#like taxes is. okay we can complain or whatever but anyone who is REALLY into hating them. immediate gross person

[lemonhemlock]

I don't see why we as green fans can't complain or say anything at all about Aemond's characterization and the overuse of certain tropes in fics when black fans do it all the time also?? Be it Aemond/OC, Aemond/Rhaena, Aegon fics paired with OCs or team black characters like Baela, Daemon/Alicent or even pure time travelling crackships like Aemond/Sansa or Sansa paired with any team green guy (yes some of them have complained about this as well because allegedly if Sansa were to time travel back in the Dance era she would only fall in love with Jace! Fine! But guess what no team black stan who has complained about this aspect has written or comissioned a fic with her and their guy, they just complain that the already existing ones aren't about what they want) and they will always find time to lash out on their accounts about how the evil green authors are mischaracterizing the team black OCs or already existing characters. At least we are not leaving hate comments or criticism that nobody asked for (or I hope no one does this! Please don't!) on the fics we read and were disappointed by (and didn't even mention them as examples in these asks).

Anonymous asked: okay i’m game for some anti-lucemond inbox antagonism. while op did indeed make some good points regarding the formulaic nature of aemond x OC i still contend they do not know the difference between a minor character and a plot device. helaena is a minor character, the cargyll twins are minor characters, laenor is a minor character, heck with a bit of massaging and extrapolating harwin could be consider a minor character. Unlike strong boy #2 at least I can say what they were doing between their respective time jumps. helaena — having babies, enjoying her bugs cargylls — aegon watch + introspection which results on them being on different sides laenor — fighting in wars, hanging with his boyfriend, parenting (?) harwin — bangin’ rhaenyra, being a goldcloak, preparing to take on a lordship (just cause harrenhall is practically unliveable doesn’t mean they don’t have peasants in the vicinity to tax I suppose idk) These are characters. They have jobs and hobbies, actual relationships. lucerys in contrast, what has he being doing for the 6 years during the time skip. training? possibly, all we know about him is that he gets his ass handed to him in a fight and gets seasick. what are his hobbies? does he have any responsibilities? friends? anything? I will grant he seems to have a decent grasp of HV. during the incident Aemond in his anxiety starts giving his command in English whereas Luke maintains HV when commanding Arrax, for all the good that it did. maybe there is something there, but I don’t want to read into it too much it because it was likely more for the audience than a way to develop the characters because those are commands not sentences, like jace was working on. Speaking of Jace, even he has something going for him, minor though it was — he trains, attends meetings, is not doing so good in his LOTE classes, really doesn’t like his stepdad, still cannot take a joke. Jace has some serious emotional problems which could be worth exploring, but Lucerys? Nothing, nada, zilch. Who is this person It seems Lucerys only role was to gas up rhaenyra; just so we in the audience know she is in fact perfect, make this face ☹️ in the background of scenes, smirk one time like a asshole, and then die. he is not a character, and while I initially had no problem with him, beyond a mild distaste because he hurt aemond (I actually put more blame on Jace) the way TB started riding this non entity so hard for the last year just made me loathe lucerys. Lucemond can occasionally be fun. I like the fics which are just absurd AUs but anyone who actually takes it seriously. The folks who insist on ‘Fated Feud’ or whatever it’s called, are reaching so hard they might tear something, pretending there is any chemistry or motivation for this relationship. And don’t get me started on the ones who call Luke the pearl of driftmark, that makes me want vom. But people need to quit pretending Lucerys is something other than a plot device, first blood in the DoD, that is all. I hope him and this ship goes away soon. [anyway sorry you’ve got to be the repository for this nonsense. How do you like your aegond? The thing which should have been the main mlm ship for this ridiculous fandom.]

ironically this is probably exactly the type of content the previous anon wanted to avoid 😂 but you can't expect to go in someone's inbox looking for drama, stirring the hornets' nest so to speak, and not expect a reaction. surely everyone can deal with their inbox messages whichever way they want, on the spectrum of not bothering to react at all vs ranting about it. i don't subscribe to this idea that you should hold your mouth shut and refrain from any kind of critical diatribe bc the other side might see it and might be up in their feelings about it.

absolutely not referring to vitriolic hateposting or other forms of bullying, but the institution of the Rant is sacred and must be protected. you can be annoyed at some fandom stuff and simply want a space to air out those thoughts - ofc you're going to be posting in designated fandom platforms, bc it looks deranged to complain about this IRL. i feel that people need to accept that users should have their own barbie playground, but, equally, there should be some spaces (keeping a respectful distance ofc) where criticism or just random rants about that thing can happen, undoubtedly respecting the parameters of decency and not resorting to crazy insults

i agree (and this is a v important caveat) that it becomes bizarre when it's the same people doing it every day, bc then it turns into an unhealthy hyperfixation which you might want to interrogate, but once in a while it can be cathartic, like shooting the shit with your bffs. moderation is key to everything, we can all co-exist and get along without taking everything to heart

this isn't even about lucemond, honestly, it's more of a general fandom criticism, because this is not the first time i've encountered people who simply refuse to mute the tags, willingly read the anti posts, find themselves irked by something, then vent their frustrations on OP

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

as for luke being a plot device vs a minor character, i can't say i''m too bothered about that distinction to argue either way. minor characters can also be plot devices and he is effectively fridged for rhaenyra's and jace's) pain. i do think he has more going for him in the show, like they really tried to give him more screen time towards the end and focus a little on his supposedly conflicting feelings about inheriting driftmark & his bastardy

anyway the "how do you like your aegond" sent me 🤣 i'm really drawn to modern setting AUs for some reason! the constraints of modern society are like a breeding ground for angst

[m0mmat0rtle]

FANCY FNAF MOVIE ➵ Ch. 9

"Glad to see the house is still standing."

Mike said as his little sister ran up to him. "Can I come with you to work tonight?" "No." Mike didn't hesitate. He looked to Fancy.

"Hi." He said softly. "Thanks again for watching her, like I said, I'll pay you... eventually."

"Mike it's fine." "Well if there's anything I can-" "Actually there is." Mike raised a brow at her, he wasn't expecting her to respond so fast or urgently. "You have a VHS player at work right?" Mike nodded. "Yeah why?" "Can I use it?" Mike sighed. "Yeah... yeah I guess so." he replied.

"Why does she get to go to work with you?" Abby complained with a frown. "Because... because she's weird and I have to keep an eye on her to make sure she doesn't commit some kind of felony." Fancy giggled.

"I have to get ready for work anyways." "Oh Mike, there's still some Alfredo left over from dinner if you want some." "Alfredo? What happened to Stouffers?" "If you thought I was going to feed that garbage to your sister then you're actually crazier than I am."

"Garbage?" "I made Alfredo. It was easy and I cleaned up. So you have nothing to worry about, and your sister ate something healthier than flash frozen lasagna." "Okay fine whatever."

Mike walked off to go find his sister who had run into her room with his vest for work. "Abby- no don't take that!" He shouted as he sped his walk into a run. "Abby-" Fancy could hear him from the living room, their banter heartwarming.

"Abby why are your polly pockets in your lizard tank?" "Fancy and I put them in there because they committed tax fraud."

"You- you what?" He sighed. Fancy giggled from the living room, overhearing their exchange. "Do you even know what that is?" "Sure, Fancy told me. It's when you don't give the government the money they want. Do you think we can tell the police that aunt Jane does that? That way we don't have to worry about her anymore?" Mike sighed again. He pulled his vest out of her hands.

"No, Abby, we cannot accuse your aunt of committing tax fraud." "Hey!" She cried. "I want the vest!" He walked out of her room. "Did you really teach my little sister about tax fraud?" He asked Fancy who was holing in a laugh. "Maybe." She replied. Mike Rolled his eyes. "Look, Max is here and I'm running late." He checked his watch. "Come on, Fancy Drew." "Did you just-" "I did. Now let's go."

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗

"So what did you need this VHS player for exactly?" Mike asked, the two of them entering that same familiar office, this time together at the same time.

"I have a tape from the police department, it's of some kind of interview from the investigation with the five missing children. It's part of the case file, you probably aren't supposed to view it-" Fancy shrugged.

"I hardly think Officer Hayden Hurst will care." She did a fake professional gruff accent when she said the name of the officer who was supposed to be observing her internship. Mike chuckled.

"So he really is a jerk like Vanessa said?" "Oh my god, Mike you don't even know. He's just awful. Misogynistic and just ew." "Just ew, huh?" "yes! And he makes me call him sir! He's not even like thirty! And he makes me call him sir!" Mike laughed again.

"What?" Fancy asked. "What is so funny?" "Nothing nothing it's just-" "Just what?" "you're so weird." Mike said as he shook his head.

"One second you're acting like a literal lawyer, spitting out technical terms that I can't even hope to comprehend; you're researching serial killers, and now you're sitting here gossiping to me like some sort of 'it girl'. It's just, not what I was expecting." "I'm not what anyone expects." "That's for sure." Mike replied as he shook his head and Fancy pulled the tape from her bag.

"Now for the main event." She said as she wiggled the tape in the air, excitement in her voice. Was it sad that she got excited about these things? She couldn't tell anymore. She reached down and placed the tape in the player, pressed it closed, and then pressed play.

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗

Static.

Static rushing between sides of the scream and the screaming of mushy groaning pure sound- TV static. It only lasted less than a minute but it felt like the static looked into her soul, reaching and grasping for that tiny locked box in the back of her mind.

No.

No it couldn't have it. She couldn't open that box with those memories, not here, not now, not with Mike present. He didn't need to know. He couldn't know. Shouldn't know. The static cleared and the TV showed the downward view of an interview table.

A table in a room with three men around it. On one side sat two officers and on the other sat a man that Fancy didn't recognize. One of the officers cleared his throat and tapped his stacked documents against the cold metal table. The sound echoed across the room and through the TV and straight into Fancy's ears.

"Alright, Mr. Patrick," He said, his voice sounded so tired.

Fancy imagined he was, absolutely exhausted. She put herself in his shoes, the unnamed officer assigned to the case originally when it was in it's prime days of investigation.

Every lead he followed turned up cold. Nothing had worked out for this man in 1983 and it wasn't working out for her either. She was reaching the same roadblocks that he had. No evidence.

Wait, did he say Mr. Patrick? As in Ness?

"You willingly came in for this interview, correct?" The man across from them nodded. "I just want to help my community." He said. that voice. She knew that voice. But from where?

"Can you tell us what you know about *RETRACTED*."

Seriously? They were going to play this game? Give her the interview but not the top suspect's name. Fine. she knew who they were talking about anyways. But Mike didn't. Or maybe he did? The retracting of the name was probably for the best anyways since Mike most likely wasn't even supposed to be viewing this. Private police property, confidential, you know?

"Oh I know *RETRACTED* quite well. We're poker buddies. Every Wednesday evening we used get together at my house, his house, or Henry Schmidt's place. That was our group, the three of us. We used to play poker for hours and hours." "Would you say you knew *RETRACTED* pretty well?" "Yes I would say so." "So what can you tell us about December 30th 1983?"

"I can tell you that *RETRACTED* was at my house playing poker until 11:30pm. Roughly, of course." "Was Henry Schmidt there as well?" "As a matter of fact, he was not, he and his wife were out of town for some reason. I can't remember what exactly but I'm sure he could tell you himself if you really wanted to know." "So it was only you and *RETRACTED*?" "Yes." "What time did *RETRACTED* arrive at your address?" "I'd say about five thirty, uh ish."

One of the officers wrote something something down.

"Are you aware of the circumstances under which we are questioning you?" "The missing kids right?" "yes. Do you know anything about the missing children?" "I do not." "Do you know if *RETRACTED* killed them?" "He did not. He was playing poker with me." "Do you know where the bodies were hidden?" "I do not."

One of the officers sighed and shuffled his papers as he leaned back in his chair. "Alright Mr. Patrick I think that's all we have for you. You're free to go." "Thank you." Mr. Patrick said as he stood. "Uh, Mr. Patrick, one more thing," the other officer asked as he stood.

"Would you say that *RETRACTED* has a good poker face?"

"Yes."

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[muirneach]

just got a reel on instagram that was like ‘why we moved from toronto to calgary: low taxes’ which is already a red flag as is but the poster? JASON KENNEY 🤢🤢

[in-tua-deep]

Ok I totally want to hear more about this survivors au/Delores is real! How do the siblings handle having this different version of Five? Five may be better adjusted but he still has to heard his family around like a bunch of stray cats. What happens when Hazel and Cha Cha show up? How do they find out that Vanya causes the apocalypse and how does Five handle that revelation?!

here is the thing, i think the survivors au has the potential to be HILARIOUS

no one knows how to handle a well-adjusted five, and this absolutely includes the commission

So you mentioned Hazel and Cha-Cha?? Five in this au was not nearly as absolutely feral as he is in the show bc he knows how to interact with people - he was raised by a competent adult and a weird best friend and they occasionally saw other survivors as well

please picture old Five hanging around the water cooler and chatting with Hazel

the other funny thing is that Five is competent passing - he is well adjusted emotionally but functionally?? Hazel is out there complaining about dental being cut and office parties and budgets and Five is there sipping his drink having never filed taxes in his life. Five doesn't know what the fuck a dental plan is, he was a child soldier and then lived in an apocalypse.

So please picture for me Hazel being like "okay I know corporate wants us to keep what we're being paid to ourselves but fuck that, workers unite, what do you get paid as a legend old timer?"

and five is like "you're getting paid? i get to not get tossed back into the apocalypse, I think"

"but what about expense forms? what about medical care?"

"I'm like 80% sure i'm being experimented on, actually." Five says nonchalantly, "Don't get me wrong, my idea of medical care is fucked by being a child soldier but I'm pretty sure regular people don't have electrodes attached to their heads every time they get a checkup. Could be wrong though! My ex-dad used to monitor my brainwaves while I slept so like, my idea of appropriate shit is fucked, you know?"

This is a Five who was raised by Rick, he is polite to his coworkers. If Dot asked him if he wanted to grab lunch, Five would have gone and grabbed lunch with her or politely said that he couldn't.

Cha Cha only ever talks to Five when she wants to talk shop, so they've had a couple of conversations about weapons but not much else tbh, Hazel just tends to be more personable

So when they're sent after Five, Hazel is much more hesitant to kill who he perceives as a "work friend" and also is definitely thinking about all the times Five casually revealed a way the commission was being highkey shady about him, such as the potential experimentation, no pay, working under duress etc. He's much more easily turned against the commission because he's even more primed to say "fuck the commission" than he is in canon

Hazel out here like "how did Five break his contract when Five wasn't even being paid? I kind of want to read it."

Hazel out here like "I would unionize if I didn't think the commission was anti-union enough to send literal assassins after me if I suggested it :/"

meanwhile with the siblings

Five just. talks over them a lot and makes so much sense that it's actually really hard to argue with him, and he's weirdly considerate of his family's obligations

Like Diego is like "i have to go see Patch" then Five is like "that's great I'm proud of you buddy, it would actually be really handy to have some law enforcement read into the situation if you think she's up to the task. that goes for everyone by the way! If y'all have people you trust, more bodies would be super helpful I think"

the entire family, collectively, who have like zero trusted social links: uhhhhhhhh

Diego, with this weird permission, probably?? Does? Awkwardly attempt to read Patch into the situation? Patch is, obviously, like "what the fuck, Diego" but probably goes with him to the mansion (????????) because she's concerned and then meets his fucking whacko family with their superpowers and suddenly everything is 100% more realistic

Five is just like "yes hello I'm aware I look like a child, i'm actually in my late 50s or early 60s (apocalypse time amiright) because of time travel stuff. Yes I am Five Hargreeves who went missing in like 2002 or whatever. anyway it's lovely to meet you, i'm so glad diego has someone he trusts, and considering my sibling's shifty looks when i told them to invite anyone they trusted this genuinely makes me concerned that Diego is the most socially well-adjusted of them."

"That cannot be possible." Patch says, like someone who has met Diego Hargreeves.

"You haven't met the rest." Five says sympathetically, "In our defense we were raised in isolation as child soldiers."

"That... explains so much." Is all Patch can say to that, "But you seem..."

"I'm adopted." Five waves away.

"We're ALL adopted." Diego grits out, very aggrieved by this and also not sure if he likes the fact that Patch seems friendly with Five, or at least is listening to him?

"I'm double adopted."

However! With the recruitment of Patch, herding Diego becomes like 90% easier.

Honestly the worst to herd are probably Luther and Allison? Luther because he's Number One and resents Five taking charge and also resents Five's casual dismissal of Reginald and also suspects that Five (or at least the commission) has something to do with Reginald's death?

Allison because she is torn between following Luther and helping him and helping Five but also calling Patrick and Claire at every possible moment while ALSO trying to repair her relationship with Vanya. She's flighty - she'd bail on a Five-apocalypse-assignment if Vanya mentioned being hungry or if Luther called or anything like that

Vanya likes to be included and, if asked, would probably drop as many current obligations as she can. Like she would probably cancel her teaching if Five genuinely and sincerely asked her for her help, which he does because he's 100% sure Dolores would manifest in front of him and smack him if he dared even imply someone without powers wouldn't be helpful

Vanya is like "I'm not sure if i'll be helpful - I don't have powers ):" and Patch is like "wtf are you talking about - my superpowers are Gun, Backup, and Reading Comprehension and i am like the most useful member of this team right now"

Vanya gets a confidence boost just from hanging out with Patch honestly, I think they should be friends

Klaus is thrilled to be included are you kidding?? He says he does it for money but he's just happy to be there and also as one of the most emotionally intelligent siblings he is mildly concerned about the fact that Five looks like he's about to cry and also emotes

Five also gives Klaus positive reinforcement, hugs, and Five absolutely weaponizes the I'm not mad, but I believe that you can do better and I'm going to give you more chances because I love you and fully believe that next time you'll be amazing way that Rick used on him.

I feel like Five ends up saying something along the lines of "I understand that x is really important, and we're definitely going to look into it. Is it something that needs to be addressed right now, or is it something that can wait until after April 1st? If it can wait, I can write it down here on this list so we don't forget. If it can't wait then we can figure out a time to address it and help you" a lot

Like Grace malfunctioning and potentially killing Reginald?

"We don't have to make this decision right now." Five says patiently, "Because Grace is a robot, we have some options. Living with a robot who is potentially malfunctioning and homicidal is dangerous, but Luther saying that means admitting that Reginald might have made a mistake or error with Grace's programming or upkeep. I haven't been here for a long time, but I remember Reginald being very precise. Regardless, this isn't a choice between permanently shutting her off or not. We can shut her down temporarily until we can fully address the issue. We can ask and see if there is a 'system reboot' option or some sort of system check that Grace can undergo. We can try find and hire an expert to take a look at her programming to find the issue."

Five gives this speech while like, organizing the weaponry in the house on a table very nonchalantly

Five out here making buzzer noises at his siblings arguments like "yeah no that's a false dichotomy and a strawman's argument, want to try again?"

(Look apocalypse nights were long and they had games that were literally about arguing pointless shit like ranking types of chairs or the best way to break out of a prison without powers and things could get heated)

"Who died and made you boss?" Luther demands.

"Uh, the world? Were you not listening?" Five asks, looking very purposefully confused.

It gets even MORE delightful when Five reads Rick into the situation because a) he promised and b) his siblings really have like, no connections jeeze

Rick fully believes that this is his son from the future, like Five introduced himself, but Five skipped out on a few key details. Such as being adopted.

So Rick spends a solid chunk of time just staring at Five, who looks basically nothing like him, trying to think like, who is his mother ???? if we save the world will Five stop existing? why would I name my child 'Five'? Does everyone have powers in the future? was there like... a radioactive apocalypse? would radiation give future humans superpowers? when did my life turn into a comic book? am i even allowed to ask these questions? will knowledge of the future fuck things up?

and then when Five comes back and is like "what is up everyone this is my dad Rick who will be joining us, he doesn't have any memories of me thanks to time travel but if anyone is mean to him i WILL kneecap them"

"Your DAD?"

Five does kidney punch Klaus for saying that Rick is a DILF but otherwise everyone just is like, warily looking at this Normal Dad Man in confusion because?? This is the dude who raised Five, who they watched take out like an entire commission team by himself yesterday? He looks so. Normal.

Rick is very confused and like, wonders if he's supposed to be the team mascot? But Five keeps involving him and asking his opinion and in return Rick enforces snack breaks and makes everyone sandwiches and has gentle talks with everyone

Every time Five notices someone about to blow he just lovingly makes sure that that person is alone in a room with Rick

Luther ends up crying on the sofa with Rick gently patting his back as Rick calmly states that Luther seems like he's put a lot of time and effort into his family and making his father proud and that since Reginald isn't here to say it, Rick will have to be the one to say that he's proud and that they've been dropped into a difficult and stressful situation - so soon after Reginald's death when they're still grieving! - and he's doing so well

Luther, experiencing unconditional positive paternal regard for the first time in his life: i don't know why i'm crying so much

honestly this is just a comedy of juggling the gang, having impromptu therapy sessions and discussions, investigating the apocalypse and the eye, leonard trying to meet vanya continuously and failing because she's constantly surrounding by family or rick/patch, the commission trying their best to bust up the dream team/isolate Vanya/kill or remove Five, while Hazel lives out his romcom dreams with Agnes and also says "fuck the commission"

[not-a-coral-snake]

for the @lamenweek Day 6 prompt: Auguste Lives Au

inspired by this post by @skyline-sunset-in-my-veins and @phoenixtcm

“When I am in Arles this fall,” Damianos says, words soft in the summer sunset air around them, “I will kneel before your brother the king and ask his permission to court you.” He pauses, smile just the slightest bit cocky. Laurent is lounging, hair mussed and shirt trailing half-opened laces, in Damen’s arms. “Court you officially, I mean.” 

“You are going to Arles for the negotiations yourself this year?” Laurent says. Seated as they are, Damen cannot mistake the shudder of tension, quickly repressed, that runs through Laurent at Damen’s words.

“You haven’t told him yet,” he says. 

“It’s just I thought that the ambassador—”

“You haven’t told him yet,” Damen says again. “You said when I saw you last fall that you would tell him last winter for sure.” He tries not to sound accusatory, but well. It is not the first time they have had this conversation.

“I haven’t told him yet,” Laurent concedes. It should not be so hard. It’s been six years since Marlas. Vere and Akielos are at peace. Laurent is in the habit of sharing nearly everything with Auguste, and yet— 

“I’m waiting for the right moment,” he says, as he always does. “It’s a sensitive matter, I wish to catch him in the right mood, lest he make up his mind before hearing me out.” 

