#look before you leap

[mourningsbane]

Palepaw runs, even as Icypaw cries out in alarm. Whatever that thing is, he will not let it catch him. He will not, he—

He only sees it for a second: a large, ugly hawk swooping down with outstretched talons. Its claws easily pierce his pelt, leaving long, blooming red gashes in their wake. He bites at its feet and feathers, curls and twists his body, but it only grips tighter, talons sinking deeper still.

It beats its wings, brittle feathers falling off as it attempts to fly, but it can't seem to get its bloated body off the ground. Its struggle gives Icypaw enough time to rip Palepaw from its grasp as Cougargleam, hearing the commotion, finishes it.

Palepaw is taken to the medicine den.

Moon 2: Palepaw's Action Pt.2.

Beginning. Go back?<< Proceed? >>

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Leap Before You Look

The sense of danger must not disappear: The way is certainly both short and steep, However gradual it looks from here; Look if you like, but you will have to leap.

Tough-minded men get mushy in their sleep And break the by-laws any fool can keep; It is not the convention but the fear That has a tendency to disappear.

The worried efforts of the busy heap, The dirt, the imprecision, and the beer Produce a few smart wisecracks every year; Laugh if you can, but you will have to leap.

The clothes that are considered right to wear Will not be either sensible or cheap, So long as we consent to live like sheep And never mention those who disappear.

Much can be said for social savior-faire, Bu to rejoice when no one else is there Is even harder than it is to weep; No one is watching, but you have to leap.

A solitude ten thousand fathoms deep Sustains the bed on which we lie, my dear: Although I love you, you will have to leap; Our dream of safety has to disappear.

-- W. H. Auden

[reapersmarch]

look before you leap

If you had to pinpoint the exact moment your hearing up and abandoned you, you would have to say it was about the time Ricardo stated: “That’s one of the things I love about you.”

You heard it in a delayed echo initially, barely registering what was being said as another off-hand comment or joke or story for the evening. You even chuckled along and uttered out a soft, yeah, in agreeance to a statement you hadn’t even comprehended properly yet. You couldn’t fathom why your heart was beating so quickly and so loudly, or why your face suddenly grew hot, and all you were catching was the shrill ringing in your ears.

Before all of that, before Ricardo blindsided you with something you think neither of you anticipated unfolding before you, the evening was actually quite pleasant. It almost felt ���just like old times’, whatever that means. The days of yore, you suppose, when you spent all of your time attached at the hip, fingers hooked into each other's belt loops to keep yourselves pressed in close. In retrospect, it’s a wonder you couldn’t see it then, how close you really were. What he was saying without ever saying it.

The difference tonight, however, is that you were letting yourself enjoy it. You didn’t even realize just how much you were enjoying it to begin with until you moved to the living room and your cheeks were sore from how hard you’d been smiling. It was all so domestic. Domesticity hardly suited you as you know it now, but you wanted that once. It feels like an eternity ago that you were denying yourself the opportunity, forcing an issue that didn’t need to be there.

You were young, stupid. Played cold and distant to keep yourself safe, trying so hard to isolate yourself while he kept trying to thaw your worst parts, and when that didn’t work, you turned to what would: commitment. Ricardo wouldn’t commit to a damn thing and you knew that. So you asked for it. You asked him to put a label on the fun you were having and he behaved the way you expected him to—he balked and said he couldn’t. Not that he didn’t want to. He just couldn’t.

But he didn’t even really say that, did he?

If you trawl through the hazy mist that is the moors of your memory, what did he actually say?

You asked: In another life, in another universe, if you weren’t you and I weren’t I, could this have worked?

And he said: Yes.

He said: You deserve more than what I can give you.

He said: I like having fun with you, but—

And it was the but you clung to. It was the but you used as an excuse to deny yourself an ounce of the personhood you so desperately craved.

You won out in the end, but the cost was high.

Tonight, though.

Tonight, you’ve let yourself smile and reminisce and laugh with reckless abandon. You’ve cracked jokes, shared kisses, let him sit close to you and fiddle with the earring you still wear after all this time. You let his arms encircle your waist and his chin settle on your shoulder while you washed the dishes, and didn’t bat an eyelash when his face found the crook of your neck.

It’s a little surreal, just how open you’re allowing yourself to be. 

Then he said it—that’s what I love about you—and everything pulled hard to port.

