#make even any sense at all. nothing i draw makes sense unless i copy exactly but cant find references that are exactly what i want

[alchemiclee]

there's so many things I cannot figure out how to draw matter how many tutorials or references I look at. no matter what i do it doesn't make sense. and I think it's just because I am incapable of seeing things in my mind. how do shadows work? tutorial: imagine how the light would hit things/how the shadows would cast/how the clothing folds/etc. me: can't imagine anything at all

[katyspersonal]

the thing about micolash is that he's just a weird-looking guy! what a lot of artists end up doing because they can't or don't want to capture his weirdness is they end up making him more conventionally-attractive than he actually is (not that he's UGLY or anything lol) and that could be warping your perspective of your own art. there's nothing wrong with the way you depict him! the only problem i can really find is that you sometimes give him eyebrows, but that's about it. if u really think there's something u can change about how you draw him, i'll be happy to help! i'm really good with faces

Pfffft weeeeeell I guess so...? I mean, for me Micolash looks very beautiful; I love the very tall cheekbones, godawful racoon eyes that look like he hadn't slept in 84 years, thin face, sick skin color and really weird smile! I actually give him eyebrows in the time periods before School of Mensis - while he still HAD them chronologically! It is not an error I swear dfshhdshf

I've figured so far that repeating how character looks exactly rarely works, it feels like a dry dish, when slightly altering the original is more like a dish with some spice and flavour to make it more tasty. Surprisingly, slightly altered way of drawing the character can capture their vibe even better than just copying their look! And THAT is my problem with visual art; I just do not have a hunch in which proportion to mix 'copying' and 'spicing up'. I feel like I just do not have the artistic intuition for beauty and aesthetic. Can't make 'I am self-taught' excuse either because plenty of other artists are self-taught to. But it feels like something my autistic ass will NOT be able to comprehend unless getting an advice and guidance, even.

Just... Just look at him though:

This is THE man himself and he looks hideous, and I think this is amazing fdjhfdhs But like, I am in CONSTANT pain. I do not KNOW how to draw him 'appealing' without accidentally losing the vibe. How do I draw the same character but also change the character but also not to the point of drawing a different character? And I do not KNOW whether it is allright and I am just self-conscious, or there is actually just some sense of aesthetic that I don't have a driver installed for in my brain :pensive:

Here are some of my art of him for examples, and I just want to know what could be improved, if anything?

Like... Maybe I am just imagining a problem. It admittedly largely snowballed from having known like, two very avid Mico fans who would reblog/retweet/like/praise any and ALL fanart of him except for mine, and would either drop me hints to try to add a bit more anime/simplicity in my art style or just not find anything nice to say about my art of him at all. Again, that was Some Time ago, but I just got memory flash recently after opening art commissions... and now that occupied my thoughts.

I just want to know whether I am objectively wrong about how I perceive beauty and do visual art, or whether I just ran into people who didn't vibe with my style much (that's fair tho!) and fell for the mistake of thinking their opinion was absolute, or whether everything is like you said and it is all subjective. I just can't grasp for anything besides "I am clearly doing something wrong with my art but don't know what, help".

[chibi-mushroom]

Hey everyone! Finally get to post my piece for the memory of promises zine! check out the link here if you want to grab one of your own copies in the leftover sale! I was so happy to be able to join in on this zine, and I hope you guys enjoy all the work that went into it! (Also keep in mind this was written before MoM.)

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Namine rubbed her temples and looked at the clock. Midnight already. DiZ was not going to like this. The next time he came into the white room would bring on some lecture or punishment of some kind. She had been working furiously all afternoon trying to get past this one section of memory, but there was something that was keeping her back. Her pulse began to race. She was feeling sick. The door to the white room opened and with a squeak, Namine ducked under the table, fearing the familiar stride of the man in red.

"It's okay, it's just me. You can come out now." A soft voice sounded in her ears. "You're safe. DiZ said he needed to run an errand and wouldn't be back for a couple of days."

Slowly looking up, Namine could see the outstretched hand of the only comfort she had in this lonely place. "Riku. You're back."

She took his offering and stood up. He hadn't let go of her hand just yet, blindfold still covering those beautiful blue green eyes he had. She was glad it stopped him from seeing things like her girlish blush. He was only offering his hand as a friend. Besides, it was wrong for her to want to be with him- nobodies weren't supposed to feel anything. So why did she?

"You're shaking." Riku stated simply. "Have you eaten anything today?"

So he could even feel the slight tremor in her hands. "No, not exactly."

"Do you want me to get something for you? I think there are some leftovers in the fridge."

"No, I'm alright. I have to get back to work." Namine tried to take her hand from his, but he held onto it all the tighter, leaning down a little to be at eye level with her. 

"You were working when I left, and I can tell you haven't gotten any sleep. How are you expecting to take care of Sora when you can't take care of yourself?"

Right. Namine thought. He's just like DiZ. All he cares about is getting Sora restored. You're just a tool.

Still, she couldn't help but notice the way her breath caught in her throat as his blinded eyes sunk to meet her tired ones. Maybe she should take a small break. All of this stress was making her read too much into small gestures.

Namine simply nodded, and Riku left to warm her up some food. Sensing that going back to Sora's memories would be futile, she grabbed her sketch pad and turned it to the very last page. This was her secret page, covered in things she thought about. Mindless doodles she drew when she was waiting for the computer to check on Sora’s physical well-being.

The sketch pad was not necessary for her magic to work. She could rearrange memories- crush the hearts of her poor unsuspecting victims- without it. She used it though to help her concentrate. By visualizing the memories, she was able to make a more convincing edit or capture the feelings that were hiding beneath the surface. So many times she had drawn Sora, Riku and Kairi together. And sure there were strong feelings of both love and jealousy, but had she not had her sketch pad, she might have missed Sora's emotions of gratitude for two stalwart best friends, confusion about school topics they had recently studied, and hope that Kairi would want to go with him to the first school dance, even though he knew they would just go together and bail early to hang out on the play island like they always did whenever the school had some social.

"Here you go. It's nothing special, but it's better than nothing." Riku interrupted her thoughts with a plate of food.

With a gasp, Namine hurried to cover her sketch pad. Even though she knew he couldn't see it, he moved so gracefully that she sometimes wondered if he really was blind. Although those first couple of days made the mansion quite a bit louder with his cries of annoyance as he bumped into furniture. He even fell into the secret compartment that hid the computer lab, but luckily managed to land safely.

"Drawing something you don't want anyone to see?" Riku smirked. 

"No!" Namine replied a bit sharper than she thought. "Maybe."

Riku laughed as he set their plates down and pulled a chair over. "I'm only kidding. You don't have to be working on Sora nonstop. If you want to take a moment for yourself, then do it."

"No, I need to be working on Sora. It was my fault he's like this in the first place. I want to keep my promise." Namine picked up the white plastic fork. For once would it hurt to have some color around here?

With a sigh, Riku held his hand out for her to hold. "We've been over this, Nam. What happened wasn't your fault. You were being used." Softly Riku muttered "you still are."

Namine looked at him for a moment and then looked down at her food. She picked at it for a few moments before softly sliding her hand in his and taking a couple of bites. She ate in a comfortable silence, simply feeling the pressure that came from the gentle touch. This sort of thing wasn't unusual for them. They could usually be found in silence with their hands connected. But the mountain of pressure from the recent block in memories and lack of self care was threatening to squish Namine with its enormous weight.

"How's the restoration going?" Riku asked.

Namine's stomach began to twist around itself. "I'm….not sure." 

Riku squeezed her hand, urging her to explain. Namine sighed, unsure of how to continue. Would he get mad if she told the truth? He had slowly been becoming more like DiZ, after all. He used to be there with her when she was getting told off. These days, Riku was never usually in the white room for more than five minutes unless it was late at night.

"You remember what Sora's mom used to tell him all the time, right?"  Riku recalled.

"Never talk to strangers on the play island?"

Riku chuckled, remembering a secret promise. "A problem shared is a problem halved. If you tell me, it might relieve some of the pressure on you."

There was no avoiding it, not as long as he held her hand. 

 "It's just that, well-" Namine fumbled for the words. "There's been a bit of a roadblock. I've been doing my best to sort it out, tracing the connections, but it's like the memories slip away as soon as I think I have a grasp on them. I may have gone through half a notebook trying to find a solid piece."

There was a pause, as if Riku were considering what to say. 

"I'll go get you a new notebook tomorrow, then. As for the memories, we'll get it figured out. You need to take a break, anyway."

"No!" Namine swallowed back further emotion. Maybe she really did need some sleep. She was being more irrational than she expected. "No, it's fine. I'm sure I'm doing something wrong."

"Don't say stuff like that. If there's anyone who can make this situation right, it's you. Please, just take a few hours to rest tomorrow, okay?" Riku squeezed her hand again.

"I don't really have a choice here, do I?" Namine sighed.

"You always have a choice. I'm just asking you as someone who cares a lot about you."

Someone who cares? Namine thought. She slowly nodded in reply. Maybe a break was exactly what she needed.

"Thank you, Riku."

One Year Later

Again Riku tried to beat Marluxia, and again he was defeated. He only had this last battle to finish, having started against the organization members he recognized or had personally fought against. Which, admittedly wasn't many, but after several attempts, he was down to the last. It frustrated him that he still wasn't quite used to the keyboard controls, and Sora's moves were much less based in strength and relied much more on magic. Riku had never been very good with magic, focusing on perfecting his cure and dark firaga spells instead of learning the large array of magic that his friends had mastered. 

Some keyblade master I turned out to be. Riku thought, sitting back in his seat and folding his arms. I can't even stop my two best friends from leaving me again. This is just like back then…

His mind began to drift away with thoughts of Castle Oblivion and Twilight Town. He heard the door open and gentle footsteps move toward him.

"Hey Aerith. We can work on that scarf in a minute. I have to get some more ethers for data Sora first."

"I take it the fight didn't go well then?" A soft voice walked closer.

He closed his eyes and shook his head. Not Aerith. 

"Hey Namine. How could you tell?"

Namine placed a hand on his shoulder and gave a gentle squeeze. "You're really tense. Besides, I could feel your frustration from a block away."

What anger and annoyance had once plagued Riku's mind had since washed away. All he could register was how reassuring Namine's hand on his shoulder felt. She smelled nice, too. A faint blush warmed his cheeks. Ever since Kairi had insisted on going to sleep and Terra had left for the dark realm with Aqua and Ven, Namine was the only person Riku shared everything with. She had heard him vent several times, and she had been helping Aerith teach him how to knit. It was her delicate fingers that had lead him through the steps of a cable.

"I guess I need a little bit of a break." Riku said with a sigh. "Wanna go get some ice cream or something?"

"Sure." Namine smiled, stepping back so he could get up and stretch. They began to talk as they walked to their usual ice cream shop. 

Since Scrooge, Huey and Dewey had returned home, the ice cream shop had been manned by one of the local citizens. He usually gave Riku a discount, so Riku usually put some munny in the tip jar. It had become routine over the past year to go whenever Namine came to visit from Twilight Town.

"How is everything going with Roxas and Xion?" Riku asked, sitting down and unwrapping his fruit bar.

"Slow." Namine replied, taking a small lick from her chocolate cherry ice cream cone. She wanted to try all of the flavors, and this was the last one. "Not too bad, but I think I preferred the strawberry cheesecake the best."

"That was a flavor Kairi always liked." Riku smiled softly. 

When he saw the way Namine looked for just the hair of a second, he realized that was probably the wrong thing to say. He inwardly cursed himself and his inability to be the suave guy all the girls had thought he was growing up. Kairi and Namine didn't get much of a chance to talk after she got her replica body, as Kairi had almost immediately asked to be put under. Riku wondered what it was like living inside a heart of pure light. Just like Castle Oblivion, she didn't talk about it much.

"We should get some for her when she wakes up." Namine continued to eat her cone. There was an uncomfortable silence for just a moment before Namine spoke up again. "Who were you fighting when I came in?"

"Marluxia. He was the head of the castle, right?"

Namine nodded.

"I never really got to meet him as I was down in the basement back then. I'm sorry you had to deal with a guy like him."

"It's alright. I...had some support. There was Sora and Donald and Goofy. And despite everything I did to him, there was your replica, too." Namine spoke slowly, choosing her words with care. "But don't feel bad. He made his decisions, like everyone else."

This time, it was Riku's turn to nod in agreement, taking a bite from his treat.

"After the data battles are all said and done, what happens next?" Namine asked softly.

"I...don't know. All I know is that I've been having these weird dreams lately."

"I wondered. You look tired." Namine grabbed on to Riku's hand, intertwining their fingers.

Maybe it was a reflex, maybe it was a force of habit, like how they used to sit back in the old mansion. Either way, the touch on its own was enough to pull Riku away from the dark thoughts that usually sat at the horizon of his mind. He squeezed her hand in response.

"Don't hesitate to call me if you ever need someone to talk to. I miss our little midnight chats." Namine admitted.

"I do too." Riku smiled softly. "They really helped clear my mind back then."

"A problem shared is a problem halved, remember?" Namine was glad she could actually see his eyes as she recalled back to his words that helped her through her time at the old mansion. "Care to share anything?"

Riku paused. He sighed before starting to speak. After he told her of the recurring dream he'd been having with the buildings and the feeling of being watched, he also admitted to the weight that had been pinned on his shoulders. 

"I know it might sound silly, but I can't help but wonder if these dreams are connected to Sora somehow. I just wish I could understand it more." Riku finished his bar and set the popsicle stick on the bench beside him.

Namine had just finished her ice cream as well, wiping her face with the napkin. "Maybe it's time you take another journey."

"With the data battle still to fight and Kairi still asleep? I can't leave now."

"Maybe not now, but after the last battle is won." Namine gently pulled his hand close to her and began massaging it. "But that means I can't follow you. Will you be alright on your own? Maybe you can check Kairi's dreams."

"I...don't know. I haven't used my dream eater powers in a long time and the process is still kind of fuzzy for me." He could feel his muscles relax as she worked at his weary hand.

Doubt was rising in his chest. Maybe she was right. Who was he kidding? He wasn't ready for this kind of thing. He wasn't like Sora or Kairi who could follow their hearts at a moment's notice. He couldn't always feel the way it was trying to lead him.

But as he saw Namine patiently working on his hands, the stiff muscles being brought to relax against her fingers, a light shone through the storm of his doubt. How he hadn't realized it before was a mystery. Ever since they had met, she had been the light in the dark, just as he had provided shade for her in the brightest situations. As she finished the massage, she tenderly squeezed his hands, reassuring him that she was there and willing to help. Surely that was love.

He felt love for her, no question. But with Sora and Kairi gone and asleep, there never seemed to be a good moment to tell her what his heart really wanted to say. 

"We...we should be getting back." Namine sighed. "Are you sure you're alright?"

"No, but then, I'm not really all that sure of anything anymore."

"If there's anything I know, it's that things will get better. We'll find Sora. I don't know how or when, but we will." Namine took his hand again, standing before him.

Namine took a quick breath and then leaned over, placing a quick kiss atop his head. Ordinarily, she wouldn't be able to reach, but since he was sitting down, she could offer a small token of her affection and confidence in his abilities.

She and Riku's faces filled with blush, although a smile tugged at her lips. Namine didn't have enough courage to kiss him on the lips like she had wanted to for so long, but this was safe. He couldn't spurn her for a harmless kiss to the head. After all, what was some reassurance between friends?

"Thank you, Namine." Riku had a hard time looking at this angel of a woman without his heartbeat increasing.

To think she was willing to be by his side after all this. He decided there and then that he would listen to his heart and tell her of his feelings...after they set everything right. Once Sora and Kairi were home and together, then they could sort out their own relationship. It would give him yet another reason to bring his best friend home. 

He could still feel the kiss on his forehead, and it brought a genuine smile to his face. He stood up and began walking away from Merlin's house.

"Don't feel like you have to stop working on the data battles on my account. I just wanted to make sure you were doing alright." Namine stopped for a second.

"We can get back to those soon enough. I need a little longer before I get back into it." He took his trash and threw it into a nearby can. "There are some fountains that are really pretty this time of day nearby if you want to check them out with me."