“And you’re afraid of hurting him,” Damen says, as he always does.

“And I want to ensure I don’t hurt him. So I have to find the right time—”

“It’s been years now,” Damen cuts in. “Should we believe that, somehow, the perfect moment will occur this summer, when it did not last winter, or last spring, or the summer before that?”

“Damen—”

“This can just be a fling, if you want,” Damen says, gently.

‘That’s not what I—no,” says Laurent. Damen’s never said that before. 

“We can just keep meeting a few times a year. It doesn’t need to be serious. It doesn’t need to be something we tell others about.”

“Damen, stop,” Laurent says. “No. I want to court you. I want it to be official. I want it to be serious.”

“Well, then let it become serious.”

“I’ll tell him this time,” Laurent says. He can do this. It’s been six years since Marlas. Auguste always speaks of Prince Damianos in respectful tones. Laurent picks up Damen’s hand, kisses his knuckles. “Promise.”

And Laurent means to tell Auguste that summer, he really does. He meant to upon his return last fall as well, and the time before that, and the time before that. It’s just that—well, it’s just that every time he returns from diplomatic visits to Delfeur or Ios, he’s struck again with the slow, deliberate way that Auguste moves now. Each year as late spring ripens into summer, he sees how it saddens Auguste that he still no longer has the vigor or endurance for hunts or long rides or anything more taxing than a slow turn around the gardens. Each year as fall deepens into winter, he sees how another year has gone by and the cold makes Auguste’s injuries ache just as much as they had the winter before. 

Auguste had nearly died on the battlefield at Marlas. But that wasn’t the whole of it. Even after he had survived the trip home to Arles, he almost died of fever, of wound rot, of the pneumonia his battle-damaged lungs nearly couldn’t shake. And he almost died of assassination, not one time but many. There were few ways to kill a king in the peak of youth and health without attracting undue suspicion, but endless subtle ways to hasten the death of a man in his sickbed. Their uncle, left to rule the court unchecked, had tried seemingly most of them, endless schemes which Laurent had only barely managed to avert and which left behind no conclusive evidence for Laurent to show the court. Even as Auguste had gained strength, the schemes had continued, until the day Laurent gave up trying to beat his uncle while playing by his uncle’s own rules and had simply arranged an accident of his own. 

After that, Auguste was safe, but the fallout from their uncle’s years ruling the court and admittedly-suspicious death left him with nearly as many enemies as allies. As prince, Auguste had been universally adored. As king, he faced a yearslong struggle to regain the allegiance of erstwhile allies. 

And all this was, at its root, because of Marlas. Because of Damianos. Auguste’s history with Damen wasn’t just the matter of an injury six years ago, not when that injury had colored every day of his life since. And Laurent can’t imagine a way of telling him that he loves Damen, wants a future with him, without it sounding like a betrayal. 

To make matters more awkward, Auguste has, for whatever reason, gotten it into his head to nag Laurent about romance. It’s uncomfortable enough to be keeping his relationship with Damen a secret from Auguste. It’s worse to lie, outright or by omission, every time Auguste asks him if there’s anyone Laurent is interested in pursuing. 

And then— “You know you can tell me anything, little brother,” Auguste says quietly, a few minutes after Laurent has let a conversation about an overly-flirtatious marquis from Lys lapse. 

Laurent swallows, mutely cataloging the darker corners of his past. He does not like to lie to Auguste. But he does.

And there are things he probably will never tell his brother about, things Auguste does not need to know, but also— “Actually, Auguste,” he makes himself say. “There’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you.”

And then he pauses, because he still hasn’t figured out a semi-workable phrasing. I’m in love with Prince Damianos, but that doesn’t mean I’m not still upset about what he did to you. I’m fucking the man who almost killed you, and I’m sorry but also I won’t stop. I know seeing the prince of Akielos this fall will probably be terrible for you but also when he asks to court me please say yes.

It’s Auguste who rescues him, after a moment or two of expectant silence. “Is this going to be you finally telling me about your romantic entanglement with Prince Damianos?” he says. “Because honestly, I’m getting sick of seeing you walking around looking guilty and sad all the time.”

“You knew?” Laurent says.

“Of course I knew! You, dear baby brother, are not very subtle. And I’ve had to hear all your reports from the negotiations with Akielos twice a year. Was I somehow not supposed to notice how you gradually stopped insulting Damianos and started telling me about all his varied and impressive positive traits?”

“I said that he was straightforward and committed to the good of his people, and thus that the negotiations were likely to be a productive use of time!”

“And then the trip after that, you said that he was an innovative thinker, a natural leader, and you couldn’t help but admire his tenacity. You said you didn’t mind having to go on hunts with him, which anyone who knows you understands is a major compliment, and when you said he was patient, you smiled that quiet smile of yours that means you are remembering something that made you very happy.”

“Auguste—”

“And yet! Whenever anyone suggests you have developed any fondness for the man, you deny it. Why go to such lengths to conceal a friendly working relationship?”

“Auguste—”

“And honestly, brother, even back when you hated him, I couldn’t help but notice you mentioned his appearance rather a lot. You were always complaining that he was ridiculously tall, or offensively muscular, or something along those lines.”

“I said he was a brute!”

“You also said that his eyes were, and I quote, ‘disgustingly soulful.’ Oh, and the letters! Was I not supposed to notice that in the last year your correspondence with the prince of Akielos has roughly quadrupled in volume and frequency, even as the official negotiations are reaching a standstill? There isn’t enough policy discussion to account for a tenth of the letters you write. There isn’t enough policy discussion to justify you going to Delfeur in person twice a year, and yet you insist on overseeing things personally each time anyway.”

“Auguste, I’m sorry, all right? I know that this must have been painful for you to witness, and I don’t want you to think I don’t care about everything you’ve been through.” He swallows. “But I don’t want to stop seeing Damianos.”

“All right.”

“‘’All right?’ You’re okay with it? Just like that?”

“He makes you happy. If your judgement of him is to be believed, then he sounds like a worthy man. And I trust your judgement.”

“But he stabbed you. And now I’m sleeping with him.”

“Well, we were at war. And it was years ago. And I’m fine. We’re at peace, the nation’s moving on, you’ve moved on in your opinion of him, I can move on as well.”

“It’s not that simple!”

“Why can’t it be? I only met him for about ten minutes. I’m sure there’s more to him than he revealed in a single duel. You have my blessing, Laurent.”

“How can you just—”

“Remember when your pony threw you and you broke your collarbone?”

“This is not the same, this is not even close to the same—”

“You snuck out of the infirmary to go to the stables and tell Chuckles you weren’t mad at him.”

“I was seven, he meant me no ill will, and the bone healed in a month. Also he was a horse,” Laurent grits out. “Damianos was—is—a grown man, responsible for his choices, the injuries he inflicted did lasting damage, and he was trying to kill you.”

“Well, no one is asking you to sleep with him,” Auguste says, in his reasonable-big-brother voice. 

Laurent lets out a breath, sits back in his chair. “I started managing the negotiations with Akielos so that you wouldn’t have to speak with him,” he says. “We said that it was because I could travel more easily, that it was because you could not justify spending so much time away from court. But in truth, I did not want you to have to be in a room with him, to have to learn to make polite conversation with him and pretend that Marlas did not happen, that it didn’t matter. If I have come to know him as far more than just the soldier who attacked you, if I have put his past actions behind me, come to care for him in spite of them—that does not mean I expect you to do the same. Could ever ask you to do the same.” 

“You’ve always been protecting me, all these years,” Auguste says softly. “Don’t think I don’t know it, or appreciate it. But let me be the protective big brother again once in a while? You’ve learned to let the past go and let yourself have the present you want with Damianos, because you’re in love with him. Allow me to let the past go and have the future I want, where my little brother is happy.”

He’s looking Laurent in the eye, gaze steady, and slowly Laurent allows himself to believe that Auguste is serious, that in his heart of hearts, he does not mind. That he is happy for Laurent. 

“Thank you,” he says. “For your blessing.” 

“Of course,” Auguste says. And then, “Well, when I say you have my blessing, I mean informally, of course. Prince Damianos will have to ask me himself.”

“You just want the chance to make him squirm,” Laurent says. 

“I just want the chance to make him squirm,” Auguste concedes, and he and Laurent break into quiet laughter, imagining it.

[itsclydebitches]

Hello, everyone! Can you believe this is the third time I've started the recap for this chapter? Between a dying computer and a mass edit during my monthly state of, "Oh my god get rid of everything we can't let people know that we wRITE!" this project is cursed. This is the version though, I can feel it. Be positive!

Now, where were we? It's been some months (RIP) since I last posted, so I wouldn't be surprised if everyone's forgotten what's going on in this insane novel. A quick recap before the recap then: new teams have formed, no one is happy about it, Sun and Velvet went off to a shady club run by The Crown and — shock shock, surprise surprise — got themselves into a heap of trouble. That's the long and the short of it. We have to wait a while to find out what happens to them though because this chapter is focused on Coco.

We learn that Professor Rumpole has sent Coco and her new team — Team ROSC — out into the desert to take care of the grimm around the city's borders. To say that Coco is disappointed in this assignment is an understatement. We learn that they've been at this for a week straight and have gone without showering or a change of clothes that entire time (no one packed a bag?), so for a second I was hugely sympathetic. You know this vine? 

I feel this vine in my soul. Give me hot water and hot coco or give me death. Besides, work is work and dangerous, physical work without a break or basic comforts is incredibly taxing. Toss in the extreme heat of a desert and I'd be pissed at everything too, no matter how important my work was. That's human.

Yet instead of humanizing Coco like this, it turns out she doesn't care at all about the hardship involved. It's fighting grimm that she's annoyed by. She thinks that "Searching for the person or persons kidnapping innocent people for some unknown but dark purpose was way more useful than fighting Grimm far from the city" and I'm just like, Coco, honey...

Do you know what your career path is?

IT'S TO KILL GRIMM.

Okay, there's admittedly a justification here, but it's a stupid one. Coco goes on to say that "This area was called the Wastelands for a reason." She's snarky about it, saying that it wastes “her time, her talent, and her patience," but the real takeaway is that it's, you know, a wasteland. Deserted of grimm and of people. What's the point of defending an area that doesn't need defending? A huntress' job might normally be to fight grimm, but when those grimm aren't around and kidnappers are, that's a whole new set of priorities.

The problem with all this is that the Wastelands is definitely not deserted and it's definitely not as far from the city as Coco would like to imply. In just a few paragraphs an alarm is going to trip and Coco will find six grimm roaming in a pack. Then she finds a person. Then that person says she needs to get back to see someone in the city within half an hour. So there are grimm, there are people about, and this area is apparently close enough to the border that you can get back to the city proper, on foot, and then get wherever it is you’re going in a bustling metropolis... all within half an hour. By that logic these grimm aren't out in the boonies, they're right outside everyone's door.

Yet Coco isn't convinced, saying that "Post Beacon [killing grimm] had been for a noble cause, but this just felt like … busywork." I cannot possibly emphasize enough that this is the job she signed up for. Not to be a detective specializing in missing people, not a war hero always on the front lines of a battle, but one of many huntsmen who perform the daily, routine, very necessary task of protecting the people from grimm. With "protecting" covering both immediate threats and preparatory work that ensures more threats don't come about — like taking care of grimm outside before they become a larger threat. You know what would have happened if Beacon had a daily chore of students killing grimm within a few miles radius of the school? There would have been far less grimm charging a mass of unprotected students when negativity unexpectedly skyrocketed.

And, as always, I am aware that Rumpole is the likely villain here. From a writing perspective, this is very much presented as her getting Coco out of the way so that she can go about her nefarious deeds in peace... but that doesn't erase the fact that the task itself is a sound one. Rumpole's motivations don't matter here, only Coco's annoyance that she... has to do her job?

I mean yeah, everyone complains about their job to one extent or another, but can you imagine if you stumbled across a firefighter complaining about all the kitchen fires they've had to put out lately? "It's so boring! There are much better things I could be spending my time and talent on. I mean, that inferno that took out a city block last year? Putting that out was noble. But routine fires? House fires? Giving lectures on how to prevent fires in the future? Ugh, I can't believe the department expects me to do this grunt work." Meanwhile, you're sneaking off, hoping that this firefighter is never called to your house, nursing mild worries about how much they're romanticizing the recent tragedy that took so many lives...

Complaints about the job turn into complaints about the teams, which makes far more sense for Coco's character. Anyone's, really. Despite my insistence that it's a good thing they're learning to fight with people other than their three besties, that was absolutely a sudden and rather traumatizing change, just given how attached the teams already are. I'm not at all surprised that Coco is struggling to cope.

She says she misses her friends, obviously, but also "surprisingly, Coco missed being in charge."

...That's supposed to be surprising? Coco, you love being in charge! How is this in any way a revelation?

Apparently it is though, stemming from how bad Reese is as their leader. As with so many things in RWBY, I find myself disagreeing with a perspective that's presented as a fact: "She liked to lead by group vote, which wasn’t leading at all." Yes... it is? We could go down a rabbit hole of literal definitions — to lead is to direct, to direct is to regulate, to regulate is to direct again — but ultimately our understanding of a word does not adhere to the dictionary alone. It's a knowledge built on experience and I would hope that everyone's experience with the term "leader" includes that person considering multiple perspectives before making a decision. A leader doesn't impose their view on a group without due consideration of their preferences and needs — that's a dictator — a leader guides the group based on feedback and their personal knowledge. If that feedback and knowledge results in a standstill, or if their knowledge outweighs preferences, they are the deciding vote because the people have previously said, "We trust your decisions" through the act of making them leader in the first place. 

Asking for a group vote isn't avoiding leadership, it's an act of leadership. Reese decided that these situations warranted a majority rule. She further decided that whatever they settled on was indeed an appropriate course of action. Leadership skills are required to assess a situation and determine whether it's appropriate to vote on in the first place. If I announce to a group that we're voting on whether we go to the movies or the museum, I've done the work to determine that both of these choices are of roughly equal value and roughly equal availability. I haven't hit on any snags like, "The only movies playing are mindless blockbusters and I want this to be an educational outing" or "The museum is too far away. We'll never make it to dinner on time." Figuring out that a group can vote is its own kind of work. This avenue is particularly useful when the group is of roughly equal standing. With a few exceptions (like Ruby and Jaune) huntsmen classmates are all the same age, underwent the same training, and have had the same combat experiences. This isn't a case of one elite huntsmen lending their knowledge to an otherwise green party, it's a school randomly pointing at a somewhat outgoing individual during orientation and saying, "You. You're leader material, I guess, even though you've done little differently than the person standing beside you." Someone has to lead and Vacuo's switcheroo proves that anyone can be the leader if they're just put in that position. Coco claims a group vote is just "passing the responsibility off to your team" and yes! You want to share the responsibility because you are a team. They are a group of four equals working together with one person to guide them, they are not a boss with three subordinates. Why wouldn't Reese utilize the skills and ideas of those teammates? When making a decision, why wouldn't she see if everyone believes it's a good idea to do Thing A as opposed to Thing B? Unless Reese is outright ignoring her own ideas, beliefs, or gut feelings to cater to the others — which there's no reference of — this is good leadership. She's assisting her team in making decisions as a whole, rather than arbitrarily imposing her view on three others of similar skill and experience.

Yet Coco acts like because Reese doesn't go, "We're doing Thing A! End of discussion!" it's not leadership. Which, frankly, says a lot about how the RWBY-verse sees leadership as a whole.

I realize I'm rambling a great deal, so let me quickly provide a different media example. I'm currently immersed in Star Trek: Voyager and in season two, episode 14 "Alliances," Captain Janeway is faced with a difficult choice: align herself with a violent and so far untrustworthy species, or risk traveling through this quadrant of space without any allies. At first she's entirely against the idea of an alliance, going so far as to say that this isn't a democracy. She's the captain, dammit, she makes the decisions! But her first officer begs her to reconsider. Then the crew express disappointment — even disgust — that she won't consider this alternative. Then her chief of security, being a Vulcan, provides a persuasively logical argument for why an alliance is worth the risk... Long story short, Janeway finds herself in the minority and changes her decision accordingly. She attempts to garner an alliance and the fact that she was right — the species wasn't trustworthy and the alliance fails — is entirely beside the point. She realized that the majority voice matters. As far as we know, Reese is already practicing what Janeway learned.

ANYWAY the point is none of it matters because these characterizations are a mess. Coco also throws out that Reese "dressed like she was a twelve-year-old hanging out at the mall" and supposedly acts like one too. We're not given any examples of what that behavior looks like and, sorry, but I'm not personally inclined to judge someone based on their fashion sense. It would be great if this story actually engaged with some of the flaws the characters demonstrated, rather than just throwing them out to exist in this unacknowledged void.

Not that Coco's fashion-focused personality is really that important. Truly, the best thing about all this is how contradictory Coco's own thoughts are. She also listens to her teammates... except when she doesn't. She know when to go with their ideas and when to dismiss them for her own... except when she gets it totally wrong. As with so much in RWBY, this doesn't feel like the author giving Coco deliberate flaws that the story will grapple with down the line, it just comes across as a nonsense philosophy about leadership we're not meant to examine too closely. Coco gets to make references to the fact that her own, supposedly superior leadership is filled with holes, but heaven forbid she engage with that. 

She ends all this with the thought that no matter what she might decide, she trusted her team to "do what she demanded of them” and is now extending that courtesy to Reese. This I'm inclined to praise Coco for. No matter what she might be thinking, it doesn't appear as if she's tried to undermine Reese (well, not yet. More on that at the chapter’s end), and she doesn’t appear to be refusing to listen to that leadership, even if she doesn't like how it comes about. As we're about to see, Coco has her team's best interests at heart, no matter the challenges they're facing.

Her thoughts turn back to her old team and we get... this.

Velvet was with a team that didn’t recognize her awesome capabilities. Fox was withdrawing, having lost his family for the second time. Yatsuhashi was going mad with worry about Velvet and his teammates, knowing that he couldn’t be there to protect them, and worrying he would accidentally hurt someone on his new team.

This is so unnecessarily dramatic. First, how does Coco even know any of this? Because it's been heavily implied that the old teams are barely in contact with one another. See: Velvet refusing to loop anyone in about the club and Coco stuck in the desert for a week. Second, why aren't they in contact, at least those who aren't on away missions? The entire group is acting as if changing teams means they're no longer allowed to be friends — family, as Coco puts it — when the relationship between Team RWBY and Team JNPR creates the opposite expectation right at the start of the series. Clearly, people from different teams can be close. Yatsu's worry that he might stumble using his semblance with new people is the only conflict that holds up here. Everything else has fairly straightforward solutions. Velvet needs to prove herself to new people. Yatsu needs to text Velvet if he's that worried about her. And Fox "having lost his family for a second time" is a pretty ridiculous exaggeration. You're attending the same school! Your family is still living down the hall if Vacuo has dorms like Beacon! In what world are these students unable to interact largely as they did before? They're acting as if the school has outright barred them from hanging out, rather than doing what will no doubt occur the moment they graduate: force them to work with different people. Just catch up with Fox over dinner! 

Honestly, this chapter is pretty short, I'm just continually bewildered by this story.

To get back to the actual plot, something trips a sensor the group has set up and Coco responds to the situation in what I think is both a smart and empathetic manner. Previous experience has taught her that it's likely just a lizard, so she doesn't want to wake up her team for no reason. Disagreements aside, she cares enough to let them rest — "They’d probably appreciate the extra sleep." However, if it's a "rare case of something she couldn’t handle alone" she'd immediately call for help. Great plan! It's not often in this novel that I feel like I enjoy the characters, but this little moment actually had me liking Coco. Which, yes, I realize is a complicated claim. Characters should test the reader to a certain degree, mirroring all the personalities we see in real life, including biased, mean, or contradictory people. It's often a good thing to write a character that your reader is frustrated with. That can be the point! The problem with Myers' writing is that it isn't the point. Coco, as the former leader of our heroes in this tale, should be someone we enjoy spending time with and her flaws should be the basis for growth, or an acknowledgement that she is an imperfect, but well-rounded person. As it stands, flaws in this novel just sort of... exist? They bop around in the RWBY universe with almost no acknowledgement from the narrative or other characters, leaving the reader with little to nothing to take away from the text. Is Coco correct in her judgement? Is this a bias she needs to work on? Is she putting on a facade and her natural instinct to care for her team is the real Coco hidden underneath? Who knows! She’s just frustrating to read about most of the time and nothing comes of that. 

Regardless, she heads out into the desert, using the night vision glasses Velvet made her. 

Now see, this would have been the perfect thing to introduce before Velvet was fixing relay towers after the expert was injured. Remember how I said the novel didn't do enough to establish Velvet's own expertise? Not that a pair of goggles is really comparable to fixing a communications issue, but it still would have gone some way towards convincing me that Velvet is this super impressive tech gal, capable of handling any and all situations that might come her way.

But no, we get this impressive display of skill after Velvet's knowledge was needed in a pinch. 

The glasses help Coco navigate the terrain, allowing her to both see in the dark and zoom in on things in the distance. This allows her to spot the six jackalopes that tripped the sensor, as well as the woman currently fighting them: Carmine, a villain from After the Fall that I know nothing about. Ah well. Note though what I said at the start, that Coco's dismissal of this assignment is based entirely in its supposed uselessness. Yet now here we have a pack of dangerous grimm and an enemy to content with.

Also, this is where Coco moves from kindly teammate to overconfident fool. She said she'd call for backup if she needed it... and she clearly needs it! From what I can gather, all of Team CFVY lost to Carmine last time they met up. But now she wants to risk fighting Carmine alone? Go get the others!

She doesn't, of course. Carmine doesn't notice Coco at first. She's talking about how she has to get back into the city. "He’s going to kill me if I’m not back to the Mirage in thirty."

As said, this also implies that Coco isn't nearly as far out as she initially suggested. If Carmine can feasibly finish this fight, cross the desert, navigate who knows how much of the city, and meet up with the mysterious "he" all in under half an hour, then Coco is patrolling pretty much right at the walls. AKA, the area that absolutely needs to be grimm free.

Luckily for those of us who are reading the books out of order, Myers gives a quick recap of Carmine's significance. Last book she had kidnapped Gus and "held off the combined might of Team CFVY in the desert” (oh hey, I was right), presumably escaping afterwards. Now here she is again, likely up to some new, nefarious deed. 

Our of curiosity, I googled to see what she looks like and... 

