better said than done.

“Woah, Woah, Woah!” he scrambled backward trying to stand but found his feet bound with the same orange sparks that were growing by the second in his attacker’s hands, “I have no clue what the hell a Sanctum Sanctorum is! I think you’ve got the wrong guy, man,”

His assailant cocked his head to the side. “So you’re telling me some other inhumanly fast kleptomaniac mutant from another dimension broke through all of my wards and tried to steal priceless magical artifacts from the Sanctum?”

Peter shrugged nonchalantly. “Magical artifacts? Dude, magic isn’t real. You’ve got the wrong guy,”

Thankfully, the man sighed in exhaustion, letting the orange sparks in his palms disappear as he pinched the bridge of his nose leaving only the ones around Peter’s ankles remaining. For the first time in his life, Peter was glad to be annoying.

“Jesus, I should have had my coffee before dealing with you…”

“I know right?” Peter propped himself up on his hands, “it’s always tragic when you catch the wrong guy, but I’m sure you’ll find your thief eventually. In fact, I think I saw some super speedy dude running towards Central Park when I was walking past that fancy building with the big circle window. That’s so weird! Maybe you should let me go so you can go find your guy,”

The man only seemed to get more pissed off the further Peter dug himself into his own grave. “Oh, I’m not planning on letting you go any time soon. I’m just avoiding a reckoning by letting your keeper know I’m taking you into the Avenger’s custody before we go,”

He was so screwed. “That’s not a-”

Before Peter could even finish his sentence, a crash echoed from across the room.

“STEPHEN STRANGE,”

Now, Peter couldn’t decide if he was saved or even more screwed than before.

There, across the room of what he had now gathered to be a large exhibit at some sort of museum, was Y/N. To say she looked furious would be an understatement.

The art on the walls seemed to shake in her wake as she stormed into the open center of the room, eyes boring holes into Peter’s assailant as she rolled up the sleeves of her paint-stained denim button-up. He could only imagine that this was the reckoning the magic dude was trying to avoid.

The man, Stephen, didn’t waver despite Y/N’s entrance. “Would it kill you to just use my title? I got my doctorate for a reason, you know,” His tone was flat and almost bored as Y/N seethed.

“Fuck you,” she spat, “what the hell are you doing with Peter? And bringing him here of all places? I thought you were supposed to be the responsible Avenger,”

“And I thought you were supposed to keep this menace under control. It looks like we both have a few responsibilities we aren’t keeping up with, huh?”

Across the floor, Peter winced. He hadn’t intended on getting anyone in trouble, he was just looking for a little fun to pass the time and maybe a housewarming gift that would fit in with the rest of Y/N’s antique decor. How was he supposed to know that a crazy, magic, floating guy would take him to what he could only assume was magic prison for breaking into his wizard’s lair? Surprisingly, Y/N picked up his movement.

“Peter, are you okay?” Her eyes never left Strange, flaming with a ferocity that bordered on homicidal, but her voice softened considerably as she spoke to him. He was quick to respond.

“I’m all good! A little tied up at the moment, but it’s nothing I can’t handle!” He shouted back.

Y/N nodded. “Good, just stick tight while I deal with this asshole,”

As the last words left her lips all the softness she had mustered for Peter’s sake dissolved, leaving behind pure, unbridled anger once more.

“You had no right to take him, Strange. We made a deal,”

“You’re right, we did make a deal,” Stephen responded, floating to the ground and taking a step closer to Y/N, “but my duties as Sorcerer Supreme will always come first,”

“That has nothing to do with him! He poses no threat to this universe!”

“He was attempting to steal extremely powerful magical artifacts, Y/N! If a mutant from another dimension had gotten their hands on the Book of Vishanti or the Clock of the Ages who knows what might have happened?”

Y/N stilled. “Peter,” her voice wasn’t the same as it had been when she was shouting at Strange, but it also wasn’t half as gentle as it has been before, “did you steal anything from Stephen?”

Peter, still dazed from the entirety of the experience, was quick to defend himself.

“No! No, I didn’t steal anything!”

One sharp look from Stephen and Y/N sent him spiraling for an excuse.

“Okay, I went in with the intention of stealing, but I had no idea that stuff was magical! I didn’t even know wizards existed! Witches I understood but wizards too? In the middle of New York? Besides, all of this is a moot point! I didn’t actually take anything,”

Surprisingly, Y/N’s expression seemed to soften once again. “See, Stephen? Peter didn’t mean any harm. Now let him go, and this can all be a thing of the past,” As she spoke, he could have sworn that her eyes began to faintly glow.

“I still don’t think it’s a great idea to let him roam free,” Stephen ran a hand through his salt and pepper hair and the restraints around Peter’s ankles tightened slightly.

“Then you’ll have to take him from me,” Y/N brought her hands up, small rippling balls of light beginning to grow in her palms. Peter had never been so scared and aroused in his life. Was this the ‘small power’ she had mentioned to him when he moved in?

“I have remained civil with you and the mages of your order, Strange, but you have no power over me, especially on my own home turf. You lack the time stone now, so you know what will happen if you and I go toe to toe again. Besides, none of that matters. Peter is mine. Mine to protect and defend until he returns to his rightful place in his universe. So, will you let him go, or will we have to settle this the old-fashioned way?”

Y/N’s eyes were definitely glowing now, a brilliant green gleaming from within her as a rough breeze began flowing in from the door across the room. Stephen made no move to attack though. Instead, he heaved a sigh. “You can have your man child back Y/N, calm down,”

Slowly, the glow dissipated, the orbs of light shrinking into nothingness as she lowered her hands. “Thank you, Stephen,”

In an instant, it was as if the pair had gotten along the whole time.

He nodded. “Don’t thank me, just keep him away from ancient magical secrets next time,” Strange paused as if he was finished speaking, but then chuckled softly. It was the most human Peter had ever seen him. “You know how this ends, Y/N. We both do. Are you really sure you want to go through with this?”

It was Y/N’s turn to nod. “I appreciate that you’re looking out for me, but I made my choice a long time ago. There has never been another path for me. Please respect that,”

Peter was clueless as to what any of their exchange meant, too busy rubbing the ache out of his newly freed ankles to think too deeply about whatever deep exchange was happening in front of him, but a nagging feeling in his chest made him think that it must have something to do with him.

Then, in a burst of golden light, Stephen Strange was gone, leaving Y/N and Peter alone as they took in everything that had just happened. It was silent for a moment, the two of them caught between being stunned and glad to see each other, before Y/N’s angry facade melted away.

“What a fucking asshole,” she snickered, making her way over to Peter and offering him a hand, “I hate that guy,”

Peter took her hand and, with a soft pull, was finally upright again. “I know, right? He seems like a total douchebag,”

“Right? Like, yeah it’s terrible enough to kidnap you and try to take you into Avengers custody, but trying to get me to hand you over at my job? That’s just rude on a whole new level,”

“You work here?” Peter gestured at the art on the walls, making Y/N smile.

“Yeah, this is where I go every day. Welcome to the Brooklyn Museum!” She began to lead him out towards the door, linking her arm around his in a strangely intimate act. Peter was sure that she didn’t mean it like that but something about her closeness made his heart flutter.

He guffawed as they walked, passing happy couples and exhibits packed full. “It’s cool here, but I just assumed you worked somewhere… I dunno, more hero-y?”

Y/N laughed. “Everyone always does, but I’ve been attached to restoring paintings since before I ever took up the whole hero gig. I guess it’s the one stable thing I’ve had for my whole life.”