A smile formed on Namine's lips. "I'd love to, Riku."

[antiloreolympus]

7 Anti LO Asks

1. tbh the fact rachel purposely didnt let persephone have any romantic relationships before hades gives the impression that had persephone had any other experience, she'd see right through him and not want him because she had better. not having any other point of reference isnt good. its setting up that hades can get away with whatever he wants because she doesnt know anything else. thats really not a healthy dynamic to have even while dating, much less eternal marriage.

2. You know what’s weird? How Hades is a 2000+ year old being and still has not gone through his trauma. We know that he was eaten by Kronos when he was around 8 and stayed there for like 13 years if i’m correct (in the LO version), so we can assume that when he got out he was in his early to mid twenties. And then he fought in the war which we don’t know how long it was in LO bc there’s no info on that at all but let’s assume that that lasted 100 years.. he’s still pretty young there. So how is it that he’s only now getting help for his traumas? Which we don’t even see actually, it’s just a sentence said by him when he adopts the little dog. We don’t even know how old he actually is bc it’s always assumed it’s 2000+ but 2000+ years old could mean 2030 years old or 2999 years old or even 3000 and more and he has just lost track of time. All of these years and he still has not processed or made any progress?? At all?! Unless therapists are a new thing in the Underworld but we have Chiron who says that she was a physician in the old world but got tired of it so she decided to study the human mind. And that must have been quite some time ago. So why exactly is Hades a 2000+ broken man who needs to be fixed by a 19 year old going through her own trauma? 

3. The underworld being an infertile world doesn’t make sense at all. If we compare the underworld with the underground it’s a fact that where there’s decay if is more fertile. Not to mention that in the myths the underworld is in fact considered a fertile land. We know that the underworld is full of souls, and souls are considered what give life to a body or place, so the underworld being a desert still doesn’t make sense at all. 

4.If I may also add, just because LO is a “retelling” doesn’t mean it doesn’t harm Greece or Greek people. They still exist, funnily enough, they didn’t all die once Alexander the Great stop conquering. They’re a country full of strong, passionate people who have gone and are still going through massive problems and hardships. They are also a country who are still, at best, ignored, or at worst, mocked for the suffering they must endure by nations that are far from economic instability and from actual war zones like Greece is. Despite all that, their mythos are seen with great reverence to this day, and they don’t “gatekeep” it, you can ask any Greek in here and they’ll tell you they enjoy stuff like the Disney version or PJO just fine, but you have to stop and wonder why LO is a Greek myth product that is almost universally despised to Greeks who know it exists.

It’s pretty obvious why, RS not only butchers the myths completely to where they don’t even resemble what they once were, but her constantly silencing and badmouthing actual Greeks who want to help her make it more accurate is not a great look. She’s acting as if she, a white woman from an island made of literal England reject descendants, somehow not only knows more about Greek myth than actual Greeks, but that she OWNS the mythology and she can do whatever she wants with it, and only those who agree to her biases know what they’re talking about while everyone else is wrong, so obviously Greeks don’t know Greek mythology! Even media products in the same, non-Greek realm as her get her ire. Case in point, we know she’s hostile to PJO, she badmouths the Disney movie all the time, she complained about Blood of Zeus (emphasize on ZEUS) didn’t revolve around HxP, and despite them being heavily promoted by her own employers, she never speaks of Punderworld or HxP ficlets, even when her fans harass them and in Ficlets case purposely got them kicked off Canvas for “copying” LO, meanwhile she will happily promote OSP because they confirm her biases and kissed her butt in their HxP video. What does this tell us? Because it doesn’t seem very nice.

Of course she’s allowed as a creator to play with the mythology as she wants, but even then there are still limits to adhere to, and she never does it because obviously her half-baked concept of the “mythology” is way better than the 3000+ years of texts and interpretations out there. Sure she has people flinging themselves at her to offer her help for free, especially Greeks and academics, but what would they know over her, the self proclaimed master of mythology itself? Obviously she created it all in 2016 when she decided to draw a sexy pink girl and that’s it. Greece and everyone else was just using a fake version this whole time! 

It seems from her POV, Greece ands its citizens are, in her own words “haters” who apparently know less about Greece and its own mythology than her, a white woman who uses a fanfic-writing white supremacist as a main source. The ego on this woman is astonishing.

5. May I also add to the age discourse, something like Edward and Bella can get away with it because Edward stopped aging physically, mentally, and emotionally at 17, and even in story there is a logic to them still going to HighSchool after all this time. He may be 117 age wise, but he’s at the same exact level as Bella in every other regard. That doesn’t excuse his creepy actions, of course, but there is in canon logic to it to justify it and make sense.

I’d say LO could use this too, but tbh it wouldn’t work. Either it’d involve making a CEO king as immature and childish as a 19 year old (not great) or it’d have a 19 year old suddenly be way wiser beyond her years which wouldn’t make much narrative sense, but also has some really creepy implications to it. Anyway RS dug herself into a stupid hole and doesn’t know how to get out of it. 

6. im in the same boat 😭 i was watching one of those LO critique videos you posted and they were showing panels from early on and i just thought "they photoshopped this, right? theres no way it looked this bad. they're just goofing around with this" and nope, that's exactly how they looked the video didnt change a thing. the bright colors really were distracting your eyes from seeing how bad it looked.

7. Correct me if i’m wrong but in one of the first few episodes wasn’t Hades annoyed with Persephone? Especially at the panel where she wanted to drive his car? Like nothing has really changed in her behaviour with him apart from her being more flirty, but the only change is that Hades started viewing her more sexually. Always thinking about her breasts and butt, and nothing else. Half the time he was thinking about her, he wouldn’t even think of her face. So how exactly is their relationship a romantic and lovely one? 

[dp-marvel94]

The Mystery Shack Spooks- Part 3

For Holiday Truce 2020

Summary:  Elle Fenton had hoped for a normal summer, a chance to make normal friends with people who know nothing about her crazy family, ghosts, or, most importantly, her status as a clone. But ghosts always seem to find her, even in Gravity Falls. Now the Mystery Shack is haunted by a unknown apparition with an unknown connection to Dipper and Mabel, and to Elle herself. The half ghost struggles to open up to her new friends and to find a way to help this lonely ghost.

Part 1 -> Part 2 -> Part 3(Here) -> Part 4 -> Part 5

Also on AO3 and fanfiction.net

The half ghost sat, waiting on her bed and hoping that the Shack's mysterious ghost would reappear. Sadness swirled in her heart as the scene replayed in her head- the panic, the desperation as the misty figure begged to be seen. Why did he react that extremely, that devastated? She puzzled over Dipper’s explanation. Maybe that was correct; the ghost was upset about still being unseen and unheard. But there had to be more, didn’t there? It was almost like….he was upset that Dipper and Mabel couldn’t see him specifically. 

The half ghost’s frowned. The ghost…he’d been moving Dipper and Mabel’s things. He’d latched on to her because she could see him but he’d first started with moving the twins’ things and following them…. almost like he was trying to get their attention, But why? 

Wait... It's me, he’d said to Dipper. Like the boy should have recognized the ghost, like he knew him. But, how could he? If the twins closely knew someone who’d died, wouldn’t they have brought up the idea that their loved one was trying to get their attention from beyond the grave? 

Unless…Elle’s eyes widened. Unless they thought it was impossible for him could come back because…. The half ghost’s breath caught in her throat as pieces slid together. He…the boy had died…maybe died… in the Mystery Shack. He was about her and Dipper and Mabel’s age. His name started with a T. But…no, that’s-

Elle’s heart stopped, the realization hitting her like a ton of bricks. Back at the beginning when Dipper’s journal went missing, she’d…she’d asked who the figure was, and he’d shown the copier in the book. The Copier meaning….No, it couldn’t be…but….The ghost’s height, it…it matched Dipper’s exactly. And the brief coloration she’s seen- white and blue like Dipper’s hat and vest. Oh god, he even paced like Dipper did. 

“Tyrone.” She whispered. “Oh my god. He’s Tyrone.”

No, the half ghost shook her head. No, that was impossible. It couldn’t be…he couldn’t be. A clone made out of paper, who’d been alive for all of a few hours. There couldn’t have been enough emotion, enough sense of self to form a ghost. But…the clone had helped to choose his own name, part of her argued. That required a degree of independence, a sense of himself as different from Dipper Pines. So maybe he was Tyrone. Maybe a magically created paper clone had managed to be reborn as a ghost. She bit her lip. Maybe…. maybe she should tell Dipper and Mabel her idea….

No, the girl bit her lip. She shouldn’t get their hopes up. If she was right, this would be an incredible miracle. But if she was wrong….Dipper’s wavered voice and downcast eyes as he talked about losing Tyrone rang in her head…if she was wrong, this would crush them. But maybe she could get proof.

Talking a deep breath, she stood. “Hey, if you’re here…” She looked up at the ceiling. “I think…I think I know who you are. You’re…you’re Tyrone, Dipper’s clone.”

Silence.

“Are you there?” She called.

Nothing. Elle sighed. Was he ignoring her? Or… he had used a lot of energy to make the lights flicker, float objects, and freeze the floor (Elle had ice powers so she knew how tiring that was). Maybe he didn’t have enough power to appear even to her.

“Okay. If…if you are Tyrone, can you give me some sigh? Or…show up so I can talk to you?”

No response. “Alright then. I’m gonna go to bed.”

Elle tossed and turned for a while, struggling to sleep without her answer but none came.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The half ghost girl blinked awake to sunlight streaming through her window. She groaned sleepily and went to bury her head back in her pillow when the sound of something heavy falling to the floor rang through the room. Suddenly startled, the girl sat up.

In the middle of the room and suspiciously far from any furniture was a thick, heavy book. Beside the object, a misty blue and white figure floated for a second before flickering out of existence.

“Are you avoiding me now?” The girl rubbed her eyes. “Look, I’m sorry I didn’t ask you if you wanted to see Dipper and Mabel. I probably should have and I get why you’d be upset if you’re…..” She trailed off, the lack of response deepening her frown. “Come out and talk to me, please. I…I just want to know if you are... who I think you are.”

The room remained silent, except for the flutter of paper on the desk. Stupid window must be….Elle looked to window, eyes widening. It was closed.

Heart pounding, the girl leapt to her feet. She practically ran to the desk. It was covered with the normal mix of knick knacks and school supplies but…there was a colorful piece of paper that hadn’t been there yesterday. With shaking hands, the half ghost picked the piece up. It was white cardstock covered with green pine trees, probably a Christmas themed piece from Mabel’s art and craft stock. In thick black marker, it read ‘Tyrone.’

Elle’s brain short circuited for a moment as she stared at the paper. What was…what did…how… The paper dropped through her fingers and into the desk. She whipped around, eyes hungrily searching for a blurry figure.

“Tyrone. You’re Tyrone. Dipper’s Tyrone. You’re….” She ran a hand through her hair. “I…I can’t believe this. How…how did this even happen? I mean I know how but…”

The girl blinked for a long moment as an insubstantial apparition appeared in front of her. Despite his flickering, translucent body and pale blue tint covering his figure, the ghost wore a surprisingly familiar looking appearance. As a clone, he looked almost exactly like Dipper, complete with the typical vest and hat, though Tyrone’s hat bore the number 2 instead of a picture of a pine tree.

Elle’s mouth fell open. “I can see you.”

The ghost boy frowned (frowned! As in she could actually see his mouth to see his frown!) and gave her an exacerbated look.

Elle shook her head. “No. Your face, I can actually see your face!”

Tyrone pursed his lips in confusion for a moment before his eyes widened in understanding. He opened his mouth and excited sounding static exited.

That sobered the half ghost. “Your voice still sounds like a broken TV though.”

He frowned, crossing his arms. Clearly, he was displeased. A sliver of sadness tugged at her heart too but she could actually see him! 

Elle marched forward. “I mean…I wish we could actually talk with words, but I can actually see your facial expressions now! I can read your body language. I could…I could learn to read your lips or we could learn sign language…or…”

Tyrone’s eyes lit up at the last suggestion, a smile stretching across his face as he nodded enthusiastically.

The half ghost grinned. “Man you’re…you’re actually him. You’re Tyrone, Dipper’s clone.” Her eyes widened, a realization filling her with awe. “You’re a clone, like I am.”

The boy nodded but there was no shock, no surprise.

Elle stumbled towards her bed, the weight of what she’d said hitting her. She’d feared even uttering the word clone in front of Dipper or Mabel but… she’d just spit it out. The girl glanced up at the other ghost. And Tyrone wasn’t even shocked. 

The half ghost put a hand on her head. “You already know. You heard me after…after I found out about the copier.”

Static buzzed for his answer, but Elle knew it was a yes. To her surprise, the conformation didn’t make her feel nervous or exposed. Instead…her core hummed with some emotion she couldn’t place.

Tyrone drifted forward, shifting in the air until he was floating crossed legged at her eyes level. He focused compassionate eyes on her. You’re like me. He said and this time she understood. Not just because that was the first thing he’d said to her that she understood. Instead….she knew the meaning. They were both ghosts. They were both clones, supposed copies of someone else but they were not alone.

Elle’s core purred in her chest and she subtly smiled. This was part of the reason he’d warmed up to her and she’d become comfortable with him so quickly. There was a connection she hadn’t recognized until now. A kinship she’d felt since….

The other clones, her first brothers were still alive. Her face fell at the thought, at the memories. Playing with tag with Tiny. Watching the clouds with Bones. Petting the cat that wandered the garden with Muscles. Sitting on the floor reading to the prime clone, Daniel.

Something cold brushed against her arm, drawing her attention. She looked up, registering the mostly insubstantial hand on her arm. She met the other clone’s eyes. ‘What?’ He mouthed.

Elle shook her head. “It’s just…I haven’t talked to another clone since…since the others were still around but…they’re all gone now. It’s just me.”

Tyrone’s eyes softened in understanding. ‘Same.’ He looked down, expression full of sorrow.

The half ghost startled at the answer before nodding. “Right. You weren’t the only one either.” There had been nine or ten others and….she paled at thought….he’d seen all them melt, barely escaping that fate just to meet his demise minutes later.

Tyrone seemed to be thinking about the same thing, a queasy look on his face.

The girl sighed. “It’s okay now.” She gave her best comforting smile. “We’re both here. We both survived.”

The other ghost blanched at the thought, looking questioningly down at his translucent body. He then pinned her with a raised eyebrow.

 “Yeah, you…that. But…” Elle shook her head. “You came back. Most people don’t.” 

She looked down. Very few people came back as ghosts but…. (The other clones, maybe they could too. Maybe they were out there somewhere, waiting. If one of Dipper’s clones became a ghost… a jab of jealousy…. Why hadn’t any of her clone brothers come back to her?) No, Elle forced the dangerously intoxicating thoughts down. This wasn’t about her and her lost siblings. 

The corner of her lip turned up as she forced her voice to sound lite. “Besides, being a ghost isn’t that bad. You’ve got cool powers and you…uhhh…more durable than before.” The girl smiled sheepishly, unsure if she should have said that as soon as it left her mouth.

Across from her, Tyrone shivered. Then he gave a rye smile and said something equally sheepish. Elle tilted her head in question and he tried again, carefully enunciating the words. The girl watched his mouth. Was he saying ‘can’t melt now’? He repeated the words a third time and Elle was sure.

She fought not to grimace. Well….that wasn’t actually true. Ghosts could melt as she well knew but…she wasn’t exactly going to tell him that right now. Instead, she shrugged uncertainly. “Yeah. Water can’t actually hurt you now.”

The boy let out a relieved breath for a moment before his shoulder’s fell. More static exited his mouth. The half ghost continued to patiently study him until the other ghost again realized she couldn’t understand him. 

With a huff, he uncrossed his legs and floated around the room, looking for something. He paused at one of the end tables as Elle came to stand beside him. The ghost boy reached for a strip of photos on the desk and then gritted his teeth as his fingers passed through. An intense look of concentration crossed his face (it reminded Elle greatly of Dipper yesterday) and he reached again. It took several tries but he managed to pick up the pictures. 

Elle tilted her head. It was a line of photo booth pictures she had taken with the twins at the arcade. Tyrone pointed at the two siblings with his free hand.