WHAT IS THAT OUTFIT? 

Coco watches as she works to keep on top of the six grimm, debating whether she should help or walk away, but when Carmine is taken unawares, Coco acts without thinking, throwing herself into the fray.

Sometimes decisions were like that—your body already knew what to do while your brain was still processing the situation. Only in this case, Coco’s body wasn’t necessarily the clearest judge of character. Her brain would have said that Carmine didn’t deserve her help.

Now see, this is a scene I can get behind. The entire RWBY-verse is based around a type of superheroism: people with unnatural abilities, fantasy weapons, and extensive training devote themselves to protecting the people from various threats. Yet too often RWBY fails to convince me that these people are actually heroic, taking the standard flaws of a character and unknowingly exacerbating them to the point where I think, "Is this meant to be a commentary on the anti-hero? Or a critical look at these fantasy formulas? Because we've got the elements of that here, but no indication that the authors realize they're writing something other than that standard story." But this? This works for me. Coco, as a huntress, is so conditioned to help others that her body responds instinctively to someone being in danger, regardless of who that someone is. She outright admits that if she'd had the chance to think about it she would have decided against helping Carmine. The fact that she recognizes this and move anyway says a lot of good about her. Well done, Coco!

We see later that Carmine probably didn't need the help, but between the two of them the grimm really don't stand a chance. What's interesting though is how chummy the two are while defending themselves. Coco comments on Carmine's tendency to talk to grimm (like she does) and Carmine freely offers information about her movements, the fact that she lost her other sword, and that her partner, Bertilak, needs to "recharge a little" before getting back in the game. Carmine asks Coco if she'd like to team up with her instead (she does not) and the two have a number of flirty exchanges to top things off:

“I’ve been dreaming of a rematch with you,” Coco said.

“You’ve been dreaming about me? I’m flattered.” Carmine winked.

***

“Hot date with the Crown?” Coco asked.

“Don’t be jealous, darling.”

I bring all this up not as a criticism of the buddy-enemy dynamic (it's a favorite of mine), but simply because of something that happens next. Before we get to that though, I admit that I am on the fence about the flirting. Given that I haven't read After the Fall (assuming this characterization exists there), I know that Coco is a lesbian mostly via RWBY cultural osmosis, rather than through the text. This is one of the few (the only?) times that I've gotten a hint at her sexuality, yet it's associated with predatory behavior. Carmine, her enemy, is the one who turns an angry dream into a flattering one, the hot date with the bad guy into something to be jealous of. I'm honestly struggling to remember what, if anything, Coco has had to say about women in this book — this is what comes of such slow recapping and I acknowledge that this is entirely my fault — but I'm nevertheless discomforted by knowing Coco's canonical status, knowing RWBY's struggles with queer rep, and then reading a scene where the most overt representation thus far is the bad guy twisting Coco's words into something sexual.

I'm no purist. Give me a good enemies-to-lovers fic any day of the week, but that doesn't mean that kind of dynamic is the best to pull from in a franchise already facing heavy criticism for its queer rep.

Especially since the moment the grimm are gone Carmine turns her sai on Coco.

This is the "something that happens next" that I referenced above. It's weird to have them attacking one another after a whole scene of pretty genuine companionship. Coco doesn't help Carmine as a consequence of defending herself, she willingly gets involved. They tease one another. Carmine appears to answer her questions honestly. There's both implied and overt references to how well they work as a team. Then, suddenly, Carmine is outright trying to kill Coco, not just with her sai but by burying her alive. It's not the sort of banter that Ruby and Roman used to engage in, trading fake compliments and, in Roman's case before his death, legitimate feelings while attacking one another. Nor is Coco prepared for an attack the moment the grimm are gone, and she's not surprised by it. It’s just this sudden change that feels rather jarring. 

Though it's far from the first time BTD has failed to convey the emotion of a scene. Here's another example rnow. As said, Carmine is attempting to bury Coco alive by moving the sand with her semblance. That's horrifying enough on its own, but remember that Coco is claustrophobic. Yet none of that panic shines through here. She comes across as indifferent throughout the attack, thinking back to summers when her brother tried to bury her while she sunbathed, amazed that she could ever consider this fun. You know who Coco sounds like in this scene?

At no point during this attack did I get the sense that Coco believes she’s in serious danger, let alone that she's struggling against a long-term phobia. The only time I even remembered that claustrophobia is meant to be a challenge for her is when she throws out the oh-so casual line, "One of her worst nightmares was being buried alive." Oh really? Because it doesn't seem like it! Coco is calm enough to remember that she used to be able to hold her breath for exactly three minutes and forty-two seconds. That doesn't feel like a character fighting against her worst nightmare.

So this scene isn't exactly compelling. Which is too bad because, as said, Coco as some other nice moments in this chapter.

However, during all this we do learn a little more about Carmine. Prior to getting trapped in the sand, Coco comments on how shockingly strong she is. "Carmine should have been at least a little bit worn down from fighting Grimm," but she's not, "She seemed nearly unstoppable now." Coco hits her full in the face, but she doesn't seem fazed. Earlier in the chapter there was that comment about how she previously took on Team CFVY alone and at the end of the battle Coco observes that Carmine "still seemed as fresh as she had at the beginning of the fight. How was she even doing that?" My basic reading comprehension skills tell me that this is setup for something, likely some change enacted by the Crown. Surely the text wouldn't put so much emphasis on Carmine's strength — have Coco questioning it to this extent, framing it as unnatural — unless we were going to get an answer, right?

But this is RWBY, so I'm not inclined to count my chickens before they hatch.

The rest of Coco's team arrives and it's then that she decides to pull the super dangerous stunt to free herself. Yeah, yeah, I get that she's suffocating and needs to do something now, can't wait to be dug out I suppose, but the timing is pretty ridiculous. The cavalry has arrived, yay! Time to blow myself up.

Seriously. She blows herself up. Using her own semblance, Coco focuses on one of her gravity dust bullets and detonates it, causing all the others in her arsenal to detonate too. It gets her out of the hole and "knocked her Aura down to a dangerously low level."

So... let’s see. Coco can literally detonate a bunch of explosives on her person, after suffocating under stand, after fighting Carmine, after fighting grimm, after a week long mission, and her aura doesn't break... but Yang's does from a single Neo slash?

Okay, RWBY.

Reese and Olive try to attack Carmine together, but end up eliminating one another's attacks. I like that a team actually has some realistic difficulties for once. Coco, however, is internally an asshole, calling them "idiots" and saying that they need to learn to coordinate their attacks. Thing is, she apparently hasn't done anything over the last week to help with that. She's been too busy complaining about Reese's clothes.

Carmine runs off as more grimm show up, drawn by Coco's non-existent panic. To her credit she does thank the others for saving her... but then immediately tries to downplay that. “It wasn’t a fair fight,” Coco spat when Reese (correctly) points out that she's the one who was ambushed. She also starts giving orders and when Reese (again, correctly!) goes to point out that she's the leader, Coco talks over her, saying they can't waste any more time out here because she has reason to believe that Shade has been compromised. She needs them only because she's out of bullets and low on aura, but they definitely need her because "let’s face it, I’m the best strategist around for miles."

Coco's a strategist?

And why does she sound like a villain trying to convince the heroes to work with her? She’s already part of the team!

Putting all that aside for the moment, we're back to this prideful characterization. I liked the well-rounded Coco from a few pages ago who balanced caring for her team with the likelihood of needing backup. Now she's flinching from the idea that she'd ever need help (hello, Sun characterization too) and snatching Reese's role the moment she's given the chance. So much for respecting her position. If the book wants me to believe that Reese is unfit to be leader and this is a golden opportunity for Coco to right a wrong... how about we actually show Reese being a bad leader?

Regardless, yay working together? The chapter ends with them presumably taking out the grimm before heading back to Shade, along with an important revelation. Prior to leaving, Carmine asked Coco why Yatsuhashi and Fox weren't rushing to her aid. It's only now that Coco realizes she didn't mention Velvet. Why? Perhaps because Carmine already knows where Velvet is, which obviously doesn't imply anything good.

And that's the end of Chapter Ten! Can you tell I never know how to finish these recaps? Describing cliffhangers doesn't have quite the same punch as, you know, actual cliffhangers. You all just have to suffer through my mediocre endings with me.

But would you look at that! Turns out the third attempt at writing this was the charm! :D

See you for Chapter Eleven! 💜

[night-unfurls-its-splendour]

Bridgerton & Selective Justification: A Rant

With a Particular Aside in Which This Author Questions if There Isn't a Double Standard at Play in Televised Historical Fiction.

Ok so the other day i posted complaining about how ludicrous the "Will Daphne marry Prince Friedrich?!" Plotline is to me and i referred to Daphne as a "commoner". I got two comments on that post of people saying Daphne *isn't* a commoner because she's a Viscount's daughter. I did respond but I'd like to go a little more in depth into it my thoughts on why this plotline verges on abject silliness to me, based on my (i will freely admit) *limited* knowledge of British aristocracy and the source material itself.

So if anyone reading this has a more detailed knowledge of the Peerage and how it relates to Bridgerton please correct me I'm eager to know more.

So to start out my understanding of the pecking order goes like this:

DUKE/DUCHESS = Highest ranking title in the peerage. Often bestowed on important members of the Royal family not in direct line for the throne. Worth noting is the fact that a Duke in British peerage is different than a Continental Duke. On the European Continent title Duke/Grand Duke can be associated with sovereign rule of an independent state, which has never been the case in England. Dukes and Duchesses are addressed as "Your Grace"

MARQUESS/MARCHIONESS = English equivalent of Marquis/Marquise. Very high ranking in the peerage, closely related to Earldom, but more important  since it has it's roots as the title of border (marcher) lords instrumental in a country's defense.  

EARL/COUNTESS = Referred to as a "count" everywhere else. The difference is the heavy germano-scandinavian influence on early medieval England. "Earl" is derived from the Nordic term for what could be considered a chieftan. Earls being only slightly lower in rank than a Marquess could be very rich and very important. The Earldom of Northumberland was one of the richest in 16th century England.

Now at this point we start to get into the lower peerage.

VISCOUNT/VISCOUNTESS = Addressed as "The Right Honourable". Viscountsies in England tend to almost exclusively be secondary titles held by Marequesses and Earls and passed down to their sons. Any son of a Marquess or Earl is a Viscount. The oldest son inherits the title of Earl plus all subsequent lands estates and incomes. The younger sons could also be viscounts wherever there are titles enough.

BARON/BARONESS = lowest rank of the peerage.

BARONET/BARONETESS = The only British title that doesn't land you in the peerage, the rank of baronet is (as I have heard it described) the barnacle on the bottom of the British aristocracy. It's basically a weird limbo between a Lord and a Knight that was invented by King James I in 1611 primarily as a way to jack up taxes so tbh its kind of a joke.

So Daphne's brother Anthony is a Viscount. He inherited this title from his father which likely means that their father was a second son. As you can see from this ranking list I just did, in marrying Simon, Daph married up. Way up. Not unsusual, given that her family has money and is well regarded.

Now clearly Bridgerton works differently than ACTUAL Regency England. Here, APPARENTLY if you just make a good impression on the Queen she takes a VERY PERSONAL interest in your life and she will marry you off to whatever Foreign prince she's related to who happens to be visiting. But here's where it's a bit wooly for me because there are two different contexts for the term "commoner" in England.  I think we all pretty well know how the European Royal marriage market  worked up through the 19th century, since we all like to make fun of them being inbred. Because there's a bit of a hang up not just about "Royal blood" but also Diplomatic marriage.

In the context of people with titles or peerages being nobles/aristocrats and any one without being a commoner then of course, Daphne is a noble. HOWEVER the context in which I used it in my previous post was ROYALS vs NOT ROYALS. It's perfectly acceptable to refer to someone not of Royal Blood as a commoner. In my replies I used Elizabeth Woodville as an example of a commoner. Now she DID marry a royal (Edward IV) and of course this was a few hundred years before Bridgerton would be BUT EVERYONE thought Edward was crazy for marrying her and she was not well liked because she was seen as at worst a gold-digger and at best an upstart. It was not only an uneven match but a purely domestic one which cut of England from potentially politically critical strategic foreign marriages. This is how royalty worked.

Naturally the strategic aspect of marriages was *slightly* diminished in the nineteenth century, but not really and it was still considered extremely important. Usually a young royal looking to get married was doing so at their family's behest and had a pre-determined pool they more or less HAD to choose from. Marriage to commoners of course  DID happen. It was called "Morganatic Marriage". Prince Augustus of Prussia had a morganatic marriage to a Polish aristocrat. One of Charlotte's own sons, Augustus Fredrick, had TWO morganatic marriages which kept him away from court because his wife could not be recognised due to their having married in defiance of the Royal Marriages Act of 1772, which requires all members of the  British Royal family to obtain the monarch's consent before marrying.

So I posed the very realistic question of "how would this choice to marry Daphne affect the Prince?" I don't know how morganatic marriages were looked on based on Prussian law but it seems likely, especially since Prince Friedrich is the direct heir that this marriage would have caused problems and i find it doubtful that Daphne would ever find herself addressed as "Princess".

I know that Bridgerton is fiction and that in being fiction it is pardoned  for not following courses that would be realistic in actual history. But at what point does "it's fiction" become an excuse for sloppy execution of world building?

The show takes the time to explain to the viewer (in one of the precious few moments of actual exposition) why there are black aristocrats [because the king married a black woman and things changed - which JUST IN CASE anyone is wondering, no Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz was not in any meaningful way "bi-racial" irl, based on the research I've done.] With this kind of deviation from history in a Drama that does, without any official caveats in the marketing, claim to be set in England in 1813, the writers recognised that this needed to be qualified. And in qualifying it, they justify it. They take it beyond fiction into fantasy, but it is justified.

The reason they recognised it had to be justified is because they know that most of the viewers know this is not how it went in history and would hold them to account. So why isn't more care taken to qualify the Liberties taken with the REST of Recency Society?

They talk repeatedly about "Coming Out" into society, particularly regarding Eloise. And Eloise wears her hair down and wears shorter skirts because she's still considered a child because she isn't out. But the IMPORTANT, PRACTICAL parts of not being "Out" are COMPLETELY IGNORED. She and her younger siblings are OUT at SOCIETY EVENTS. CONSTANTLY. Eloise speaks when not spoken to. She speaks DIRECTLY TO THE FOPPING QUEEN (TO WHOM SHE'S NEVER BEEN PRESENTED, BUT I GUESS IF YOU'RE DaPhNe BRiDgErToN's sister you can do whatever you want). There are BABIES at BALLS in this show. For a story that's trying to sell you on the Strrrrrrictures of RRRegency Societeh they're TOTALLY NOT INCLUDING MOST OF THOSE STRICTURES except when the plot demands it.

Why, I ask, is this? Perhaps it is pure ignorance on the writers part. They don't qualify it because they don't know rules like this existed. In which case its just bad, sloppy writing.

OR

They do know about it and ignore it and don't bother to qualify it with a "Oh Daphne a match with Prince Friedrich is so advantageous how marvellous Prussia has recently accepted Morganatic Marriage ahahaha" because they think we a) don't know or b) don't care and ITS STILL SLOPPY WRITING. Which hey, most Bridgerton fans who swallow any swill where hot people catch feelings probably don't care, but that doesn't mean its not careless writing and it doesn't make it NOT condescending. Never write DOWN to your audience.

This show approaches (but by a hair's breadth doesn't reach) REIGN levels of bad in terms of historicity. And the writers of Reign, like the writers of Bridgerton never claimed to be making an authentic representation of history. But perhaps it's because BTon only has 2 actual historical figures (one of whom is SO UNRECOGNIZABLE from her historical counterpart in countenance and personality that they might as well have just made a composite character - "How much can you change a thing before it isn't that thing anymore?") Or perhaps it's the inclusivity shield  but it seems like Bridgerton is getting a lot more leniency than Reign did.

The pass I see given to Bridgerton is "its frothy fun" (and yeah okay these costumes are worlds more realistic to the claimed period than Reign was even with the jacked up, flat bustlines) BUT. SO. WAS. REIGN.

I don't even like Reign but I do think there's a double standard here and I would like to know why.

[acanvasofabillionsuns]

it was over.

the (wicked, though of course that hardly needed saying) queen had been ousted from the kingdom, and serenity was about to be crowned in her place. she had her friends by her side, and she felt like she could do anything.

“your highness, the choreographers are here.”

“claude,” she hissed, still fiddling with her hair. “i told you not to call me that!”

“because i can just call you by your name in front of the whole court and not have it be a huge scandal.” they rolled their eyes, hopping up on the vanity. “i’m practicing, you should be grateful.”

“i’d be grateful if you’d help me with my hair. there’s this one piece that just won’t stay put.” she tried to gesture at it without actually letting go. “and get off the furniture; you know we aren’t supposed to sit on it!”

“i know that no one’s around to care besides you, and you only care because you can’t do it yourself.” nevertheless, they jumped off, plucking a bobby pin from the little container. “okay, here, bend back some — squat a little? yeah. annnnnnd there, is that good?”

serenity straightened, scrutinizing the mirror as she gingerly let go of her hair. “perfect, thanks. what’d you want to tell me again?”

“the choreographers are here,” claude repeated. “your highness.”

she stuck her tongue out at them. they mimicked her, but she turned away as soon as she saw them starting to, so she got the last word there.

“what choreographers? why do we need choreographers?” she’d known they’d need a lot of people to set up the coronation when she first started preparing for it. she’d since learned that they needed a lot of people to set up the coronation. there were more people still that she had yet to hire, or at least delegate the task of hiring to someone else. but never once had anyone mentioned choreographers, and she couldn’t fathom why they were necessary.

“for the big dance thing?”

she turned to show claude how little that meant to her. they’d gotten back on the vanity, and serenity wasn’t sure if she wanted to pull them off or go sit next to them; she settled for rolling her eyes and balancing on the arm of the chaise across from the vanity.

“it’s like... you know how at the end of movies there’s the jump-cut to show how everyone’s doing great now, and if it’s a musical everyone gets to sing a happy song and do a dance about how amazing everything is now, or the power of true love or whatever?”

“yeah?”

“we’re doing that.”

serenity wrinkled her nose. “we are?”

“apparently.”

“since when?”

“i don’t know. i only got told about this when the choreographers got here.”

“ugh.” wouldn’t having to do the specific moves and worry about getting the steps right take all the fun out of it? and presumably being made to memorize a song to sing along with it too; that just sounded like more work. “wait, does that mean i have to sing?”

“i mean, you are the princess.”

“ugh.” she scrunched her face up more. “do you think it’s too late to cancel it?”

“maybe? i just found out like ten minutes ago, i don’t know.”

“ughhhhhhhhhhhh.” serenity flopped backwards onto the chaise, which was extremely satisfying, and if she actually wanted to move she would probably get up and do it again. “why do we even have to do this? it’s stupid.”

claude shrugged. “morale, i guess?”

“stupid.”

“we still have to do it,” they said, which was not very helpful, thanks claude.

“not if we hire some assassins to help us fake our deaths,” serenity suggested, grabbing a fallen pillow and hugging it. “we could run off with some of the jewels and live well off in somewhere quiet enough that no one’ll ever know we didn’t actually die.”

“who’ll be the princess, then?”

“hmmmmm.” serenity squeezed the pillow while she thought. “claire, maybe? i’m sure they’ll find somebody.”

“so we fake our deaths, leaving a note that we conveniently managed to write before being murdered, and then claire gets to mourn our deaths while being made the new princess?”

“shhhhhhh,” she told them. “we can’t take all our friends with us.”

“so it’s better to let them think we died?”

serenity threw her pillow at them. “shush. do you want to run away with me or not?”

“i don’t know,” claude hummed. “i think we don’t have to pay taxes if you’re the princess.”

“we have to do a stupid dance and sing if i’m princess, though.”

“one dance... versus a lifetime without taxes...” they made a show of weighing the pros and cons. serenity sighed loudly.

“i’ll do the stupid dance, i guess.” she knew she was going to have to anyway, but imagining avoiding it was nice. she muttered, “see if i bring you along with me next time i fake my death, though.”

claude gasped, one hand smacking against their chest as the back of the other flew to their forehead. “how could you?”

“serves you right,” she told them. “and this way you still won’t have to pay taxes.”

“but i’ll have to avenge you! while grieving, of course.”

“of course.”

“imagine: you fake your death and then go on your merry way, taking from the treasury and setting up a new life. meanwhile, i swear vengeance against the person who took your life and those that set them up to it. i track down the assassin and threaten — or i guess just ask, though i doubt they’d be obliging — them until they tell me who hired them to kill you. imagine the heartbreak, to find out that you’re still alive, that you were the one that hired the assassin, that you left me.”

“but i’d cover my tracks,” serenity countered, swinging upright so that she could gesture and explain properly. “i’d create a false organization behind the plot to kill me, and then a false organization behind that that’s planning to take over the kingdom. and then i’d pay the assassin so handsomely that they won’t tell you i set it all up, and you’ll spend all your time chasing down smoke and never find out the truth.”

“so much work?” claude flopped against the vanity mirror dramatically. “just to elude me?”

“and so i don’t have to sing in front of a crowd of people,” she said primly. they sighed, deflating. “hey, you could’ve just faked your death with me. not my fault you chose to not have to pay taxes.”

“oh!” claude sat up, leaning forward slightly. serenity mirrored them. “what if we just steal enough money that we don’t have to worry about taxes?”

“perfect.” she grinned.

“there we go!” they crowed, grinning back at her.

“um, your highness?” someone said quietly, and she turned to see a servant woman standing in the doorway. she looked over to claude, visibly fumbling for an honorific before settling on “your grace?”

“they’re my consort,” serenity said loftily, sticking her nose up and biting down a grin when claude gasped offendedly behind her.

“i am not just your consort, and ‘your grace’ is fine, thank you.”

“can people really call you that if you don’t have any grace?”

“can people really call you ‘highness’ when you’re tiny?”

“the high part is about my status, and i’m plenty tall enough to punch you in the face.”

“mmm, are you sure? maybe you should try my abs first. start small. like you!”

“we’ll see how small i am when i wipe the smirk off your face—“

“madam?” the woman broke in pointedly. “the choreographers want to know where their rooms are and where they’ll be teaching everyone the dance, and when they’ll get to do that. um, and one of them said something about smoothies?”

serenity sighed. “fine. take me to them, please.”

she nodded, and serenity jerked her head for claude to come with.

“do i have to?” they asked, even as they hopped down and over to her.