Watching Y/N’s face light up almost made Peter forget that less than an hour earlier he’d been shoved in an infinite dark dimension and threatened with imprisonment by a wizard. It was like she was the only thing worth seeing in a building full of priceless art.

“I’ve always felt strangely comfortable in museums,” she continued, hand brushing against Peter’s bicep in what he could only assume was an accident, “being surrounded by history just feels right to me. It’s like coming home,” Peter couldn’t help but grin, holding back a snicker.

“I’m guessing that’s the real reason you offered to take me in,” he teased, gently ribbing Y/N and making her giggle, “just couldn’t help but bring home a blast from the past who still has their youthful good looks,”

“You caught me! I just couldn’t resist your elderly charms,”

In a moment of poor judgment, Peter found himself leaning into her touch but was surprised to find her leaning right back into him. His heart began to pound faster. He could only hope she couldn’t tell. The feeling of being close to Y/N, listening to her laugh, being the shoulder she leaned on… it was like nothing Peter had ever felt before.

The short remainder of their walk to Y/N’s destination was mostly quiet, but neither of them tried to pull away from the other. Their moment only ended when they reached a large door labeled ‘Staff Only’. Y/N finally unlinked her arm from Peter’s before turning to face him. He was proud to note the flush on her face.

“I’m gonna go grab my bag,” she muttered, worrying the edge of her lip with her teeth, “do you mind taking me home? Traveling with you would probably be faster than hailing a taxi, and way less expensive,”

Between the thought of getting to be close to Y/N again and the excitement of getting to show off his powers, Peter was eager to please. “Sure thing! Do you want me to grab your bag for you? I’m sure I’d be quicker?” He emphasized his statement with a wink. Unfortunately, it didn’t have the desired effect.

Instead, Y/N looked almost nervous as she shook her head no. “I’ve got it, Peter,” she insisted.

He quirked up an eyebrow in surprise. “You sure? We could be home in a minute tops, just say the word,”

“There’s just a lot of important museum stuff back there! I trust you Peter, but this is priceless art we’re talking about, so I’d rather not take any chances. I’ll be back in a second!”

She slowly backed towards the door, offering him one last smile before disappearing into the darkness beyond. Something about her expression turned Peter’s stomach. It wasn’t unfamiliar, she had acted similarly in a few days Peter had known her at seemingly random times, but it just seemed… suspicious, like there was something he should definitely know that he was being kept in the dark about. Despite everything, he shook off the feeling, chalking it up to him not understanding all the intricacies of this new universe. If love made him blind, he was willing to take that chance.

It only took a few minutes for Y/N to emerge, a small messenger bag in hand, but when she did she was joyful once again, offering Peter an apologetic smile. “Sorry about that. Did I miss anything while I was gone?”

He shook his head, pulling down his goggles and offering her his hand. “Not much, just the end of the world,”

She giggled. “So do I just hop on your back or what?”

Peter’s heart skipped a beat. In a second he was down on his knee. “All aboard,” He did his best to keep still as Y/N settled herself on his back, then he was lifting her easily, arms hooked under her knees as she giggled into his hair. “What’s so funny?”

She wrapped her arms around his shoulders securely as he stood. “I just expected you to call yourself the Bohner express,”

It took all of Peter’s strength to keep his laughter under control. “You tell me that now? After the opportunity to use it has passed?”

Y/N squeezed him a little tighter. “I’m sure you’ll get to use it next time,”

The thought of a next time sent Peter’s heart rate through the roof. Oh, it was on.

“I’d hold on if I were you,” he said, smirking, “the Bohner express is leaving the station,”

Y/N was quick to snap back. “Let’s hope it doesn’t disappoint,”

“Oh Y/N, the Bohner express never disappoints,”

“Prove it,”

Peter had them back to the brownstone in record time.

[roughentumble]

geralt and roachie

@avrupasya​ asked for a fic/continuation of this post of mine, where modern au geralt’s roach is a stuffed animal. sortve told in, like, vignettes, i suppose?

[read on ao3 if you like!]

The one constant in Geralt's short, stressful life, is Roachie. The little brown stuffed horse, named after a fish with similarly colored eyes("I'm gonna' study animals when I'm big!" he proclaims to anyone who will listen, which isn't many, so he whispers it into his horse's mane instead) has been with him long enough that he has no memories without her in some peripheral corner-- clenched in his fist, sitting on his blanket, overflowing from a fit-to-bursting pocket of his shorts. She's been with him through two houses now. He likes to think that she was given to him the day he was born, that they'd never been separated, but he can hardly ask anyone for confirmation. It's just one of those certainties you hold in your heart as a child.

So of course, for his seventh birthday, a dog eats her.

(The kicker is that it isn't even his birthday. It's a government assigned day that may or may not be in the vicinity of the actual day of his birth. It's not like he was dropped off at the fire station with paperwork or anything. He is vaguely, sort of, aware of this, just enough that it feels like an extra kick while he's down.)

She is utterly and completely beyond repair. Her shape isn't even recognizable, and for all his inconsolable tears, she's gathered up and unceremoniously dumped in the trash.

He cries when he finds her, cries through dinner, cries late into the night, cries until he is informed by one of his caretakers through what seems to be a rather impressive headache that if he doesn't stop crying, he would be "given something to cry about," which...

He already had something to cry about. Hence the crying.

He chews on his fist, however, startled into silence by the shouting, and hiccups softly into his pillow. Even as he's left alone, in the dark, he can't settle-- the thought of Roach thrown away like garbage is one that just doesn't sit right with him. He waits until the house is silent, into the wee hours of the morning, then sneaks on silent feet to the kitchen. He rustles through the trash as quietly as he can, pulling out pieces of his old friend, now not simply in tatters but also covered in what was left of dinner.

He nearly loses it at the sight of her, destroyed and filthy. Tears well in his eyes, blurring the world around him, and he sniffles once, weakly, but he doesn't want to wake anyone, and who knows what they'd do if they found him rooting through the trash, so he steels his resolve. Stomps down on the urge to give into another round of crying fits.

The night air is cold against his hot, sticky face. It's refreshing, but he barely notices it as he shuffles into a far corner of the yard. He digs a shallow hole with his hands and reverently lays her body inside. He covers her back up, tamps the earth back down with his palms, and then sits back on his heels. He's a little too young to fully understand what goes on in a funeral-- he's never seen one before, after all-- but he's seen TV, and he knows you're supposed to say something nice, so he says something to the effect of "Roachie was the bestest friend, an' the prettiest horse, there ever was in the whole entire world," and then sits in silence for a few moments longer, sniffling in the cold night air.

He suddenly recalls headstones, and he doesn't have any rocks-- doesn't know how to carve words into one-- but he does see a stick nearby. He shoves it in the ground like a stake and looks over his work. About as good as any grave dug by a seven-year-old could hope to be. He stays there until the cold starts making the tip of his nose and the joints of his fingers hurt, and then he stumbles back inside and curls up in bed.

He's moved to a new house a week later.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

He starts skipping lunches. He goes to school hungry, and comes home hungrier, and devours his dinners in this new house voraciously.

Every penny that would be spent on school lunches gets shoved in his pocket, then consolidated and shoved in his sock drawer when he gets home. Once he's gotten a decently-sized pile, he gathers it all up in his tiny little fists, shoves it in his pockets, and walks all the way to the local thrift store.

He'd gotten it into his head, somehow, that Roach still existed. Some childish idea that'd popped into his head as a comfort, and that got ingrained in his mind as he repeated it to himself over and over at night. He'd seen the rags, of course, what'd become of her after the dog had had it's way, he knew she was buried in the dirt a state away... but the core "soul" of his Roachie, that'd been with him and loved him and cared for him, was out there, in some other brown stuffed horse, waiting to be found again.