“Dipper and Mabel?” She questioned. 

The boy nodded. In that moment, his concertation lapsed and the pictures fell through his hand. He groaned in displeasure.

Elle bent down to take the paper, studying it. Then she looked at the other ghost again. “What about Dipper and Mabel?”

Tyrone frowned. Deliberately, he pointed at each twin. Then he shook his head, covering his ears and then his eyes.

“Oh.” Elle also frowned. “They still can’t see or hear you.”

The ghost nodded, a deep sadness in his eyes. The half ghost felt a similar sadness. Though she now knew that the ghost haunting the shack was Tyrone and could see him, he was still invisible to everyone else. He can’t show himself or talk to Dipper and Mabel. It was almost he wasn’t even here. Except that he was. 

Tyrone had come back as a ghost and Elle didn’t know the true extent of his relationship to the twins. She didn’t know what he actually thought of Dipper especially. And she didn’t know what the twins actually thought about him, how they would react if he showed up again. But…

She remembered Dipper’s sadness talking about Tyrone melting, Mabel’s uncharacteristic soberness during that conversation. She remembered last night- Tyrone begging and crying in front of them. Please, it’s me. I’m right in front of you. He wanted to connect with them, didn’t he? But he couldn’t do that alone.

“We’ll figure something out.” Elle ran a hand through her hair. “But for now, what am I gonna tell Dipper and Mabel?”

Tyrone’s eyes widened, a panicked look crossing his face. He vigorously shook his head.

The girl stared at him. “Tyrone. I figured out who you are. I can actually see you. I have to tell them something.”

The ghost boy continued to shake his head exaggeratedly. 

Elle raised an eyebrow. “You don’t want me to tell them?”

His voice buzzed as panicked static and she didn’t need to understand the words to know he was saying no.

The girl held out her hands. “Why not? I saw how upset you got last night. You want to talk to them. And…I think they’d want to talk to you too.” She said that last part with less certainty but it was true, right?

At some point, the ghostly clone had started pacing. He stopped to stare at her. He waved his arms, motioning to his mouth.

Elle scowled before catching. “You can’t talk to them…and they can’t see you.” Her lips turned down.

Tyrone nodded, more static popping. Some words broke through the noise. “Can’t see…how can…like not here….and….can’t break their hearts….”

“You don’t want to hurt them.” The half ghost said softly.

The boy confirmed with a nod.

Elle frowned. “But..” She started to argue.

Tyrone floated forward, holding up his hands. He closed his eyes, concentrating before he opened his mouth. “Please, wait until we figure this out.” He motioned to his still insubstantial form. 

“They could help us with that, if they knew.” She argued.

He still shook his head, before biting his lip. “No, I’m…not ready…..” There was a long pause when the half ghost thought he wouldn’t say anything else. “I’m…Just a copy. Aren’t I? But….I don’t know…what will they think of me?” The last words rang with doubt and fear but somehow they were more real and solid than anything she’d heard from him.

Elle frowned, trying to make sense of the words. Except they made too much sense. She knew all the self-worth issues that came with being a clone, all the fear of people knowing what a freak you are, not being ready to face the truth. Or…maybe she was projecting what she felt on to him. Maybe he wasn’t feeling insecure because of his clone status. Maybe he was just afraid of hurting Dipper and Mabel and being physically unable to comfort them.

After long consideration, the half ghost sighed. “Alright. I won’t tell them. But we’ll find a way for them to see and hear you. And then you’ll have to face them.”

Tyrone swallowed nervously but nodded in agreement. Then he offered her a half-smile and a mouthed ‘Thank you,’ before he disappeared, leaving Elle to get dressed and go downstairs for breakfast.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Maybe agreeing not to tell Dipper or Mabel about Tyrone was a bad idea, Elle thought ruefully. The fair had come early this year and she was supposed to be having fun with the twins. Mabel was talking about their time travel adventure last year, gushing about how she won Waddles and chuckling about how Dipper kept hitting Wendy in the eyes with a baseball, to the boy’s groaning. 

“Yeah, we never figured out what that time anomaly thing was.” The female twin shrugged. 

“Mabel, that was us.” Dipper stated flatly.

“That’s just silly bro. Us, cause a time anomaly. Psh.” She waved her hand flippantly. Dipper rolled his eyes, exacerbated. Elle wasn’t sure if Mabel was being serious or not but before she could say anything, the other girl’s eyes widened. “Candy! Grenda!”

As Mabel ran off to meet her friends, Elle sighed, and Dipper’s smile fell. A moment later, he looked at the other teen and sighed. “So…what do you want to do?”

Elle shrugged, frowning. “I don’t know. Whatever.” 

If she was honest, she wasn’t in the mood for fun, not after this morning. She was feeling blue and Dipper didn’t seem to be doing much better. Elle had noticed it as soon as she saw him at breakfast this morning. The tension in his shoulders, the bags under his sunken eyes, the way he kept wringing his hands. He looked like he had barely slept, deeply bothered by something. 

“How about we go get some food?” The boy offered halfheartedly.

“Sure.” Elle agreed, her thoughts away from her friend’s sour mood. 

The pair walked to one of the food trucks, ordering cheeseburgers, fries, and cans of Pit Cola. They sit down to eat at a picnic table, beside some of the older teens.

Elle listlessly picked at her food, while passively watching people pass by their table. Across from her, Dipper was in a similar mood, his eyes fixed down while he nibbled at his fries. He remained silent which was fine with Elle; she wasn’t in a talking mood today either. 

If she’s been in a better mood, she might have wondered about what was bothering him and asked about it. But instead, her head remained filled with her own troubled thoughts. She couldn’t stop thinking about Tyrone who was in the Shack somewhere, still invisible. Elle sighed. She knew his name now but what did that matter? She still had no idea how to actually help him.

A blue tinted figure drew Elle’s attention away. She looked up, her frown deepening. There in the attic window was Tyrone. He was watching them with one hand on the window; even from this distance she could make out the sad look in his eyes. 

“What are you looking at?” The living boy across from her asked, startling her.

Elle whipped to look at him. A moment later, she recognized the question. “Oh…our ghostly friend.” It wasn’t a lie, technically, right? “He’s in the window of your bedroom.” She looked back up and pointed, causing the boy to swivel around to see and then frowned. “Or he was.” Tyrone had disappeared in second she looked away.

“Oh.” Dipper frowned. “What was he doing?”

“Just looking out the window. Watching the fair I guess.” She shrugged, trying to sound unbothered. But she was bothered. He was watching them, with the expression of someone on the outside looking in.

Despite her efforts, the boy mostly likely picked up on the unease anyway. “He must be really lonely.”

“Yeah.” The girl nodded, putting her arms around herself. Jazz had said as much earlier and Elle herself thought that was well. She shivered. “No one being able to see and hear you must be horrible.”

Dipper swallowed. “It is. It’s awful.” 

The sureness of the statement giving her pause, Elle blinked at him in surprise. “You sound...very sure about that.”

The boy’s shoulders rose, and he paled, looking like he’d been caught. Then a deep look of consideration covered his face. He looked around cautiously. “There’s a reason for that.” He lowered his voice. “We shouldn’t talk about it here.”

With that, the boy stood. He grabbed his food and Elle followed with her own food as he led her away from the picnic tables. With another cautious glance, he darted behind one of the game stales. With a food truck to their backs and the back of the stall in front of them, it formed a secluded little alley away from listening ears.

Dipper took a seat, slumping into the grass. He bit his lip, mulling over something silently before meeting her eyes. “I..I kinda know what it’s like to be a ghost.”

Elle frowned in surprise. “What?”

The boy opened and closed his mouth, searching for words. He nervously rubbed one of his arms. “I…When Bill Cipher possessed me, I got kicked out of my own body. While that demon,” His voice pitched up in anger at the word, before dipping down in sadness. “was tramping around in my body. I was just floating there. I couldn't touch anything. And no one could see or hear me. I yelled in people’s ears, waved in their faces but…nothing.” He looked at his hands. “It’s like…I didn’t even exist. I wasn’t even there, like I was a….”

“A ghost.” The girl’s eyes lit up in understanding. “It’s like you were a ghost.”

Dipper nodded. “It was horrible. I felt so…helpless. Cipher was running around, doing whatever he wanted to do to me and I couldn’t stop him. I couldn’t get anyone to help me, because they couldn’t see me. It was…one of the most horrible things that's ever happened to me.” He almost whispered that last part before shaking his head. “It turned out okay though. I possessed one of Mabel’s sock puppets to talk to her and she helped get the demon out of me.” Elle’s eyes widened at the last part, wanting to ask more about that story but Dipper continued before she could. “But the point is…I was stuck like that for a few hours and it was awful. But the ghost in the Shack…he’s been like that for who knows how long.”

Elle shook her head, considering the words. “I can’t even imagine that. Well…Well no, I can...” 

The boy gave her a curious look and the girl pinched her mouth shut. She didn’t want to bring that up, not right now, not when it could lead to…other revelations but….she met Dipper’s eyes. He’d already spilled deep secrets to her. He trusted her, repeatedly, and she still remained closed off. 

Elle hazarded a cautious glance at Dipper. "I...uhh….I have something to tell you about..." She rubbed the back of her neck. "About why I can see the ghost but no one else can. It's uhhh.. it's not because I've been living above a ghost portal."

The boy seemed to pick up on her somber tone, his frowning deepening. "What do you mean? Is there no portal?"

The halfa wrung her hands. "No, I mean…Mom and Dad do have a portal and it is in our basement. So I have been living above it but… I know what's not why I can see the ghost."

"Then why?"

Elle could hardly believe she was saying this, she was trying to confess this as she stammered. "I...uhh...I..umm… it's...it's complicated and weird. And...I'm … I'm sorry I didn't tell you earlier but I thought...well.. it's silly but…" Her voice quieted. "Please don't be mad."

Dipper's expression softened. "Elle, it's okay. You can tell me whatever it is."

The girl took a breath and closed her eyes. She braced herself. She would say it. She was gonna actually say it and it would be fine because she could trust Dipper and he'd believe her and...She spit out the words. "I'm half ghost."

There was a long moment of silence when the other teen didn't react. Tentatively, she peaked her eyes open and took in his bewildered expression.

"What?" He finally said.

"I'm half ghost." Elle forced the words out again. "That's why I can see the Shack's ghost, 'cause I'm one too." She glanced up, meeting Dipper's still confused gaze, before looking down again. She then continued as the other boy remained silent. “So yeah...I’ve got all the typical powers. I can turn invisible.” In demonstration, her hand disappeared. “Intangible.” Her hand took on a bluish tint before she passed it into the ground. “Make ectoblasts.” Pulling her hand back up, she summoned neon green energy into her palm. “I can do ice too and float but those are….uhh...harder in this form….”

She trailed off at the end, blushing under Dipper’s slack jawed stare. The girl bit her lip. Had she gone too fast? Should she have explained better? Should she transform? No that was a stupid idea. This was stupid idea. Stupid! She just broke her friend. He probably thought-

“You’re a ghost.” Dipper’s uncharacteristically quiet voice cut through her growing panic. “You’re a ghost. I can’t believe this.” His voice was quickly growing in volume as he spoke faster. “In the Shack, right under our noses the whole time. You told me...you told me your parents are ghost experts. And...you’ve gone through the ghost portal.... Earlier, I thought I saw your eyes glow like that.” His eyes flickered between her face and her still lit hand as he pointed. “You’ve really a ghost which means you’re…” His speech slowed as his eyes widened, shining with sadness. “You’re dead.” He practically leapt to his feet, waving his arms. “You’re dead. You’ve been dead this entire time. You’re-”

“Dipper! Stop!” Elle cut the boy off as she rose to her feet and extinguished her ectoenergy. She grabbed one of his arms. “I’m not dead.” 

The boy suddenly stopped, jaw falling again. "But.. you just said you were a ghost."

"I'm half ghost." She corrected pointedly.

"Half ghost?" Dipper questioned.

Elle blew out a breath at her friend's lingering confusion. “Yeah, Half ghost and half human. I’m a...human-ghost hybrid.” She ran a hand through her hair. “I am a ghost but I’m a human too. And…. I’m not dead…”

The boy continued to study her, his expression equal parts confused and distressed. “But...how can you be both? Ghosts are the spirits of dead people and you’re…” He looked down at her hand that was still around his wrists. “You’re solid and warm and..you’re breathing but…” He pulled away. “Are you possessed? Is this you trying to tell me you’re possessed because if you are-”

Elle cut him off again. “Dipper, I’m not possessed. These are my powers.” Again, she demonstrated, deliberately turning a hand invisible. “See. I’m doing this. There isn’t a ghost controlling me. It’s just...this is just me.” The boy said nothing, staring at her hand. Elle bit her lip. “Maybe….I should transform. That might help you understand.”

Dipper’s eyes flickered back up to her face. “Transform?”

“Yeah uhh...into my ghost form. Since I have a human form.” She motioned down her body. “And a ghost form.” 

The boy nodded, seeming to follow what she was saying even if the blank look suggested he still had no idea what she meant.

Elle took a step back. “Okay. So...there’s this light that's gonna form around me and I’ll change. You...uhh...might not want to look directly at me. It’s bright.”

With another nod from the other teen, the half ghost summoned the ring of light. Dipper’s eyes widened at the sight and remained fixed even as the light moved across Elle’s form. The light passed Elle’s head, stealing the breath from her lungs. A moment later, the familiar chill and weightlessness enveloped her, leaving the girl floating in ghost form a few inches above the ground.

As Dipper hadn’t looked away, he squinted at her, blinking the spots from his vision. After what felt like minutes but was really seconds, he focused on her face again. “Elle?” He took a tentative step forward. “Is that really you?”

The girl nodded. “Yeah. I know I kinda look different but… it’s still me.”

The boy took another cautious step forward, the shocked look on his face morphing into awe. “Wow. You do look so different.” Elle frowned, shifting nervously in the air. Dipper shook his head, noticing her reaction. “No, I mean...you look so different from the other ghost I’ve seen. You’re not see-through at all. You look solid…” He reached a hand forward. “Can I...uh… touch you?”

The girl blushed. “Uh...sure?” She put an arm forward and let Dipper take it.

His eyes lit up. “You are solid but...you’re so cold.” His lips turned down. “And you’re not...you’re not dead?”

Elle shook her head. “No. I even still have a heartbeat in this form. Here if you press down on my pulse point, you should feel it.”

With a hum, the boy did so. Slowly, he smiled, his voice ringing with relief. “You do.” 

“Yeah.” Elle gently removed her arm from his grasp. “So not dead. Or half dead. Or anything like that.”

Dipper blinked. “But then how...how are you like this?”

The girl paled. “Well that’s...that’s complicated.” She bit her lip, again shifting nervously.

The other teen stepped back. “Oh...sorry. Sorry if that’s personal. You don’t have to tell me.” Clearly he’d picked up on her discomfort but despite the words, Elle could still see the pure curious interest in his eyes.

The half ghost sighed. “No...I wanna tell you but...it’s hard to talk about and…” 

Dipper’s expression softened. “It’s okay.”

Elle shook her head. “I’ll just say...I was in a bad place with a bad person. That bastard. I was…I was an experiment to him. He hurt me and…” She swallowed. “And other people too.” She clenched and unclenched her fists, thinking about the other clones. “He tried to get me to help him. I...I should’ve died. I should be dead.” Dipper’s eyes widened in alarm at the statement but she continued. “I almost died but...Danny saved me.” A small smile spread across her face at the statement.

“Danny?” The boy raised a brow. “You mean your brother?”

The half ghost blinked, realizing what she said. “Yeah...I guess I should mention….Danny’s half ghost like me.”

“Your brother’s...half ghost?” He put a hand on his head. “But how..wait, is this genetic or something?”

“Or something.” Elle shrugged, trying to avoid the topic. “Anyway, Danny’s half ghost too and he saved my life. He got me out of that place or...guess we helped each other escape really. But still...I would have probably died that day without him.” Her face fell at the last part, remembering Vlad’s hate filled face, how the man would have driven her to the point of destabilization if Danny hadn’t refused to fight her. She swallowed. “And...I got really sick after that.” She shivered, the memory of her body numb and dripping green fashed in her mind. Those dark, cold nights when her body was threatening to fall apart and she’d feared that she’d died there on the streets. But- “Danny found a way to make me better. He...he saved me. He saved my life, again. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for him.” In more ways than one, she thought almost ruefully. But she smiled fondly anyway. 