“yes,” she said, grabbing their hand. “come on.” quieter, she added, “if we go together, we can complain more effectively about it together once it’s over.”

“fine,” they acquiesced, though they squeezed her hand minutely and quickened their pace slightly to match her. serenity smiled and marched off after the woman.

[redstainedsocks]

The Break-in; Aftermath

I decided to come back and write a comfort piece set a couple of weeks after the break-in story line, and here it finally is! It’s not my most favourite piece of writing ever, but it’s soft, and sweet, and developed plotty feelings, and I have something worth celebrating today so I decided to do that by doing a quicker-than-usual-edit and post this up for happy feels! Who’s ready for some hurt/comfort?!

Warnings: Box boy universe, general dehumanzation (for the ‘verse), referenced violence, referenced beatings, injuries (head injury, broken ribs, broken fingers), self-blame, scared and confused headspace

Tag list:  @haro-whumps, @theycomeinthrees, @whumpthisway, @samanddeaninpanties, @teachunks, @draganies, @pepperonyscience, @whump-it, @castielamigos-whump-side-blog, @untilthepainstarts, @galaxywhump, @kiretto-laorentze, @lonesome--hunter @slaintetowhump @just-a-whumping-racoon-with-wifi @still-an-asshole

Kit hadn’t seen anyone in nearly two weeks. No-one but Emile and the store pets. He was mostly confined to bed—and still the actual bed, not just his mattress on the floor. Emile insisted he rested, he was forbidden from anything strenuous or taxing, only allowed him to help with small tasks at the end of the day,

He’d never known such luxury. If it weren’t for the broken bones and deep tissue bruising he might have melted away at being given such time to relax. As it was, mostly he just focused on dragging breath into his lungs past the stabbing ache in his ribs.

He was bored too, and on edge. Nothing felt as safe as it had. He tried to let it go, Emile said he was taking care of it. New security systems had been installed, and all the windows replaced with stronger glass. His body remembered though—the feeling of fists and feet, the kicks and punches and heavy handed shoves. His body remembered being beaten, but more than that it remembered losing his charges to the whims of people who didn’t have their best interests at heart.

So he wasn’t sleeping well, food sat heavy in his stomach, and he had no way to work off his restless energy without earning a glare from Emile and cutting remarks about needing to recover more quickly. And that was his other concern—that as soon as he was declared fit and healthy again Emile would have no more worries about inflicting whatever punishment must be brewing for his mistakes.

It left him strung out, a lit fuse with nowhere to burn. He wanted to recover well, he wanted to be good and make up for his errors and inability to fulfil his duties. It just wasn’t working. He felt more tired than ever, the pain making him sluggish and slow. Emile hated the way he looked with his bruised face and bandaged hand, told Kit it wasn’t appropriate for him to be seen by customers until it wasn’t noticeable.

Even once he could move around without wincing in pain he was confined to the upstairs apartment or the back rooms whenever the store was open. He didn’t mind missing out on the customers, they were never that important to him. But he hated not being busy. He hated sitting with the itch under his skin that stemmed from his failure to take care of himself. He hated having nothing to do but think of all the ways things felt wrong.

The bright spot on the horizon was Libby. He’d missed her too, and was finally up on his feet enough to be allowed downstairs during her lunch break.

“Hey,” Libby said and rushed up to him all at once. She cupped his face lightly, her eyes roving over the bruising. “I’m so sorry about what happened. I heard a few days later but Mr Raser said you weren’t up to visitors.”

He blinked, noting the change from calling Emile by his first name, and back to referring to him by his surname. Libby hadn’t done that around Kit since the first few weeks of her employment. He wondered if it meant anything.

“How are you?” She gathered up his unbandaged hand and squeezed.

He looked down at their joined hands with bleary eyes, watching the way their fingers curled around one another.

“Kit?”

He flinched a little at his name, at the concern. He wasn’t scared of her, he just… felt seen, really seen, for the first time. More than the paramedics who had tended to him, more than the police detectives who had questioned him, more than by Emile who inspected him with detached scrutiny and thin lipped annoyance.

“I can’t believe they hurt you this badly,” she said fiercely, like she was angry on his behalf.

“I’m okay,” he said, finally looking up again. “They said I’ll be okay.”

“But you’re not. Not right now.”

He tried to smile, and reassure her, but all he ended up doing was sighing. “I’m trying.”

“Is anyone taking care of you?”

“That’s… I don’t need... Um, that’s not what I’m for? I’m the one who takes care of them.”

“So that’s a no, then.” She huffed and he curled into himself before remembering how much everything hurt and gasping in pain. She caught his elbow and guided him to sit down. “Here, gently. I brought you soup, and you’re going to drink it, and then…” he watched her eyes rove over him and around the shop, too. Her hand came up to brush through his hair and he leaned into the touch. “Have you managed to get this clean?” she asked gently.

He shook his head. “My hand… and I can’t lift my arm without my side hurting, and it hurt too much at the back… where I hit my head.” He ducked down in shame.

“Okay, that’s what I thought. And Mr. Raser hasn’t tried to help you?”

He started to speak and she cut him off, “And if you say that isn’t his job I might cry.”

He looked up, worried, but found her smiling softly at him, and it emboldened him “I don’t think he noticed.”

She rolled her eyes. “Well that settles it. Soup and a hair wash.”

Before he could even protest, she whisked herself away.

  *  *  *

He thought that usually he would be nervous of this. Stripping his top off in front of her, letting her see his bruises and marks. But on a full stomach of easy to digest food, and after two weeks of pain, he was too tired to worry.

They were in the bathroom for the store pets and she helped him ease out of his shirt and he stood nearby while she filled up the sink. It was low and deep—perfect for helping someone else get washed if they were kneeling or restrained, or otherwise incapable of doing it themselves.

She helped him lean forward over it, sitting on a stool to be the right height.

“I’ll go carefully, tell me if anything hurts and we can take a break okay?”

“Alright, I’m sure I’ll be fine.”

She flicked water at him and he drew back in surprise, relaxing when he saw her try not to smile while looking stern. “I mean it, don’t go pushing through pain. I’ve got twenty-five minutes of my lunch break left and I don’t mind spending them all in here with you.”

“That’s very kind, thank you.”

“Come on then, here we go.”

She started by slowly wetting his hair, used a cup to pour water over his head while shielding his eyes with her other hand. He sighed in contentment as weeks worth of grime started to wash away. She worked her fingers through the matted hair that had dried with blood, that he hadn’t been able to fully get rid of.

“Still feeling okay?”

His ribs protested the position a little, but not really any worse than anything else, so he nodded. “Feels good.”

“This bump looks really bad. Does it hurt a lot?”

“Mmm, no? Not since they gave me something to take. The tablets help. They just don’t… my ribs hurt too much so I can’t reach up.” He winced. “I don’t mean to complain.”

She snorted. “Looks like you have every right to complain, to me anyway.” She eased him upright and squeezed the generic shampoo into her hand. “You got a raw deal here, it’s alright if it bothers you.”

“You mean the break-in?” He asked with a frown.

She looked at him steadily for a moment. “Yeah, that, among other things,” she said from between clenched teeth. “But yes. It must have been scary.”

She lathered his head, massaging in gentle circling motions as she went. His eyes closed involuntarily and without meaning to he leaned into her touch.

“I… I didn’t know what to do. And there were so many of them and I couldn’t see their faces and I didn’t know what they wanted.” He gulped, tried to swallow his words but between the soft comforting touch and the pent up emotions he’d been sitting with for weeks, they just kept spilling over. “When they hit me all I could think was how much trouble I’d be in, and then the pain hit too and I thought… thought they might do worse. Like… like in training. And then after, I thought Sir might send me back to training for being bad, for losing the pets... letting them be taken.” He squeezed his eyes closed tighter, scrunching up his face until his healing bruises started to hurt. He could fight back tears if he focused on the physical pain.

Libby’s hands left his head and he heard water splashing, and then her hands cupped his face. He opened his eyes as she ran her thumbs across his cheeks and his muscles relaxed under the steady pressure. “It won’t happen again, Mr. Raser is taking care of it, taking even more precautions. I don’t think anyone would try the same thing twice anyway. You’re safe here, with me, like this. We’ll make sure you stay safe.”

He nodded, breathing slowly so he wouldn’t sob and hurt his ribs.

“Was Mr. Raser mad at you?” Her face darkened, and if he wasn’t so well attuned to the emotions of others he might have missed it.

He shook his head vigorously, sending water droplets and shampoo splashing across the tiles. “Not really. Only because I can’t work for a while. But I don’t think it’s me he’s really angry with. It’s confusing, but I’m glad.”

“Well that’s something at least.” She swiped shampoo off his forehead to stop it slipping into his eyes.

“He’s letting me sleep in the big bed,” Kit added shyly. “It’s very nice.”

“The what?”

“The big bed, upstairs? There’s one in the wall, it folds down. He uses it when he had to stay overnight, but now…it’s for me, until I’m better.” Kit smiled, timidly, and shrugged.

Libby’s face went through a range of emotions so fast he felt dizzy just watching her. She sighed, finally, and returned to massaging the shampoo deeper into his scalp. She muttered something under her breath that he didn’t catch. “Libby?”

“Yes?”

“I upset you?”

“No. Well, I am upset for you. That’s not your fault. I can’t…can’t believe there’s been a bed up there this whole time and he makes you sleep on the floor on that tiny mattress.”

“Pets belong—”

“I know, I know the spiel. It just seems wrong.”

He pondered that as she gently tipped his head back and began pouring water over his hair, rinsing the shampoo clean. So many things seemed wrong. The break in. His different treatment since. Libby’s insistence that he should be better cared for. He was being better cared for, wasn’t he? Rest, and time, and the ability to laze about in bed. And he knew he didn’t deserve it. He knew punishment must be coming, he’d failed so spectacularly it must be.

His thoughts broke off as she spoke again. “I think we’re just about done. Unless you need help with anything else?”

His hair felt amazing, squeaky clean and heavenly. He kept his eyes closed in contentment, revelling in the warmth of the room and the moment of peace where he knew exactly what he was supposed to do. He startled as she used a washcloth and rubbed down his face, over the tops of his shoulders and this his neck. He shivered as water ran down his back but not because it felt bad.

“I can manage the other stuff.” He opened his eyes and smiled. “Thank you.”

“Anytime.” She hesitated and then turned away. The loss of her attention stabbed pain in his gut, he didn’t want the moment of calm to be over. His thoughts scrambled to catch up with a swell of emotion he couldn’t name.

She let the sink drain, wiping down the edges and wringing out the washcloth. He began to speak without knowing where he was going, words forming and leaving his lips in a rush.

“You said something seemed wrong, but I don’t know which thing you mean. Everything feels wrong since… since I got hurt. Everything has been so different.” The admittance tumbled out before he could question it, but saying it aloud flooded him with relief.

She leaned against the sink and considered him. “I just know that you deserve better than the lot you’ve been dealt. You deserve to be comfortable not just when you’re hurt, and you don’t, you shouldn’t, have had to be hurt in the first place—not ever. It’s not my place to question your owner, but I wish I could give him a piece of my mind.”

“I try to be good. But sometimes I don’t know what that means either. I don’t know how to be everything that’s expected of me.”

She nodded, stuck her tongue between her teeth and then bit at her lip before sighing. “I wish I could help you more.”

“You helped me now,” he smiled. Everything in him was calmer, no itch, no buzzing of a thousand unanswered questions, no worries about his safety. Sudden tears filled his eyes and he had to look away. “I’m sorry, I’m just tired, just tired.”

She moved swiftly and cradled his head with one arm wrapped around his bare shoulders. He cried silently for a few long minutes, letting everything that had built up slowly bleed away. It was wrong of him to take her time like this, to show weakness like this, but he could hardly care. She didn’t stop him and that made him believe she didn’t care either.

“Same time next shift, okay? Until your ribs heal I’ll help you in any way I can. And… other things will work themselves out in time, you’ll see.”

He nodded, and for some reason he believed her and trusted her words more than anything anyone else had ever said. They settled deep in his chest and he didn’t even question that some of it ran counter to his training. Words like deserve, and help, concepts like him not being hurt—none of them were right. But from her… they didn’t seem wrong either.

His mind was lighter, and he was more centred than he had been since the attack. He sat with the feeling and decided, without really meaning to, that he liked her better than Emile in almost every way.

It felt like a small betrayal, after all the leanience Emile had given him, and he resolved to go and ask for his punishment as soon as his ribs felt better, and to work extra hard to make up for not liking his owner best of all. But even so—he wouldn’t give up the feeling for anything, because it felt like safety, and it felt as far from wrong as he had ever remembered feeling.

[violetsystems]

#personal

I did not get to see the Fortnite extravaganza last night due to an encryption error on their servers. It was more something to stay out of trouble than anything. I did place number one earlier for the first time ever after a year of playing. But this is probably mostly due to the performance of the machine I've built and upgraded over time. I've learned to understand in almost everything when it is not about me. Being an optimist in a hopeless situation trains you to look on the bright side. The bright side these days is that home on the inside is mostly private. I did have to fight off a wasp that flew down the venting in my bathroom before the broadcast. It's an old house I tell myself. Then I decide to leave my apartment and wait for the bus to go to the Home Depot. Maybe I wanted to build a real fort? I really just wanted to get some bug spray and some more fly tape to deal with a problem myself. But waiting for the bus is a whole other problem these days. Especially when everybody seems to want to make your public appearance an excuse to chip away at your ego. I finished watching the Snowden movie last night. It was great timing. The quote about the Nuremberg trials is too real. How they tried the regular people next. The ones just doing their jobs. The other quote was something about pressure points. I have been under extreme pressure lately without much guidance or semblance of civil rights. I've complained about this weekly on a blog for years only to realize nobody really cares or understands the level of what I put up with. This sort of desensitizes you after awhile. You begin to accept that American society is just the way it is. Mostly because it is still run by rich white men who have figured out layers upon layers of gaslighting. I caught a small part of the Ronan Farrow documentary on HBO where he was being followed by Weinstein because of his work. He had interviewed a private eye who worked for a company called Blackcube. This private security company hired local detectives to get around issues with jurisdictions. The PI eventually turned to the FBI because he was disturbed about the work he was doing to the free press in America. The FBI asked his business then hung up on him. This is how it came to be that Ronan Farrow interviewed his surveillance. The gaslighting never goes away. There are so many reasons for people to watch you. So many special interests. So many mobs. Gangs. Powerful organizations. Snowden really buries the hatchet. What if the government you trust doesn't represent you anymore? What if it's caught doing the same bad things over and over like an abusive spouse? What can you do when the state department holds the key to your entire identity? If this sounds like the plot of a Bond film, it is more or less what I live from day to day. So it's better for me to lay low and keep focusing on crypto mining than write the play by play nobody would believe.

I write to make sense of something that is beyond broken. In that, it can be a little exhausting for everything to sort of work but not follow through. My passport delayed in the mail. A wasp crawling in from the attic into my bathroom as I get ready for a stream. Stores mysteriously closed and locked when I walk around the corner to get distilled water. Friends who text suspiciously a year later asking how I'm doing after they took my job. A thermostat that is set for 73 that on a good day reads 78. A cracked floor I'm afraid to say anything about for fear of the rent going up. A gang of neighbors who watch my every move but say nothing. A city full of gangs that assault me passively aggressively on the train on my way for groceries. I fear sometimes if I cry uncle that it would cut off the good parts. The secret communication and narratives that I have protected for the good of all things I care about. It's like the world says "if you can be free to do that, you've gotta let us be the judge." And after watching how the NSA and government literally tracks every literal thing you do, how can we call any of this freedom? It's a sales pitch I get it. Freedom to live in debt and be all that you can be. I don't live that way anymore at all. But I don't live much when I'm expected to stay in my home for over a year and pretend that the hidden plan will work out in my favor. I have no life to speak of other than my cat, a blog and some weird unstated agreement that gets hijacked, manipulated, intimidated, and pressured. You'd have to wonder who applies the pressure. If I had to put a finger back on it, it's a sad reality. It's not just the government. It's everyone. It's greed. It's selfishness. It is mediocre people scared of not being in control of anything you say or do that might upset the fragility of the lie this country is built upon. It's the sober reality that America is going off a cliff with nothing to show for it except a smile strained so fake it's starting to scare me. Nobody listens. Everyone points the blame. Everyone deflects. And I just sit here alone to some extent. No new friends other than the ones I write to from week to week. I do consider this space safe enough to say that. And yet I wonder how much anyone reads them. Do the people who follow me every time I walk out the door read these as deeply? Their reading comprehension must be garbage. What do I have to say to make it stop? What magic words do I have to say to reverse this invisibility? You were right? I'd rather stay invisible. This neighborhood walks around in trucker hats with crowns spelling out cocaine in bold italic as if it's the constitution. I'm supposed to lay low and realize the laws of the jungle. No opportunity. No jobs. No freedom. No justice. And a wasp flying around in my bathroom.

Will I be ok? My net income hasn't really changed since last fall. I'm sure this year will be a fun tax year. But it is the first time I own my own business with books to balance and spreadsheets to toggle. My health insurance works but the drama behind it is worse for wear. I'm more scared I might be hunted and murdered because someone is jealous of me than the fear of going broke. And even then for fear of it being used as a "CIA pressure point" I just shrug it off like a model on a catwalk. This experience for me is worse than hell. It's a silent wall of shame and coercion that makes this country feel like Nazi Germany. All the while the bully keeps telling you this is for the best. It's so much worse in other countries according to them. And if you speak up or rock the boat, they will find you. This is America 2021. A country that can't look itself in the mirror or read a paragraph or two to understand it has failed people like me. It just waits for us to die. To lay low in an epidemic of pure vapidity. It's no wonder I invest whatever I have overseas and in the future. I do believe there's no way to survive this alone. And yet I do believe that people pushing their way into my life year after year with nothing to show for it is worse. If we were being real about it, my resolve broke over a week ago. I submitted an anonymous tip to the FBI. I know I probably shouldn't write about it here. For fear of more retaliation. I'm more afraid of being stung by a wasp in the bathtub than a city I've suffered through for decades. But on the real, when enough is enough and there is no reply what can you rely on anymore? Yourself. I don't have a whistle to blow. I don't have an opinion that matters. And that is the lie about America. That any of this really means anything. That talking about it and explaining it succinctly on the internet changes anything when diabolic men still control everything. When women live in fear more than men can imagine. Fear of being harassed. Fear of losing control over their own body. Fear of competing for a livable wage. Fear of not being free in a country claiming to be the center of the universe. I don't know any other fight left to fight. As a man I see nothing but wrong, lies, evil and pain. Nobody looks in the mirror. Nobody starts to change things in themselves first. Nobody except me. Yeah, I'm laying low. It's 2021. The patriarchy is everywhere. They've learned to talk over you again with the same old double speak. What are you going to do about it? Here's an idea. Ready? Okay, $19 Fortnite card, who wants it? And yes, I'm giving it away. Remember; share, share share. And trolls, don't get blocked!" <3 Tim

[the-phantom-nagisa]

Valentines day short fic! With karma, nagisa, hazama and terasaka! Oh boy!

Have this non-beta read piece that I mostly wrote while in the train this week. Credit to @handy-dandy-headcanons for the gay comment in the middle of this work.

Terasaka isn't a homophobe, he just doesn't like Karma.

I'm so sorry for the shitty formatting I can't work with Tumblr and just wanted to post this.

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

It had been an incredibly stupid idea, Nagisa knew that now. Sure he loved his boyfriend to death and was glad they were spending the entirety of valentine's day together but he also wanted to use the day to help his friend Hazama with her first official date with Terasaka. She was nervous for it, he'd noticed, which is why he suggested the solution in the first place. He should have realised, however, that Karma and Terasaka were not a good combination. A double date was destined to fail miserably.

Dinner. It was just a dinner. He and Hazama agreed neither of their boyfriends would behave properly in a fancy restaurant so some midway compromise between a fast food place and a fancy restaurant was found. A decent place, really. 3 courses, proper seating and a relatively big menu. A big enough menu for Karma to find absolutely nothing he could NOT criticize.

"I'm just saying, i can probably make it better- actually, no. I KNOW i can make it better than this place can." He was pointing at some stew he saw on he menu, basically shoving it in Nagisa's face who just smiled at him in reaction.

Hazama rolled her eyes, wondering how Nagisa loved the cocky idiot so much. She did have to admit her hypocrisy, seeing as her boyfriend was another type of idiot. Not that she minded being the smart one in their relationship.

Terasaka sighed and slumped down even further than anyone at the table thought was possible to do in the restaurant's mildly comfortable booths. "Can you do better in shutting the hell up?" He grumbled.

Karma was about to bring some sarcastic comeback, Nagisa just knew it. Preventing the moment from escalating into something ridiculous he took ahold of Karma's arm and looked him in the eye.

"I'm not that big of an eater, can we share the first course?" He asked his boyfriend. Said boyfriend completely forgot about Terasaka's existence for a moment, completely taken away by Nagisa's gaze. Nagisa was very familiar with Karma's thoughts about him. The red head was a firm believer of freedom of speech when that meant he'd get to call Nagisa pretty. Nagisa really did not need another session of Karma advocating for his beauty, as if he was giving a speech and Nagisa was the subject.

Everyone ordered their food and the date continued. Karma and Terasaka couldn't help but bicker through most of it, however. Karma clearly didn't have a filter and Terasaka had no impulse control to prevent him from immediately arguing with the red head. 

"As a future government worker, I believe it should be legal for me to commit tax fraud" Karma argued as he and Nagisa had the most random discussion on teaching high schoolers how to pay their taxes. 

Terasaka held a tight grip on his fork. It wasn't hard for Nagisa to imagine that that grip could actually kill a human being. He tried to throw thoughts off murder out of his head as he figured the fork would probably be fine. "That ks the stupidest thing I've ever heard, you're not above the law, Akabane." Terasaka said. 

"Is it still tax fraud if you legally don't have to pay?" Nagisa couldn't help but wonder out loud. Hazama shrugged in reaction and Karma smirked a little. Terasaka ignored the thought and remained on edge. 

"Look, Terasaka, don't meddle with what the smart people are handling." Karma held the same cocky look on his face. "Your brain is too incompetent to comprehend what we're doing anyways" 

Rage emitted from Terasaka, Nagisa noted. It was also obvious enough for anyone without Nagisa's skill to notice. He knew Hazama noticed because she carefully took Terasaka's knife and put it beside her plate where her boyfriend couldn't easily grab it. 