He marches into the toy section in the back of the thrift store with the determination of a soldier on a rescue mission.

And at the bottom of the bin, underneath all the teddy bears and off-brand babydolls, is one single brown stuffed horse.

Logic would dictate a coincidence-- but to his little eyes it looks a lot like magic.

He snatches her up instantly and runs to the front of the store, lest anything come and rip her from his arms again. He has to stand on his tip-toes, but he pushes her up on the counter, then pushes over the pile of money and asks if it's enough. The old lady looks at his pile, then pushes her glasses down the bridge of her nose to get a better look at the tag on the horse's ear. She squints, then glances at his wide, desperate eyes. "Well!" She announces. "Would you look at that. That's the exact right amount. Must be fate." Then winks down at him.

He gasps loudly, eyes getting impossibly wider. Fate-- Roach really had been waiting for him! He reaches up and makes a grabbing motion with his hands. "Can, can I... can I hold her, then?"

"She's all yours." The woman says gently, and places it in his waiting arms.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Roach stays with him all the way to the doorstep of the Kaer Morhen Home for Wayward Boys. He's thirteen, and she has a few weak seams, a few patches where the fur's been worn away. She's heavily loved, and he hasn't spent a night without her since they were "reunited". He's worn as well-- tired of the constant cycle of new places, new "families".

A few months later, with no prospect of leaving in sight, he takes back his wish for someplace permanent.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

He rooms with a boy named Eskel, who is about the only bright spot in Kaer Morhen, as far as Geralt is concerned. He is only mildly mocking of a thirteen year old sleeping with a stuffed animal every night, and it's mostly companionable ribbing, so even though the thought of anyone mocking Roachie gets under his skin, he lets it go. Eskel is his friend, after all. Of course, though, because that's the way of the world, some older boys overhear Eskel's teasing.

He comes back to his and Eskel's room that night, expecting to find Roach under his pillow-- he's too old to carry her everywhere, now, so that's where she lives-- and instead she's strewn across his bed.

He's old enough, now, to know that it maybe looks a little ridiculous from the outside, but he's too upset to be self-conscious, and Eskel is nothing if not understanding as Geralt sobs into his shoulder that night, quiet except for the occasional little soothing noise as he strokes a hand up and down Geralt's trembling back.

It's unsalvageable, at least for their inexperienced hands. Neither of them is a seamstress. After lights out, Geralt sneaks out-- this time with Eskel in tow-- and creeps into the backyard. Just like last time, he silently digs a hole and places her inside. That's what you do with Roaches, after all-- you bury them, then you find her all over again. The idea of Roach not existing out there, somewhere, is inconceivable.

He curls up next to Eskel that night, and it isn't the same, and he doesn't quite sleep... but it helps.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

His first Roach had been about the side of a Beanie Baby, and had been a light, palomino sort of color. His second had been more the size of a Build-A-Bear, with slightly stiff limbs and brown fur so dark it was nearly black. The third time he finds Roach, she's a reddish sort of Bay, peeking out at him from behind a large Lego set on the thrift store shelf.

He'd already searched the bins three times and had come up empty-handed, not even a miscolored unicorn, or something else close-but-wrong to show for his efforts, and... there she is, sitting right there, like it's some sort of game. He gasps, and Eskel turns away from the slightly melted Barbies he'd been toying with at the sound. Geralt shoves the box aside and grabs at her, cradling her carefully in his hands. She's already a little on the worn side this time around-- one eye's a bit loose-- and she's right in the middle, size-wise, compared to her other two incarnations.

He loves her instantly.

It must show on his face, because Eskel laughs a little and throws an arm around his shoulders. "So, is this the fated horse, then?" He asks, teasing.

"Yeah," Geralt replies breathlessly, too excited to meet the teasing tone back, "I think so."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Lambert shows up when he's thirteen and they're both sixteen.

He's loud, and violent, and instantly hones in on Geralt's preternaturally graying hair and the shock of white growing out of the back of his head(poliosis, born from stress, though none of them know that term). He's inhumanly annoying, a real pain in the ass, and somehow, against all odds, Geralt and Eskel both instantly adore him.

Maybe it's the way he talks back to their "caregivers", or the way he sometimes gets into fights on smaller kids' behalf, who knows, but the three of them form a little clique fairly quickly. Lambert pretends it's begrudging, but it's not hard to see that it's mostly a front. He's a brat, through and through, but he's their brat.

Which is why he's even in their room-- they're all hanging out, Geralt flipping through a book and Eskel attempting to study, while Lambert fiddles with Roach. He turns her over in his hands, examines the spot where the loose eye had fallen off a year back, picks at one of her loose seams. "I just don't get it," he says, scrunching up his nose, "like. What does it do?" He asks.

"Be careful with her." Geralt says, flicking a glance over at Lambert before returning to his book. "And she doesn't do anything. She's a stuffed animal, she just sits there."

"Well, yeah, no duh." Lambert replies, rolling his eyes. "I'm not stupid." Eskel mumbles 'Could've fooled me,' from his own bed, and Lambert hisses back 'Watch it,' and kicks his leg as he snickers. "I mean, what do you do with it? Give it wots and wots of hugs and kissews?" He asks mockingly. He's holding her by the front legs, wiggling them up and down like some sort of dance and shoving her in Geralt's direction. He's about to tell Lambert to knock it off, trying to bat him out of the way to continue reading when, one of her legs just... pops off. There's a stunned moment where Lambert just stares at the two pieces in his hands.

A strangled noise works its way out of Geralt's throat, and he snatches Roach out of Lambert's hands.

"I-- I didn't mean..." He tries, looking between Geralt and Eskel helplessly, but the tears are already welling up as Geralt clutches her closer to his chest.

"Oh, shit," Eskel mutters and scrambles to his side drawer, which hides in the bottom a small sewing kit. Lambert slips out of the room in between Geralt sobbing and Eskel rushing to reattach the limb.

The fabric is weak enough around the seam, and Eskel is inexperienced enough at sewing, that the limb is noticeably shorter than the rest, but she's whole and in one piece by the end of the night.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Lambert awkwardly shuffles in place in their doorway the next day. "I-- fuck, man, I really didn't mean to..." He mutters, rubbing at the back of his neck.

Geralt holds Roach a little closer. "It's fine," he says tersely, "but no one's allowed to touch Roach anymore. Ever." He says firmly.

"Yeah, no, that works." Lambert tentatively steps into the room and then, when he isn't shooed out and no one starts crying, grows a bit bolder, sitting down on the edge of Eskel's bed. "I mean, except for nursemaid Eskel over here, right?" He says jokingly, and earns himself a punch on the shoulder from Eskel.

"Piss off, ya' little brat." He mutters fondly.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Years pass and Geralt and Eskel age out of Kaer Morhen. They get an apartment, split the costs, because they've basically never not shared a room, and they need all the shoulders to lean on they can get. All they really get is each other, so they settle for that. A few more years and Lambert is shoved out at the healthy age of eighteen-- just like they were. He's invited to their little apartment, and he's loud, and complains that he went from one roommate to two, bitches about how they're both sticks-in-the-mud who don't know how to have fun, and that they snore, and that he'll never get a good night's rest.

It's exactly what they were missing, and Roach watches all of it from her spot on the shelf near Geralt's bed.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Then, Geralt meets Jaskier.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The first time Jaskier comes over, Eskel and Lambert are both at work, so they have the apartment to themselves. Geralt opens the fridge to pull out two beers, and Jaskier flounces past him towards the shared bedroom. "I'm gonna' go root through your stuff without permission." He announces teasingly as he opens the door and slips inside.