Thus, bringing this full circle.

Ricardo joins you on the couch, where you remain frozen, thoughts stuck in a rotating gyre of total confusion and chaotic elation.

“Earth to Bel,” his voice cuts through the mire, soft and teasing, “have I lost you for good, space cadet?”

Not yet.

Your mouth falls open and you suck in a sharp breath as if to speak, but nothing escapes you, each word scrabbling over the other to be the first that claws its way out of your mouth. The sides of your vision are beginning to blacken—oh, fuck, you really are going to faint, aren’t you? Reflexively, you grab his hand, clutching so tightly you think you might cut off the blood flow to his fingers.

He gently but firmly squeezes your hand, grounding you again, calling you back down safely from orbit.

“Ricardo, what…” you blink and shake your head a few times in a desperate bid to clear it. “You… what?”

It isn’t that strange a thing to say—you love Danny’s enthusiasm, for instance, and have said as much to him before—and in any other context, that might be true. But you and Ortega have never even admitted to ‘like-liking’ one another. Never mind indirectly saying—well. You aren’t entirely sure what he’s saying. You surely know what you want him to be saying, but whether or not that’s the case… you’ll have to stop being a coward to find out.

“Hm?” he gives you a quizzical look and you aren't sure if he’s faking it, but you’re surprisingly annoyed about it anyway. It’s the birds cawing in your stomach, making you this way. It’s the raw primal fear that you imagined it, that you’re about to be rejected again and again and again for the single worst sin you could possibly commit—wanting.

So, you pry open your mouth and begin to speak: “You—”

“I love you,” he says. “Yeah.”

There it is.

He knew exactly what you were trying to ask after, and he didn’t need to be able to read your mind to do it.

“Took you dying for me to fess up to it,” he continues. “I always knew. I was just…”

Afraid.

He was afraid, just as much as you were. Scared of such big feelings that you couldn’t be sure were really yours or not, and that you didn’t know how to contain. Scared that it would all be taken away from you. Scared that there was something wrong with you for wanting more, wanting affection, wanting love of any kind.

And then you found it in him. In the way he made you feel so normal. Years you spent feeling like a Martian, struggling to acclimate to the societal rules of a world you didn’t know; being told what to feel, how to feel, when to talk, what to say, how to say it. It took a practiced effort day in, day out: raise your inflection here. Tilt your head like this. Laugh this way. No, not like that. Try again. Try again. Try again.

But then you met Ricardo Ortega, and it all came so naturally. He looked at you like you were anybody off the street, without knowing you, what you really are. The heinous orange lines marring your skin didn’t matter, he didn’t know. To him, you were just Niall. And then you were just Bel, and then just Red, and then just you. It didn’t matter whatever else you had going on, you were you, and that’s all he saw.

He made you believe it, too—that you were a person. That you were human, and worthy of being loved. You latched on to him like he was your salvation, and part of you still believes that he is. 

But a small, gnawing corner of your mind insists that when you tell him the truth, he’ll hate you. He will hate you, and all of this will have been for nothing, and there is nothing that you can do or say to fix that, but right now, he loves you. And, Christ, do you ever still love him.

You haven’t the foggiest fucking idea what to say, but he squeezes your hand again, looking at you with an expression that falls somewhere between concern and fondness, and you do the only thing you can think of: you kiss him.

You kiss him, and hope it says enough. You kiss him, and pour every ounce of you and the way he’s made you feel into it, and hope he understands what it is you’re trying to say: I have loved you for seven years. I still love you. I don’t know how to stop. I don’t want to stop. I’m sorry for what I am about to do. Please forgive me. I still love you.

At some point, you stop, and Ricardo wordlessly takes your hand, leading you back to the bedroom. 

“I’m not trying to start anything,” he promises when you get there. “I just think… we should share a bed again?”

It’s asked sheepishly, in the smallest, unsure voice, and your chest constricts. The first time you ever shared a bed was because you put him in the fucking hospital. That shouldn’t count. So you nod, your arms snaking their way around his waist without waiting, and he draws you in closer and closer still, until there’s no space between you. You bury your face against his shoulder, breathe him in, and do your damnedest not to start weeping. It doesn’t have to be this hard all the time, does it?

At some point, it gets easier, surely, navigating whatever the hell this is.

You put it out of your mind, compartmentalize it for another day, and let yourself sink into how tightly he’s holding on. 