"Oh I'm sorry, was that rude? I didn't think your brain could figure out what i was say-OOF" Karma was interrupted by Nagisa elbowing him in the side. "That wasn't necessary." He complained. 

"Yes it was." Nagisa sighed, giving a pleading look at Hazama. 

She got the hint and put her arm around Terasaka. "Hey big boy, perhaps pay more attention to your girlfriend at your date." She told him. 

Luckily Terasaka took a note of her and turned to her, letting out an annoyed sigh. Within minutes he was completely cooled down and he and Hazama were having a lovely conversation about…Occult stuff. Whatever pleases them. Nagisa was more than happy to discuss Karma's favourite movie with him. 

Just when Nagisa thought things were going well again the two started bickering again. Nagisa barely had the energy to figure out what their discussion was this time but it didn't matter. The argument turned more into both guys listing what they disliked about the other and defending their own honour. Nagisa thought what they were doing had quite the opposite effect, he really didn't think highly of either of them at that point. 

He and Hazama were exchanging knowing look with each other. A second double date would not be scheduled. Both only properly returned their attention to the conversation when Terasaka used a new completely done tone in Karma's direction. 

Now, Karma and Nagisa's relationship was relatively new. Most people were surprised to find out the boys had started dating, mostly because neither of them ever discussed their sexuality. Neither Karma or Nagisa really cared what others thought about homosexuality but it was still considered rude to say something about it. 

"Didn't even know you were gay, Akabane" Terasaka said. 

For a few seconds Karma didn't say anything. His expression was empty and didn't say a lot. Then he turned to Hazama. 

"Didn't know you dated ignorant idiots, Hazama" 

For some reason THAT was all that was needed for the date to escalate into hell. Both guys were furious and ignoring their dates trying to calm them down. 

"I will punch you so hard you'll feel the thing you call a brain bounce all throughout your head." Karma stood up fast and incidentally knocked his plate off the table and made the flower vase topple. 

"Not if I break your arm first" Terasaka screamed as he also got up. 

Everyone was looking at their table. Nagisa noted Hazama trying her best to pick up all the food the guys had spilled. All Nagisa could do was try and hide in shame. 

Just when they thought things couldn't get worse, they reached over the table and grabbed each other. Nagisa knew in advance that the date wouldn't go great but he wasn't prepared for his boyfriend getting physical. 

"U-uhm, excuse me" Their table went silent as they noticed the waitress that carefully approached their table. "I'm going to- going to have to ask you to leave, p-please"

It wasn't long before Karma broke the uncomfortable silence. "Look what you've done now!" He complained as he looked at Terasaka. 

The two started bickering again and Hazama dragged her boyfriend along with her. The only reason it went successful is because he respected her enough to deny her force. Nagisa tried doing the same with Karma but he was his usual self. 

"Sir, someone will have to pay…"The waitress said, tapping Nagisa's shoulder. She probably noticed very easily he was the most sensible person to talk to, what with the two fightinf guys and the girl who was threatening to curse both of them at this point. All he could do was sigh and do so, noticing his unusual forceful manner of putting in his pin code. It was almost as if he treated the card machine as his enemy. 'Better to treat the machine like this than your boyfriend' was all he could think.

---

Standing outside of the restaurant no one in their company was happy. The most positive thing of it all was the now calm Terasaka with Hazama's arm around him. 

"Well I think we're just going to spend the rest of the day with us two." Hazama said, mostly talking to Nagisa. "Thanks for trying though" 

Nagisa waved her off with a light smile. The moment she was out of view he swiftly turned around to scowl at his boyfriend. "Really?" He didn't need to say more. 

Judging by the look on his face, Karma did in fact feel a bit of guilt. "We'll probably have more fun when it's just the two of us anyways" He defended himself. 

At first Nagisa didn't react. His face didn't change and he didn't say anything. Sure, he was calming himself down, that was part of the reason. In all honesty, however, he also just wanted to say something that kept the evening going in perhaps a more romantic direction while also making clear to Karma that what he'd done was not okay. Eventually he realised how futile his effort would be. He could help Karma but never in his life could he hope to change him. Not like Nagisa wanted him to change at all. 

He took a hold of Karma's hands, face still unchanged, catching Karma off guard. He took advantage of this and pulled Karma down lightly so his boyfriend was at eye level with him. He wasn't ignorant to the surprised look on Karma's face that perhaps also showed a little fear. 

"You better pay me back for this dinner" 

And with that Nagisa pecked a kiss on Karma's lip before releasing his hold on him. He portrayed a small smile on his face. As bad as the dinner was he knew Hazama would force an apology out of Terasaka the next time they saw each other. Nagisa would make sure he did the same. 

Karma came back to his senses as he mumbled a soft apology. Nagisa figured he could see how he ruined his boyfriends night, which was even worse considering it was their first Valentine's together. 

"I think I can make it up to you." He said as he put his arm around Nagisa's shoulders. "Let's go to my place, we're more of a movie night couple anyways" 

With that Nagisa couldn't disagree. He leaned in on Karma's embrace with a smile. "I think I'd like that"

[iwritethat]

Jason Todd: Paint Job

A/N: Here we go again :)

>>>>——————————>

"Oh my god, is this symbol painted on your bike?"

"Of all things, that's what you pick up on?!" The vigilante yelled back in an exasperated yet distracted tone, evidently frustrated as he released his sleeping hold on the final thug.

"I wouldn't have if it wasn't so bad - it's all over the headlight. You do this with your helmet on or something?" You wittily responded, standing from your crouching position in front of his motorcycle.

"I don't have to explain myself to you now run along and stay out of trouble!" Red Hood waved you off, at this point simply wanting to get on with the rest of his night.

"Ooooh, look whose getting defensive - how 'bout you bring it to my shop, (L/n) Autos, tomorrow night once I'm closed and I'll give it a custom paint job free of charge, think of it as a..." Your hands rested on your hips as you drifted off toward the end of your statement apparently in thought. The way your brows furrowed was quite cute actually.

"A thanks for saving your life?" The vigilante cockily finished for you once getting on his bike, but you shook your head and sassily shot him down.

"Ew, no. An upgrade, I mean wow."

"Rude, so ungrateful nowadays." The tone was unbelievably sarcastic and you knew he was rolling his eyes under the helmet but you couldn't care less, only folding your arms and responding with a dead tone.

"Uh Huh, I'll see you tomorrow 11pm. Got it?" You called after him, the male speeding off into the night - maybe Mrs C keeping you late had its meanings. God that mysterious woman...

.

In honesty you didn't think he'd show up, or if he'd even heard you after he'd raced off. Maybe you should've thanked him for preventing those assholes from robbing you instead of insulting his ride yet you stayed up after closing just in case.

A diligent knock brought you back to reality, the sound of clanging metal echoing through your workshop as you heaved open the massive entrance door. There stood your knight in leather armour, helmet still covering his identity as he leaned against the wall.

"That offer still open?"

"For that atrocity, hell yes." You internally winced at your inability to be kind to your saviour but breathed a sigh of relief when he laughed and handed you his keys.

"How long do you want it?"

"Hmm, give me a week."

"Whatever you want doll." And with that he was gone, off grappling across Gothams skyline with nothing but effortless beauty.

.

It had been a taxing week without his baby, but hopefully you didn't disappoint - Jason creaked open the door to your unique workshop, immediately noticing his newly designed motorcycle and it took his breath away.

"Woah..."

He walked around it admiringly, fingers delicately tracing your beautiful handiwork as he went, still unable to comprehend that this masterpiece was once his bike before coming to a stop at the station a metre or two away and inspecting your handwritten checklist.

Red Hoods ‘Thank You’:

• Matte Black = nice finish

• Red line detailing throughout cuz the guy likes red apparently.

• Detachable symbol, nicely painted

• Fixed engine -> more efficient

• Customised weaponry

• Taunt Hood about upgrades

A content laugh escaped him at the mocking words, you truly hadn't changed since he'd been gone and it only made him miss you more - where were you anyway??? He'd carefully scanned the area, finding your sleeping form curled up on the couch and shaking his head he made his way over, stopping in front of you with an amused expression only faltering when he took in your appearance. A red hoodie draped your figure - his hoodie, the sleeves reached the joints of your fingers and it was now stained with motor oil over the time you'd worked in it but honestly you rocked it better than he ever did. He’d given it to you when you were walking through Gothams back alleys together, yourself smugly complaining about the dropping temperatures before Jason had mercilessly thrown it at you rather than admit he cared about your wellbeing as his closest friend. It didn’t stop you from taunting him about his feelings though.

It was apparent you'd attempted to wait up for him so you could check off the last thing on your list but had failed to do so, it was rather late and you'd clearly worked hard on his ride that day. Jason knew he shouldn't wake you, and he couldn't handle making conversation knowing you wore what was once his, that you hadn't forgotten him. Instead he covered you with the fluffy blanket folded over the arm and left $500 on the table beside the takeout bag marked with 'C's Diner', memories of that place came flooding back and he'd silently decided to take Roy there that week. Muttering a thanks before leaving, Red Hood took his bike and left little evidence of ever being there at all.

.

The scent of the 60’s themed diner was always pleasant, it was a common occurrence for you to stop by after working late. It reminded you of Jason, and the elderly owner remembered you two well considering the liveliness you both once brought and honestly that charming woman was basically a parental figure in your life. Although she always has a suspiciously omniscience aura about her - Nanny McPhee incarnate as you and your lost friend had joked when you were children.

Unbeknownst to you, Jason remembered this place too though he regularly avoided it until tonight and ensured to drag Roy along with him out of convenience. The pair sat in a booth discussing Jason's bike upgrades when a mug of hot cocoa was set in front of Jason much to his confusion.

"Excuse me, I'm pretty sure I didn't order this."

"Ah, it's on the house. Mrs Cayce’s orders." The (h/c) waitress who Jason knew wasn't an employee proudly winked, saluting the elderly owner who waved over to him.

"Hey uh... do I know you at all? Just you seem familiar and Mrs Cayce clearly does..."

"Nope, don't think so, I would've remembered a beauty like you." The ravenette shrugged, you nodded walking back over the counter to converse with the owner once more.

Roy gave his partner a questioning glance, the sudden realisation and content smile briefly crossing Jason's features had him worried.

"Damn... Mrs C remembers me, I was hoping she'd forget. A friend and I used to come in here on the regular before the whole death thing, sometimes even help out and we would always order this."

"I didn't know Jaybird, sorry... But for the record this is the best diner we've been to in a while and I get if you don't wanna talk about it - but woah who was the waitress, d’ya think she’s single?" His partner questioned, gaze lazily drifting over to your laughing form.

"That was the miracle responsible for my bike, but (Y/n) doesn't work he-"

"Really?! EXCUSE ME?" Roy abruptly cut his best friend off, ensuring his wave caught your attention - eyes practically sparkling after hearing that information.

"What the fuck was that?! Don't, it's more conplicat-" Jason grabbed Roys offending arm, pinning it down to the table with his hushed warning.

"Despite me bringing over the drink earlier, I'm not actually a waitress here so you might wanna call -"

"(Y/n)! They're nice boys who probably wanted to talk to a beautiful lady, would you be polite for once in your life?" Mrs Cayce's words caused you to wince, your 'motherly scolding' spurring a frustrated sigh but in the end the judgments always brought you not necessarily what you wanted but what you needed.

"... How can I help you sir?" It was incredibly forced, as was the brief uninterested smile you gave them and the low but polite tone.

"I'm Roy and this is Jason. I was wondering if you could take a look at my ride if that's okay? The Red Hoods' or whoever’s is pretty sweet and he gave all credit to you." Admittedly, they noticed the positive change in demeanour at the mention of mechanics as Roy continued his request.

"Seriously?! He did?! Yes, 100 times yes! I’d lo- wait... Jason... as in Jason Jason? I do know you, don't I?" You were on the verge of squealing before that name registered, how the face matched your memories of your long lost friend and almost immediately your attention focused solely on the ravenette in front of you.

"..."

His silence wasn't considered useful, although his signature guilty expression gave it away, the awkwardly sheepish smirk he always wore when he knew you were right, his facial features were more mature and he was more handsome than you remembered - though you'd wished he'd never died in the first place. In fact you didn't even give a second thought to how he was sitting before you, instead trusting in the happiness he always blessed you with when in his presence.

"Fuck you nerd." Instantly you'd excitedly tackled him to the booth cushion regardless of your contrasting vocabulary, his arm wrapped around your waist whilst the other grabbed the back of the booth for stability since you'd almost pinned him to the seat.

"Rude much?" He abruptly commented, a playful undertone to his voice.

"Give me a break, you're supposed to be dead! I don’t know how or why but it's me Jason, we've always told each other everything..."

"I know, I didn't want to put you through anymore pain."

"You were a pain that I enjoyed having dumbass." Your tone was soft, more meaningful than he'd expected and it encouraged him to tell you everything.

"(Y/n) I-"

"Save the explanation for later, let me just enjoy your company for now and then I gotta show you my place! I managed to get my own mechanic shop and I fixed up Red Hoods bike - the Red Hood! God I have so much to tell you!" Despite knowing the excited tone you held was technically for him, he had no intentions of telling you who he was just yet, after all he was more than content to have you in his life again rather than longing for more of your time when saving your dumb ass under his alias.

That was the only reason he'd come to your garage that night, to enjoy your familiar company a little longer, if it were anyone else he wouldn't have bothered but for you? He'd still do anything for you.

"Me too doll, for a start this is Roy Harper..."

.

The owner Mrs Cayce carefully studied the scene, towel drying off your favourite mug as she continued to watch with a small smirk on her features and mysterious glint in her eyes.

"Why, it's about time you finally brought those two together isn't it Universe? Better late than never I suppose - but don’t you start any love triangle business ya hear?"

[lovelyr00]

A conversation that I had with my stepdad many weeks ago made me want to share my thoughts on Trump.

So fair warning to everyone:

⚠️THIS IS A LONG POST⚠️

I still get salty that I pay more thousands in taxes every year, shit…I pay more in speeding tickets and Trump pays a measly $700 for his.

I brought this argument to my stepdad and he got upset.

“It doesn’t matter that he pays less than us,” my stepdad told me.

Throughout the rest of the night, while my stepdad continued to talk..I stayed silent. I was so upset that I did not get a chance to put any words chiming in on our discussion. Now that I am calm, I think back to that moment and realize what I should have said to him.

My stepdad should not get to complain about what our tax dollars pay for as a country. He made money on stocks, profits from giant conglomerates. THEY were the only ones profiting from this whole mess.

It is so agonizing. That is because the poor every day people have to continue working and put themselves at risk in order to stay ALIVE. We are not worried about the big corporations. They will still stay open and survive despite all the pain losses that the every day person is experiencing.

So many mom and pop shops have closed, so many people have died, so many have become homeless, and every day there are people on the front lines risking their lives. While businessmen are able to live in luxury, still making money, and acting as though everything is the same because they do not feel these fears personally.

My stepdad asked me: “what is Biden’s platform? What are his plans to continue for this country?”

I did not answer at the time, due to my anger but what I did wish to say: “I don’t know yet but if you asked me this…well, what is Trump’s?”

Anytime Trump is asked for a finite plan, there is nothing. We do not necessarily vote for Biden for his platform and policies. We are simply voting AGAINST Trump for who he is…for the MASS CHAOS he has sown, for the lack of empathy and understanding in what his words have caused. If for nothing else, his extremely and disgusting handling of the pandemic is sole PROOF why he should not be in office. His vocal and baseless attacks on other politicians, organizations, etc. are all insults under the belt.

His entire platform is built on fear…fear and hate mongering.

To not understand this is to be completely disconnected with the current condition of our country and our people. If nothing else, his lies and bolstering of himself should be concerning. He galvanizes the far right and he cannot even-for one second-condemn white supremacists, a group that even the FBI calls “the biggest terrorist group in the US.”

What we need in such a trying time is someone with empathy.

Let me get this message across loud and clear: I do NOT like Biden, that is the sole truth. I really do NOT.

However when compared to two evils…there is only one clear choice. Maybe if there is a different Republican, America would have been okay.

I do not vote party lines but we only had two true choices at this point.

Trump, in every single way, has undermined our democracy. The election was never Trump vs Biden, not for the majority of us who understand our government. This election was Trump vs Democracy.

Trump used third world tactics from dictators in order to hold onto his power. He has never been fit to be president. Nothing made him qualified.

An average person can compare him to a game of family feud. Where Steve Harvey asks, “what scares rich white people the most?”

Trump took advantage of that fear. He dug into so many people’s deepest and darkest fears because he touts that he will solve it all.

Then what do people do? People listen.

Let us be honest, the education system in America is sorely lacking. It is only the stupid and the willfully ignorant that is deceived.

Why is it mostly people in my age group and generation-those that grew up with technology and the entire world of information at their fingertips-can grasp the true reality of our situation?

Generations before us fought through a recession. They fought to take back their lives and to break old norms, but now scoff at my generation for doing the same thing. The only difference is that my generation is at a precipice.

What is a precipice? It is a very steep rock face or a cliff, especially a tall one. That is where we are at.

We are focused on the future, not just the here and now.

The generation before is worried about too much government control, yet they seek to control women’s bodies and right to healthcare. Why? Is the reason that they will actually have to contribute to society? To “strangers” they do not know?

Our government is falling apart. Without federal help, each state has been forced to deal with the pandemic themselves. Look where that brought it. Fucking hell, there are counties where cops are not allowed to wear masks. How is that even something that makes sense?

All our generation is asking for is a voice. This is the sole foundation our nation was founded on. It is why we separated from England back then, a right to govern ourselves.

“By the people, for the people..” Is that what our declaration said?

So let the people have a say. Let us govern.

The truth is that the majority of our citizens want more, want better.

Just like what happened in 2016, Hilary won the popular vote yet Trump still got elected. Amy got nominated and sworn into the Supreme Court without true vetting.

Our government is not what it once was. There has always been corruption, everyone knows it but now no one cares to even hide it anymore. Those that inflect it are not even remotely embarrassed in any sense.

This does not sound like the proud America our parents sought out to live in. This sounds like a corrupted government of any other third world country, where citizens are fighting for basic human rights and safety for their family.

The left is not brainwashed. They are educated. The far right is the one who can only mimic Trump’s words when asking for why they want him in office.

Both my mom and stepdad voted for Trump again. They still say my only perception of Trump is that he is a bad businessman. There is no winning my parents or anyone over.

Being American born Vietnamese, I have been drilled how my mom and her family escaped Vietnam constantly my entire life. Despite that I see there is a disconnect between myself and other children of immigrants with our families. Those who fled Vietnam cannot understand us, because in Vietnam the government over there is in total control. That is the core depth of their fears. They do not understand that the breadcrumbs we get (while more than they ever got), are still just breadcrumbs.

Our democracy is a facade. The only way to fix it is to vote for those who at least WANT to try. Trump only cares about exploiting any and all loopholes that he can. Fuck that, he has always openly voiced how he has “all the power and can do whatever he wants.”

That is not a president, that is a dictator. Our parents and others who follow him are just blind to see it.

Republicans only ever talk about the economy and “family values.” Whereas Democrats are currently prioritizing social causes and policies.

The truth is, when Republicans talk about the economy, they use the stock exchange as a metric. Again, those are companies that have their own legal-they identify in the eyes of our government. Democrats are talking about saving the people, the individuals that make up the working class and beyond. That is the core difference between both parties.

Republicans hold dear of an idea. An idea of fictional rights and benefits attributed directly to them but in truth, benefits no one but those at the very top-those in power and those with already padded pockets.

Just like how they cling to the idea of a fetus as human life, but completely disregard that baby once born. Republicans hide and pretend that real life struggles do not exist because on paper America is thriving.

Those I fear, honestly, are not Republicans but Nationalists. This is not “American Pride.” Nationalism is when that gets taken too far...to the point of no return.

So with me sharing this, I hope you understand where I am coming from. Everything that happened in this past year has been difficult to bear. Hell, the past four years felt like a long ass tv show that I did not want to be a part in.

With this new presidency, it feels like a season finale…a new arc that has been desperately desired by my generation and others that look forward to something new. Let us be prepared for what is to come that will come indefinitely and that is change.

[apparitionism]

Propagator 6

For those who aren’t acquainted with Ballet AU, I invite you to see the full story, as recounted in @notallwonder​ ‘s beautiful “program” for the AU—I’ve reblogged it so that it will precede this post. It all started with a manip by @amatterofcomplication, and then everything got pretty crazy. For those who ARE acquainted with it, and with Propagator in particular (it’s the ninth in a series of stories in which Helena is a ballet dancer and Myka is an engineer—my contribution to the larger AU situation), you may or may not recall, given how long ago its first five parts appeared (easily findable via search or archive on my tumblr), that previously in Propagator, Myka and Helena had gone to Hawaii, on a “honeymoon,” to deal with some issues that arose as a result of Helena’s surgery and rehab. They’re working it out.

Propagator 6

As it turns out, no one is bored—so much so that for quite some length of time, Helena doesn’t remember which side of the bed is right and which is wrong.

But as night deepens, as she now drowses on Myka’s right (and thus wrong) shoulder, she does feel a disorientation. Her own right arm had always tucked easily beneath her, on the other side; here, her left does not know how to fit itself so as not to lose all sensation. She shifts, and in response, Myka inhales, as if about to speak. “What?” Helena breathes out.

Myka offers a little shrug of her far shoulder, over in that space that is no longer Helena’s. “So I have this confession,” she says.

Disoriented physically, and now philosophically too; Helena should never be anyone’s confessor. “I absolve thee from thy sins,” she says. “Will that do, or must you tell me?”

Myka chuckles. That moves both her shoulders. “No, no, it’s not bad. Well. A little bad?” And she goes on to narrate a tale in which before they left home, she had set up an appointment. For tomorrow morning with surfers at dawn to talk about wetsuit materials and construction because she had not been sure what this trip was about and she had thought she should try to do something work-related so if nothing else they could write some of it off their taxes but of course now that she and Helena have—and Helena kisses her, for she is not ready for Myka to narrate what just happened. What their situation is now, how it differs. Leave it as difference, better difference, just for now. “You know you’ve always been training me to overexplain, when you kiss me like that if I do,” Myka says after a moment.

Helena smiles. “It’s all right. Meet your surfers. I’ll get up when you do and try the sunrise yoga class.”

“You’ll what?”

“You heard me.”

“I don’t quite believe my ears though. Have you ever done anything at sunrise other than roll over and mumble about every dwelling needing blackout curtains?”