Dipper frowned for a long moment, taking in all she said. “Wow, that’s...that’s a lot. That sounds really awful.”

“Yeah. It sucked.” Elle rubbed the back of her neck. “But everything’s okay now.” Which was true for the most part. “I’m healthy. That fruitloop is out of my life. I’ve got an incredible family and…” She smiled very deliberately at Dipper. “I finally have friends.”

The boy blushed at the attention, though he also smiled. “Yeah, friends. And...I’m happy things are better for you know.”

Elle sighed, feeling happiness at his agreement along with a sense of relief. She’d shared the barest hint of all she’d gone through but it felt good to say at least a portion of it. Although...she looked back at Dipper who was looking at her thoughtfully.Her stomach flopped as she wondered what he was thinking. 

“You’re taking this well.” She said, slightly skeptically. “But...I guess you’re kinda used to the paranormal.”

Dipper raised a brow. “I don’t think there’s any getting used to your friend secretly being a supernatural creature.”

“Part supernatural creature.” She snorted. “So….do you have any more questions?”

“Do I? Well…”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Dipper of course had dozens of questions for the newly revealed halfa. After posing several questions about her powers and requests to demonstrate, Elle turned human and asked to go somewhere more secluded. The pair made their way away from the field hosting the fair and into the woods, far enough to not be seen by any of the townsfolk but close enough to easily find their way back to the Shack.

Elle demonstrated her powers and the two talked more about the Ghost Zone and ghosts. Dipper even learned about Elle’s superhero alter-ego and Phantom’s real identity . Again, it was nice sharing the truth with someone. The boy wasn’t angry that she’d waited or distrustful of her. Instead, his enthusiasm and wonder was infectious, lifting her spirits. He clearly thought what she was, what she could do was wondrous and incredible, not weird and inhuman. In an odd way, it reminded her of her dad and the child-like wonder he exhibited when talking about ghosts. The man had worn similar expressions when watching either of his two half ghost children display their powers. The reaction made her literally glow with happiness. Until…

“Hey, Elle.” Dipper put down the journal he’d been jotting down notes in. “Thanks for showing me all this. I could tell how nervous you were earlier about telling me so...thank you for trusting me with your secret.”

And just like that, an underlying tension surged. She’d shared a secret but not her biggest one, not about her origin as a clone. Her stomach flopped. She could tell him about that now, right?. He accepted her being a halfa; learning that she was a clone too wouldn’t change that. But…doubt stabbed in her heart. It would change the way he saw her. He’d know that she was not a real person but a fake, a copy, a hateful voice whispered.

No, Elle shook her head. She wasn’t those things. She’s been over this again and again, reassured by her family. She was a real person, her own person.

“Come on.” Dipper interrupted her thoughts. “Let’s head back to the fair.”

“Oh, yeah. Sure.” Elle shrugged, returning to human form.

The boy led her back to the field, stopping as they cleared the trees. “Do you want to play some games?” He pointed. “I’m pretty good at balloon darts.”

“Let’s do it.” The girl agreed.

With that, the pair of friends walked to the stall and played the game. All the while, Elle’s thoughts tumbled her head. She really should tell him about how she really got her powers and....She watched Mabel walk by with her friends...She needed to tell the other girl as well. Elle frowned. Well, one thing at a time then. She’d talk to Mabel about being half ghost and then...figure out what to do next.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

About an hour later, Mabel joined back up with Elle and Dipper. “Candy and Grenda had to leave so I’m back!” She grinned. Then she wiggled her eyebrows. “Did you two have fun?”

Elle raised a brow at that tone; what exactly was she implying?

Dipper either didn’t pick up in the expression or chose to ignore it. Instead he excitedly said. “Yeah! Mabel you won’t believe what Elle-”

The half ghost elbowed the boy in the side, cutting him off. “Dipper.”

“What?” He shrugged, slightly confused and slightly incredulous. Elle gave him a pointed look and a moment later, understanding dawned on his face. “Oh, right. I guess you should tell her yourself.“

“Tell me what?” Mabel questioned.

Elle bit her lip. “More like show you. Let’s...let’s go somewhere private.”

Without further questions, the group went back to the area in the woods where Elle and Dipper talked earlier. Once they arrived, the half ghost turned around to face her two friends.

“So...I’m half ghost.” She started, already cursing herself for not deciding to tell both twins at the same time. Really, why did she keep doing this? It wasn’t that she didn’t like or trust Mabel so why...

She pushed the idea out of her head to focus on explaining and showing off her powers. Much as she had with Dipper, she gave a very vague explanation of why she was half ghost and the awful things that happened before she was stabilized.

“I’m sorry that happened to you.” Mabel said, after she finished.

With a huff, the girl touched down on the ground. “Yeah..it was really bad but...I came out okay.” She rubbed the back of her neck. “And like I said, Danny helped me.” 

The other girl’s expression softened. “He sounds like a good brother.”

Elle nodded. “He really is.” That was true, no matter the complicated feelings she had about being his clone.

“Are you two close?” The halfa rose a brow Mabel’s question and the other girl continued. “The two of you have the same powers and all the stuff you went through together? I know with all the crazy stuff that happened last summer, all the times I had to save Dipper’s butt.”

“Hey!” Said boy gave a somewhat indignant cry. “You saved my butt? I saved your butt!”

Mabel glared at him without heat. “We saved each other’s butts. But anyway...we got closer, after everything that happened.”

Dipper lowered his pointed finger. “You’re right.” His expression turned fond. “We did.”

Elle glanced between the brother and sister, fondness entering her heart at the thought of her own living siblings. “You’re right. Danny and me are close. Well...I’m closer to him than Jazz anyway. Some of that is being half ghost.” Though some was, she had known him longer than she had known Jazz. “He got his powers first so he’s taught me things. And all the stuff that happened with the fruitloop…” She bit her lip. “I know he’ll always have my back.” Elle shook her head; she could say more, a lot more. Her relationship with the older teen was complicated. “I mean...he sometimes drives me nuts and...” This was saying a lot from a clone. “I wonder how the heck we’re even related.”

That earned a laugh from Mabel. “Same. I mean, brothers?” She jabbed a thumb at Dipper. “What are you gonna do with them?”

The mentioned boy rolled his eyes. “I love you too.” 

His sister stuck out her tongue and Elle giggled.

The halfa then shrugged. “But yeah….I guess the point is...it’s not always perfect. But Danny’s my big bro. I don’t know what I’d do without him.”

There was a pause as Elle let the statement settle and the silence stretched. From the fond looks the pair of twins traded, the half ghost was sure each thought the same of their respective sibling even if neither was going to say it out loud. Granted, Elle wasn’t sure how much of that said she would say to Danny out loud but...maybe she should. Maybe after this, she’d call Jazz and Danny and thank them for encouraging her to trust Dipper and Mabel. She’d tell the two how much she loved them.

Speaking of trusting….she did have more to tell them but…

“Elle! Can you show us your ice again?” Dipper grinned excitedly. 

Mabel beamed similarity. “Can you make snowballs?! Oh, can we have a snowball fight?”

The halfa laughed, forming a snowball in her hands. “I don’t know…” She threw it at Mabel and smiled. “Can we?”

A shocked expression crossed the girl’s face before she shrieked with laughter. “No fair. Me and Dipper need snowballs too!”

With that, the half ghost made a pile of snowballs. As the three had a snowball fight in the middle of the summer, Elle was again happy that she told her friends about her powers and she could share this with them. There was still that little secret about being a clone which kept rearing its head. But for now…. Elle laughed as a snowball hit her in the back.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

After the impromptu snowball fight, the group went back to the fair. Elle looked side to side; there were noticeably less people around and many of the game and food stalls were closed.

Mabel frowned. “I guess we ended up talking for a long time.”

“Sorry you didn’t get to see much of the fair.” Dipper said.

“That’s okay. I still had fun with you guys.” Elle shrugged.

The twins both smiled at the statement. Mabel then waved. “Come on. Let’s ride the Ferris wheel before they close.”

The three got in line for the ride and soon after loaded onto one of the cars. The group happily chatted. As they rose higher, Dipper and Mabel oohed and awed at the sight. Elle looked around with considerably less awe. The sight was beautiful but she could see it all time she liked; she could fly of her own power after all. But still she smiled, enjoying her friends’ reactions.

That is...until she looked through one of the windows of the Shack and again, saw the misty form of Tyrone. Her smile fell; there he was in the window again, watching, waiting and probably hoping she’d come up with a way to make him fully visible and audible. Guilt wrapped around Elle’s heart; she’d forgotten about him all day, too busy hanging out with Dipper and Mabel and thinking about herself.  She’d been worried about telling them about her status as a clone but there was another clone to worry about. She still needed to figure out how to tell them about Tyrone. But how to have that conversation, that definitely painful conversation that Tyrone didn’t want to have yet?

“Look! It’s the water tower!” Mabel grabbed her arm and pointed, drawing Elle out of the train of thought.

The halfa tilted her head. “Is that a muffin painted on the side?” 

Dipper waved exaggeratedly. “That’s what I said!” The boy crossed his arms. “Robbie says it’s an explosion, though.”

“An explosion?” Elle raised a brow. “Huh? I can kinda see it.”

The boy’s mouth fell open and his nose wrinkled. “Traitor.” He muttered.

At that, Mabel laughed. “I think Elle’s right. It does look like an explosion.”

The two girls continued to laugh at the other teen’s offended expression. More quips were traded as the Ferris Wheel spun around. After several minutes, the ride ended. The trio walked around the fair for a while as the sun set before going back to the Shack after the fair closed.

As soon as Elle walked into the living room, her ghost sense stirred in his chest before exiting her mouth. She crossed her eyes, looking at the blue mist. 

“What was that?” Dipper asked, apparently having noticed.

“Ghost sense. I guess...our friend’s around.” She frowned. “I don’t see him though. I’ll just…” She looked side to side. Seeing no one around, she summoned the rings. “I’ll look for him.”

Elle half-smiled, enjoying the twin’s awed looks at her transformation. But she was still worried about the ghost she’d sensed. After that conversation this morning, he’d been alone all day and based on glimpses, Tyrone had been watching the going-ons at the fair. She sighed as she phased through the ceiling, wondering what she’d say when she found the ghostly clone. And what would she tell Dipper and Mabel?

In quick succession, she invisibly flew through the house, searching. Where was he? Her core pulsed with the familiar cold of sensing another ghost. But there was no mist, no semi transparent figure. Where was Tyrone?

Five minutes later, Elle returned to her friends.

“Did you find him?” Dipper asked hopefully.

The half ghost shook her head. “No..I sensed him a few more times but he’s nowhere to be found.”

“Oh.” Dipper seemed to sober at that. “Do you think he’s still upset about last night?”

“Maybe…” Elle’s stomach flopped at the idea. Maybe he was still upset. It wasn’t like him, just disappearing. Again she worried. Was he moping? Avoiding her? Avoiding the twins? “Maybe he...he doesn’t want to see any of us.”

That was kinda hard to believe but...with how upset he got seeing the twins, how he didn’t want to tell them about his true identity...maybe he didn’t want to see them. And her….what exactly were they gonna talk about after that bombshell?”

Mabel frowned. “What do we do now?”

Elle swallowed. "I guess...he’ll show up again eventually.”

“And we keep researching.” Dipper said, eyes downcast. “I wish we could do something.”

Guilt churned in her gut as part of her whispered, she could do something. She could tell Dipper and Mabel that the ghost was Tyrone but… the ghostly clone’s uncertain and distraught face flashed in her mind. Would it be more painful for him if the two knew but he remained unseen and unheard? Won’t he be angry if she told them without his permission?

Heart aching, Elle remained silent. 

[nanoland]

new chapter (supernatural fic)

(earlier parts are here; whole thing is here) 

Clean Hands, part 3 

Crowley/Castiel/Dean Winchester, warning for violence and spn demons being spn demons   

0   

Another day, another assassination attempt.

“Congratulations, sir,” said Paula, bustling in with his coffee and daily planner. “That brings it to eight, yes? I recall your making some remark about throwing a small office party if we hit ten before the end of the month.”

Lifting the corpse off the row of retractable spikes he’d installed in his desk, Crowley grunted, “It was a joke. On the other hand, maybe it would be good for morale. Make the blighters less determined to snuff me.”

“I’ll add it to the calendar. Sir, your ten ‘o clock is waiting in the lobby. Should I send him in?”

Technically, ‘ten ‘o clock’ didn’t exist in Hell. Time didn’t exist in Hell.

But by God, it did for Paula.

Infamous among Crowley’s minions, she ruled his appointment diary with an iron fist (well – iron talons, more accurately) and kept a horseman’s pick tucked neatly under her workstation for anyone who was more than five minutes late.

She’d been the most competent corporate PA in the business when Crowley had purchased her soul in exchange for a medical breakthrough that had beaten down her cancer and allowed her those ten precious years. It would, in fact, have allowed her a normal human lifespan, if not for Crowley’s hounds.

(Her wish was among his favourites and her contract had pride of place in his trophy cabinet. She could have just said ‘cure me’; she’d dreamed bigger. Ambition! Now that was what Crowley liked to see. Very few people who sold their souls managed to leave the world a better place than they’d found it.

Truthfully, arranging the breakthrough had taken an amount of power on his part that, ordinarily, he’d have objected to. Ever since the Zuckerberg Incident of 2004, Crowley had maintained a policy against granting wishes that fundamentally altered the pace and trajectory of human scientific development. But he’d wanted her. Reliable PAs were like gold dust and they almost always went to bloody Heaven. “And for what, I ask you?” he’d said to Dean once. “How much admin is really involved in keeping people locked in a lotus-eater machine?”)  

“The ten… oh, piss. It’s Alan, isn’t it? Yes, yes. Let’s get this over with. Send him in.”  

Another day, another fucking workplace harassment mess to sort out. How many more sodding seminars was he going to have to host before they all got it through their heads that biting off a co-worker’s arm was not a viable long-term conflict resolution strategy?

Sigh.

It was only after four meetings and sixteen calls that Crowley remembered he’d not yet disposed of the assassin.

“I suppose I should make an example of you,” he huffed, already imagining it.

The hassle.

The bother.

Getting an apron on.

Finding the hammer.

Lugging the stupid bastard up a ladder and nailing him to the office noticeboard by his scrote.

He could always ask Paula to do it. But, bless her heart, she’d only been a demon for six years and arranging a corpse for maximum intimidation was just as much a matter of practice as talent.

As Crowley was fetching the ladder, Gwen from Legal arrived whey-faced and dogged by two dozen assistants and interns.

“Sir, it’s a catastrophe,” she wailed.

Five minutes later, Crowley was back at his desk, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Avoidable. Utterly, pathetically avoidable. All you had to do was amend the contract to state that the phrase ‘ten years’ refers solely and specifically to Earth’s orbital period, not the orbital period of the contractee.”

Gwen hung her head. “I don’t know what to tell you, sir. Finding qualified staff to manage this sort of deal is tricky. When people with, you know, science degrees and stuff die and are damned, the assholes over at the Experimental Punishments Department always snatch ‘em up first. It’s a real problem.”

“I’ll have a word with them. Ugh – alright, alright, let’s try and sort this out. How long is a Martian year?”

“The internet says six hundred and eighty-seven days.”

“Damn. Almost twice as long,” Crowley grumbled, pouring himself a drink. “What did he even want from us? He’s a billionaire. The list of things they can’t get without our help grows shorter by the day.”

“He wanted to guarantee that he’d be the first man on Mars, sir; that none of his competitors would get there before he did.”

“Wait. Hold on. The thing he wished for and the mechanism by which he’s attempting to fuck us over are one and the same? Oh, no, no, no. I’m not going to take that cheeky bollocks lying down. Get the head of Research and Development in here, now. We’re going to find out how to crash a spaceship.”

Gwen’s gaze flickered to the assassin’s corpse. “Um.”

“Fuck,” Crowley muttered.