Geralt snorts and rolls his eyes, taking his time popping open both bottles. He hears an exaggerated 'oooohh, interesting,' from the other room and carries the beers to his room. "There's really not much here to see." He says as he bumps the door open with his hip.

"Oh, I don't know about that." Jaskier replies from his place on Geralt's bed. "Who's this little cutie, huh?" His tone is light, teasing, and he's got Roach in his lap, playing with her ears.

Panic crawls up Geralt's throat-- she's old, now, and her ears were always a weak point. It's been years since he was sixteen, and her leg had come off so easily back then, so now... he shouts something strangled at Jaskier, maybe 'no' or 'stop', he isn't really sure, and Jaskier looks up with wide, startled eyes. He rushes over and drops the bottles on his night stand before scooping Roach out of Jaskier's hands. He doesn't yank-- terrified of what might happen to her stitching if he did-- but he isn't nice about it either.

He ignores Jaskier's stammering entirely, swiping his hand across her shelf to make sure there isn't any dust, before carefully sitting her precisely where she'd been. His hands tremble a little as they hover in the air in front of her, waiting to make sure she didn't fall, glancing over her to make sure nothing was out of place, that she still had all her limbs. After a moment, he lets out a shaky breath and steps back from the shelf.

"No one touches Roach." He says firmly.

"I'm sorry, I didn't know," Jaskier starts, and Geralt whirls on his heel, grabs Jaskier's wrist.

"Swear it." He says, squeezes Jaskier's wrist tight. "Swear you won't touch her."

"I won't." He sounds a little mystified at the afternoon's sudden turn, but he gently places his other hand over Geralt's. "I promise."

Geralt deflates a little with relief, loosens his grip and lets Jaskier's wrist slip from between his fingers. "She's..." he starts quietly, eyes averted, guilt and embarrassment creeping in over his sudden outburst. "She's really fragile. I... I didn't mean to... just, please don't touch her." He finishes weakly.

Jaskier agrees once more, reaches out and squeezes Geralt's hand reassuringly. They drink their beer in the living room.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Months pass and his friendship with Jaskier deepens.

Then, he meets Yen.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

"Hmm." She says thoughtfully, arms crossed over her chest. "I like your stupid little horse."

Her tone is light, teasing, and it strikes him right through the heart all the same. But, at least she isn't trying to touch Roach. He pulls her down into his bed, and the conversation is forgotten.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

They dance around each other like that for far longer than either reasonably should. Fuck, then fight, then silent treatment, only to fall back into bed and start the cycle anew.

He cares, really he does, and he knows Yen cares back, in her own way, but it's just all so... much. It's a little hard to take, most nights. As he lays there, unable to sleep, he catches sight of Roach out of the corner of his eye. His bed is cold and lonely, and thoughts of Yen won't stop swirling around his mind, and he just... he just wants to feel settled. Before he can talk himself out of it, he's carrying Roach down off her perch and curling around her to sleep with his old friend for the first time in a long time.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

A few months later, Jaskier uses his spare key to open the door to Geralt's apartment after a few rounds of knocking goes ignored.

He's got snacks, and a six-pack of beer that he deposits in the fridge, before calling out into the apartment, announcing his presence. He gets back a muffled 'in here,' and opens the door to the bedroom to find Geralt planted on the middle of his bed, Roach cradled carefully to his chest. "Sorry," he says weakly, sniffling into his palm, "I- I guess I forgot we were supposed to hang out."

Jaskier's by his side in a moment, kneeling in front of him on the bed, gently brushing his hair out of his face. "Oh, Geralt, what happened?"

He shrugs a little, helplessly. "Yen and I broke up." He pauses for a moment, rubbing little circles into the back of Roach's head, and then adds, "For good this time."

Jaskier reaches out and gathers Geralt up in his arms, lets him tuck his face in the crook of his neck. "I'm so sorry..." He mumbles, nosing into Geralt's hair.

"It's fine," Geralt replies weakly, voice cracking, "it was bound to happen sooner or later. We're kinda'... volatile."

Jaskier huffs out a humorless laugh. "Yeah, that you were..." The past-tense on Jaskier's tongue hits Geralt like a bolt to the chest, and he chokes out a sob. "Oh," Jaskier croons back, reaching up to cradle the back of his head, "oh, it's alright... it'll be alright..."

As he collapses forward into Jaskier's arms, he lets himself be soothed by Jaskier's voice, his arms enveloping him, and the softness of Roach's fur beneath his fingers.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

A few months later they kiss for the first time there, on his bed, in full view of Roach, which doesn't occur to him until later, but once it does it makes some small part of him wish he'd turned her around. She's seen enough of him, she doesn't need front-row seats to... that.

Then he realizes that she was also there for Yennefer, and he feels a sudden surge of guilt mixed with a healthy dose of shame.

His poor little Roachie.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The first time they fuck in his room, Geralt pauses with his hands on Jaskier's hips, blushing faintly. "Do... do you mind if I...?" He asks nervously.

"What is it, dearest?" Jaskier asks lowly, smoothing his hands up and down Geralt's bare chest, eyes all want and smoldering heat.

Geralt clears his throat awkwardly and lets go of Jaskier for a moment to reach up and carefully turn Roach so she was facing the wall. It's deeply embarrassing, but he hasn't been able to stop thinking about it ever since he had the realization about his time with Yen. He turns back around, expecting to be mocked, but Jaskier looks nothing except fond.

He laughs a little, but not meanly, and wraps his arms around Geralt's neck. "Good call," he says, pressing a kiss into Geralt's cheek, "don't want to subject poor Roachie to anything she didn't sign up for."

The complete lack of judgement, paired with the nickname, has a surge of affection swelling in Geralt's chest. He grabs Jaskier by the hips once more, and gently tosses him onto the bed. Jaskier laughs again, delighted, and opens his arms to grab at Geralt, who happily follows after him.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

"Geralt, look at this!" Jaskier announces from the couch, tilting his phone screen to the side as Geralt scoots closer and hooks an arm around his shoulders for easier viewing. "It's a stuffed animal repair service, but she runs a blog with pictures of the process and calls herself Doctor Beth. Isn't that the cutest thing?"

"Hmm." Geralt hums back. He glances at the screen, scrolls a little, but he quickly abandons it in favor of burying his face in Jaskier's neck and depositing kisses along its length.

Jaskier laughs and snuggles closer, but holds out his phone screen more insistently. "C'mon, Geraaalt," he whines, "you have to actually look. It's cute! You have to say it's cute."

Geralt flicks his eyes towards the screen once more, then away just as quickly as he deadpans the word "Adorable." right into the curve of Jaskier's jaw.

"You are the worst!" He announces, but he's grinning like a fool, and he turns his head into Geralt's affection all the same.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Once the kissing has died down, and Jaskier is seated side-saddle in Geralt's lap, he pulls his phone back out. "In all seriousness," he says, tucked up comfortably against Geralt's chest, "it's actually very interesting. She's really good at her job-- look at this, the bear's practically rags before she reconstructs it."

Instead of trying to distract Jaskier again, Geralt dutifully listens, watching the pictures as Jaskier flips through them. She is rather good, he has to admit, and there is something interesting in watching the stuffed animal go from rags to repaired, in the same way it's relaxing to watch an episode of How It's Made. He 'hmm's again, though it's a more thoughtfully, agreeing sort of ‘hmm’ this time.