“Set your alarm,” Helena directs, for now she is determined. Now she will get up at dawn for yoga, whatever modified version she can manage, or die in the attempt... well, no, that’s overdramatic. But it seems important to do something that Myka finds difficult to believe. To show her that anything is possible, even from Helena.

In the morning they do, however improbably, both rise at the same still-dark hour, and Helena would like to be able to say that she feels rested despite that—how romantic, to profess “I slept better than I have in months”—but that would be a lie. Practice: when Myka mumbles “Did you sleep,” Helena answers, “Not really.”

“Go try it now,” Myka suggests. “Those windows do have blackout curtains. And if you want me to cancel, I will.”

“Why would I want you to cancel?”

“You might have changed your mind.” Myka says this with a funny little note in her voice.

“Do you want me to change my mind?”

“No...” Myka says, and Helena kisses her for the hesitation; Myka amends, “But maybe yes? We don’t need the tax write-off that bad.”

The swell of love Helena feels at such a banal statement embarrasses her. It makes her push Myka away. Gently, but even so. “Go find your sunrise surfers,” she says. “Ask them why they refuse to surf at a reasonable hour.”

“Something to do with the tide? Or more likely the tourists. Which is to say, us, so in a weird way, it’s our own dumb fault.”

“Speak for yourself.”

“In my opinion, it’s our own dumb fault.” She smiles. Helena smiles back.

****

Helena finds the yoga class... instructive. This surprises her.

The morning begins misty, gray, with sea heavy in the air, there to be tasted. Breathing in and breathing out is difficult, wet work. Their group is quiet, content to watch and breathe and wait.

Then it happens: the gray gives way to an insinuation of blue, lighter, then lighter still, until everyone at once inhales; as one, they see that the blue tease has become a wash of pink, that the volcanic ridges have taken on a band of light that thickens by the second, and that that in turn is thinning the air. One state, then a perfect balance between that and what comes next, and then, like a miracle, that next. Helena’s body cannot do that anymore. She had not known it for the miracle it was, when she could do it, and for one wild moment she is possessed by the idea of taking one great inhale, flinging herself into a jeté, and suffering the consequences.

Instead she raises her arms, as directed.

Helena is no yogi; she cannot posture and breathe her way to good. But while she may not be enlightened, she is trying to be pragmatic: being mindful is likely to get her farther than not being mindful will. She is trying to be pragmatic, and she is trying to be mindful. She is also trying to breathe as instructed, to balance, and to pay salutations to the sun.

At a certain point she considers attempting trikonasana, bent over her right leg, but her daughter’s voice introduces itself into her head: “I don’t think you should do that, Mama.” That that voice should even here, even now, be her best advisor... Helena sighs and modifies the pose.

They face the water now, and the sun rises behind and beside them. A tight fold of cynicism within Helena is measuring itself against this symbol of beginning, perversely trying to match its power. In this mindful moment, cynicism’s attempt is failing.

****

“You’ll laugh,” Myka says, hours later, as she hauls her beach-damp and somewhat grumpy self back into the hotel room. She sets her similarly damp notebook down on the dining table, then fetches a towel from the bathroom. Helena watches all this with no idea why it’s meant to be funny.

“At your vain attempt to salvage your leather portfolio cover?”

“You should. My soggy notes. But actually at the fact that one of the surfers was very interested to hear about you. She herself isn’t a ballet fan, she made sure to tell me.”

“Then why—”

“But her girlfriend is. And two years ago, when we were here, they went to see you dance. On their first date.”

“Their first date.”

“I know. Even if she made it up, it’s still pretty sweet.”

“She certainly divined exactly how to get to you. I presume you’ll now be constructing for her a custom wetsuit?” Helena says this with a patina of jealousy.

Myka rejects the artifice with a shrug and a “you never know.” She had worn her hair up in a twist as a shield against the morning’s moisture; now she takes out the tie and shakes her head. The tight, wet curls suggest that the intended barrier was not respected. Myka touches her hair and sighs, presumably at her vain attempts to control any and all parts of her person and possessions, but then she begins to smile. “I might come up with something for the girlfriend. She teaches at Ballet Hawaii, a ‘Ballet Princess Camp’ for little kids, up to six years old. Junior would’ve loved it. They have ballet classes and also tea parties.”

“Tea parties? Our daughter would laugh derisively. She would have, even two years ago.”

“You’re mistaking her for you. She would’ve loved it, because it was ballet.” Myka collapses into an armchair. She closes her eyes. “Which isn’t to say she wouldn’t have criticized the quality of the tea at said parties.”

“Now you’re mistaking her for me.”

“Easier to do, every day. The both of you were all I kept thinking about, anyway... you, for obvious reasons, but also I was thinking that Junior really should learn to surf. The exhilaration—she’d lose her balance and shriek and fall right into that ocean with no fear at all and then haul that long body of hers up on the board again and love it. Or maybe she’d be perfection up there, standing all tall, and she’d decide on the spot to become a pro surfer instead of a dancer. Or she’d come face to face with a sea turtle and take up marine biology...” She trails off, cracks open an eyelid.

“Is something the matter?”

“I was sort of expecting you to kiss me to stop me talking at some point.”

Helena notes aloud that she was very recently instructed by Myka herself not to reward her for overexplaining; Myka tells her that intermittent rewards are even more effective reinforcements than expected rewards are, that this has been established by more experiments than there are stars in the sky, that they have no doubt created all kinds of behaviors inadvertently in Junior “because of this selective reinforce—” are the last syllables she manages in this overexplanation, before Helena gives in, goes to her, and leans down to kiss her.

Then Helena says, “The baby as a marine biologist, or as a surfer, that’s a bit more pleasant to consider than the primary way she was on my mind: I imagined her reprimanding me. Still, we are extremely stereotypical parents.”

“I think that isn’t true at all. Have you met us?”

“Perhaps not as people. But as parents.” Helena is sure this is true.

“Even that,” Myka disputes. “How was yoga, anyway?”

“I heeded the reprimand,” Helena says, as boast and confession, for disentangling achievements and failures is impossible.

Myka tugs on her hand. “It’s okay. You saw a sunrise.”

That afternoon, they at last go to the water together. Helena expects Myka to complain, but she does not: instead, she picks up shells; she exclaims at the sight of a goose; she even constructs a sculpture—an abstract rendering of a castle?—out of sand. Helena has no idea what it is meant to signify, but she takes a picture of Myka kneeling proudly next to it.

“Do you remember the first beach we went to?” Helena asks her strangely happy wife.

That first beach was in Oregon, on a cold November afternoon, overcast, gray and dark everywhere, a drastic contrast to today. Myka had been sullen, resistant—also marking today as a drastic contrast—but their relationship had been so new that Helena had had no way of knowing how typical that beach-related bad humor was. Helena had cajoled, and Myka had given in, but her resultant glower certainly fit with the wind and weather.

Those layers of gloom had left Helena unprepared for the jolt of beauty that was Myka against water. The wind had whipped Myka’s hair in a disastrous mess across her face, and Helena had thought herself accustomed to beauty, and to Myka, and to the way the latter embodied the former, but that sight... Myka so somber as to skirt parody, like a moody rock star posing for photographs, as she regarded the breakers and braced her body against the wind...

Helena had let her right foot perform an ecstatic little battement, with Myka’s resentful body her barre.

Myka must have felt it, for she said, “You just want to live in a ballet, don’t you?”

“You’ve never seemed to dislike the idea. Or have you forgotten how this romance began? ‘The Ballerina and Her Engineer’ may lack a full orchestral score, but—”

“I think you mean ‘The Engineer and Her Ballerina.’” Myka had shaken her curls, as if she’d known that action would strike Helena dumb, and she’d turned to look out over the ocean once again, her expression now wry rather than surly.

Helena wishes she had a photo of that moment but is glad she doesn’t. It could never have captured the shift in mood, nor the physical surge from chill to warmth that followed as Myka turned and cupped her hands over Helena’s cold-raw ears: the resultant roar seemed some right and full chorus of the sea, the fanfare of Myka’s face, and Helena’s own raucous, jubilant heart.

“You should’ve worn a hat,” Myka had whispered under the wind, a chastisement slipped into one of Helena’s sorry ears.

“I don’t have a hat,” Helena had told her, and thus it became an intimacy: “You should’ve worn a hat,” Myka would say, with slight or even no apparent provocation, and “I don’t have a hat,” Helena would answer. They did that once in front of Steve and Liam, and Steve, perplexed, asked, “Why would Helena wear a hat to go out for ice cream in the middle of August?” and Liam groaned, “Oh god, it’s code for something,” and Myka looked at Helena, and Helena looked at Myka, and they nodded at Liam, and Myka told Steve not to worry about it, that she’d said it only because Helena looked sad about having made the unfortunate discovery that her butter pecan didn’t seem to have enough pecans to suit her.

That had set Helena laughing—because it was exactly what she had discovered—and Liam always found her laughter contagious, so there they stood, on a sidewalk in the late steam of an August evening, Liam braying, Helena chortling, Steve clearly working hard to establish a conceptual link between hats and pecans, while Myka calmly ate her sugar-free ice cream, then took Helena’s disappointing cup from her and, making a deadpan point, delicately spooned the pecan pieces out of it, one by one, and ate them herself, bit by tiny bit, in a performance so lengthy that Helena had had to concede that she hadn’t looked hard enough and promised to be more diligent in the future.

“I remember that you should’ve worn a hat,” Myka says now.

“I don’t have a hat,” Helena says in response.

Myka smiles, then squints into the sun, the shine angling brighter and brighter as more and more of it moves below the ocean horizon. Tourists surround them, but Helena’s ears are filled by the waves, their sound more gentle lap than crash. A weak breeze tries and fails to persuade Myka’s hair to move.

Nearly fifteen years have passed since that first beach, but Helena is still rendered helpless by the sight of Myka against water.

****

“That was boring,” Myka says.

They are back in the suite, after their beach afternoon, followed by their first meal outside the hotel—outside the hotel room—and they have just had what Helena has to agree was spectacularly uninteresting sex.

“I’d even call it rote,” Myka now says, and she sounds overjoyed.

Helena is looking down her body at Myka’s head, halfway down the bed. They have defaulted to their traditional sides; clearly, the switch is going to take some time to become habitual.

“Just some normal night,” Myka goes on, “you with no performance, me with an early meeting...”

“Don’t tell me you have yet more surfers.”

“Okay, me with no meeting. Still, that was pretty by-the-book. Process and result.”

Helena puts her right hand into Myka’s hair. The humidity has made it spring dramatically. Myka always bemoans humidity’s effect, but Helena would never complain about the additional tangle; now, abraded by salt, it has softened, too.

They’d left the lights on. Helena can see clearly the hair she is petting, and she finds one glistening gray-white strand, then two, three. More. “So much silver...” she says. “Are those my fault?”

“As if you’re my only stressor.”

“Don’t diminish me,” Helena remonstrates, matching Myka’s tease.

“I’m not. I’m elevating Junior. You’re the one who says we’re stereotypical parents.”

“Hoist by my own. I suppose you win.”

“That’s what I like best.”

“I know you don’t like Hawaii, so thank you—again—for this. Particularly this day.” The sunrise, the water...

“I’m the fool who said I’d go wherever you wanted. You were just honest.”

Helena, lying on her back, must tilt slightly left, away from trouble. Myka, who is resting to the side of Helena’s right hip, appears now to be staring directly at the doubled scar, and Helena wonders whether she is doing that on purpose. Myka kisses the disfigurement. Conclusion: yes.

Helena anticipates a prickle of anger within herself at this aggressive proving. It doesn’t come.

Once Helena had no longer needed active assistance with wound care, she hadn’t wanted Myka to look, to see, to be reminded of the existence of the... cuts. Helena has been the one to work them, flex them, apply the mess of vitamin E serum to them. She supposes she had on some level understood that they would not go away, no matter her diligence. But she supposes also that she had on another level hoped that Myka would not notice them. Even in her head, it sounds preposterous. Yet the evidence of these few days, that Myka is not put off by her appearance, has been a relief that Helena hadn’t known she had tensed herself against never feeling.

And the absence of anger within her, now, as Myka is demonstrating that she is not put off, is yet another relief.

“It’s a rugged look,” Myka says. “I kind of like it.”

“I’m so pleased to hear that.”

“As dance damage goes, it’s actually a lot more aesthetically pleasing than your feet.”

“Pardon me for causing wear and tear to the tools of my trade.” Helena is sure that her saying of such words even a week ago would have led them to stop speaking to each other entirely. “If you engineers used slide rules these days, yours would no doubt be a sorry mess.”

“Mm. Falling apart. And I could’ve bought a new one, just like you and your hip.”

“I suspect there would have been far less rehabilitation involved. And it wouldn’t have necessitated alteration of your preferred beach attire.”

“Well, no, not when you consider that my preferred beach attire is none.”

Helena feels free to pout. “I wish you meant that the way it sounds, instead of ‘none, because I would prefer never to be near a beach.’”

“And yet here I am in Hawaii, and all day today I’ve done a reasonably good impression of somebody who’s perfectly happy to go to beaches all the time. Even with those crazy surfers.”

“Is the wetsuit situation interesting?” An instant after Helena asks, she realizes that this is the first normal, conversational question she has asked Myka about her work in a very long time. Helena doesn’t understand Myka’s work, not as it extends beyond ballet costuming, and not even that, in a structural sense; she has no real hope that she ever will. But Myka loves it. And Helena is self-centered, to be sure, but she also has made conversation with her wife for a decade and a half.

“The wetsuit situation is interesting,” Myka says, and she sounds just as overjoyed about making conversation as she did about routine intimacy. Helena feels given a gift. “Also, I forgot to mention, I fell off a surfboard.”

“I didn’t realize you would be surfing.”

“‘Surfing’ isn’t even vaguely what I was doing. But I was told that I couldn’t understand the impact unless I’d felt it myself.”

“And?”

“Surfers, it turns out, are soothsayers in the most literal sense. Because having felt it myself, I understand now that there’s a spiritual component.”

“To the impact.”

“Which I did not understand till I’d felt it. Anyway, by the end of that, my ‘perfectly happy’ impression started slipping a little. But speaking of perfectly happy, I’d be perfectly happy with you still wearing that string bikini you used to be so fond of. Perfectly happy.”

Helena feels free also to say, “I wouldn’t.”

“I see that. You could wear a wetsuit, and I’d be perfectly happy with that too. They’re going to be really great wetsuits, by the way, if they work out like I think. Way less spiritual on the impact. Pillow-soft.” She kisses at the scar site again, with just that softness, then clearly decides that she has soothed sufficiently; her tone turns jaunty. “You could always say you got ’em in a knife fight!”

“A knife fight in which my attacker gifted me with an extremely expensive metallic ball-and-socket joint?”

“Maybe it was your trophy for winning the knife fight.”

“I don’t feel as if I won the knife fight.”

Myka kisses Helena’s hip yet again. “Well, then, maybe I did.”

Some path forward: Myka won the fight.

They are almost asleep, both of them. The lag between their utterances increases.

“You did win,” Helena says.

“What I like best.” A long pause. “Also you.”

“What?”

“What I like best.”

“I do too,” Helena tells the miraculous woman who lies next to her. Lies next to her and is her wife. Is still her wife.

“What?” asks that miraculous woman, after a time.

And Helena responds, after a similar time, “You.”

****

You’d thought you were going to miss Mama and Mom so bad all the time, but you really don’t have time to miss them, except when you’re thinking about them. You’re supposed to Skype with them “at some point,” and Skyping reminds you of when Mama would be gone on tour. You and Mom would be home by yourselves, and Mom would make you a calendar for counting down the days till Mama came home, and she was almost as excited as you, every day, when you put a big X through a box to mean that day was over and you were one day closer to seeing Mama in person again. And Mom was always even more excited than you when it was time to put the big X through the last box. You almost would rather wait to talk to them until it’s time for them to come home and you’ve put your own big X through your own last box—because you’ve made your own calendar—and they’re back where they’re supposed to be.

Anyway Aunt Tracy and Sam have had lots of plans, and Uncle Liam and Uncle Steve, and Grandma and Grandpa, and you even have already had a visit with Aunt Amanda and Pete too, at the pool where Aunt Amanda was coaching and you got to swim and Pete said he was no champ like Amanda but he thought you were pretty good and you could probably be Aquawoman even though you don’t have hair as long as Jason Momoa’s. You explained that you would, maybe, by now, except for you had lice a while ago when it was going around, and Pete said that he never had lice but he almost had rabies once so you are practically disease twins.

And on top of all that there is school and ballet. You are a very busy person.

On the fourth day, you’re watching Aunt Tracy make dinner. Aunt Tracy is a very good cook—better than Mom, even, and of course Mama doesn’t know anything about cooking, but you two are exceptional at ordering delivery together, and you can’t remember whether Mama had said that to you first or you said it to her, but now you always say it to her when you’re getting the stack of menus out of the menu drawer, and she always laughs and says “That is correct, my darling daughter”—and Aunt Tracy says you can help at a certain point but not yet. She tells you to make conversation with Sam, because she doesn’t want Sam’s help at all ever.

You make conversation by asking Sam what she’s working on dancing in now, and Sam says that it’s Raymonda, and you say that Mama did that three or two years ago you think, and Sam says she knows that, because everybody keeps looking at her and shaking their heads like she’s a non-Helena-fantastic-Wells disappointment, but you don’t believe her. Then Sam asks about Mama’s rehab and is she okay with it, because she looks pretty good walking around, and you tell her about how Mama really can walk close to almost like normal but she can’t dance like normal, even though she keeps trying. Trying so hard.

Sam gets a funny look her face. “Trying so hard,” she says, and you can’t tell if she’s talking to you. Then she is talking to you; she says, “So she wants to dance.”

You give Sam the same look that your friend Esme gave you that one time when you asked if she ever wanted to eat peanut butter even though she can’t have it because she’s allergic.

“Don’t give me that look,” Sam tells you.

“What look?” you say, even though you know exactly. You also know that it was a good idea not to say “duh” to Sam like Esme had said to you, when you asked about the peanut butter.

Sam just shakes her head. “Does she really want to dance?” she asks.

“She can’t.”

“Everybody can dance, kid.”

“No she can’t. Not now.” It’s true, and Mama hates it and you hate it too, but it has to be okay, because if it isn’t, how can anything ever be okay again? And you think of a reason for maybe why it’s okay. “You know what, Sam? Mom can’t dance either. She never could.”

Now Sam smiles. “Dancing’s just another word for pineapples, a lot of the time. Dancing’s another word for a lot of things.”

You sort of give up trying to make sense of what Sam says.

Aunt Tracy says, “Shouldn’t it be that dancing represents pineapples?” and you give up there too. Then she says that she’d like you to please come and stir the curry if you can be careful and not splatter the entire kitchen with turmeric because she is not a fan of orange cabinets, and you concentrate so hard on making sure what’s in the pan stays there that you forget the whole thing.

Except for how weird it is that everybody keeps talking about pineapples for no reason.

****

Sam’s been thinking, ever since Junior talked about Helena fucking Wells wanting to dance. Thinking hard. Actually, being real, she’s been thinking hard for a while, but then Junior said it out loud... so when she and Tracy are alone in bed that night (sort of alone; Sam hadn’t ever had to consider how a kid snoozing one room away basically means never being alone) she takes her hard thinking and tries to put it on a plate. “So I have this... I don’t know. Sort of an idea. It’ll probably fuck everything up worse.”

Tracy tilts her head against Sam’s. “Sounds great so far.”

Sam can hear a half-smile in that, but she forges ahead anyway. “I want you and the kid to meet a guy I know.���

“That doesn’t seem bad at all.”

“He’s a choreographer.” Sam figures that might on its own be enough to initiate the fuck-up.

“Of...?”

Okay, apparently not quite. “Modern, mostly. He was a dancer himself, forever ago, but he started choreographing because of his mom. She was a dancer, but then she lost a leg. And his deal was that she should keep dancing.”

“Did she?”

“Nah. Wouldn’t. Sad fucking situation. But anyway he’s really interested in befores and afters. Of bodies.”

“I don’t quite get it,” Tracy says.

This annoys Sam. Why would Tracy be dense about this? “My point is, you’re smart and you’ll know how to talk to him.”

“Talk to him about what?”

Could she be doing this on purpose? “I swear to god. About Helena fucking Wells! How is that not obvious?”

“But why would you want me to... wait. He’s a choreographer. Interested in befores and afters of bodies?”

Thank god. “Right. Basically. I mean it’s way more fucking complicated than that. I danced for him this one time, as a favor, and I swear to god he would not shut the fuck up about the reason for this and the reason for that. The best fucking thing about ballet is that as long as your lines are right, nobody gives much of a fuck about reasons, so if you—”

Tracy commands, “Sameen, stop,” and Sam does. Then Tracy asks, “Are you really saying that you think he should work with Helena? Make something for her... her, now? That he would want to?”

Sam would hate that she responded so immediately to such a command, if it had come from anybody else, but she never seems to have any choice about these reactions to Tracy. And she doesn’t hate it. So what else could she have done? “No. I’m saying that I think you and Junior should meet him first so you can tell me if she’d baseline want to kill him. If you think he’s one of those people like me, who she instantly hates. I mean I can tell you up front, he’s nothing like me. Except he’s short. Really fucking short.”

“Short like you? That is really short.” Tracy’s tone is muse-y, flirty, and it drives Sam crazy.

“Shut up,” she says, pointlessly. “Are you gonna meet him or not?”

Tracy kisses her. And it’s in that intense thank-you way, so Sam is fairly happy with the initial result of the idea. She wonders how Tracy might kiss her if this thing manages to work out somehow. Maybe, if Helena dances, Sam and Tracy can go to Hawaii themselves on some post-Helena-fucking-Wells-is-dancing-again honeymoon.

Sam wants to smack herself for even starting to think the thought that any of this might actually happen—the working out somehow, the dancing, the honeymooning. She tells herself she’d better shut that thought down right fucking fast.

But not before she thinks about it just a little more.

TBC

****

Reblogging notallwonder’s astonishingly lovely program led me to reflect on the remarkable constellation of talents and enthusiasts who’ve made up the Bering and Wells community over these several years. That history has been on my mind lately, due to a dustup on Twitter. It’s a good reminder to say over here, out loud, that I remember it and value it and am so grateful to have been, and to continue to be, a part of it at all.

[the-is13]

A Pinch of Salt

Description:  You didn’t expect to be working tonight. It was a regular Friday night, or so you thought. Two beautiful men happen to come into the small pizza joint, one with particularly captivating hazel eyes.