At which point Paula tapped on the door to ask if he wanted to reschedule his next five meetings, because unless he could deal with them all in a grand total of twelve minutes, he’d be late for his call with the NRA’s chairman.

When Castiel arrived – without an appointment, as per usual, but Paula had standing instructions to let him through – he found Crowley resting his head on his desk, fantasising about being a paperweight.

“I’ve come for more sex,” he explained.

Dragging himself from despair’s depths, Crowley slurred, “T’riffic.”

He instructed his meat suit to sit up and turn on the winning smile. Unlike more reliable vehicles, possessed bodies didn’t have dashboard lights to indicate an exhausted battery; instead, it announced its displeasure by growing three new tumours.

Castiel stepped back, confused. Displeased. “You’re usually more enthusiastic than this. Why is your desk covered in diagrams of rockets? Is this a ‘new hobby’?”

Exaggerated finger quotes. Damn him to the pit, he was precious.

“Kitten, rest assured I have only two hobbies and they both dress badly.”

He expected retaliation for that. Castiel hated being reminded that Crowley regularly dallied with his favourite human. It came as a surprise, then, when the angel simply reached out and firmly gripped his shoulder, declaring, “You need to rest.”

Wings flapped. Suddenly, Crowley was standing in front of a wide, glassy lake, surrounded by dense forest, and in the distance…

“Is that Mount Fuji?”

“Indeed,” said Castiel, smiling briefly. “She’s a childhood friend. I first visited when she was little more than an unusually picturesque bump in the ground.”  

There was no one around. There was nothing around. No boats on the lake, no fishermen, no families on holiday, not even the distant roar of traffic. Just them, the view, the water, and a – huh – a bright orange tent pitched nearby.

“This is where I come to relax,” Castiel informed him, opening up the zipper.

“Whose is it?”

“Mine.”

“Huh. I wasn’t aware that you…”

“That I what?”

“Owned things. Or even grasped the concept of owning things. Don’t give me that look; you’re the one who’s worn the same socks ever since you slipped into that God-bothering flesh puppet.”

Castiel sniffed. “Materialism is a disease. But I’m not a child, Crowley. For your information, in my time on Earth I have owned many things.”

Always fun to ruffle the pretty bird’s feathers. “Yeah? How many of them were hand-me-downs from the Hardy Boys?”

“Most of them,” he said, levelly. “With the exception of this tent and your ass, demon.”

A pin drop pause.

Castiel maintained unblinking eye contact for exactly twelve seconds, then turned and crawled into his neon den.

Practically vibrating with adoration, Crowley followed.

It was evident that Castiel, despite his laudable efforts to create a space for himself in a world that had no space for him, didn’t entirely grok camping.

There were no sleeping bags. Instead, the tent’s bottom was covered in duvets, dozens of them, soft and fresh as if they’d come directly from the shop – or, more accurately, Crowley suspected, someone’s washing line.

“I cured her dog’s foot infection,” Castiel said, somewhat defensively, settling into his cotton and fleece nest.

“Ah. And she was so grateful she said you could make off with all her laundry, hm?”

“She… did not say those words, precisely. But it was heavily implied.”

Thank sin this was only a meat suit. Thank sin, thank everything that Castiel couldn’t see the expression of hopeless, pitiable fondness that would have adorned Crowley’s true face at that moment.

It was a relief when Castiel, without further ado, started undressing. Crowley, copying him, took the opportunity to talk sense into himself.

Come on. Grow up. Get it together. You know what you are. More importantly, you know what he is. Ageless. Unfathomable. Demons, at the end of the day, are just distilled human nastiness, but him? He existed before humans. Before microbes. He’s nice to babies and bees and pot plants and Dean and that makes it easy to forget that… that…

Oh, yes. Remember when he came to Hell? The first time he saw Dean; the start of their epic, eternal, infuriating romance? And where were you? That’s right. You were with the others, standing there slack-jawed and helpless, like dinosaurs watching the comet hit. Like children gazing up at a mushroom cloud.

Twelve thousand. That’s how many demons he burned out of existence, without even trying. Twelve thousand.

Do you think he ever thinks about them? Do you think he even noticed?

Twelve thousand.

Do you think he knows how close you were to being one of them?

Do you think he cares?

He’s nice to babies. Bees. Pot plants. Dean. You, even, sometimes. He’s sweet. He’s got big, soft blue eyes and hair that aches to be tussled. He’s a top-tier, world-class fuck. And at any moment, for any reason, he could end you, easy as blowing away dust, and you can’t say for certain he would even remember your name in a month’s time.

“What? No,” Castiel protested when Crowley kissed him. “We’re here to rest, Crowley.”

Drawing back, Crowley leered. “That’s what you want to do, is it? Rest?”

Perpetually thirsty tart that he was, Castiel bit his lip and looked torn. “I… yes.”

Crowley pouted.

Firmer now, Castiel said, “We will rest for a while first. Then we will have sex. Is that satisfactory?”

No sooner had Crowley resignedly nodded than Castiel seized him and finished undressing him, tossing his undershirt and socks out the tent. When they were both naked, the cold air coming off the lake making Crowley shiver, Castiel burrowed into his pilfered pile and dragged the demon down with him.

“Rest first,” he ordered him. “Sex afterwards. No, no – stop that. Afterwards, I said.”

Crowley groaned and whined and fussed, but obeyed.  

And bugger him gently if it wasn’t actually pleasant, very pleasant, to lie there with Castiel’s strong arms locked around his torso, toasty warm under layers of wool while, outside, the lake lapped at its bank and wind rustled through the trees. No assassins. No paperwork. No blood. Everything nice and quiet. Everything calm and clean.

Then Castiel sighed, a hot puff against the back of Crowley’s neck, and said, “You know, the thing that vexes me most about Dean is the way he…”

[mattzerella-sticks]

Portmanteau, 1.1k, KiriBaku, DynaRiot

(ao3)

Portmanteau (port·man·teau) n. a word blending the sounds and combining the meanings of two others

Like Bakugo's chosen hero name. But was that his first choice? Kirishima doesn't think so, after finding a damning piece of evidence hidden within his notes. Except it's not what he thinks, at all...

           Eijiro barely paid his friends any attention, currently copying Katsuki’s notes while they fooled around. Yelled about a movie playing on screen, ignoring it, and throwing popcorn across the seating area. Mostly Mina, Hanta, and Denki. Katsuki stayed out of it. Only getting involved when stray kernels bounced off his head, drawing his attention away from Eijiro. Delaying his efforts at helping Eijiro study as he ranted freely. Like now, with Katsuki jumping from his seated position. Fingertips crackling, tiny explosions rippled through the air, punctuating his many threats. Normally Eijiro enjoyed this kind of break. But he nearly finished transcribing today’s English lecture, one page left. Katsuki promised him no more schoolwork after that.

           Motivated, Eijiro grabbed his pen, and then moved onto the next page. He scanned it, estimating how quickly he can scrawl his friend’s work, when Eijiro caught sight of a word that successfully derailed his concentration. “Bakugo?” he asked, pulling Katsuki’s and everyone else’s focus away from their fight. Instead towards where Eijiro’s finger pointed. “What’s this?”

           Katsuki stuttered on a breath, cheeks bulging bright crimson. Eyes twitching with fury, those explosions near his hand grew more frequent, and larger. Eijiro looked past him, at their friends. Mina sank deeper into her seat, smugly watching Katsuki melt down. Meanwhile, Denki leaned forward, hand raised for a high five Hanta happily gave. Their clapping broke Katsuki from his daze. He angrily snatched his notebook back, tossing it far from the couches. “It was nothing, Kirishima,” he said, “just a stupid thought I had…”

           That was clearly a lie, even without Katsuki’s lame addition. Eijiro knew how important notetaking was to his friend. Saw him erase mistakes like All-Might pressed a gun against his head, telling Katsuki if even a trace remained then he will never be a hero. So not only did it mean something, but it was also important. Enough that Katsuki risked valuable class time in creating it.

           He can still see Katsuki’s notebook, and the little doodle different than his notes. Handwriting shaky, as if testing this word before committing with a large heart ensnaring it. Brushstroke heavy, making curves rounder and sweeter. Which begged the question –

           What was DynaRiot?

           Eijiro rubbed his chin, thinking. He cycled amongst theories he entertained for a few seconds. Most of these revolved around his first insight that whatever DynaRiot was, it meant a great deal to Katsuki. Leaving his unflappable friend flustered since its discovery. Standing, glaring at everyone, yet silent in the strangest sense. Afraid of what he might say. Surprising and uncharacteristic. Unfortunately, each attempt at finding a reason ended in failure. Nothing he imagined fit exactly, his gut rejecting all of them.

           Following his instincts, he stopped looking at the whole and instead examined its parts. Broke it into easier segments, like Yamada taught them. First, Dyna, reminded Eijiro of Katsuki’s hero name. A smile graced his lips, reminded of how Katsuki told him.

           Alone on campus, left behind by their class as they ran off, they walked in comfortable silence together. Katsuki nudged him, muttering how he wanted Eijiro’s opinion on a possible name. “DynaMight,” he told Eijiro, “because of my quirk and –“

           “And you’re honoring All Might,” Eijiro smiled, throwing an arm around Katsuki. Felt him tense briefly, then melt into his side. “I totally get it man, I… I think it’s awesome. Manly, too. I mean, that was why I chose my name, nothing is manlier than honoring people who inspire you!”

           “Yeah, well…” Katsuki scoffed, avoiding his gaze, “I mean, I did sort of… sometimes you have not-so-shitty ideas, y’know?”

           His chest warmed at the memory. Fleeting, however, as his mind abandoned it for the second part of this mystery. Why would Katsuki write Riot, alongside Dyna, and not Might? Unless…

           Eijiro might have inspired an earlier draft.

           “Bakugo…” Eijiro cooed, gazing up at his friend. Katsuki flinched, meeting his stare. Red skin paling while swallowing past a freshly formed lump. “I can’t believe you’d do that, it – it really means a lot.”

           Their friends perk considerably, surprise visible. Katsuki’s jaw hung for a few seconds, snapping shut with a loud boom! “It… you really feel that way?”

           “Of course!” Eijiro rocked back and forth, body vibrating in excitement. “Knowing that you even considered naming yourself after Crimson Riot, I… I’m so happy you think he’s an amazing hero, too!”

           Mina tumbled off the couch, landing hard on her face. She wasn’t alone with her pain, Hanta’s arms thrown haphazardly into air and smacking Denki. Immediately Denki responded by shocking him, Hanta yelping. Katsuki tugged on his hair; explosions trailing, mini fireworks as sweat jumped off his body.

           Seeing this disappointed Eijiro, his theory rejected. Worse, he’s alone in not understanding what DynaRiot meant. Group reactions expressed how everyone knew except him. Eijiro hated being left out of the loop.

           “Kiri…” Mina frowned at him, pity wounding.

           He shook his head, discarding the previous assumption. If not a hero name, then… “What we’ll call our agency?” he tried, “After we graduate?”

           “Shitty hair…” Katsuki dragged a hand down his face, familiar aggravation returning, “You can stop guessing. Seriously, you’re reading too much into it! It was dumb, and I should never have -”

           “No! No, I can – give me another chance Bakugo! Please!”

           “No!”

                                           💥💥💥💥💥💥

           Mina crawled over towards Denki and Hanta, groaning. “I can’t believe Kiri’s this dense.” She glanced at her friends, both boys oblivious about how much noise they made. Eijiro’s voice rose, matching Katsuki’s. Katsuki, creating competitions wherever he can, shouted louder. They disturbed the calm atmosphere within their dorms, attracting other classmates to their spectacle.

           “Are you?” Hanta chuckled, “This is the same Kirishima who thought Bakugo’s confession was a sign he had a concussion.”

           “To be fair,” Denki defended Eijiro, “Bakugo did look like he was having a stroke during that.”

           “Maybe an allergic reaction, at best.”

           Sighing, Mina rolled onto her back. “This is getting tiring, though. I mean – DynaRiot? He literally spelled it out for him. What will it take for them to get together already?” An explosion rocked the room, bits of ceiling debris falling. Mina growled and wiped it off her face. Turning, she listened to Eijiro and Katsuki’s argument again –

           “What’s so important about DynaRiot that you don’t want to tell me? Is it a code! Do you think I should change my name?”

           “If you don’t shut up, I swear I’m – no level of Unbreakable will save you from shattering under my fists!”

           “Tell me, please!”

           Mina choked on a sob seeing how their foreheads touched, noses pressed tight, with lips inches apart. Though she knew neither will take the initiative, closing that distance. Katsuki doubtful of Eijiro’s feelings. Eijiro unaware that he loved his hot-headed best friend.

           Criminally, DynaRiot only existed on the page.

           But if her prayers were answered, that wouldn’t be the case for long.

[bang-to-the-tan]

Moth to Flame

Chapter 14

Reader x OT7

► Vampire!AU

Smut/Porn With Some Plot

Warnings: Mentions of Violence, Mentions of Anal Sex, Slight Stockholm Syndrome?, Possessiveness, Vampires (Biting, Blood-Sucking, Reference to Death), Language

↳ Summary: Robbed of your memories and intended as a birthday present for a deadly creature of the night, you unwittingly become the center of a territorial dispute between two covens of vampires. Tensions are rising and the brothers are getting hungry…

Previous   Masterlist          Next

“And how are we doing today?”

You hum into your coffee with a grimace, eyes not straying from the television. 

Hoseok somehow takes your grim silence as an invitation to get closer, vaulting himself over the edge of the couch and plopping down beside you with a deep noise of personal satisfaction. A sharp breath of pain leaves your throat when the bounce jostles you, your legs, your abused holes. 

“Sorry,” he adds, quick, and you almost believe him. When you throw a tired look his way, he’s got this weird half-smile on, lips stretched straight across his face. It pushes his cheeks up into his eyes. When your gazes meet, he waggles his brows at you. It’s so close to cute, but you aren’t in the mood. “How are you feeling?”

“Are you going to keep asking me that until I answer?” you mutter, turning back to the tv. 

“Yeah, probably.”

“I’m feeling shitty.” 

“How’s your ass?”

“Feels shitty.”

“Yoongi really gave it to you yesterday.”

“He did indeed.” You take another careless sip of your coffee. This morning, you managed to complain loud enough to Namjoon that he went and got you milk and sugar for it before he left to go and do his mysterious ‘vampire stuff’. It’s still way too strong, but at least palatable. You even had a croissant when you got up—real food. Not exactly a king’s breakfast, but something. He promised to fill the cupboards for you when he got back, and you intend to keep him to it.  

“When is it my turn?” 

“We aren’t taking turns.”

“Weird, that’s not what you said yesterday.”

“Can I help you Hoseok? I’m trying to watch my show.”

There’s a pause. 

“Animal planet?” 

“I like the little furry things.”

“Same.”

“I’m not talking about genitals.”

“Oh. Then I take it back.” 

Silence sinks back in and you go back to absently imagining throttling him, half-listening to the narrator talk ceaselessly about mongoose. Mongeese? The little guy on the screen takes down a snake and damn near bites its head off. Wouldn’t it be cool if you had sharp little teeth and quick reflexes like that? Not sure the ego trip is worth it, though. Present company very much included.

“You aren’t getting rid of me today.” Oh, good. He’s decided to continue talking. 

“Am I not?”

“No yoga studio today. Joon’s going looking for covens. Even Yoongi’s headed out. It’ll just be you and me.”

“Oh, good. Just what I wanted.”

Hoseok chuckles, the sound far too low in his chest. “I know it is.” 

“No fucking today, Hoseok,” you throw pleading, exasperated look at him, shoulders sagging. “Come on, I’m seriously hurting.”

He raises his hands, palms forward, in a sign of surrender. He makes an expression that’s all innocence, wrongfully accused. “I’m just teasing you, pretty girl. It’s okay. We won’t do anything. If you wanna chill and watch your boring animal planet, that is all you’ll do.” 

Uh-huh. Right. 

“I’ll tell Namjoon.” You threaten. 

“Ooooh. Wouldn’t wanna get in trouble with the boss.”

“No, you wouldn’t.”

“Hey.” Yoongi’s deep drawl comes from behind the sofa. You pay no mind to the shiver that slinks down your frame at just the sound of his voice. “I’m going out.”