"I've actually been following her blog for a little while now, and... I was just thinking..." Jaskier fiddles with the edge of his phone case, "maybe you could... send Roach to her, and--"

"No." He says, swift and firm. The playfulness has left his tone entirely, just the thought of sending Roach anywhere enough to make anxiety race through his chest and his palms turn clammy.

Jaskier's mouth twists into a frown. "Oh... sorry. I just... I know she's fragile and I thought this might help, so I--"

Geralt slides a hand up and down Jaskier's back soothingly. "It's alright. Thank you, for thinking of her, just... I... I can't."

He nods in return and straightens up to press a kiss to Geralt's cheek. "Alright, love, whatever you're comfortable with."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Now that Jaskier's said it, though, the thought won't leave Geralt's head. He scrolls through Doctor Beth's blog when he's alone, gets a feel for her track record.

Roachie is fragile now. Close to ten years with him, and she was already thin in some places before he got to her.

On the other hand, does he really trust some stranger on the internet to treat her right? What if she comes back wrong? What if, somehow, she doesn't come back Roach? He reaches out to run his thumb gently across her snout, looking to soothe himself, and watches as little tufts of fur come away under his feather-light touch.

He's already buried two Roaches. He really doesn't want to do again.

"Well, Roachie," he murmurs into the empty room, "third time's the charm, right?"

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

He is the closest to a nervous wreck that Jaskier's ever seen him in the intervening weeks. He'd packed the box with Roach so delicately, gently surrounding her with bubble wrap so she didn't get knocked around and somehow lose pieces in shipping, and as soon as the box was shipped he took to pacing the apartment and checking his phone every twenty minutes. Jaskier thought it was endearing, if a bit worrying.

It drove Eskel and Lambert up a wall.

There were a lot of movie nights in those weeks in an effort to keep Geralt's mind off of things, but inevitably about halfway through the movie he'd get a bit of a distant look in his eyes and he'd reach down to feel his phone in his pocket, make sure it was where he'd be able to feel it if he got an email.

Waiting to confirm materials, what color cloth to use and what eye matched best with her other in his opinion, what to do about her now rather sparse tail and mane.

Jaskier would touch his arm gently, bring him back to the present, and he'd turn his attention back to the movie, maybe sling his arm around Jaskier's shoulders. It was nice, and very sweet to see him so very concerned, but Jaskier did wish he could do a little more to ease some of Geralt's worries.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

There are, as Jaskier recalls, a few posts where people had sent in video of the results, of them opening the box and seeing their little stuffed animal friend all fixed up. And he knows for a fact Geralt's going to be excited to see Roach again, so when the box finally arrives and Geralt sits down on the couch with it, Jaskier opens up the camera on his phone without much thought.

And then has to set it down almost immediately.

As soon as the box opens, before he could even get his hands on her, big, fat tears start rolling down Geralt's cheeks. Jaskier drops his phone on the table without even bothering to turn off the recording, rushing forward to envelop Geralt in a hug.

Geralt's hands grip the edge of the box so tightly his knuckles turn white, and Jaskier holds him closer, runs his fingers through Geralt's hair soothingly. "What is it, what's wrong?" He asks softly. Geralt shakes his head.

"She just-- she didn't even look this good when I first got her and I--" He's cut off by another sob, and Jaskier holds him a little tighter. "I just can't stop thinking about e- every time she... she broke and I couldn't fix her and I h- had to just... just buy a new one and I... I..."

"Shh, shhh..." Jaskier quiets him gently, pressing a kiss to his temple. "It's alright..."

"I know, I know, she just... she's like new, you know?" He says weakly into Jaskier's shoulder.

That gives Jaskier pause. "Love... are you," he asks incredulously, "are you crying because you're happy?" Geralt nods, and Jaskier can't help the little laugh that escapes him. "Oh, my dear heart..." He murmurs, almost sickeningly fond as he nuzzles into Geralt's hair. "Why don't you pick her up, then? I'm sure she missed you."

Geralt reluctantly pulls back from Jaskier's embrace to look down into the box.

She really does look good as new, and Geralt's almost afraid to touch her. Maybe the new stitching isn't as sturdy as it looks, maybe she'll fall apart in his hands, or maybe she just won't feel right... He sucks in a breath and carefully curls his hands around her. All his breath leaves him in a whoosh.

He holds her in his hands, and something he didn't even know was unsettled, settles in his chest.

As he presses her close to his chest, she still feels like Roach.

Except now she looks like herself again. Whole and complete and strong.

"Thank you," he turns to Jaskier and wraps an arm around him, tugging him in close while the other keeps a hold of Roach, "I never would've done this if you hadn't brought it up. I... Jask... thank you so much."

"Of course, love," he says gently, carding his fingers through Geralt's hair, "got to look out for dear Roachie... where would you be without her, hmm?"

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

"You know, she's so much sturdier now that she's all fixed up." Jaskier points out gently, after a few quiet moments have passed. "She could handle... well. Being handled more, again. She doesn't have to live up on that shelf anymore."

Which, kind of had been the whole point, but Geralt hadn't thought it through in so many words. The tears come back with a vengeance and he sniffles into Jaskier's shoulder, clutches her to his chest firmer than he's dared to in years.

That night, he falls asleep with Jaskier behind him, and his old friend clutched in his arms, and it's maybe a little silly, a little childish, but it's the best sleep he's had in his life.

[spookyspaghettisundae]

What Wretches Call the Law

The chains squeaked and creaked, and I startled awake.

They always made that dreadful sound whenever I moved, whenever the wind blew. It was driving me insane. It was not like sleep came easy for me anymore.

My feet ached. Everything hurt. The iron bars dug into my back as I sat there, with my legs so close to me that I could have held my ears shut with my knees. So uncomfortable.

But I only had two options left. Standing up until almost everything hurt or sitting like this until everything else hurt. I had given out hope of ever experiencing anything but this persistent pain. But I had yet to come to terms with my end.

The bastards left me out here to die. On display for all to see.

Did not even have the decency to hang me first, or quarter me, or whatever else the sick coxcombs come up with next.

Maybe I could have spent more time in pondering where it all went wrong, but I had stopped seeing the point in that. Somewhere in between shouting profanities into the night until I went hoarse, mulling over all the little things I came to regret in life, and sobbing while I pleaded for my freedom, every single peep from my parched throat falling upon deaf ears.

Nobody ever answered.

Only the damned metal chain links squeaked.

So, there I was, hanging inside this inhumanly narrow cage. They called it a "gibbet". Love how they always found the time to come up with fancy names and forms for shit like this. All their riches and all their reading and faith and books, and this is what they filled their lives with.

Rotten inbred scum.

Their twisted sense of justice in putting me here, leaving me here—there was nothing just about it. They were deranged. Their sadistic pleasure in seeing my plight spoke volumes of their madness. The way the crowds gasped, and laughed, and cheered whenever they watched public executions.

I knew. I had been of them, too. At some point.

And all the while, every single one of them would have done the same in my place.

I knew because that was where I had gone.

As well as all the louts who stopped by the crossroads to look upon me there. To point, to talk ill about me, to tell their children that this was why they had to eat their supper and go to sleep and obey whatever they were told.

All cowards. Cowards who either loved to crush the peasants beneath their heel and mock me as they rode by on fancy horses, or cowards who feared the thought of ending up in my place if they helped me or even just dared to question this disgusting injustice.

Little walking piles of shit, all of them.

Even that little girl.

My thoughts had boiled down to these two extremes. Crushing remorse over mistakes I had made, and seething anger towards my captors.

Light and dark.