Characters: Jared, Jensen, Reader, OFC’s OMC’s

Relationship: Jared x Reader

Warnings:  None really, cursing? A bit of fluff

Word Count: 4046, wow that surprised me

A/N: So this is my first fic, I read a lot but have never wrote anything. This stemmed from a dream I had. For the purpose of this fic its set in early stages of the boys filming Supernatural. Jared is a bit younger, late twenties. Him and Gen are friends but nothing more. This purely fiction! I mean no harm to J2 or their families, I love them all the to moon and back. Any hate will not be tolerated. Please be kind and let me know if you liked it! 

Beta: A GIANT shoutout to @team-free-will-you-idjits-67 for being a beta and pretty much helping me get this right, haha pun intended. You rock chick. 

Oversized t-shirt, fuzzy socks, warm cup of tea, and netflix. That’s how you typically spend your Friday nights since you aren’t one to go out or party. You like your space.You’re content with the quietness of just sitting and reading a good book or just watching netflix by yourself.

That’s how you’d like to be spending this friday night, but alas, Susan called in to work.Again. Apparently her little boy is sick, for the third time this month. You’re pretty sure he’s fine and that she just has a date. It wouldn’t bother you if she would just ask and tell you the truth, but of course, she lies. Well, at least you think she’s lying.

Oh well, more tips for you.

So here you are, at Pete’s Pizza on a Friday night. It's not too busy, but its not slow either. Pete’s is a pretty good place to eat, lots of beer and, of course, plenty of variety on pizza. The owner, and head pizza master, Jimmy, is an amazing cook and is always trying new things to put on pizzas. It's a popular spot. If you didn’t work there, you would probably eat there too.

You’re busy turning in another order for this weekends special; spicy taco pizza with extra jalapenos, when your coworker Nancy bumps you roughly.

“Sorry, y/n!” She went to turn away from you and tend to her own tables when she exclaimed, “Oh! A few guys just sat in your area.” She placed her hand beside her face like she was trying to cover a secret she was about to tell you, but you knew whatever she had to say wouldn’t be quiet. “They seem like a rowdy bunch too.”

You sigh, “Great. First the Johnson’s, now these guys.”

Everyone knew the Johnson’s, they were regulars, the kind of customers you hate: rude, always blaming you for everything, and nitpicking every single thing. od forbid there be an onion out of place on their pizza. They had five kids. Seriously, five, and they were ALWAYS misbehaving. But of course, it was never their fault, according to their parents. You thought differently, they all needed a good whoopin’. On top of it all, they never, ever, tipped. No matter how hard ANYONE tried. It was very taxing to say the least.

Grabbing your pen and paper you waltzed off to table 8 and tried to put on your best smile. You really wanted to make some money tonight, afterall you needed to pay the bills.

“Welcome to Pete’s! What can I..” Looking up from your pad you started to stutter as you noticed who was in front of you. This couldn’t be. You had to be dreaming, it wasn't real. You stared into his hazel eyes, the captivating blues, greens, and speckles of brown. He smiled, oh lord, his smile, so bright and white.

“Wh-what can I start you off with tonight?” You stuttered. Wow, you made a sentence. You were pretty sure you were going to faint.

“I think I’ll have a beer, what ‘bout you Jay?” Oh god, his booming voice, if he spoke another word you might turn into a puddle right then and there.

“Yeah, beer sounds great right now.” said his friend, his best friend. Of course you knew him, well, knew of him.

“I think we’ll just take two beers for now” He smiled politely brushing some hair from his face.

“I-I, I’ll.. be, right.. B-back with those” You smiled back, trying not to sound so foolish, but damn, how could you not? Jared fucking Padalecki and Jensen fucking Ackles just walked into Pete’s, and sat in your area!

You let Nate, the bartender that night, know you needed two beers asap. Then you whipped out your phone to text your best friend, Hannah. You two had been through hell and back, knowing each other practically since birth or before since your moms attended lamaz together. She shared your healthy obsession with Supernatural and all things cooperating. She had to know what was happening. Now!  

Y/n:OMG!! HANNAH YOURE NEVER GOING TO BELIEVE THIS!!!

She quickly wrote you back, knowing you had to work this evening

H: What’s up? You get a $100 tip or something, ‘cause that WOULD be unbelievable!

y/n: Wow bitch, thanks. NO this is MUCH MORE EXCITING!!

H: Well.. go on with it…

y/n: JARED AND JENSEN ARE HERE

H: …

You’re joking right?

y/n: OMG NO! WHY WOULD I JOKE ABOUT THIS!? I KID YOU NOT, THEY ARE BOTH HERE SITTING IN MY AREA!!!!!! IM GOING TO DIE!!!

H: BREATHE! You need to be cool, or at least as cool as you can be. Hehehe

y/n: Shut the fuck up, im cool.

H: uhhhhuh you keep telling yourself that.. ;)

You waited for her to be serious, since she probably thought you were joking. The realization of your truth hadn’t hit her yet or else she’d be freaking out as much as you were. You waited, watching her little dots letting you know she was indeed typing back to you. You didn’t get a chance to read it as you were snapped out of your world with your best friend by Nate.

“Eh hemm, y/n, you busy over there, or you wanna take these beers?” You nearly jumped out of your skin. He had been staring at you, watching you frantically typing away on your phone. “OH! Yes, thanks Nate,” you said with a wink. Nate and you flirted all the time but you never really meant anything by it. You were pretty sure he had a crush on you though. You could feel him staring at your ass as you walked away.

Approaching their table you made sure to take some deep breaths. In and out Y/n, in and out, you reminded yourself. With a polite smile you were able to speak, “Here’s your beers, gentlemen.” You didn’t want to seem like the fangirl you were, knowing their names, so you stuck to the informalities. “Are y’all ready to order?” As you smiled once again, trying to keep your excitement under control.

Jensen spoke first this time “Yeah, I think so. That speciality pizza sounds pretty good darlin’. I think we’ll have two with a side of cheesy sticks,” he said before sending a quick wink your way. You gulped, knowing that he definitely noticed you staring at them. Who would blame you though? They were such fine men, and they knew it.

Scribbling down their orders legibly as possible, all while trying not to fling your pen out of your hand like an idiot you chirped, “I’ll put that right in, be out soon”.

You went to grab their menus, meeting Jared’s eyes once more and drowning in the sea of colors, causing you to accidentally knock the salt over on the table. You watched in horror as the top flung off and covered Jared’s lap with salt.

“Oh! My gosh! I’m, so, so sorry! Let me get a towel, I’ll clean this up, sorry.” You rambled. You thought you were playing it cool, but obviously not. You scolded yourself for being so clumsy before you ran off to the kitchen. Handing Jimmy their order quickly, you went around the door of the kitchen to the closet to grab a rag.

Jensen nudged Jared as they watched you run away “Dude, I think she knows who we are. he seemed a little flustered, doncha think?” He hit Jared in the shoulder, noting how he wasn’t phased that his lap was saltier than the ocean.

Jared winced as he rubbed at his arm,”Ow! What?”

Jensen stared at Jared with a ‘are you serious?’ look. “Didn’t you hear me? I think she recognized us.” Jared’s attention had returned to the direction you disappeared in. SNAP SNAP SNAP  “Dude, what is your deal?!” Jensen spoke with a little more irritation as he waved his hands in front of Jared’s face.

Jared finally turned to him and stuttered a little “Uhh, yeah, whadya say Jay?”

Smacking his forehead a little dramatically Jensen exclaimed, “Have you heard a word I said? Like, at all?!” He talked louder than he had wanted, drawing more attention to them than he planned.

“Do you really need to shout?” Jared questioned. “I Just wanted to go out and relax tonight and you’re trying to make a scene!” He snapped.

Finally looking down at his lap he tried to gather as much of the salt he could and dump in onto the table. Scooting back in his chair, he stood up to shake some salt off but heard a soft ompf as he stood. He bumped into you, nearly knocking you down.

Now it was his turn to apologize.

Spinning around quickly he grabbed your wrist before you could tumble all the way down, yanking you a little hard as you ended up with a face full of his chest. You couldn’t complain though, he smelled delightful.

You crained your head upwards to look at him, seeing his mouth moving but the words not registering in your head. You probably looked like a fish out of water, jaw slack, eyes wide.

“You okay?” He repeated. Finally, you snapped out of it. Blinking rapidly you managed one word “Yeah..” Jared smiled softly, “You sure? You’re sorta staring at me like you’ve seen a ghost.”

Retreating from his hold, you internally scolded yourself for the third time of the night. This was Jared Padalecki. You couldn’t be looking at him like a damn knight in shining armor. This was not a fairytale. This was real life, or so you hoped. You straightened yourself out a bit “Uhm, yeah, I’m good, so sorry again. Let me clean your table,” you clipped out.

“It’s okay, no big deal really. It’s not like you a-salt-ed me, or anything,” he said giggling, trying to lighten the mood. But failing to contain his laughter from his own joke. Jensen smacked his forehead once again and thoroughly rolled his eyes.

You lifted your head and just stared at him, was he kidding? You couldn’t tell, all you heard was assault. Immediately you assumed the worst, he was going to press charges because you spilled salt. My god how stupid were you! So fucking stupid, you should’ve just stayed home!

“I’m so sorry Mr. Padalecki, please don’t sue me,” you squeaked out. Your voice barely above a whisper, afraid you’d burst into tears on the spot.

Realizing you didn’t take his joke well, he started to back track. Holding his hands up almost defensively. “What? No! I was joking! It was a joke! I’m not going to..” then it clicked, you called him ‘Padalecki’.

“Wait, you know me?” He said with a raised, questioning brow.

“Uhh.. hmm.” Stuttering slightly, your brain went into overdrive to try and explain yourself. But it was working too fast trying to form the correct words. You cleared your throat trying to remain calm and collect yourself. “I guess you could say that, I mean I do watch ‘Supernatural’..” you looked towards Jensen “So yeah, I guess I do know who you are, both of you.”

Jensen’s face lit up “I told you dude! I can always tell when they know!” he exclaimed.

You could feel heat creeping into your cheeks, embarrassed because you thought you were playing it cool. Maybe Hannah was right. You were just a waitress at a pizza joint, and this was Jared fucking Padalecki we were talking about here.

Without saying a word, you began to turn away and head back to the kitchen or to check on your other tables. Hell, almost literally, anywhere but right here.

“Hey…” Jared had snached your wrist once again, “Don’t worry about it, its okay.. D-do you want to take a picture.. Being a fan of the show and all..” he trailed off motioning to Jensen.

“Uh, yeah.. Sure, as long as y’all don't mind.”

They both chuckled lightly, wishing you could hear that sound forever. It was such a beautiful sound, much different in person. “Nah, it's no problem, afterall we try to maintain a good relationship with our fans,” Jensen drawled with a wiggle of his brows. You weren't sure if he was just being friendly, or if he was displaying some of Dean’s flirtiness.

You were still slightly embarrassed as you pulled out your phone quickly, closing your recent conversation with Hannah. You tried to angle your phone to get a good selfie, but you couldn't really capture the behemoth of men behind you. Jared lightly and plucked your phone from your grasp, knowing you were struggling to get a good picture. “Here, let me..”

Click click click

He took a few pictures to make sure you got a good one. You had the the attention of almost the entire restaurant now, since you spilled the salt all over Jared and were now snapping pictures with the two of them.

“There ya go, I’m sure you got a good one.” Jared said handing your phone back to you.

“Thanks..” You trailed off, looking down to try and hide the blush creeping onto your cheeks as your fingers brushed his in the exchange.

“Y/N!! Y/N!!” Mrs. Johnson yelled from across the room waving her hand like the lunatic she is. “Y/N!! Come here!”

Huffing a bit, you quickly said additional ‘sorry’s’ to Jared for making a mess and ‘thanks’ to them both for the pictures. Taking a deep breath, before dealing with the table from hell, you turned on your heel making your way to their table.

Meanwhile, that was the first time Jared had heard your name, y/n. You were too caught up in who you were looking at to introduce yourself upon taking their order. ‘Y/n’ he thought it was a beautiful name.

“Yes, Mrs. Johnson, how can I help you?” You said as you plastered on a fake smile.

“We need more napkins, what do you keep stocked in these things? Two napkins?” she said in a snarky tone while tapping the napkin dispenser. Trying to refrain from commenting on how her children used half the restaurants napkins because they were either such a mess or building a damn castle in the bathroom with them, you made your smile even wider.

“I’ll run and get more right now Mrs. Johnson.”

Turning away from their table you were halted by her grabbing your elbow and not so whispering in your ear. “That performance was horrendous, spilling salt all over that poor boy, just for him to take a picture with you. Pathetic.”

You ripped your arm from her grasp and gave a tight lipped smile, “I’ll go get those napkins now, be right back.” Heading towards the backroom once more, you heard her muttering to her husband how ‘sad and pathetic’ your life was. Like she should give a damn about your life.

Sometimes you wished people would just mind their own damn business and keep their mouths shut. Afterall, that's what you did. You were never one for confrontation. Even as a child, you hated arguing with your older brother or your parents, you just kept to yourself. You never really stood up for yourself. You took the blame for so much, even if it wasn’t your fault or you didn't do it, you took it. You didn't want to upset anyone.

You dropped a huge pile of napkins off with the Johnson’s after taking Jared and Jensen their pizza’s. All while Mrs. Johnson kept nonchalantly whispering about you, either to herself, Mr. Johnson, or ‘non-directly’ at you. It was really tiring.

You tried to keep a smile on while checking on your other customers and, of course, Jared and Jensen. You really wanted to talk to them about the show, their lives, or anything else for that matter. It was still hard for you to believe this was real.

Between the Johnson’s, their herd of children that you constantly cleaned up after, the other customers, and Jared and Jensen, you were feeling a little worn out. Nate could tell, he kept asking if you were okay, to which you always replied with a kind smile, and ‘yup i’m good’. It was nice for him to be concerned about you. He was always a nice guy. He never pushed too far with the harmless flirting, never talked behind your back, and he always made sure you got your tips. It was refreshing after being walked on most of your life.

Jared and Jensen ate their pizza slowly and drank their beer a little faster than they ate their pizza. You kept bringing them refills and could tell they were getting a little loose. Not that you were to judge, it must be hard being famous and all. Plus, you pretty much ruined their evening. They kept smiling at you though, letting you know everything was fine, and damn, were they.

After the Johnson’s finally left and things calmed down a little, you stood behind the bar with Nate making idle chit chat.

“Do you know them?” He asked, pointing to where Jensen was currently laughing at Jared for some joke he made. “I saw you taking pictures with them..”

You were currently making heart eyes at the pair, after all, who wouldn't? They had some damn good genes. You realized Nate was talking to you and not a customer. “Oh, what? Know them? Do you not?”

He just shook his head ‘no’ looking at you like you had two heads. “Am I supposed to?” he questioned.

“NATE!” You said just a bit too loud, causing Jared and Jensen to look your way. You just smiled and turned toward Nate, blocking yourself from their view. “Do you really not know who they are?” He shook his head again peeking around your shoulder to look at them.

You tugged his shoulder and scolded him for staring. Now you were pot calling the kettle black. “They’re famous Nate, that’s Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles. They star on the show ‘Supernatural’, it's like the best sci-fi, drama, family show, ever!” He was still looking at you like you were crazy. “Nate c’mon, you've never watched it?”

You could tell he was wracking his brain by the look on his face.

After about a minute, or what felt like it, he finally spoke up. “Hmmm, Jensen… Ackles… I think he was on Smallville right?” You’re face lit up with excitement but you tried to contain yourself. “YES! Yes, he was! He played Jason!”

“Soo, you took a picture with them?” He pondered. You looked a little dumbfounded, would he not have? I mean, what if he was to meet someone famous? Just pass them by? Nate could tell by the way your face was twisting up in that sour look he thought was so cute, you were not pleased with his answer. “I mean that's pretty cool right? You can tell your grandkids you met ‘the stars of supernatural’,” he said a little too sarcastically as he waved his hands in the air like he could see the headlines of it.

You were still a little offended he was making fun of you but laughed it off and lightly pushed his shoulder. “Oh stop it Nate! You’re just jealous.” He smiled a little but then noticed the guys you had been making heart eyes at were getting ready to leave. “Hey..” he pointed in their direction, “I think your friends are leaving.”

Turning around quickly and nearly tripping over your own feet again, you noticed they were started to fight over the check. You could barely hear them arguing about who paid last time and who drank more. Mustering up all the courage you could, you put one foot in front of the other and marched towards their table. They both looked up at you curiously. “Beer’s on me guys, afterall you put up with the disaster I made earlier and were kind enough to take a picture with me”

They smiled widely, both slightly tipsy, you could tell their emotions were genuine, which made your heart flutter.

Jensen spoke first, running his tongue out across his lip, “That’s mighty kind of you darlin’,” he drawled, his southern accent peeking out more from the alcohol.

“Jay stop flirting, you’re probably scaring her! Then she won’t pay for anything!” Jared said with a wink and grin that made your knees weak.

You took in their drunken state light heartedly. They were much more kind than the other guys who would come in, get drunk and try to cop a feel. Not that you would mind if it was them though.  You’d let Jared or Jensen feel you up all day or night.

You waved Jensen off, “Its fine, not like I’ll ever see y’all again..” you trailed off, the thought making you a little sad. You had enjoyed watching them interact, even if it wasn’t with you.

Jensen piped up with a smile that would shatter the moon, “I wouldn’t be so sure about that, sweetheart”, he winked and was out the door in a flash. That left just you and Jared, standing there like awkward teens at the school dance.

Jared nervously ran his hand through his hair and scratched the back of his neck. You were in awe. He looked so beautiful, even with the nervous behavior he was displaying.

“W-would you mind if I asked you for your number?” He stammered

You blinked, what was happening, was Jared fucking Padalecki asking you for your number? You pinched yourself and jumped, he was still there, awaiting your answer.

Noticing your apprehension he began to turn away “It’s fine if you don’t wanna give it to me, I know we just met and all..”

“YES” you replied a bit too eagerly. “I mean, yeah, you can have my number,” you spoke as you grabbed your notepad and quickly wrote it down, handing it to him.

He looked at you shyly, “Thank you, y/n for everything.” He flashed that bright smile and waved before turning to leave.

You stood there for a moment longer, shocked that what just happened, had indeed happened. You gave Jared PADALECKI your number.

Maybe he wouldn’t even contact you, maybe he was just trying to be nice. That was it, he was just being nice, I mean, from what you had seen about them in the media, they were generally nice guys.

You finally moved from your place, noticing that you got off in 10 minutes. You decided to just go ahead and start your cleaning duties and head home. You were wiping down Jared and Jensen’s table picking up a few napkins noticing something written on one. Flipping it over you had to slap your hand over your mouth to stifle the gasp that left your lips.

“Y/n, you are too beautiful and kind to be working here, and you are not pathetic. I did kinda like the a-salt though ;)”

Was delicately written and tucked inside was a crisp $100 bill, by far the best tip you’d ever received. Hannah would be eating her words and you couldn’t wait to tell her.

You did the rest of the cleaning and closing with Nate rather quickly. Anxious to get out of there and phone your best friend.

Biding goodnight to Nate and Jimmy, you rushed to your car, about to grab your phone to call Hannah when a little ding let you know you had a text. Figuring it was her, you click the screen to light it up. Of course you had 12 texts from her wondering what was happening and how she needed the ‘dirty details’. Rolling your eyes you scrolled down noticing you had a text from a number you didn’t recognize. Opening it, you could have burst into tears from the fire in your heart.

I loved the pizza, beer and taking a picture with a beautiful girl, hope to see you soon. :)  -Jare

Clutching your phone to your chest tightly you sighed and pinched your leg.

Ow, nope not dreaming, you thought to yourself. Now you really couldn’t wait to get home and tell Hannah.

[nemossubmarine]

Warhammer 40k: Wrath & Glory RP #45

Even though it’s late, pretty soon after Vivek and Saef have left, Gimlet makes his way to the AdMech ship docked in the hangar of Santa Maria. Donning his Inquisition badge, he asks to see the tech priest, and is granted an audience. Gimlet requests to be handed over the belongings of the servitor. The tech-priest is difficult as always, he points out that several of the belongings are standard AdMech gear, so there’s no point in handing those over. What does Gimlet want to with stuff like clothes anyway? Gimlet says he wants to see how the servitor would react, and this seems to cause some leering from Z47r, who points out that servitors don’t react. Gimlet shrugs. In the end, most of the stuff has been either discarded or recycled, so Gimlet manages to get some of Vivek’s clothes, a bunny he looted from Wes’ corpse (back in Elysium campaign) and his phone (in pieces).

Gorm meanwhile has returned to his room where he finds Uffe looking somewhat distraught. Uffe asks for Gorm’s council, and recounts that his and Vivek’s conversation didn’t go too well. Indeed, Uffe is quite certain after meeting Vivek’s brother that he had heard Vivek talking on the phone with him before, back when Uffe had that little wolfing out incident. Uffe confronted Vivek about it, and Vivek categorically denied it but Uffe knows he is lying to him, so the talk devolved into a row. Gorm thinks this makes very little sense, as this doesn’t add up with Vivek’s past behavior. He suggests getting Vivek into the room, and see if they can figure this out for themselves. Uffe agrees, though reluctantly. (at some point the two talk about what’s going to happen after, and Uffe kind of implies he has thought he isn’t going to make it through the hunt alive).

Gorm goes to Saef’s room to get Vivek. Saef opens the door (expecting a pizza) and says he’s not sure if Vivek is up for talking, but he’ll ask. Vivek comes to the door, clearly having just finished crying, but says he’s ok with figuring this out. Gorm comments that the talk with Gimlet seemed to have gone well, and Vivek tells Gorm about them having asked about purging Triplex Phall. They get back to Gorm’s room, where Vivek sits down opposite Uffe. Gorm asks him about the situation and Vivek reiterates that he has no idea about any phone call. Vivek asks if he has at any point done anything that would harm Uffe at all, and Gorm has to concede that he has not. Uffe gets a bit angry (for the reason that he is quite scared), asking if Gorm thinks he is lying. Gorm reprimands him for his behavior and asks him not to snap at other people. Uffe points out that he knows Vivek is lying and Vivek gives Gorm a desperate side glance (because he is lying about Uffe wounding him). Gorm says that the only way to get to the bottom of this is to look through Vivek’s phone records, so he’ll have to pop by the tech priest to see if he can get his hands on it. Vivek and Uffe should go to eat pizza at Saef’s place. Vivek says they’ll be there, but he has one more thing to say to Uffe. What that is, no one will know. 