“Hey.” you and Hoseok echo at the same time. 

“Did a good job on the couch,” Hoseok pipes up, cheerful. “Can’t even really tell there was a foursome on it 24 hours ago. Mostly.”

“Thanks.” 

You don’t hear him moving. Is he watching the show with you? You can’t tell. What do you suppose Yoongi’s opinion of mongoose is? Are?

“Hey,” he says again, quieter. 

“Hey?” you mumble, sensing that he might be addressing you.

“I...I’m sorry. For yesterday.”

“Sorry about fucking your ass like a maniac,” Hoseok clarifies helpfully. “Imagine that on a card.”

Yoongi ignores him. “I’m gonna go...try and get something to eat. I’m sorry...for what I said.” He draws a breath through his teeth. “Threatening.” 

“...it’s okay.” you say after a beat. 

“I’m sorry for the other things I said, too. Calling you stuff.”

“It’s fine, Yoongi.” It isn’t fine, not really. You aren’t sure how you feel about being called a slut when they’re no better, but the threatening to kill you feels like it should be crossing a very specific line. On the other hand...you can’t shake the sense that he’s being honest. Like he’s actually sorry. You won’t look at him, though. You know exactly what kind of look he has on his face. The kind of deeply hungry look etched into his very skin. And if he’s any worse off than he was yesterday, you aren’t sure either of you would survive if you made eye contact. 

Out of the corner of your vision, you catch movement. A long, veiny hand, hovering over the couch. You’re afraid for a moment that it might be reaching for you, but instead, he drifts towards Hoseok’s shoulder. It hesitates, as if waiting for a reprimand, but eventually touches down and curls faintly, familiarly. 

“Sorry for hazing you, Hope.”

Hoseok snorts. But his tone is genuine as you’ve ever heard him. “It’s alright. I know you aren’t okay.”

“I mean it.” He's oddly insistent. “I won’t do it again without permission.” 

Hoseok nods, pouting absently. “‘Kay.” 

Yoongi’s hand lingers before it slips off, and you aren’t sure what, exactly, sort of vibe is filling the atmosphere. 

“Good luck,” Hoseok adds, oddly gentle.  

“Thanks.” You can hear him travelling down the hallway to the front door. He has a habit of dragging his feet. The door is, by comparison, almost unbearably loud, and when it shuts, it shuts everything into a muted silence.

There’s a blissful quiet, but you can tell that Hoseok isn’t the kind of person to stay quiet for very long. He starts twitching, sniffing, scratching his neck, trying and failing to feign interest in your show.

“Heard you met Jackson.”

There it is. It’s begun. You resist the urge to sigh. “Yep.” 

“What did you think about Yugyeom?” 

“Who?”

“The baby of the coven. Sweet kid.”

“I didn’t meet any of the others.”

“Oh.”

Again, a silence settles between you. The mongoose on screen darts furiously, little legs spurring it over terrain with that kind of desperation that small animals are so good at. 

“Mark’s nice, too.”

“Do you really have nothing better to do?” You crane to peer at him in exasperation, brow furrowed. 

“I want to hang out with you.” Funny, considering he isn’t looking you in the eye. 

“We haven’t interacted at all unless it was for sex.”

“I know!” He throws up his hands, flopping backwards dramatically. “That’s the thing! But Namjoon seems to be really caught up in you. I’m curious, okay?” 

“I don’t know what to tell you but all you’re doing is making things awkward.”

“No.” There’s a weird tone in his voice that convinces you to look back to him. His grin has disappeared, and when he shrugs, it’s heavy, like the world is up there. “No, I don’t have anything better to do. And, I...honestly, not to be mean, but I can’t stand animal planet, alright?”

“What psycho doesn't like animals?”

“Animals are fine, it’s not the animals, just—like, okay, I get it!” He waves at the screen. “He’s really fast and he’s gonna eat smaller things and something bigger is probably gonna eat him. I get it. Once you’ve watched one, you’ve watched all of them.”

“What would you rather do, then, huh?”

“Anything! Let’s go out.”

“I’m not leaving this couch. I cannot walk.”

“We can do anything else. Anything.”

“What if I don’t want to do something with you?”

“Sheesh, I just want to get to know you.”

“I don’t know you!” you burst, throwing your own hands ceiling ward, rolling your eyes. “I don’t know any of you! I don’t know me! So sorry not sorry, it’s tough that you’re bored, but what I wanna do is sit here and watch animal planet until my taint stops fucking hurting!”

“Do you want to?” 

“Do I want to what.”

“Know me. I don’t mind talking about it.”

“You don’t seem to mind talking, full stop.”

“You aren’t wrong,” he adds, “Anything to distract from animal planet. Anything.”

“Alright, fine.” you lean back with a huff, rolling your eyes. “Tell me your story, Hoseok. Animal planet stays on during.”

“Poor family.” he starts off much less dramatically than you’d have thought he would, just diving right into it. “Really poor. Dirt poor. Ma and Pa worked triple, just to keep food on the table. Me and my sister worked too, soon as we could, delivering papers and stuff.”

“...You have a sister?” 

“Don’t interrupt.”

“Sorry.”

“Yeah.” You can hear the shuffle of the fabric, feel the displacement as he moves to copy you, sinking further into the sofa’s cushions. “I did. I got really into music, too. Music, y’know, it doesn’t care, where you’re from. What you know, who you know. Started making it. Shitty stuff, really bad.” 

“How bad?”

“Incredibly bad.”

“I believe it.”

“Don’t be rude.”

You shrug, watching a mole dig a hole and wiggle into it with a faint feeling of jealousy. “Beginners are bad.”

“Yeah, well. I got better. Once Yoongi and I met...I mean—”

You crane your head, throwing him a surprised raise of your brows. “You knew each other? Like before?”

The dark expression that flits across his face reminds you of who he is. Who he’s been to you, regardless of the person he’s talking about now. His grin isn’t friendly. “What did I say about interrupting?” he muses, low, but he cocks his head and returns his empty stare to the television. “It was like magic. He could write like the devil, make all these tracks that made you feel things...He was a music god and I prayed in his church every day I could.” 

“So the…” you make fangs on either side of your mouth with your fingers. He pretends he doesn’t see you. 

“I don’t know where he got it. He said he knew a way to the top. He said...we’d never die.” Here, he chuckles, but like the smile, there’s no warmth in it. “I thought he meant by being famous. Y’know, like a sane person.”

“Yoongi changed you?”

“Yeah. He did.”  

Hoseok shifts on the couch again, his gaze turning into thoughtful as he reminisces. The light of the television plays off his hair, his fine cheekbones and long eyelashes. You think briefly of how that must have looked. A different version of him. A hardworking boy promised a way up through the rungs of his passion. He’s kind of understandable when you think of him that way. Doesn’t excuse his behavior, in your opinion. But understandable.

“We fell out for a while. My family grew old without me. I went to my mom’s funeral in a disguise. My sister...I mean, by the end, she didn’t even recognize me.”

“...I’m sorry.”

He shrugs. “It’s how things are supposed to be. I’m just not...supposed to be stuck for them. I’m supposed to go through them too. But he was still there for me. And eventually I came back to him. Scared of being alone, I guess. Together, we met Jin and Namjoon. And that’s...I mean, that’s pretty much it.” 

The tv switches to a commercial break, and above the glare of super-powered objects that will surely change your life for the better, the shouting people telling you exactly what you’re missing, you finally enjoy a pause of real silence that lasts longer than two minutes. Hoseok seems to have fallen out of whatever chatty mood had spurred this impromptu baring of his soul, but you aren’t sure, now that you have it, whether you preferred it when he was talking. The commercial break turns to a news report and suddenly Jin’s face is appearing on the screen, handsome eyes dark and expression serious. Suit sharp, hands clasped businesslike on the table in front of him. He’s reporting on this and that, talking about celebrities you don’t know, people in offices of power that you don’t remember. None of it particularly interests either of you as far as you can tell. Neither of you really belongs here anyways.

Until a picture flashes on the screen that you immediately recognize. 

“Oh shit.” Hoseok exhales sharply next to you. You’re inclined to agree with him. 

It’s you. Standing next to Namjoon in his hoodie and Yoongi’s sweatpants, scarf wrapped carelessly about your shoulders. It’s a little blurry, but there’s no mistaking either of you, even with Namjoon halfway turned away from the camera. Ahead, the sharp lights of the store, and all around you the racks of reasonably priced outfits.

“In other news, we’ve received an anonymous tip about the whereabouts of a local wanted criminal—” Oops, you’re having a really hard time breathing. Local wanted criminal? Namjoon. Oh, fuck. “—posted on social media, with the comment, quote, ‘look at that guy—”

Hoseok moves, scrambling for his phone stashed away in his back pocket, brow furrowed. 

Those kids. Those teens. Oh, shit. 

“—do not try to engage, and instead call law enforcement with the street address—”

How can Jin stay so calm, ratting his brother out like that? You scrutinize his face in shock, looking for some indication, some way out. But he only continues on, steely, unmoved.

“—for her involvement in the riots that have been plaguing—”

Wait. 

Did he say “her”?...

“Namjoon,” Hoseok says from next to you. He must have gotten his phone out, punched in the numbers to connect him to the other man. “Yeah, uh, everything’s okay with us, but...” 

Another picture flashes on the screen. 

It’s you again. 

But this time, it’s a mugshot. Your hair’s wild. Your makeup is smeared. And there’s a look in your eyes you don’t remember ever wearing in your life. But it’s you. You see that face in the mirror as often as you can bear it. 

“—while authorities confirm, and continue the search for the suspect.” 

“Again, if you see this woman, do not engage. Report to your nearest law enforcement office as soon as you can. Stay safe.” Jin finishes.

“Namjoon, I think we have a problem.” 

Previous   Masterlist          Next

[soveryanon]

Reviewing time for MAG183!

- I’m not sure I can manage to put it into words quite right but: sounds-wise, this episode’s domain didn’t feel mind-blowingly new, it wasn’t something that felt “Oh! I’ve never heard something like this before!”? But the echoes, grinding and scratching were timed so well, giving so much strength and gravitas to the conversations, that it perfectly scratched an itch. I could hear that there was something close to Jon and Martin, that it was big, and mostly deserted, that it stood eerily in the overall wasteland, that they were two people alone against a whole world, a whole machine with gears and a mechanism ready to crush anyone?

- I LIVE for artist!Martin giving his commentary and overall throwing shade at the Fears’ taking of artistic licence liberties:

(MAG183) MARTIN: Oh, bugger off! ARCHIVIST: Everything all right? MARTIN: Oh, no, what e–, what e–, what even is that? It, it’s like Escher ate a bad cathedral and threw up everywhere.

He had shown interest in the Stranger’s carousel upon learning that the statements had been a poem, but shots fired for that tower, uh.

- Jon and Martin were so cute starting the episode! Their quick banter was adorable!

(MAG183) ARCHIVIST: It’s a building. A tower. … In a sense. MARTIN: Oh yeah? A–and what sense might that be? ARCHIVIST: [FAINTLY OMINOUS] … The Tarot sense. MARTIN: [SPLUTTERS WITH LAUGHTER] Really? ARCHIVIST: Wha–? No? Sorry, it… felt like a good line…! MARTIN: No, no, it was, I just… I dunno, I… [FOND EXHALE] You did the look, and…! It’s fine, sorry.

Martin being IN LOVE and appreciating Jon’s cuteness! The return of Jon showing that he’s an occult/horror nerd! We had seen in season 2 that he was generally very knowledgeable about anything related to the supernatural, and in season 4 that he was into Neil Lagorio’s movies, I’m happy to get another trace of it!

(MAG076) MELANIE: So I came here to dig a bit deeper. ARCHIVIST: Really? Our… our library is extensive, but it’s hardly focused on the Second World War. MELANIE: No, but the most detailed description of the crash that I could find came from the report of a man called William W. Hay. And later in life William Hay… ARCHIVIST: Became a noted occultist, whose memoirs and researches were only ever published in a heavily edited form. And we have unexpurgated copies. MELANIE: Exactly.

(MAG136) ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] Statement ends. Hm. Neil Lagorio… You ever see any of his work? DAISY: No. Not really into films. ARCHIVIST: Oh, they were… Well, let’s just say that it’s not a complete shock there was something unnatural to them. Didn’t know we had copies in the Institute, though; let alone original cuts. [CHUCKLE] Records indicate they [PAPER RUSTLING] ended up in… Artefact Storage. DAISY: Probably best that they stay there. ARCHIVIST: … Yeah. Yes, of course.

But SOB x2 since:

* Tower-in-the-tarot-sense meaning ominous stuff… and change. (While Jon knew they would soon come face to face with the choice to take the route through Martin’s domain.)

* Crying over the fact that we’ve seen and learned quite a few outside-of-the-job aspects of Jon this season, comparatively to the previous ones? He’s cute! He’s making jokes! He mentioned his student days a bit in MAG165, and visiting Upton House as a kid in MAG180! And this is happening when the world has been forked over and Jon&Martin certainly won’t survive together past MAG200, which means they have at most seventeen episodes together remaining. Martin, and we alongside him, are seeing so many different, more casual aspects of Jon, and it’s at the end of things…

- I really like how information bounced around in this episode? It felt even more dynamic than usual, quickly shifting depending on some reaction, or going from an association to another:

(MAG183) MARTIN: What, what’s the deal, though? Parts of it almost look like– ARCHIVIST: The Institute. MARTIN: Yeah…! ARCHIVIST: Yes. [INHALE] It makes sense, after all it was… built on the ruins of what Robert Smirke constructed…! MARTIN: Smirke? … What, no! But, but, surely he’s– ARCHIVIST: Dead, yeah, I mean, yes. [CHUCKLING] Very much so! This place is… an homage, shall we say. A monument. To him, and those like him, who tried to… categorise the world with themselves at the centre. In so doing, constructed the architecture of its suffering…!

Ohohoh about Martin feeling like the tower looked a bit like the Institute, and Jon drawing similarities through Smirke – the Institute being built on the ruins of a Smirke building, and the current domain being dedicated to people like him. The Institute is coming closer and weighing on their minds, isn’t it? I really like that Martin immediately worried about Smirke potentially being alive-ish, since:

(MAG138) MARTIN: “The Eye has marked me for something, of this I have no doubt. My… humble hope is that it may be a swift death, an accidental effect of your own researches, which I once again implore you to abandon. It is likely too late for me, but I will not…” [PAPER RUSTLE] Uh… [INHALE] The, hum… The letter ends there. Uh… Ap–apparently Robert Smirke was found collapsed in his study that evening, dead of, uh… [FLIPPING THROUGH PAPERS] Apoplexy. Mm. I–I don’t know how the letter reached the Archives, I mean… Well, I can guess, but…

… he had read Smirke’s last words before he died. (But Martin has seen enough by now to know that there is always a risk for people to not have actually died; on that front, we’re safe, Jon confirmed! Loving Jon’s chuckle: ah yeah, no, Smirke, “very much so” dead from Jonah.)

(Also loved the “[those] who tried to categorise the world with themselves at the centre” shade: yep! That’s West-Eurocentrism and Smirke’s little gang for you!)

- About the way the world works now since the Change, I’m curious about Jon’s wording as “the architecture of [the world’s] suffering”, since it’s echoing the title of Smirke’s statement, “The Architecture of Fear”: my understanding is that right now, the world is mostly running on a loop of people’s fears => feeding and shaping the landscape => which hurts people by turning those realised fears against them => squeezing the fear out of them => feeding the landscape, etc.

What is quite curious is the status of Smirke’s taxonomy in the current world. Jon went off on a rant about how Smirke and people who attempted to classify had been wrong all along because it was meant to fail… while he himself has persistently been using the very same classifications during this very season:

(MAG166) ARCHIVIST: Look, we can talk about it later, we’re– coming to a… “domain of The Buried”, and [STATIC RISES] I would really rather… […] God, I hate The Buried. [DEEP BREATHS] … End recording.