“I keep thinking you’ll disappear on me,” Ricardo admits softly through a laugh. You know, though, the thinly masked fear in his voice. He can’t hide that. “And I don’t want to, I don’t know… waste more time worrying over the stupidest shit. I don’t want to lose sight of you again and have to hang on to all of—” he gestures broadly with one hand, you can feel it leave your waist momentarily before the warmth of his arm settles there again “—that with nowhere to put it.”

Your fingers clutch at his shirt, your eyes squeeze shut. How long has it been since you’ve said anything? Minutes? An hour? A decade?

“I’m sorry,” you manage, swallowing thickly. “I—”

“It’s fine,” he soothes. “Hey, it’s fine. You haven’t done a thing. And—you don’t have to say it, okay? Not if you don’t want to.”

“I do,” you say quickly, lifting your head. “Want to. Feel the same. I just—need time.”

You’re not sure ‘time’ is a currency you’re rich in.

Should you be wasting it?

“But I do,” you repeat. “Love you.”

It makes your stomach churn, how much you love him.

It’s selfish, you know it is, but you’re willing to face the consequences of your own confession as long as you can have this. A single night, a few sleepless hours, lying face to face and giggling over nothing. Ricardo looks at you like he’s greeting the sun after a long winter, and you can scarcely look at him without burning up, but it’s different this time.

Tonight, you’ll set it all aside. You’ll let yourself bask in the warmth, bottle that up, and let it fuel you for whatever comes next. 

[old-type-40]

With today being a leap day, I absolutely had to watch one of the funniest things ever on tv when Frasier's advice to use the leap day to take a leap in doing something different goes horribly awry.

[zanderds]

I didn't read the prompt and just saw the word trans and clicked. I guess I'm going across antarctica now :/

[therandomestwriter]

“They say, ‘Look before you leap.’ So look. But do not look for too long. Do not look into the void of uncertainty trying to predict each and every possible outcome, to evaluate every possible mistake, to prevent each possible failure. Look for the opportunity to leap, and leap faster than your fear can grab you.”

— Vironika Tugaleva

[think4yaself]

My Failures

I was talking to a new collogue and now family of mine. He was telling me about someone who he used to work with misused funds and created distrust within the group. Long story short it reminded me of my failure with crypto currency project I worked on a few years ago.

I'm still letting go of what happened. I don't wish the founder any failure. I just won't be contributing to her "success" if you even wanna call it that. Long story short I see how if I hadn't have gone through that I wouldn't have the wisdom now to be more protective of my skillset.

[erinwantstowrite]

was thinking about how they'd be best friends + trying out this new line art brush and thus this happened

line art under the cut!

peter in LoF will be Miles' mentor but also,, that's his little brother. their sibling energy is off the charts

[christinered]

Wisdom of A Redhead:

I have a habit of just leaping over the side and jumping right in.

Its not always the safest move for a girl like me.

One day I'll learn to look before I leap.

~Red

[gbirrd]

3/9 - Bruce Wayne tarot card designs for Complete Candor by @vexfulfolly as part of the @batfam-big-bang

Read the fic here!

Other cards:

1-Babs 2-Cass 3-Bruce 4-Tim 5-Damian 6-Jason 7-Duke 8-Steph 9-Dick

Image IDs

Image 1:

A design of "The Emperor" tarot card. It has the texture of recycled paper and reads "THE EMPEROR". A symbol of a spider-web is visible behind the numeral "IV".

Bruce Wayne stands facing foward in his classic Batman uniform with pupil-less white eyes. He is inside of a cave with large stalactites. In two rows of four in front of him is Dick, Barbara, Jason, Tim, Steph, Cass, Damian and Duke, each in their first vigilante uniforms. Barbara and Cass are both Batgirl. Steph is Spoiler. The boys are all in their Robin uniforms. They are all kneeling as though pledging allegiance. A faint spider-web pattern stretches from Bruce's feet to the bottom of the frame.

Image 2:

A design of "The Emperor" tarot card. It has the texture of recycled paper and reads "THE EMPEROR" upside-down. A symbol of a spider-web is visible behind the numeral "IV".

Bruce Wayne stands with his back turned in an all-black Batman uniform inside of a cave with large stalactites. The whole frame is dark. The only visible part of his face is one pupil-less white eye, looking over his shoulder at two rows of four gravestones. The gravestones all have spider-web patterns and there is another spider-web visible at Bruce’s feet. The entire card is upside-down.