My skin had begun to peel from all the exposure to bouts of the sun burning down on me, while the cold and gloom of cloudy skies was something I had come to appreciate. Rain remained absent, as if God and heavens had decided to mock me like all the other cowards down here.

Day and night.

That was how my thoughts kept circling, cycling. I had no way of telling what time of day it was, or how long I had been left here.

Left to die miserably. For all to see.

Just like I had lost track of the passage of days and nights, I drifted in and out of uneasy slumber.

Squeak.

Fucking iron. Woke me up again.

There she was. Again.

The little girl.

No ten winters old, I guessed. Filthy, ratty, just like the rest of us who lived their lives in squalor. I began to wonder if she had even had a home where she took the food from, or if she was an orphan who nabbed these bits from townsfolk that pitied her. I wondered if she, too, one day, would end up like me.

Or if one of those bastards would take her life and get stuck in a cage to die, too.

Or if she would just be another one of the sorry souls, trampled underfoot by those rat bastards.

She held up a piece of soggy bread, offering it to me.

The first few times she had brought me any food, I always greedily gobbled it up. But in the beginning, I had held hopes of escaping. I ate only when I still dreamt of getting out from this fucking cage somehow, of getting my revenge.

Now, I would have spat on the little girl out of spite, but I did not want to spare any more spittle from my chapped lips. My mouth felt like sand.

I did not know how much longer I had, but another damned day in this damnable cage was a day too long to suffer through.

I shook my head at her, and she continued to stare at me through those big, wide eyes. Like staring at a doe in the woods, and the doe staring back. Curious and fearful. Frozen as I was, ready to bolt.

Like she knew what I had done but was entranced by it. Or she had no idea and did not understand why I was here. Or maybe the little witch was possessed by a demon who took pleasure in my torment.

At first, I welcomed the morsels she brought me. Usually bread, an onion here, even a chunk of cheese there. At first, I had still mistakenly believed I was getting out of this gibbet alive.

Now, I cursed her misguided pity. I cursed her with every bit of God's body. Anything she gave me only prolonged my suffering. Prolonged my captivity here, not only in this cage—but in this flesh.

I was too weak to do anything, too weak to speak back at people who insulted me whenever they passed my cage anymore. Too weak to hurl back profanities at those who mocked me, or threw rocks, or flung mud and dung pies. I reacted plentifully in the beginning. Colorfully. Sometimes pleaded, even.

But if there was one thing that the Lord had failed to teach us all, I guess it was showing mercy. This I now knew, taking root deep inside my bones.

The little girl shook the piece of bread, emphasizing how she wanted me to take it and eat it.

I guess if I had learned the lesson of mercy myself, I would have had to give the little brat the benefit of the doubt—that she pitied me, and shared food with me, thinking it was just the right thing to do.

That part won out. For now.

I shook my head again. She finally stopped holding out the chunk of bread. Turned around and left.

She always looked over her shoulder back at me when she went away, like I might finally climb out of my cage and follow her. She always showed up alone, no other people in sight. Vanished back into the hills, not taking the muddy roads where my cage swayed drearily in the wind.

Her presence portended something slightly unreal. Part of why I wondered if she was not some devil.

But none of that mattered. I just wanted it to end. All of it.

Not only my own life. I wanted the world to end. I wanted to see it burn, and to hear the screams of people suffering in ways undreamed of.

I wished ill upon all who had wronged me. And as far as I was concerned, here, hanging in this cage and dying slowly like a wretch—the whole damned world was guilty of wronging me.

I had lied, stolen, and slain. I cannot say that I did any of that for good reason. Sometimes I did it for fun. Often, I did it for my own survival and more often for my own gain, reckless of the cost upon others.

But how else was I supposed to live?

Not just survive.

Live.

Was I supposed to work the fields until my bones were bare and my feet bloody? To accept my place in life? Watch as others lived high and mighty, looking down upon us from their grandiose castles, taking from us because of the blood and loins they were born of? Leave alone all the things they have and do not need, so many that only the Lord almighty can keep an eye on it all and they need more servants to watch what they believe is theirs?

Craven toads.

Of course, I would steal from them. Of course, I would take their rotten children for ransom, and kill one of them when it came to saving my own hide. If those liver-eaters could get fat on the food we decked their tables with, then they certainly could fuck whomever they wanted to, to spawn more of their little rat-fucking offspring to continue their awful legacy.

Cowards. They would have done the exact same in my position. Any of you who want to tell otherwise, why are you lying to yourselves?

The only difference between them and us was the golden spoon that fed them from cradle to grave.

For when they stole, raped, and murdered, it was just. When we did as the example they led with, it was crime.

I regretted none of that. Think of me as a terrible creature, and I will not argue with you. That is not my place. Think of me as a terrible monster, that I have come to embrace.

As I awaited Death to greet me, sitting in my hanging cage, I only felt the occasional pangs of remorse over other things. My things.

The time I watched as the other children bullied a friend, and I joined in on it with them. How I should have done something. I could tell that he never looked at me the same away again ever after. And here, of all places, I wondered what became of him. Would he throw the first dung pie if he had the opportunity?

The time I broke a friend's nose in anger, and we never spoke again afterwards. I had overreacted, and he never deserved that. His wrathful gaze and bloodied face, I will never forget. I wondered if he still loathed me, wherever he wandered now. If he even walked this earth anymore.

And the time I made my darling cry, and never saw her again but doors closed on my face, angry shouts muffled by the wood. Owed to mistakes I had made all on my own, with nobody else to blame. Though I would never apologize for where I wandered in my life before and after, I would never strike her again. Those eyes, so filled with accusation, so cold and unforgiving for all the times I had wronged her, I had learned from those mistakes and would nary repeat them.

My sadness stemmed from those moments and filled my quiet loneliness now, thoughts I had not afforded much space until I had wound up stuck in this cage where I would die.

I was not a good person, and never would be. The longer I lingered here, the closer Death crept to my tiny prison, the smaller that remorse shrank. The shorter the bouts of sadness.

With this justice? This mockery of justice?

No. By now, I felt only anger. I had no more energy for it to burn bright like a flame.

All that was left of it was something seething and cold and almost sinister.

Oh, the things I imagined doing to people now as my last moments waned, and I drifted in and out of depraved dreams thereof.

Squeak.

Fucking iron.

Night had fallen, and I struggled to stand again, finally relieving my back of the pressure from the cage's bars. Within minutes of standing in the gibbet, my feet began to ache.

My stomach had long stopped growling. Funny, that. Never realized that it only growled after I had eaten. Now, that I had gone without nourishment for God-only-knew-how-long, all that my belly had become was a pit from which sharp spikes of pain shot out every now and again, stabbing at my insides to remind me of my coming demise.

I gripped the bars of my cage. And that was that.

No longer did I try to bend them, no longer did I possess any strength to even dare dreaming of such folly.

Death awaited me.

The shadows in the mist between the hillocks, they sometimes took the shape of people. Like the silhouette of a person. Standing still. Watching from afar.

Death.

When I came to next, it was gloomy again, light out.

I hated everything. Everyone.

A horse carried a nobleman down the crossroad. Hooves kicked up muck and the bastard turned his nose up to look down at me as he passed by. Pure disdain and disgust, judging by the lop-sided sneer across his visage.

Never seen him before but would have murdered him in a heartbeat over some food. Especially now. Or—my freedom, rather. Food only meant further torment, I reckoned.

Food without freedom only meant that Death took his time. Took longer to finally approach me.

The lousy nobleman in his bright and colorful cloth offered no prolonged stare, ignored me on his ride, gaining distance quickly. Had somewhere more important to be. Had others to gossip with, and perhaps speak derisively of me.