(MAG172) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] “Knowing”, “seeing”… i–it’s not the same thing as… understanding. Every time I try to know what The Web’s plan is, if it can even be called a plan, I see… a hundred thousand events and causes and links, an impossibly intricate pattern of consequences and subtle nudges, but I–I can’t…! … I can’t hold them all in my head at the same time. There’s no way to see the “whole”, the, the point of it all. I can see all the details, but it doesn’t… provide… context or… intention. I suppose The Web doesn’t work in knowledge, not in the same way.

(MAG173) MARTIN: That’s the avatar for this place? ARCHIVIST: Callum Brodie, thirteen years old. He guides the children through their fears of The Dark.

(MAG174) ARCHIVIST: I’m not entirely sure what you were expecting, it’s The Vast. The clue is in the name! MARTIN: Yes, all right…!

(MAG176) MARTIN: … Besides, I thought The Hunt was meant to make you go faster. ARCHIVIST: Depends on the type of pursuit. [INHALE] Besides, the chase isn’t… really the point of this particular place.

(MAG177) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] Bad therapists. Let’s just say it’s the fear of bad therapists, filtered through The Spiral. BASIRA: That’s… a lot more nuance than I’ve gotten used to since everything went wrong. ARCHIVIST: Yes, well. The Spiral is nothing if not insidious. […] You just heard what The Spiral does to people, you can’t… trust her.

“constructed the architecture of [the world’s] suffering” kind of implies that they did manage something, even if it doomed the world? Is it specifically about Jonah using the division into 14 in his incantation? We’ve seen that that one had limitations, since The Extinction also got there anyway… But at the same time, true that at this point, we would still force-apply Smirke’s labels to anything anyway.

- Loved Jon sounding awfully pedantic and (fake-)poetic at the same time:

(MAG183) MARTIN: [SIGH] Bit of a mouthful. ARCHIVIST: Would you prefer I described it as a… “cascading recursion of shifting arrogance and hubristic dead-ends”? [STATIC RISES] [THE DOOR CREAKS OPEN] [CONSTANT HIGH-PITCHED FREQUENCY] HELEN: I would. [FOOTSTEPS] [THE DOOR SHUTS] [STATIC FADES] MARTIN: [SIGH] Hello, Helen.

AND HELEN HAVING THE BEST ENTRANCES. It also cleared up something for me (unless I had already realised it and forgot about it since then): the high-pitched sound we hear when she’s around is the mark of Helen and Michael, not of the corridors – if the door is open or characters are inside of the hallways, we’ll hear some of the usual crackling static, but we heard it rise when Helen arrived and fade when the door shut behind her (and same thing with her departure, it was briefly heard when she opened the door).

- Shots fired, MARTIN PLEASE:

(MAG183) MARTIN: [SIGH] Hello, Helen. Might have guessed you’d be into weird architecture. Very much your area of expertise, no? HELEN: Hmm, depends! Would you describe “petulant poet” as your area of expertise? I am weird architecture.

And Helen went equally incisive on that one, but also UUUUUH WAS IT A SPECIFIC REFERENCE TO PETER’S COMMENT ABOUT MARTIN…

(MAG158) MARTIN: I’m… saying no. I refuse! Game over. [KNIFE CLATTERING ON THE GROUND] PETER: Martin, this is not the time for petulance; there are bigger things at stake, here.

This was the only time someone referred to Martin as (acting) petulant… I mean, Helen not missing one second of MAG158 wouldn’t be surprising (she did tell Jon at the end of MAG157 that she would be enjoying the show), but ;; Little chilling when remembering Elias-Peter-Martin in the Panopticon and Martin refusing to kill Jonah there…

- I was right to suspect that Helen might have been unable to know where Jon&Martin were over their stay at Upton House, and that she wouldn’t be pleased about it!

(MAG183) HELEN: Anyway, where have you been? I’ve been looking for you, but you both just vanished. ARCHIVIST: Aaah… Right, I see…! HELEN: I was so looking forward to catching up after that whole Basira and Daisy thing, but then, pfft! You both disappear. I’d be very keen to know how you managed that little trick. MARTIN: Why, it caught us by surprise too, I mean, we, we actually ended– ARCHIVIST: [FIRMLY] We found somewhere to rest. That’s all. MARTIN: … Oh, yeah. Ah, yes, hm. HELEN: Fine. Be like that. I can appreciate the particular pleasure of a kept secret. ARCHIVIST: I’m sure you can.

* Salesa’s zone seems to be protected as long as you don’t physically find it? I wonder how Annabelle managed to find it, still, since Jon only become aware of that blind spot when they arrived nearby; how did she become aware of it in the first place? Did it feel like a hole in the world’s web?

* Awww for Jon keeping the secret and conveying to Martin that they should keep quiet about it ;w;

* AHAHAHHAHA for Jon’s “aaah”, which was absolutely a mischievous grandpa sound. Jon ready to cause trouble, with a smug smile on his face.

- … I love how Helen could observe that the dynamic of the exchange was slipping out of her control (Jon&Martin knew something that she didn’t, didn’t feel threatened by her, and Jon was amused to keep it out of her reach) and immediately tried to go for the throat again:

(MAG183) HELEN: Anyway. Such a shame about Basira and Daisy. I was really rooting for them to make up. MARTIN: [SPLUTTERS] Since when? What happened to– I mean, how did you put it… a, “a quick shot to the back of her head, and then back in time for tea”, or whatever?

Martin: Forgive and forget? NO, RESENT AND REMEMBER AHAHAHAHAH.

Direct reference to the fact that Helen indeed ~offered her door to Basira~ to quickly get to Daisy and execute her:

(MAG177) HELEN: I can offer a shortcut. Take you right to that murder machine you call a partner. MARTIN: Basira… Jon can’t go through Helen’s doors, we, we couldn’t come with you. HELEN: Basira is a strong, independent woman. She doesn’t need you two holding her hand. Anyway, it’ll be dead quick. Two minutes, door-to-door, quick shot to the back of Daisy’s head, and we’ll be home before you know it!

Laughing that Martin added the tea mention (Martin, you single-track minded tea-aficionado), but I’m glad that he remembered it full well to throw it in her face; it wasn’t even a personal attack towards Martin, it was something Helen tried to do to Basira, I’m glad that Martin is still absolutely offended about it ;w;

- I felt like Jon and Helen had two definitions of “what we want”: Helen potentially talking about quick, short-term wants (even if they turn out to be self-destructive), while Jon was more about well-thought decisions and choices?

(MAG183) HELEN: [EXASPERATED SIGH] Oh, give over. I was obviously just prodding her, trying to make a point. She didn’t want to kill her. ARCHIVIST: What we want doesn’t matter much these days. HELEN: Oh, [RASPBERRY NOISE], nonsense. What we want is the only thing that matters these days. And Basira wanted to join Daisy. ARCHIVIST: She made her choice. HELEN: With your assistance. ARCHIVIST: It was still her choice. HELEN: [SIGH] What a waste. ARCHIVIST: No. [INHALE] It wasn’t.

There have been a lot of discussions about “choices” and “wants” throughout the series (with big moments in MAG092, MAG117 and MAG147), so it felt a bit nice that Jon seems to have reached a point where he could draw a line between both? Jon, Martin and Basira didn’t want this world, don’t want the way it operates and what it inflicts on them; it doesn’t mean they can’t weigh options and make specific decisions – Basira, to honour her promise to Daisy and kill the monster she had become; Jon, to not smite for revenge (and Martin, to face his own domain).

I LOVE HOW JON WAS FIRM ABOUT BASIRA’S CHOICE MATTERING ;w; It once again reminds me of Martin’s line to Simon: “I think our experience of the universe has value. Even if it disappears forever.” (MAG151); the little things, the individual existences and choices, their own stories, still having value in the expanse of the universe…

- Martin! It’s a delight to see him so firm, having faith in Basira although he’s been so worried for her:

(MAG179) ARCHIVIST: Martin, this is what she needs. MARTIN: No, no! I–it’s…! BASIRA: It’ll… MARTIN: It’s completely– […] … We’re not doing this. BASIRA: [SOFTLY] Martin. Please. [SILENCE] MARTIN: … [SIGH] You’d better look after yourself. BASIRA: I will.

(MAG180) ARCHIVIST: How are you doing? About… MARTIN: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I’m… I don’t know. I’m–I’m not sure how to feel; just… pressing on, you know? ARCHIVIST: I do. [SILENCE] MARTIN: Do you think she’ll be okay without us? ARCHIVIST: Oh, she’s made it this far. MARTIN: … Yeah. I just worry.

(MAG183) MARTIN: Basira is… She’s going to be okay.

And then pointing out that he was involved in the discussion too and that he wanted to know what the other two knew already and not be kept out of the loop:

(MAG183) HELEN: Oh. Is she? Do you want me to tell you what she’s been up to while you were “resting”? Where she is right now? ARCHIVIST: You don’t need to. I already know. MARTIN: I don’t. [STATIC RISES] ARCHIVIST: She’s currently moving through, uh… “The Void.” [STATIC FADES] Hungry shadows drifting in the dark. She’s been there a long time now, struggling to find the path. MARTIN: But she will? ARCHIVIST: I think so. HELEN: Yeah, she does always seem to manage, doesn’t she? It’s impressive. Although a little bit… tempting at times.

I’m not absoooolutely sure about Basira’s status: is “the void” a space between domains, or is it a Dark domain that Basira is having trouble finding the exit of, since unlike Jon, she can’t just “know” the paths? I suspect the latter but I’m not 100% certain. If it’s indeed The Dark, that’s a close to home one for her, since she had a few brushes with it over the course of the show – the Section 31 expedition to save Callum Brodie, leading to Rayner’s death and Basira’s decision to quit the police, her research to find out more about the People’s Church of the Divine Host (as shown in season 3) and her overall worry about them, which allowed Elias to convince her that they would attempt another ritual in Ny-Ålesund, leading to her discovering what “Rayner” was and travelling there with Jon, finding Manuela and the Dark Sun mid-season 4…

;ww; for Jon having faith in Basira, too… And the fact that once again, Basira has it a bit rougher than Jon&Martin (Jon had already told Martin that it had been a difficult journey for her, before they reunited). Helen does have a point that Basira seems to manage to find her way out in general: she had successfully escaped The Unknowing on her own, she had survived The Flesh’s attack on the Institute, she had pursued Daisy in the apocalypse… Basira has already gone through Helen’s corridors (offscreen at the end of MAG143, to return to the Institute), I’m YIKES about Helen implying that it would be “tempting” to grab her. (… But at the same time, why hasn’t she done it already, if she is capable of doing it? It might be a bit more complicated than that?)

- … I love Martin, I love that he was RIGHT to point out that Helen had just waltzed in to try and steer chaos:

(MAG183) MARTIN: Look, Helen, what do you even want? Okay, you keep turning up like a bad penny and, honestly, it, it seems like it’s… it’s just to be a dick! HELEN: Gasp! I am trying to be friends, Martin. Forever is a long time. And I occasionally like to have some company that isn’t… screaming. MARTIN: … What do you even think friendship is? HELEN: I dunno, do I? The only personhood I have is from someone I ate.

It feels like Helen has REALLY tried hard to make up for the weeks(?) she couldn’t find Jon and Martin? She went extra-hard on them: first with Basira, then implying to Jon that he had manipulated her into killing Daisy, then pointing out that Basira was not safe at the moment and still at risk of falling prey to other Fears (including herself), then trying to mock Martin about his domain, trying to guilt-trip Jon for not having told him about it yet, and when she finally managed to get Martin shocked and upset… job done, byebye.

Is it that she’s trying to get Jon so riled up he ends her? “Helen” used to like Jon and to turn to him (MAG101: “Helen liked you so… there’s a lot to consider. But I will help you leave.” / MAG115: “Before, talking to you made Helen feel better.”), before she was absolutely Down With Doors And Murders (MAG146: “We do what we need to do when it comes to feeding, don’t we? … Don’t we, Archivist?”), is it a remnant of that? Or is it really just an attempt at confusing Jon and Martin further, feeding from them Spiral-style?

- More about Martin’s domain later, but the reveal was BRUTAL, and yet not coming out of nowhere; we knew he had one, we knew he had almost been trapped in the Lonely house in MAG170 and the question was whether or not it had been (/was still) his domain once Martin got freed from it, but there was also the question of how Martin was able to walk in the apocalypse unharmed (was it due to Jon’s proximity, Martin’s connection to The Eye as an assistant, etc.), and Basira’s own status after Daisy’s death… so, yay! Answers and clarifications, and as usual, nothing feeling like a plot-twist, just things that make sense, and that we already had most of the information about!

(MAG183) ARCHIVIST: Martin… MARTIN: Are there people, Jon? ARCHIVIST: What? MARTIN: Are there people in my domain? ARCHIVIST: Not many. [SILENCE] MARTIN: Do you need to do your… your thing? Make a statement about whatever’s going on in there? … I could use a moment to think. ARCHIVIST: Sure thing. Yeah, I–I’ll… [INHALE] Yeah. [EXHALE] [BAG JOSTLING] [DEPARTING FOOTSTEPS]

Sobbing a bit about Martin’s priorities (“Are there people, Jon?”) and Martin asking for a quick me-time. It wasn’t ice-cold, Martin turned it into something useful for both of them (expecting that Jon would have to give his statement anyway), but aouch, he sounded absolutely shattered inside while blank on the surface…

- Yes, yes, yes, reminder that Smirke’s categorisation is arbitrary and just like the Doctor’s theory, sometimes just doesn’t work, because it’s trying to force-apply rules and a classification over something that resists it (and because the classification is not perfect from the start), but hey, that’s most theories and classifications out there anyway, so: Escher reference, the functioning of the Tower reminding me of the Great Twisting, and the reasonings sometimes reminding me of Gabriel’s work (MAG126), plus Helen popping by – it was Spiral stuff, right?

Well! I felt like it looks like Spiral, but the Doctor’s fears by themselves:

(MAG183) ARCHIVIST: “But it is not the fall that terrifies him, not the pain of the impacts, but the fact that none of them should be there. That it doesn’t make sense, and it must make sense, there must be a system, there must be, because if there isn’t– [THE BODY LANDS WETLY] He lands with a heavy smack onto rough limestone, and lies still, his body twisted and broken. He knows it will knit itself back together, slowly, painfully, as it always has before. But the thought of starting over, of composing yet another theory, fills him with a deep dread.”

… are more something I would identify as Eye (fear of a truth) and Hunt (fear of having to return to the start, to have to elaborate a new theory from scratch, again and again, of being trapped forever)?

It was really reminiscent of Smirke thinking back over his life, his hubris and the pride of being the one who would have found the answer, to the point where he would reject reality if it didn’t match his taxonomy (refusing to, well… do what you do with a theory: change, or evolve and perfect it when its flaws are pointed out):

(MAG138, Robert Smirke) “I believed then, as I still believe now, that these places I saw were the Powers themselves, expressed in their truest form, far more entirely than any ‘secret book’ can claim. And if, as I came to believe, the Dread Powers were themselves places of a sort, then surely with the right space, the right architecture, they could be contained. Channelled. Harnessed. So yes. Hubris. Not simply in that, I suppose, but in believing that those I brought into my confidence shared my lofty goals. […] Would you have me separate The Corruption between insects, dirt and disease? To, to divide the fungal bloom from the maggot? No. No, I… stand by my work. And thus, we must conclude that the only explanation is a new Power, created from what was once others, yet also distinct. And if such change is possible, how then can any “true balance” be achieved through immutable, unchanging stone…?”

(MAG183) ARCHIVIST: “If they are feeling very confident, they may lean down and stretch a curious tongue beyond their chipped teeth and rotten gums, desperate to add another sense to their observances – more evidence to support their declaration of what the world must be. […] They must simply study and learn, if they are to escape the labyrinth. They will be the first to escape. The one who sits in the central chamber cannot remember his name. But he knows that people called him “doctor”. He made sure of that; to ignore it would have been the greatest disrespect, and he will not be disrespected. […] He knows, for a fact, that this is the central chamber because he is the one sat here. […] They’ll all remember him forever, the first to escape the Monument. His name will be hallowed with the greats: Doctor, uh… Doctor…”

Same old pride, Leitner knew that well too (MAG080: “But I think, in my heart, I dreamed of my work becoming known. That ‘The Library of Jurgen Leitner’ would stand as a symbol of courage and protection. Hubris.”) and Gerry didn’t have many nice things to say about it (MAG111: “Flamsteed, Smirke, Leitner. Idiots who destroyed themselves chasing a secret that wasn’t worth knowing.”). Loved how the statements came for Smirke’s life and was absolutely ruthless about it – but maayyybe a bit too ruthless, even? Jon didn’t express much sympathy for “fools like Smirke” either, and this is a rare case in season 5 where I find that the statement was a bit lacking in empathy for… people who were technically victims. I mean! Insufferable pedantic academics sure are a type, they’re really not having the worst life out there, but it makes me feel a bit weird, with season 5’s overall tone, that the episode had that vibe of “serves them well, they’re insufferable” about people who were technically still trapped in a domain and suffering from it?