[13catastrophic-blues]

I sing a secret song to you each night we are apart Remember me Though I have to travel far Remember me Each time you hear a sad guitar

Know that I'm with you the only way that I can be Until you're in my arms again Remember me

[reapersmarch]

(canon-typical suicidal thoughts, dissociation, and mentions of self harm, so be forewarned)

Forty-nine.

That’s the exact number of ceiling tiles in this room.

You hate that it isn’t an even fifty, or even a lesser forty-five. Granted, you suppose you could round up. There are several half-tiles where roof meets wall that, if put together, would total up to an additional tile to make it a cool fifty. But you also hate that they’re popcorn, and there’s no half-cocked fix for that. You didn’t think popcorn ceilings were still in, and, honestly, it’s a little insulting that they’d put you in a room with such outdated, ugly decor. Even the paint looks kind of grungy for a building that’s supposedly state of the art—a garish, red gash lines the pale white of the walls, and it reminds you too much of blood, making you more than a little queasy. Maybe their budget isn’t as high as you thought it was.

Orrrr… more likely, they put you in a room out of the way so nobody knows you’re there.

Nobody else. Just about everyone relevant to your life knows you’re here.

Of course, none of the interior decorating is remotely important in any conceivable way, you just aren’t interested in facing the reality in front of you currently. If you don’t acknowledge it, then you never have to deal with it. If you don’t have to deal with it, then it hasn’t happened. If it hasn’t happened, then you’re fine.

You know this isn’t how that works, but you can pretend.

Sort of.

It’s kind of difficult to ignore the shattered state of both your legs, or the peekaboo of hideous orange circuitry that taints your skin, or the way Ricardo is sitting in a mirror of your positions not that long ago—only, this time, it’s him with his arms folded on the edge of your hospital bed, head rested over top of his forearm.

You don’t know how long he’s been there—a while, you’re sure. The better question is probably how long you’ve been out, but you don’t want to know the answer to that, either.

Hesitantly, reflexively, your hand moves of its own accord towards his hair. It stops just before you connect, fingers folding in on themselves as you settle it on the bed next to him instead. You’re not sure if this is even allowed. Are you allowed to reach for him like this, so familiar as you once were? Does he even want your comfort? Do you even know each other anymore?

He thought you were related to Hollow Ground; you thought he knew you were Entropy.

Evidently, there is much you don’t know about either of you.

But you love him anyway. You love him so much, it hurts, and you are so goddamn sorry for the spiral you’ve caused because of it. You’re sorry for worrying him, sorry for lying to him, sorry for letting it get too big to handle on your own. You thought you could. You planned so meticulously, calculated every statistic, accounted for all the little possibilities you might not have even thought of. But you never factored in Ricardo because… why would you have?

He was always in your blindspot.

The gentle nudging of fingers beneath your clenched fist catches your attention and you recoil, quickly drawing your hand back. Your eyes glance briefly in his direction before darting elsewhere, anywhere, up. Back up at the ceiling.

“Bel.”

You flinch when your name is called. You aren’t entirely sure why, but you could hazard a guess. For one, you hadn’t actually expected to live through that, so you thought you’d never hear it again; names are hardly relevant to a corpse. And two, had you survived, you fully expected him to wield it like a knife. He has every right to be angry with you—you lied. You betrayed his trust. You let him get close to you, fall in love with you, lose you, regret losing you, hang on tighter than he ever has before. You lost sight of the end goal. Got wrapped up in petty little feelings that should be of no use to you. You should know better than that!

So, you braced yourself for the dagger’s tip, waiting for it to slide between the third and fourth rib and rend you asunder already.

But it never came.

You were so ready for an attack that was never even a passing thought to him, that you hadn’t considered the alternative. No, you can’t read his mind, but you can hear it anyway. When he calls your name, it isn’t sharp and targeted, like you’d so hoped it would be. He says—“Bel, hey. Look at me.”—and it’s soft, delicate. Fragile. It’s tinged with relief and fear and elation and grief. You hear his voice catch, hear him clear it, and try again, a little more urgently this time.

“Please.”

You still aren’t sure you’ve survived. Forgiveness shouldn’t come this easily.