Now swallowed by the fog.

Squeak.

Next, I remembered, I was sitting again. My back no longer hurt. My eyes did not open.

Yet I saw.

I saw everything from here. Floating beside myself, studying the husk of my former being. Oh, how pathetic I looked. I wondered how many days lay in wait between my passing and my body turning into a skeleton. Knowing the scoundrels who had done this to me, I knew they would leave it there as a reminder.

Do not cross the crown, or you shall find yourself in the gibbet, just like me.

But my body was not alone as I hovered there.

There was that girl again. She could see me—not in my new form—thus she held up some bread to my body. Then she lowered her hand, seeing that my sorry carcass offered her no reaction. The deathly, vacant stare in my hollow eyes. The crows already cawed in the distance, hungry to pick the jelly from my skull.

The shadow of Death had long come and gone. But in sending only his shadow, so did I remain, a shadow of my former self.

My time in this flesh had passed.

But I now understood the potential. Felt something when I should have felt nothing anymore.

A thirst to dwell longer and unleash my wrath. All I needed was a way back.

That spark of curiosity. That open little mind of hers.

I could taste it. I could touch it.

And she could not see my shadow, growing as the sun set, crawling across the dirt, and reaching out like dark thorns.

I took control. I entered her head and took over. Saw through those big wide eyes. Studied my tiny little hands and wondered what I could possibly do with them. Wondered next if I could take another body, bigger and stronger than hers.

She still had all her teeth. Soon I knew her every memory.

Had I known this possibility, perhaps I would have welcomed Death sooner.

And without a body to tether me any longer, I would have my revenge.

I would make them pay.

All of them.

Now, I know you look at me in disbelief. I have seen so many faces like yours before.

How can this be?

Well—kill me. Cut me down. End my life and find out if my yarn is but a strange tale. I dare thee.

But when I return to haunt, I will remind you. No matter the face. I will admit that I lie, I steal, and I murder, like anybody else. Even if man gives me no right to. And whatever justice you think there is, it is an illusion. Justice serves only the strong and the wicked.

I will wear another face, and I will speak, with pride, "The flesh is a cage, and I am here to free thee from it." I will remind you of this tale as you weep and beg for mercy, and you will know for certain.

There is only what wretches call the law.

And then there is me.

—Submitted by Wratts

[zargsnake]

Knightkiller: Anakin and Obi-Wan’s First Adventure

Chapter 8: Priorities

Word Count: 2565 Links: Chapter 1, Table of Contents

*   *   *

Anakin hears the cheers for Obi-Wan turn sour, and he soon figures out why. It is no fault of his master's, who fights beautifully -- but there is a transparent dome-shield around the arena, and whenever someone in the angry, heavily-armed audience shoots at it, ripples of white electric shocks cross the dome and obscure the fight. Anakin is relieved that the audience is booing each other, not his master, though he worries that Obi-Wan will think they're booing at him.

Obi-Wan looks over his shoulder, trying to locate Anakin in the audience, and a blade suddenly whizzes by his neck. His reflexes protect him and he jerks out of the way, but a moment later he feels hot blood on his skin. He hadn't moved quickly enough -- the blade cut him sharp and swift. It hurts a lot more than he expected. It could have easily killed him.

He was so focused on finding Anakin in this crowd that he forgot Anakin's own words to him, his warnings about this opponent. Obi-Wan hadn't taken Anakin seriously about Tiango. Of course it was sad about Anakin’s “cool” gladiator friend, but Obi-Wan defeated a Sith lord not long ago. The experience buoyed his confidence to a fault. This Tiango -- not a Sith, not even a professional, just an ex-science experiment, just a Yooro -- landed a blow on him -- a pretty good one, too.

Obi-Wan rapidly teaches himself a lesson. Connecting with Anakin doesn't mean knowing exactly where he is. It means listening to him. Believing him. That's what teachers do. It's what friends do.

This isn't the Outer Rim, but these people are. This is Anakin's haunt. Obi-Wan will train it out of him, will make him a man of the Core. But for now, Anakin is the expert here, and his words must be Obi-Wan's textbook.

With his heart opened wide for Anakin, and his guard up because of Anakin's warning, Obi-Wan realizes he will have to hunker down in defense for a while. Tiango's assault is brutal and inhumanly quick, though Obi-Wan remembers that Yoroos do get exhausted -- eventually. What Obi-Wan lacks in comparative strength, he makes up for in endurance -- patience and energy, the long game, care -- these are Obi-Wan's secret weapons.

Anakin watches Obi-Wan deflect the same moves that once ruthlessly whittled down Crix Spartak, the gladiator who he had loved. The memory of that death match sends chills up his spine. He is certain that some of these blows must hit his master. Part of him is certain that Obi-Wan is doomed, too. Anakin had believed Crix would win, and he had been wrong. It is asking too much to have hope again, against the same, utterly evil man.

Though Obi-Wan has great endurance, his vibroblade does not. Out of habit, he treats it as roughly as if it were a laser weapon, depending on it for deflection, as a shield. Tiango's barrage strikes the metal and bends it back and forth into a zigzag, then into a knot. Obi-Wan is slowly disarmed as his blade becomes less and less tenable as a weapon. He has no choice; he has no other shield. The biggest bother is his own hand: the damn vibroblade is aptly named -- it quivers like a leaf in the wind, wearing out his wrist and weakening his fingers.

The crowd cheers enthusiastically for the graceful Jedi, chanting, "Kenobi! Kenobi!" Anakin does not join in. Obi-Wan could almost be dancing with his expert moves, but Anakin is not in the mood to learn from him. He gazes in hopeless terror at the duel. He watches bullets, lasers and slingshotted electrostones bounce off the dome, as well as gifts, toys and even people’s underwear. All such wild debris from this crazed crowd trying to reach out to their beloved or hated athlete, his poor, wonderful master.

The fastest or biggest bullets send fuzzy waves across the dome, but the dome quickly repairs itself. Anakin follows the arc of the dome, calculating the sources of its projection points from subtle distortions in the waves.

He moves the layers of fur in his stolen disguise to peek at the recharging screen on his hidden acid-blaster: 52%. No other weapons are making a dent in the dome. But no other weapons are quite like this one, and no one else seems to have figured out where to shoot. Could he crack the dome? What would he do then?

Anakin looks away from Obi-Wan for a second and scans his narrowed eyes over the happy rabble. He does not understand them. Are they seeing what he's seeing? They all shout and cheer, laughing and clapping, as if Obi-Wan is triumphant, as if he is playing. He looks back at his master. He sees that Obi-Wan is in great pain. Dying, even. How can the information from his senses, and the conclusions from his feelings, be so different from everyone else's?

Is he connecting, mentally, to his master -- using his supposed Jedi powers to see things for how they truly are? Is he seeing the truth, better than they are, because he is a Jedi, a Jedi Padawan? Is the Force giving him a special message -- because he, unlike the rabble, is a Jedi -- because he, unlike everyone, is the answer to a prophecy -- because he is closer to Obi-Wan than anyone else is?

Or ... is he, Anakin, wrong? Is everyone else right? Is his sight blinded by irrational fear, brought about by his utter dependence on this man? Did Obi-Wan really stumble, just now? No one else seems to have seen it.

Is he, Anakin, perhaps, confusing the past for the present? Crix for Obi-Wan? Death for life?

Is it all in his head? Or is it real?

   *   *   *

Below the arena, Zlinky has memorized the map from the computer. With Jane, she trespasses through the employee quarters. They reach a large, important-looking office which Zlinky guesses is Knightkiller's.