Gorm runs into Gimlet right outside the AdMech ship and asks what he’s up to. Upon learning that Gimlet has Vivek’s phone, Gorm takes him aside and explains the situation. Gimlet absolutely refuses to look into Vivek’s phone information, so he hands the bits to Gorm, who points out he doesn’t have the technical know-how to get information out of bits of phone. So they go ask Vivek if it’s okay, and Vivek says sure. So they go do that and Gimlet pulls out all the information he can from the phone, but no phone call has been made. 

Before returning to the others, Gorm and Gimlet (mostly Gorm) decide it’s time to turn this depressing pizza party into an actual party, and they go to the bar to order some drinks and then to the tax free to get some party paraphernalia (and strippers (apparently Paul the Tax-Free guy is a part-time stripper)), including party hats, glasses, a boombox with some space Kesha music. On this party’s invitation list are Tabasco and Cayenne, all the Sable Swords (Carl and Stuart show up), Molly the engineer,  and Jennifer (some of the Sable Swords watch over Laurel). So with this party bus in tow, they return to Saef’s room. Gorm lets Uffe know the results, and then shushes his “I don’t understand”s with a tankard of mead.

Party time means party games, so a game of “Never have I ever” is called upon. Saef asks about people having their memories tampered with and then grimaces (the Space Marines, Vivek, Gimlet and Theo drink). Here’s some interesting things that are called “crushes on doctors” (Gimlet, Tabasco, Molly and Gorm drink), “crushes on Space Marines” (Gimlet, Tabasco, Vivek drink), “whether one regrets joining their current faction” (Theo, Saef, Vivek and Gimlet drink), “whether one has had night training” (what’s night training? -Stuart, “ask Gimlet” - Gorm (it’s sex)) (Molly, Jennifer, Tabasco, Cayenne, Vivek and Saef drink), “whether one has overheard night training” (Molly, Saef, Vivek and Carl (apparently he was sleeping in a tent next door to some Imperial Guard) drink). Uffe asks “never have I ever made a bet of how many cookies I can stuff in my mouth and lost”, which makes Vivek complain that that was told in confidence. Vivek drinks, as does Saef, and Vivek gives Saef a hug for it.

After “Never have I ever” Gimlet suggests some truth of dare. First up Gimlet dares Carl to call the person he admires the most. Carl says that person is dead and Gorm calls for a toast to Revan. Gimlet clarifies that a person who is alive will have to do, so Carl calls Gorm and explains (somewhat drunkenly) that he really thinks Gorm has been exemplary in his behavior considering the situation he has wound up in. The thing goes around, and here’s some of the things I remember: Stuart asks Vivek about how many cookies it was anyway. Apparently 5½. Vivek asks Gorm if Space Marines truly can’t have relationships outside their squads, and Gorm says that obviously there’s differences, but he personally thinks there’s nothing wrong with having a special relationship with someone.

Saef dares Uffe to kiss the person he would like to kiss the most. Uffe wants clarification, so Saef clarifies he can’t kiss his brother, and he should probably use tongue, which he then downgrades to whatever Uffe is comfortable with when Gorm points out that that’s not nice (especially if someone hasn’t kissed anyone before). Uffe turns to Vivek and lets him know he can back out of it, and Vivek just says that it’s okay, so Uffe touches foreheads with Vivek and brushes their noses together.

Gorm dares Tabasco to go sit next to the person he likes the most in the room, so Tabasco goes to sit between Gorm and Gimlet. Tabasco asks if Saef has his vaccines in order, which he does not (Tabasco will give them to him in the morning). Later Saef asks if Gimlet is in a relationship and Gimlet says yes (which is apparently new information to Cayenne). Gimlet dares Uffe to take a sexy pic of himself and send it to his crush. Uffe says his phone doesn’t take pictures, so Gorm says he can help and they go to the bathroom, where Uffe admits he has little idea what sexy entails. Gorm suggests he take off his chestplate and blow a kiss to the camera, which Uffe is very uncomfortable with, so he ends up just flexing for the camera. Gorm asks who to send it to, and then just sends it to Vivek. Uffe asks Gorm about an incident with Ivar and some alleged “ork kill-stealing” (totally happened, because Ivar is just too slow).

Gorm calls for a bonus round of questions everyone has to answer. First question is only slightly heretical, namely which chaos god would everyone follow if they really had to? Tabasco says that he’d follow Nurgle, for his life-giving abilities, Theo says same. Molly goes with Slaneesh for obvious reasons. Jennifer goes with Khorne. Cayenne says Tzeentch. Stuart says he’d have to go with Slaneesh because Noise Marines are pretty cool. Carl and Uffe both go Khorne. Vivek says Tzeentch, Saef Slaneesh (and Stuart dubs himself, Molly and Saef the Slaneesh team). Gimlet says Tzeentch and Gorm goes with Khorne as well.

Gimlet also has a bonus question, namely what people had seen they’d like to forget. It starts off as depressing as one might say with Theo saying he’d like to forget the image of his gang leader being decapitated. Molly goes noticeably less dark and mentions having walked in on her parents doing some night training once. Jennifer says she wishes to forget the faces of her kids when she had to tell them about their father’s death (Gorm cries a bit). Tabasco and Cayenne both mention family members taken by the Tyranids. Stuart says half eaten child. Carl gets teary telling about corpses of a family they found in a collapsed building, and Gorm goes to hug him. Uffe says he wishes to forget what his brother Harald had become. Vivek tells a story about being 14 at the factory and having one of his brother’s friend getting caught in the machines of the factory (apparently it took few days to get all the bits out). Saef’s thing he wishes to erase is finding the bodies of his gang, Gimlet’s is obviously Limestow. Gorm says he wishes he didn’t go last, because he doesn’t have such a depressing answer, namely Uffe’s former haircut, even before the topknot, which was apparently just the worst.

Suddenly there’s a knock on the door and it’s the police! Stuart scrambles to hide the booze while Molly goes to open the door. It’s the strippers and they’re here to arrest everyone for partying too much and being just too damn sexy. Molly has bunch of bills and no one is sure why she had them prepared and Saef dives for his wallet as well. 

Gimlet and Tabasco slip off at some point to go somewhere more private (namely the bar, though apparently one of the strippers was the barkeep so it is truly empty). Gorm was planning on getting the Space Marines of the group together but he notices that at some point Uffe and Vivek have disappeared as well (presumably together), so he asks Carl if they could go talk somewhere and they return to the Sable Swords ship. Saef drunk-texts Demir, lets the party continue and at some point just goes to bed, while in the background Sable Sword Stuart is doing a keg-stand.

Gorm and Carl go to the Sable Sword ship’s medbay to have a little conversation. Gorm lets Carl know that he would like to visit him on Obsidia and he would like Carl to visit Fenris, and Carl seems pleased to have such a relationship. He has one last gift for Gorm, but is a bit hesitant to give it, saying that he totally understands if Gorm can’t accept it. The gift is a device, known among the Space Wolves as Claw of Morkai, made to extract the progenial glands of the Space Marines. Carl says that Gorm’s talk of possibly doing a mistake with Snorri made him think, that perhaps there will be losses in the coming hunt as well, but with this Gorm could at least bring his brothers home in one form or another. Obviously the procedure is a difficult one, and there’s no guarantee that Gorm would be able to perform it, but trying wouldn’t hurt. Gorm says he can see why Carl was hesitant to give something so valuable and important. He’ll have to ask what Fenris thinks of the gift, but for now he takes it gladly. Carl shows Gorm how the device works. 

They talk a little bit more about Gorm’s future. Gorm explains how he feels it might be difficult for him to return to the normal in Fenris straight away, and though he’d love to fight alongside Carl and his Sable Swords, it would be difficult to arrange, and he would be an outsider. There is a place however where Astartes may work together, namely the Deathwatch. Carl comments that that would mean Gorm having to work under Inquisition, which the Wolves are famously not fans of. Gorm says it’s the Ordo Hereticus they mostly have problems with. Besides this would be a chance to perhaps keep an eye out on the career of an Inquisitive friend, namely Gimlet. And, perhaps there would be a chance for Gorm and Carl to work together as well? Carl says he hopes Gorm isn’t planning on joining the Deathwatch for those reasons, and Gorm says of course not, he genuinely thinks Deathwatch might be a good suit for him, and those two would just be bonuses. Carl says it is not uncommon for Sable Swords to serve in Deathwatch, what with their acumen for fighting Tyranids. Revan in fact served for a mission, so Carl obviously would follow his former leader’s footstep if asked, and working with Gorm would obviously nice. Carl isn’t quite sure what will happen to his squad after they return to Obsidia. Perhaps if the Emperor wills it, Gorm’s and Carl’s paths will go alongside for a while. They talk about leaders, and how Revan’s influence is still very much with Carl, and perhaps some of Rolf’s is still with Gorm even though he wasn’t working under him for quite so long. Gorm says he used to think Rolf was a great leader, and Carl thinks perhaps he still was, chaos makes mockery of all the intentions of mice and men after all. One isn’t born a great leader, one grows into it, and Rolf never quite had the chance to grow. Somehow the talk turns to Stuart dancing the night away at the party, and Gorm suggests perhaps Astartes might be better off dancing a bit more. So the two have a little dance (while Gorm sings sagas of Ragnar Blackmane as accompaniment). Gorm stays and sleeps in the Sable Swords’ ship.

In the night Saef has a dream where he meets up with Ahram, his Ahram, sitting on a rock looking at the vast expanse of space. Saef sits down opposite him and Ahram greets him. Saef asks why he was sent away from the gang. Ahram apparently knew that Kane Bullard was after potential psykers and had figured Saef as one (because Ahram looked like a man who worked for Bullard, he got some stuff figured out), so he asumed sending Saef away might save both him and the gang. Nope. Ahram notes that he is technically younger than Saef, so his mistake may be forgiven, hopefully. Saef doesn’t seem to hold any grudge, he just wanted to know. Ahram is sorry for the situation Saef is in, but at least he made it, and Saef says he often wished he didn’t make it. But now he’s got this life and time to figure out what to do with it. They reminiscence the night away. (also talk about Rat, but we forgot, so will be added later) Saef wakes up to find Sable Sword Stuart passed out on the floor, so he throws a blanket on him.

In the morning Gorm calls Sveleighr on Fenris. He explains the gift he got from Carl and asks what he should do about it. Sveleighr says that indeed it looks like Gorm has quite taken a mantle of the Wolf Priest already, so that would be the next logical step it seems. Sveleighr says he’s gotten multiple reports on Gorm’s conduct, both in terms of spiritual guidance and medical acumen. Gorm says that he has indeed been trying to get better at those both. He still isn’t sure why the necklace was given to him, other than Fenris thinking he was not strong-willed enough. Sveleighr asks what if Gorm takes the Claw of Morkai and uses it and fails, either with the medical procedure or with recognizing that the seed is far too corrupt to be returned. There is after all a difference between a mistake and a failure. Gorm says the medical procedure not working he could live with, but taking corrupt gene-seed would be a great failure indeed. Sveleighr says that he believes this last hunt will challenge Gorm’s both medical and spiritual skills, and it is indeed time for him to walk the walk of the Wolf Priest, and he instructs Gorm to paint his armors black. Gorm thanks Sveleighr and disappears off to do just that.

In the morning Saef goes to visit Konstantine who is just about to leave. Konstantine congratulates him on passing the test and asks Saef how it was, and Saef admits he thought it would be harder. Konstantine asks what Saef would like to do now he’s Imperial Guard, and Saef says he’d hope eventually to end up as a teacher, he just rather not join Inquisition for it. Konstantine is sure Saef can make it. Konstantine also wanted to discuss Rat with Saef, namely that if Saef doesn’t mention anything about Rat’s existence, Konstantine will neither. Konstantine feels he has failed Rat, but there isn’t really a place for her. Konstantine thinks she would be better off with her people (she might not want it). The only place that might take her is the Ordo Xenos, but that would have to be a non-scummy Inquisitor and even then Rat would be working against her own people. Saef says he’ll try to figure things out with the little time he has. Konstantine tells Saef he can always call, if he needs Inquisition-adjacent help. With that he is off.

In the morning after getting some breakfast, Gimlet goes to knock on Saef’s door. Theo answers and Gimlet asks for the “strange little man”. Vivek comes to the door and Gimlet asks if they could talk in his room. Which they do. Gimlet wants to know what to do with the whole Vivek being Inquisition evidence situation. What was Vivek planning on doing after all this anyway? Vivek shrugs and says he was planning on getting his friends off Triplex Phall, hopefully figure the life eater virus situation, finding safe places for his friends and then getting as far away from them as possible to keep them safe. Truthfully he has not thought about Gimlet’s situation much, like obviously Inquisition wouldn’t want Gimlet to let Vivek go, and that is something Vivek can’t help with, unless Gimlet wants to shoot him in the head, which Vivek rather he didn’t. Vivek recommends maybe asking someone else for help, because Vivek, as a literal prisoner, is in no position to help Gimlet. Not sure who would help, he definitely doesn’t want to get the Wolves in trouble (and neither does Gimlet). Gimlet laments that the odds don’t look to be too good for either of them, and Vivek agrees that there is indeed a lot of trouble ahead. Gimlet apologizes for telling Vivek about the whole purging of Triplex Phall, and Vivek says it was good, just means he and Eden were right in thinking Inquisition can’t have Eden. Gimlet still thinks it’s a bit fucked up that they could talk about it so casually. That’s Inquisition Vivek says. Gimlet asks if Vivek still wants to talk with his brother, and Vivek says yes, but that would probably spell more trouble for Gimlet in the future, so Gimlet might want not to do that. Gimlet tends to agree.

Saef returns to his room and begins to clean the rest of the party away when there’s a knock on the door. It’s Uffe who has come to retrieve his chest plate. And while he’s here, he wanted to point out that Saef kind of told him he doesn’t do mind magic, but now he has done it twice. Saef admits that yeah, maybe he wasn’t thinking too straight in the party. It is a new power, and he didn’t think it through. Uffe asks about the other time, and Saef said he was maybe a bit panicked at the moment. About Uffe killing Vivek? Uffe asks. Saef says yeah. Uffe thanks Saef for assistance with Vivek, but says that he’d like it if Saef would ask about that kind of stuff first. Saef agrees. Saef asks if he may use it on Uffe on the up-coming mission, and Uffe says only if it’s really, really important. Saef explains why he is coming along to the mission, namely finding Rat and Uffe offers help with dealing with Inpax, which Saef is sure Gimlet has got covered. Saef also says Uffe his old hair wasn’t that bad in his opinion, too bad about losing it, Uffe says thanks, better losing hair than losing a brother. Then he takes his armor and off he goes.

Gorm comes back to his room after finishing painting his armors (they’re left to dry in the other room). Uffe is there, and he wants to apologize for his behavior the day before, he got his fears got the better of him. Gorm doesn’t think there’s anything to apologize for, understandably it felt real to Uffe. Uffe admits that it is very rough right now, not being able to trust himself, and he can’t exactly live his life leaning on Gorm and Vivek. Gorm thinks that Uffe shouldn’t beat himself up over having to rely on others. It is a good thing to cultivate relationships. Gorm says he’s always thought Uffe as a loner but the more they’ve spent time together, the more he has started to see similarities between the two of them, both needing other people, forging bonds. Uffe says that Gorm appears to be much better at it than Uffe, but Gorm points out that not very many Space Wolves would bond with an AdMech. They discuss Vivek’s rather difficult situation for the moment, Uffe is not happy that Vivek has been forced on the run. Gorm says that though Wolves are very keen on head-on conflicts, there is not shame in retreat. In fact Gorm has read of something called a Tactical Retreat, fancied by the Primarch of Ultramarines. No shame in positioning oneself better for survival.

Uffe admits that he has a lot reservations about Triplex Phall, lot of blanks he doesn’t probably want filled. He just has this persistent feeling that something bad is going to happen. Vivek has been helping him out with mapping the blanks of his memory, and there’s a lot more missing than he had realized, around the time he left the others (after having killed Rolf). He mentions that Vivek recognized the ship he left in as an AdMech ship, so obviously AdMechs were around when he left. Gorm asks if he contacted Fenris, and Uffe says yes. Gorm asks if they should ask Fenris what kind of information he gave them originally, and Uffe agrees to it. They decide Gorm should get the information, just in case it’s bad. 

Gorm says that he has something to show Uffe that might take his mind off the current situation. Gorm takes Uffe to the room where he has been painting his armor, and Uffe congratulates him on his path, telling Gorm that he is proud of him. Gorm mentions his wishes to possibly join the Deathwatch, and asks what Uffe might do in the future, perhaps Deathwatch might suit him as well. Uffe says he hasn’t considered, as he hasn’t expecting to make it this far. Gorm asks him to consider, to keep his mind off all the bad things he seems to be so keen to think about. Uffe agrees that he’ll give it a go.

Uffe notes that Gorm seemed to be rather close with the Sable Swords sergeant, Carl at the party. Gorm says it was mead but yes he is close to Carl, there is certainly something special between them, that he really can’t put into exact words (and Uffe doesn’t think he needs to). Uffe says that he was kind of against these kinds of relationships for a while, as he deemed Harald’s fate to be the fault of Rolf, because of the closeness of their relationship. But he has changed his mind about that, and thinks good things may come out of being close to people. Besides it would be rather hypocritical of him to think that they are bad now. Gorm asks if he means him and Vivek, and Uffe admits that yes, there is something very similar there to Harald and Rolf and possibly Gorm and Carl. He feels no need to define it any further than Vivek being very important to him. Gorm says that Uffe is very important and dear to him, and that he loves him, and Uffe says he loves Gorm too.

Gorm also makes a phonecall.

Gorm goes to find Vivek in Saef’s room. He asks to talk in private, so Vivek shoos Theo away. Gorm mentions about thinking that Uffe might also be carrying the life eater virus, and that would probably need to be tested. And for that, Eden might be needed. So how are Vivek and Eden right now anyway? Vivek shrugs and says that Gimlet telling about the possible purging of Triplex Phall only justified his and Eden’s decision to merge, and that Eden can’t survive, but doesn’t mean Vivek is very happy about it. They’re not in much communication, currently. Vivek notes that there are some good stuff in his head too, that might be useful to hand out if they can find a person to give it to. Vivek has the ability to completely purge Eden from his mind, and the other part too, but right now since they can’t reach the other half, he is holding back. But yes, Vivek can do the test with the help from Tabasco. Vivek asks how much they can trust the doctor, whether it’s wise to let him see the results. Gorm says that he doesn’t know the doctor very well, certainly Gimlet trusts him (since boyfriends). Doesn’t mean he would maybe get the whole life eater virus thing, so perhaps better not to tell. Gorm asks Vivek to come to him with the results first.

Vivek comes back with bad news few hours later. Gorm was right, Uffe has it. Obviously this has really big rammifications for the relationships between the Space Wolves and the Mechanicus and Vivek is quite distraught, though understanding. Gorm is sure that Fenris is not going to go all Inquisition on the planet. Vivek also brings up his brother, and says that he thinks his brother might agree in putting something inside his own body, he would never agree to do the same to an Astartes, as that goes against the core beliefs of the Mechanicus (and all the bad things he’s done has been to prisoners). But if he is involved, obviously he needs to get his comeuppance. They discuss whether to tell Uffe about this, and Gorm asks Vivek’s opinion. Vivek thinks they should, namely the things Vivek hasn’t told had been about things Uffe would beat himself over and there is no reason this would be Uffe’s fault. Besides if something happens to both Vivek and Gorm, Uffe needs to know so he doesn’t put Fenris or any other planet at risk. Gorm agrees to this assessment so Vivek goes to break the news, while Gorm calls Fenris. Fenris is understandably angry, but also agrees that this has to dealt with discretion, since whoever did this clearly has few screws loose and access to means of mass destruction and that is the last thing anyone wants.

Vivek has been gone for a while, but as he catches Saef in the room they chat a bit. Vivek mentions that he is pretty sure he told Saef not to get caught with the army. Well, can’t be helped. Vivek says he would have helped Saef desert, but probably not the best idea at the moment to hang with him. Saef is rather resigned to his fate, but Vivek says he is allowed to feel frustrated about it. And he does. Vivek says he would change places with Saef in a heartbeat, but hey army is not for everyone. Saef’s going to do fine, still. (and Vivek hopes Saef knows he loves him, and Saef loves Vivek back)

Vivek asks about Saef’s family and how they are, and Saef mentions that things with family are still awkward. Vivek has three people who Saef and his family might help, three AdMech friends of his; Agda, her partner Max and Agda’s son Zeki. They’re decent people, not criminals. Agda apparently started the whole factory riot that got Eden’s skitarii arrested because Zeki got caught in unsafe machines and almost died (without Eden’s help). There is of course the problem of Eden being the only one willing to help renew Zeki’s cybernetics when he grows, but if that issue is somehow cleared with could Saef’s parents help rehome the three to Civitas A? Saef thinks so. Saef brings up Rat, the problem of her and Theo’s future, and in fact tells Vivek about her eldar parentage. Vivek admits that being a problem, but is sure they can manage something, they may need help (maybe not from the Wolves…).

Vivek asks Saef’s opinion of Eden at the moment, and Saef says that obviously he’s in debt to Eden, but doesn’t agree to everything he’s done. Vivek laments that he totally gets why Eden did why he did, which is why he doesn’t feel entirely justified in his anger, but yeah, he hasn’t decided Eden’s fate yet. His usefulness will be weighed against Vivek’s AdMech friends and all of Triplex Phall, and Vivek is not sure how that’s going to break down just yet. Saef says he’ll support Vivek no matter what, and Vivek says he shouldn’t if he makes a dumb choice. Vivek also asks Saef about his opinion of Gimlet, and Saef says that he doesn’t agree to some things Gimlet has done, but Saef’s the kind of guy that doesn’t let single actions change his opinion and Gimlet is still a friend. Vivek admits having difficulty reading Gimlet, but seems to think he is sincere in not wanting to screw Vivek over (despite it being so much easier for Gimlet), for whatever reason. Saef mentions having drunk-texted Demir, and Vivek hopes it’s not dick-pics (not that there’s anything wrong with that per se). Just strippers, says Saef (better?). Vivek asks if there’s anything there and Saef says they’ve only met once, and besides it doesn’t look like a good time for a long relationship. Vivek says that it’s important to find joy in small moments, and not do stuff just because they might not last. But that’s just his opinion.