You mindlessly scratch and pick at the thinnest line on your upper arm as if it’s a scab that can be pulled away and made to bleed, then make yourself slide your gaze over to him. He looks exhausted, but his shoulders immediately sag, all the tension momentarily leaving his body at the sight of you. You think you hear a soft, thank fucking god, and it almost makes you want to chuckle.

But, that’s about as far as either of you gets before you both settle into the world’s most uncomfortable staring contest.

What the hell are you supposed to say in a situation like this—actually admit that you’re sorry? Christ, like an apology is going to just… make all of this go away? It isn’t as though they taught you how to handle a crisis of this caliber back at the Farm, and all your time spent on your own could not have prepared you for the emotional fallout of all your idiotic decisions.

The explosion of pain any time you move wrong or too suddenly—it makes you want to fucking black out again, but that you know how to handle. It’s another cruel reminder that you’re still alive, and, while you are in unbearable amounts of it, it’s nothing you haven’t endured before. You’ll either survive, or kill yourself before the Special Directive can reclaim its property; of this, you can be certain.

And, really, what the hell would you even apologize for, anyway? ‘Sorry for all the crime, it will happen again’? Or maybe, sorry for lying to you? Sorry it had to be this way, or any of the other hundreds of regrets you burden yourself with? You might be the sorriest bastard in Los Diablos, but that’s not about to change anything, and saying it aloud will make you look like a jackass.

Yet, “Sorry,” is what flies out of your mouth in a short, half-gasped, pathetic sounding voice you don’t recognize.

You look like a jackass.

“Why didn’t you say anything, Bel?”

You don’t know what he’s referring to. Any of it. All of it. His eyes settle on your twitching fingers, scraping and scraping and scraping at the thin orange line with your nail. Ah, that first.

Even still, there’s no accusation in his tone, though there really ought to be, and when you spare him a set of eyes, you feel the impact of his love for you hit you squarely in the chest. Why? Why, why, why, why? Why won’t he just hate you? Why won’t he just condemn you for every ounce of betrayal? Why won’t he just make this easy? Hate your guts and leave you alone already so you can sever the last ties you have that make this so fucking difficult? You want to shout, just swing the fucking axe and take my head off. My neck’s finally on the block.

But he looks at you, and there’s nothing accusatory. No venomous hatred. No vitriolic ire. Not even bitter disappointment. Just the tired, melancholic eyes of a man who almost lost you again, and a plea for you to be honest. To let him in. Let him help you. Let him pry open your rib cage and nestle in between meat and marrow, as though he doesn’t currently occupy that space as it is. 

Please just fucking hate me. Please. Please. Please. 

You are buckling under the weight of how much he cares.

“What was I supposed to say, Ricardo? That I’m a re-gene?” you ask flatly. He winces, remorse evident in his body language. Every disparaging comment, every absentmindedly spoken sneer, it all comes rushing back to both of you—him, mostly. You could never forget. Which is why the fact that you’re sitting here, face to face, stewing in how much you love him still, despite is almost an affront to everything you stand for.

You should’ve stood your ground from the jump, insisted that this would not and could not happen. You should have been a better tool.

Tools are there to be used. They know their purpose, and even if they don’t, they don’t care what they’re used for.

People are messy, burdensome creations. They care too much, think too much, feel too much. Is that what you wanted? To feel? Well, congratulations. You felt. Was it worth it?

“But you’re—” he starts.

“Don’t—”

“—will you let me—”

“ —don’t you fucking dare.” 

“—finish!”

You grit your teeth, eyes squeezing shut.

“Don’t call me human, Ricardo.” You spit it at him like it leaves a vile taste in your mouth. “Humans have rights. I’m just a thing.”

You were out of your depth. This was always how it was going to end.

“I wasn’t going to—” You watch him scrub both palms over his face, then slouch back in his chair, eyes still beleaguered and settled on you. He’s navigating a minefield and you both know it. “I’m not about to—ah, fuck, Bel.”

You scoff out a small, sardonic laugh. “Sounds about right, yeah.”

He watches helplessly for a long, dreadful moment, gaze fixed on you. It’s like being the target of a sudden, focused heat, but you’re too busy looking at your fidgeting fingers. You don’t want to see it, what he really thinks of you.