She hears voices inside and shouts at the door, “Hey boss! There's fried fluunies in Rec Room 3!”

She backs off as the door opens and two people exit. Zlinky creeps inside and Jane blusters along behind her. Too soon, they hear the people coming back and Zlinky shoves Jane under the slick metallic desk; the robot is so big that two of the desk legs lift a few inches from the ground. There isn't much room left for Zlinky; she has to nestle right up against Jane's bazooka. A belt of detonators falls across Zlinky's lap.

She peeks over the edge of the desk and sees the people more closely. They look more decorated than the other guards, with sashes and medals, as if there was some kind of made-up military ranking among Knightkiller's cronies, a worthless army dedicated solely to this evil entertainment. 

“These fluunies are great,” says one crony.

“I’ve had better,” says the other.

The hidden Padawan hears the gross sounds of chewing, and then the rather more alarming sound of Jane powering up her neutralizers. Zlinky quiets her and gestures for her to stop. Stealth has worked so far; it would be best to avoid violence, especially since these two seem important.

“I can't wait to run the missing Jedi kids through with this,” says the first one, as he ignites a lightsaber.

Zlinky stops gesturing, but Jane has already powered down.

“The Jedi kids must still be on the ship. No one's been allowed to leave and no shuttle pods have activated.”

“You think Jedi could survive in space?”

“No. Only the boss can do that. You saw them in those Coruscanti space suits, idiot.”

“Oh right.”

The second crony ignites another lightsaber. Even without looking, Zlinky recognizes the sound as her own. She feels something very powerful and uncomfortable. Taken aback, she identifies it as jealousy, one of the very worst emotions. Afraid of her own feelings, she is frozen, unable to act, unable to know if she is behaving rationally, according to the light side, or irrationally, which will lead her off the narrow path into darkness.

“They're real nice suits. I called dibs on the man-size one for me and the little one for my daughter.”

“Yeah...the gigantic one and the lady-size one are pretty useless.”

“I'll take the lady one for my kid to grow into.”

Zlinky thinks, I'm twelve! I’m not a lady! Though I am much taller than Anakin. So they say Anakin is missing, too? That means he's not dead! If only I was strong enough to detect his presence!

Jane pokes Zlinky and gestures to her blasters. Zlinky shakes her head.

We can't kill him! He's a dad!

They hear the two men walking closer and closer. One of them accidentally hits something with the lightsaber; the girls hear them cursing and smell melting plastic.

Zlinky feels time running out. This hiding spot is bad. She ran in here without a plan. She knows her decision-making is impeded by fear, jealousy, and access to a murder-droid, but she must decide something.

Zlinky quickly examines the settings on Jane's weapons. All these numbers and charts are too confusing to parse right now. She dials one dial back, but it only causes some numbers to rise and others to fall. She puts it back where it was, though the numbers are still not the same. The last time Jane shot someone, it wasn't fatal. At least not immediately.

The girl feels tears pressuring her eyes and throat. She doesn't want to hurt anyone. She has learned through stories and lessons that the darkness within is far worse than the darkness without. She is more frightened of doing wrong than she is of dying. There is no death. But there is evil.

She can't get out of her head a discussion she overheard from some of the older Padawans. This group of twenty- and thirty-somethings is the pride of the whole Temple. Everyone adores them -- the strongest, most beautiful, best students in school. Once they are knighted, then they leave the young people’s social circle to rub shoulders with the teachers, and have no time for their old friends -- but before they are knighted, they rule the school from the inside, and everyone lets them get away with a little more fun than knights are allowed. In those last years of Padawanship, they are the most free a Jedi can be.

Just last month, when Zlinky fetched the group snacks from the mess hall in order to bask in their presence, she found them in a very strange state. When one of them returns from a mission, the others crowd around to hear the stories and see the new scars. The latest conquering hero, a human named Sara Chid-wun, did not have a physical scar. But she had such an aura of bitterness around her that the whole group was affected, including the young interloper Zlinky.

Sara explained how she and her Master Kayji were caught in various difficult situations, and each time Kayji had neglected to act, so each time Sara had been forced to act herself, often with violence. It felt like a test that she continuously failed. And yet, ultimately, they succeeded in their mission. Sara claimed that Kayji would not address her concerns with anything beyond platitudes.

The whole experience led Sara to, hesitantly, conclude that Masters often take advantage of their students. Masters refuse to move, and claim they are trusting in the Force, or allowing evil to collapse in on itself, or some such excuse, while in reality they are leaving the sensible but nasty work to the impure, young Padawan tagging along.

The group discussed each example, and more from their own adventures, each trying to explain away their masters’ -- sometimes -- confusing actions, each unwilling to support Sara’s conclusion -- including, of course, Sara herself. But the group found that, if they were being honest, she might be right. Sometimes. So they had moved on to finding the moral lesson in this seemingly cruel behavior -- something about knightly violence being worse than non-knightly violence, something about power and purity.

And maybe they came to a satisfying explanation among themselves; Sara herself seemed as cheerful as normal the next time Zlinky saw her. But Zlinky hadn't felt comfortable sitting in on their important big-kid conversation any longer, so she had left at the darkest part of it.

Tila has never forced Zlinky's hand before. Zlinky has never had to kill anyone before. But now the master is indeed the one sitting out, while the student is the one doing the work.

Is it okay to stray off the path when you are only a Padawan? Is it, in fact, expected, and necessary? Must she walk in the gray area beside the light, until she is a master herself, and can savor the light all the time, and never have to do any more wrong? When she is knighted, then she can delegate that dark stuff to someone else, someone young and obedient?

The thought occurs to Zlinky that she is not the one who would do the killing -- that would be Jane. But she knows that is a flaky excuse. Jane is her responsibility. Just as she is Tila's. The blood is on all their hands.

Zlinky turns to Jane and nods. Jane immediately stands up and neutralizes the guards. Zlinky pokes her head over the desk, sees the smoking bodies, and fears the worst.

“Are they dead?”

“ɪ ᴅᴏᴜʙᴛ ɪᴛ. ꜱʏꜱᴛᴇᴍꜱ ᴀʀᴇ ʜᴀʀᴅʟʏ ᴀᴛ ꜰᴜʟʟ ᴄᴀᴘᴀᴄɪᴛʏ.“

“I'm pretty sure your full capacity is overkill.”

She tiptoes over to the guard's bodies. One seems to be breathing. The other, she can't tell.

She can't alert anyone to the danger, and she doesn't trust the medical facilities here anyway. But she has nothing to give them, to help them. She puts her hand on the soft, sandy hair of the one whose life is unclear to her, the one who has a little daughter.

“May the Force be with you.”

Her voice is a shaky whisper, but she's never meant those words so much as she means them now.

Please, please, live.

She pulls the lightsaber from his hand and turns it off, and does the same with the other guard. She finds three more lightsabers on their belts. She recognizes hers and her master’s; two of them must be Anakin’s and his master’s; the last one could be Glagret’s, a.k.a. Knightkiller’s. It's green, and of the same old fashion as her master’s. She is surprised and glad that it isn't red. But maybe Knightkiller carries her red one on her person. Or maybe, just maybe, the Sith are not at all involved. She prays that they aren't.

Zlinky and Jane hide the bodies behind the desk and lock the door behind them. Zlinky turns away from the door and does not look back.

They were gonna kill me. They still will kill me, if they figure it out. I have to act in self-defense. And I have to save the other three Jedi. These people may be people, but they are low-lives, murderers, and lawbreakers. It wasn't my choice that they got in my way.

Chapter 9: Crix Spartak