“Okay,” he says, finally, tossing his hands up in resignation before slapping them back down on his thighs. You flinch at the sound, but it demands your attention. “Okay, we’ll do it your way, then. You aren’t human—your words. So what are you, then?”

You stare at him blankly. He cannot be serious. 

“If you’re not human, what are you?” he challenges again. “‘Cause you look and sound human to me.”

You’re not. You’re not. You aren’t.

“I’m not—”

“A person?” he fills in. “So then what is it?”

Clenching your jaw that hard is giving you a migraine on top of everything else that’s going completely and utterly left. You don’t know where he’s going with this, what stupid point he’s trying to make. You don’t know, but you’re starting to think whoever painted this room didn’t have much of a creative vision, and the anticipation is making you want to add your own splatter of red to jazz up the place.

“Do you want me to tell you?” Ricardo asks, leaning forward, elbows rested on his knees. It forces you to lean backwards, away from him. You’re within kissing distance at this point, less than a few centimeters apart, and it infuriates you that that is the prominent thought in your mind at this very moment. Regardless, he doesn’t wait for an answer. He wasn’t looking for one; the question was rhetorical: “You’re you, Bel.”

Well, no shit.

“And I was an asshole.”

Okay…?

“You could have two heads and four arms for all I care, and I’d still love you because… you’re you.”

You think you’re going to vomit.

“So, I’m sorry for being an asshole, but I was right that one time; you deserved so much better than what I could give you. So, forget that. Forget all of that, none of it is true, all right?” Ricardo smiles crookedly, morosely, and you don’t know when your hands started shaking or when he took hold of them, but he lifts your left one to press a kiss to your pulse point. “I love you. I love you.”

The sound that escapes you is completely foreign to your ears—a deep, full-bodied, broken sob that forces you to double over and press your palms to your eyes, as though that might stop the tide spilling through your fingertips; it’s like someone took a sledgehammer to a fire hydrant. You’re bawling so hard, you might really throw up if you don’t settle down, but you’re not wholly in control of yourself. It feels surreal, as though you’re experiencing it from above and within at the same time, both the watcher and the watched, floating further and further away into the outer reaches of space.

This entire situation is completely and utterly fucked. You are in excruciating pain, you’ve never been more hopeless in your life, everything you’ve worked towards is compromised, you’re trapped here, you’re going to die, and Ricardo Ortega still loves you, unrepentantly.

Every time you think of speaking, you can’t find your voice. It isn’t yours. This isn’t you it’s happening to, you’re watching it happen to your vessel. The machine, the ship. Simultaneously, you’re in the thick of it, the pilot behind the controls, feeling as though the tapestry of your life is unraveling before your eyes, stretching across the accretion disk of the black hole. What do you mean he, too, loves you still, despite? How is that possible? After all you’ve done? Who you are? Not human. You’re not. Mars bids you return. Return, return, they’ll come to collect soon.

Then his arms envelop you as tightly as they can without hurting you, calling you back, waiting for you to return safely with your feet on solid ground. Anchored. Secured. Mission control waits for your re-entry. They want you to come home.

Okay.

Are you certain you survived?

You didn’t just… make up a scenario in your head to make yourself feel better? Go figure that, if you are dead, you still find a way to make yourself miserable. Your face finds the curve of his neck. Warm. Familiar. Probably not dead. Even if you were, you think he would still feel the same—warm and familiar. Safe.

Home.

Eventually, you calm enough that you aren’t heaving, so Ricardo moves to sit beside you, letting you lean up against his side instead of making you twist towards him, arms still locked around you, thumb sweeping back and forth against your shoulder.

“You need to get me out of here, Ricardo.” Your voice is hoarse, and still thick with tears, but you’ve found it again and it’s as calm as you can make it, so that’s a start. “I can’t stay here. I can’t, I cannot.”

You half-expect him to interrogate you, now that the worst of the storm has passed, but instead you feel his chest rise with a deep inhale, then fall with a sigh. It’s not directed at you, you don’t think. You’re almost positive he’s just lost in thought, but you can’t be sure and you can’t read his mind. Right now, you really hate that more than ever.

“I’m as good as dead if I stay,” you plead. “We all are. They’ll finish what the truck couldn’t, and then some. I can’t go back there, Ric. I won’t survive it this time.”

“Go back where?”

“The Farm.”

It all comes tumbling out at that point, your voice laced with fatigue. The Special Directive. What happened after Heartbreak. Where they took you—what they did to you.

“Drugs muddle the mind,” you state bitterly. “They needed me at optimal performance to see just how far they could push. They always pulled back just before they broke something. I was too valuable an asset to lose. Do you know what that’s like? Being awake and aware and unable to do a thing about it? No one cares when you’re not a person in the eyes of the law. I think they did, you know. Break me.”

Ricardo, to his credit, stays silent while you speak, listening intently to every word and periodically reminding you that you’re still here, grounded, and he’s still there with you. Squeezing your shoulder, waiting for you to continue, to land. You wish you could hear it, what he’s thinking. Maybe it’s better you can’t.

“Sometimes, y—” Your fingers dig into his shirt as you tense, clutching at the soft cotton tightly, and his hand finds yours, covering it where it’s tangled. Your grip slackens some, but stays wound up in his shirt. “Sometimes, you feel like them. On good days, it’s kind of nice. I don’t have to think so hard, try to keep the door shut to force out the noise. I can relax, because it’s just you. It’s just Ricardo, I’m okay, I can be myself. And… I know it’s not your fault, I know. But I can’t read you, and on bad days, you feel like them. The coats. You feel just like them, and it scares me.”

The silence settles heavily between you, and you’re starting to wonder if he’s regretting his decision to stay, but you feel it then. The slightest tremor in his hand. His fingers curl around yours and squeeze, gently, firmly.

“Bel, I’m sorry,” he says, and you aren’t wholly sure why. At first you think it’s pity, and it sours your stomach. You don’t want him to pity you, you don’t ever want pity from anybody, but you are trying so hard to give him the benefit of the doubt. After all that, all this, he’s stayed beside you and hasn’t looked at you any differently. Why would now be the turning point? “I wish I’d known, I—fuck!” 

You lift your head quizzically, watching him drag a hand down his mouth and over his beard. You watch it trail down his throat, watch his Adam’s apple bob as he swallows.

“I understand,” he says after a beat, “why you didn’t say anything. Why you never felt like you could say anything. Why you always kept pushing when I got too close. I was the nearest reminder, and I was a fucking idiot, and I’m sorry. For my part in it, I am… incredibly sorry.”

The remorse is genuine. You know Ricardo well enough at this point to know when he’s giving lip service, and you know that he isn’t—whatever he's thinking or feeling, it’s genuine. In fact, he looks a little ill himself. You wonder if he’s turning it all over in his head, replaying the things he’s said in passing, the moments when you were more prickly than normal, more combative about your personal space.

Every time he startled you, or you got a little flighty, or jumped out of your skin, and shouted at him not to sneak up on you. They must be on repeat, but that isn’t for you to know.

“The last thing I want is for you to be afraid of me.”

“I know,” you respond quietly. “I know, but I can’t help it.”

“I know,” Ricardo echoes, moving a loose strand of hair out of your eyes. “I’m not asking you to stop something you have no control over, Bel. I’m asking you not to endure it alone.”

“Then get me out of here, Ricardo. Please.”

“You aren’t staying.” He takes your face in both hands and presses a kiss to your forehead. Your fingers curl around his wrists. “Just give me a bit to think of something.”

Something, as it turns out, was Ricardo swaddling you in several-sizes-too-big clothing and hauling your ass out of the building. You admit, it’s not what you had in mind when he got Chen to watch over you while he stepped out of the room for a ‘quick sec’, but you’d be hard pressed to complain about it when the alternative was. Well. That.

You’re sure the embarrassment and shame will catch up to you when you’re clear of this place, but for now, you don’t care. Sprawled across the backseat of Ortega’s car, you do not fucking care. Currently, the only thing you care about is sleeping. Eating, maybe. A smoke would be great, too. You know this conversation isn’t finished—why the fuck does he think you were related to Hollow Ground?

You’re too tired to think about it now. 

[scrmnviking]

Miscalculaaatioooooon!

[gil-estel]

wow I wonder what could have happened around 2013 to cause this

[leblogreblog]

Proposal: In DC Universe, character has to live trough their birth day, the exact day they were born on, to age.

Idea: Tim was born on a leap day during leap year

Reasoning: His age is weirdly inconsistient with others because he literally ages slower than them

[pavlikbuonarroti]

theyve done more to sell to me on the romance this episode than any other but. didnt work. rough day to not really care about markhelly.