… I still laughed a lot about the Doctor vs. Professor rivalry and how they solved their argument:

(MAG183) ARCHIVIST: “The doctor that lies on the floor has recovered, just enough to laugh. ‘You’re still working on mineral theory? How painfully outdated.’ A flash of genuine fear crosses the face of the professor at this dismissal, before he picks up his chunk of granite, and begins to smash the doctor’s head in, yet again.” [SOUNDS OF BRUTAL PEER REVIEW]

Academia unleashed.

(- OKAY, I HAVE TO CONFESS that when the character could only remember his title as “Doctor”, with Smirke having been mentioned earlier, my mind just jumped to Doctor Fanshawe… ;; He had left a strong impression on me, okay.)

- ;w; Over the fact that Martin got his me-time and that it was enough: he was clearly tense, but he came back with direct questions and knew what he wanted cleared up…

(MAG183) MARTIN: Finished? ARCHIVIST: Yes. MARTIN: Good. … I need you to explain something to me. ARCHIVIST: All right.

- I can’t believe that Martin Global Heartthrob Blackwood made The Eye FALL FOR HIM too:

(MAG183) MARTIN: How do I have a domain? That doesn’t make any sense. ARCHIVIST: It’s like I said. [INHALE] Everything here is either watcher, or watched. MARTIN: [SIGH] Subject or object, yes, I know, we’ve been over this. ARCHIVIST: Well, you’re a watcher, Martin. You worked for the Institute, you read statements, The Eye is… fond of you. You’re not getting thrown into your own personal hell, which means…

Jane, Peter, Simon, Elias, Salesa, Annabelle, now Beholding – do you have any limit, Martin.

!! I’m excited over the fact that Martin’s entanglement with Beholding stuff was acknowledged! Comparatively, Melanie had read 2 statements (MAG086, MAG106) and Basira 1 (MAG112). Meanwhile, Martin had read 12; plus, although Tim, Melanie, Martin and Basira had taken (… or tried to take) one live statement each in MAG100, Martin had also taken 3 additional full statements:

MAG084, Adrian Weiss (Corruption) MAG088, Enrique MacMillan (Buried) MAG090, Ross Davenport (Flesh) MAG095, Luca Moretti (Slaughter) MAG098, Doctor Algernon Moss (Dark) MAG100 (live), Lynne Hammond (Desolation) MAG104 (live), Tim Stoker (Stranger) MAG108, Adonis Biros (Lonely) MAG110, Alexia Crawley (Web) MAG134, Adelard Dekker (Extinction) MAG138, Robert Smirke (Eye) MAG142 (live), Jess Tyrell (Buried, Eye) MAG144, Gary Boylan (Extinction) MAG149, Judith O’Neill (Extinction) MAG151 (live), Simon Fairchild (Vast) MAG156, Adelard Dekker (Extinction)

With Simon highlighting that Beholding had compelled him through Martin:

(MAG151) SIMON: Hm! No wonder I’m so sympathetic to The Lonely. You know: this really is a place for self-discovery, isn’t it? [CHUCKLE] “Statement ends”, I suppose! MARTIN: Uh… I’m sorry? SIMON: Oh! Nothing, just my own hubris. I should have known. When I came here, I said to myself: “Simon,” I said, “you’re going to answer this young man’s questions, but you’re not going to give The Watcher a statement. You’re better than that.” But it’s a hard one to resist, isn’t it? You get in the flow of talking about yourself, and it all just… tumbles out. MARTIN: Mm, does seem like it.

Elias might have been eyeing him as back-up Archivist, too (although since then, we’ve learned of his bet with Peter which would have already been running at the time – it might have been that Elias mostly wanted to ensure that Martin wouldn’t die during the Unknowing because he’d be needing him afterwards):

(MAG116) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] What about Martin? MARTIN: What about me? ARCHIVIST: He should stay behind. MARTIN: What?! ELIAS: Really. MARTIN: Why? ARCHIVIST: Too many people might attract attention. MARTIN: No, no, I can help, I’ve been reading the statements! ELIAS: … Quite right, er, probably best he does stay behind. BASIRA: What, so you have a backup if Jon doesn’t make it? ELIAS: I’m sure that won’t be necessary.

Martin did a lot of research, read these statements aloud, took live statements, was hinted as a potential replacement; tape recorders have spawned around him like they do with Jon, even outside of statements, and Martin had been exceptionally kind towards them on multiple occasions; there had been that little moment of Martin somehow knowing that Jon was alive back in season 3 (MAG088: “It’s the not knowing, you know? I mean, Jon’s still alive. Not sure why, but I’m sure of that. But Sasha, I…”), shortly before we had learned about Jon’s own Knowing powers developing; we don’t know why and whether that was Beholding or The Web or something else, but Martin had been able to know how to get Jon out of the Coffin in season 4:

(MAG134) PETER: What does puzzle me, though, and I mean that genuinely, is… why you were piling tape recorders onto the coffin, while Jon was in there. [PAUSE] It’s a question, Martin, it’s– it’s not an accusation. MARTIN: I don’t know. And I just… felt like it might help. He’s always recording, I thought… it–it might help him… find his way out. PETER: Interesting. Were you compelled? MARTIN: [SULLEN] … I don’t know. … M–maybe? I–I, I definitely wanted to do it… PETER: But? MARTIN: I’m… I’m not sure where the idea came from. PETER: You should watch out for that. Could be something dangerous. MARTIN: Sure.

… And Peter’s whole plan relied on the fact that Martin was initially touched by Beholding:

(MAG134) PETER: [BREATHES] I’m still working out some of the kinks. But I believe I have a plan. However, it requires this place, and it requires someone touched by The Beholding. Elias was, perhaps unsurprisingly, unwilling to help.

(MAG158) PETER: It’s quite simple, really…! I want to use the powers of this place to learn about The Extinction: what it’s doing, where it’s manifesting. Then we can stop it. MARTIN: And you need me for this? PETER: Correct! Without a connection to The Eye, any attempt to use it would likely end… very messily indeed! But thankfully, it just so happens that you hold such a connection. MARTIN: So that’s it… Both “lonely” and “watching”. PETER: You must admit you’re the perfect candidate. MARTIN: I suppose I am.

Beholding baby!! Now coming in an additional Lonely flavour.

- Mmmmmmmm… The way Jon put it, it seems that Beholding is consciously rewarding its servant and:

* It could be Jon trying to make sense of something else, that he doesn’t understand? Gertrude didn’t think that the Fears were able to “think” at all (MAG145: “Sometimes, I think They understand us as… little as we understand Them. We don’t think like They do.” “I’m not actually convinced they “think” at all.”); reward&affection could be primitive enough feelings for a blob of terrors to work out (Martin fed Beholding as an assistant by reading statements => Beholding grants him things in the hope of getting fed even more?), but I don’t know, I can’t help but wonder if this is just Jon humanising the Fears a bit too much? It’s curious that Beholding got “fond” of Martin precisely when Jon himself fell in love with him – could Jon’s feelings have influenced Martin’s position in the apocalypse, could Jon be having a bit more power over the landscape than he realises?

* … If Beholding is rewarding its servants, that doesn’t bode well for Elias. WELL, no, I mean: it might mean that Elias is having a Great Time as a Beholding acolyte, which means it doesn’t bode well for my desire to see Elias get absolutely wrecked and wrong about being the “king of a ruined world”. I want him to have miscalculated, damnit! x’D

- I’m having so many feelings over Martin himself being unsure of what he wants, whether it’s better to know or to remain ignorant…

(MAG183) ARCHIVIST: It’s like I said. [INHALE] Everything here is either watcher, or watched. MARTIN: [SIGH] Subject or object, yes, I know, we’ve been over this. ARCHIVIST: Well, you’re a watcher, Martin. You worked for the Institute, you read statements, The Eye is… fond of you. You’re not getting thrown into your own personal hell, which means… MARTIN: [QUIETLY] That one of them belongs to me. But that’s… Ho–how can I be a “Watcher”? I, I didn’t even know it existed! ARCHIVIST: But you’ve suspected for a while now, haven’t you? MARTIN: Maybe? But that’s not “watching”! ARCHIVIST: Do you want me to tell you about it? MARTIN: No. … Yes. N–no, no, I don’t know, I don’t know. [SIGH]

Is it a remnant of his discussions with Tim in season 3? He’s basically gone the reverse of Tim about it:

(MAG098) MARTIN: Y’know, I think he thinks that the distance keeps us safe, you know? Like, like, if he just makes sure that we’re not involved, we’re somehow fine. TIM: He’s an idiot. Look, we didn’t know what that door was, and it still trapped us. Ignorance isn’t going to save anyone. MARTIN: No, I mean, you’re right, I guess.

Martin has seen enough to know now that ignorance doesn’t protect anyone, but also that knowledge can be used as a weapon – that the horrors are just made to hurt. I feel like, in his situation, noping out of Jon’s statements was one of his only ways to assert his boundaries (which had been denied from him — and from others — for a long time)? But here, the situation is different; it’s about Martin’s own involvement, he knew the knowledge would hurt anyway… but it’s also his load to bear? To at least face what is happening, since he’s benefitting from it, since he’s been made complicit (without ever wanting to)? It still goes perfectly with the exploration of exploitative and oppressive systems: Martin, unknowingly and unwillingly inflicting hurt, still being in a better situation than others… while not being directly responsible for it, not wanting to benefit from it. It really makes me want to see Jon&Martin find a way to reverse or improve things, to get people out of the domains or giving them the keys to escape them, and I don’t know if I can even hope something about this ;; (On the Jon&Martin front, things are so good; but it still feels so unfair for… everyone else.)

- Martin having a domain and being classified as a “watcher” finally explains why he hadn’t been impacted by the apocalypse since the Change! He had been able to get out of the domains’ grasp even when he wasn’t around Jon (he had fallen behind at the end of MAG163, he wandered around in the Web’s theatre, he left Jon alone for most of the statements), and there was still the question of… how he was still surviving without eating, and at the same time wasn’t (at least as far as we knew) trapped in a domain:

(MAG161) MARTIN: [MIRTHLESS HUFF] What about food? ARCHIVIST: What about it? When’s the last time you thought to eat, o–or even felt hungry? MARTIN: [FAINT] What…? Wha… Uh… I don’t know. ARCHIVIST: No. Whatever is sustaining us now doesn’t need us to eat. MARTIN: That… that can’t be possible– ARCHIVIST: It’s a new world, Martin, the natural laws are whatever they want them to be. And I suspect they don’t much care to keep humanity fed and watered.

I was wondering if it was Jon’s influence, or Martin being “trapped” in Jon’s domain, and Jon had also alluded to the possibility that they were themselves trapped in their quest towards the Panopticon:

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: “Free” doesn’t really exist in this place. MARTIN: Apart from us. ARCHIVIST: I suppose. I–in a sense, though… [CHUCKLING] how much of that is because we are trapped in our own quest to– MARTIN: Okay, let’s, let’s not dive into another… ontological debate right now, not here. ARCHIVIST: Fair enough.

And Jon had even specifically told Martin that he had a domain, shortly before Martin got almost imprisoned in the Lonely house:

(MAG167) ARCHIVIST: We all have a domain here, Martin. The place that feeds us. MARTIN: Oh. [PAUSE] Where’s yours? ARCHIVIST: [MIRTHLESS CHUCKLE] I mean, we’re… traveling towards it. MARTIN: Oh! Right, obviously. [CHUCKLING] Duh. Hum… What about me? ARCHIVIST: … Would you… like me to… ? MARTIN: No, no. Don’t tell me. I don’t want to know. ARCHIVIST: … Okay!

(MAG170) ARCHIVIST: I, I didn’t want to… look too ha–, I–I–I promised I wouldn’t… know you, and, and with the fog in all–all the rooms, I’ll, I just, I lost y–, I… I–I’m sorry. MARTIN: It’s okay. ARCHIVIST: … No, I… I tried to use the… to know where you were, but… it was… You–you were faint. It was so strange, i–it took me so long just to find you…! [RUSTLING OF CLOTHES] MARTIN: Jon, it’s… okay. I promise it’s okay. This place tried, it really did, and honestly I… I wanted to believe it. But I didn’t. ARCHIVIST: This… “place”, i–it… [STATIC] My god…! […] I, I just… I wanted to make sure that you knew what this place was. MARTIN: It’s The Lonely, Jon. It’s me. ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] Not anymore. MARTIN: Hm! No. [LONG INHALE, EXHALE] No…! Not anymore.

And alright, that finally answers it: the Lonely house wasn’t his domain, wasn’t meant to be (but he was susceptible to it, got almost trapped in it as a “watched” although he eventually managed to reject and break free from it). His own domain was elsewhere, and Martin himself was amongst the “watchers” all along; Martin is living a bit like Helen in this apocalypse, having a fixed domain, but able to navigate elsewhere.

Aouch for Martin, since he had been encouraging Jon to smite domains’ rulers as soon as he discovered that Jon could do it; it was already murky territory for Jon himself (if the “avatars” and “monsters” just deserve to die, what about Jon?), it was awful with Callum (Martin himself drew the line at smiting a kid)… but now, we know it was directly including him, too, and that he had been fed through people’s pain all along. No wonder Helen had encouraged the smiting so hard, if she already knew they were kind of neighbours…

… Double-aouch for Jon, because he had offered twice the option for Martin to stay elsewhere, permanently:

(MAG170) ARCHIVIST: M–Martin, if you… did; i–if you wanted to forget… a–all of it, stay here and just… escape. I… I would understand. MARTIN: … N–no…! It’s comforting here, leaving all those… painful memories behind, but… It’s not a good comfort, it’s… I–it’s the kind that makes you fade, makes you… dim and… distant.

(MAG181) ARCHIVIST: I’m sorry, I… It would have been nice to stay. MARTIN: [WISTFULLY] Yeah… I’d almost forgotten what it was like, you know? A bit of peace, eh! ARCHIVIST: I mean, you could have… MARTIN: No, don’t say it, Jon. You know I never would. I–I can’t just “forget” about all the people out here! Besides, I’d rather be trapped in a post-apocalyptic wasteland with you than spend one more moment in paradise with her.

And Jon probably didn’t know what Martin’s domain was exactly, back then, since we heard the knowing static kick in when he described the domain in this episode? But he probably knew, already, that Martin having a domain didn’t mean that he belonged to it as a victim, but as a ruler, and that it would hurt Martin so much. (“No one gets what they deserve. Not in this place. They just get whatever hurts them the most! … Even me.”, indeed ;;)

- I AM HAVING SO MANY FEELINGS OVER THE DESCRIPTION OF MARTIN’S DOMAIN…

(MAG183) [STATIC RISES] ARCHIVIST: It’s a small domain. A swirling mix of The Eye and The Lonely. Inhabited by a few lost souls whose fear is not of their isolation or their agonies, but that no-one… will ever know of them. That they shall suffer in silence, and be mourned by nobody. That’s why you can’t really see it. It’s why even if we do travel through it, you won’t be able to see… any of the people trapped there.

… It reminds me so much of what Martin probably experienced in his own flat, when Prentiss besieged him for two weeks and Martin was unable to contact anyone, and nobody came to check on him? Did Martin’s domain grow from his own old fears…?

It also reminds me a bit of Naomi’s brush with The Lonely:

(MAG013) NAOMI: The fog seemed to follow me as went and seemed to swirl around with a strange, deliberate motion. You’ll probably think me an idiot, but it felt almost malicious. I don’t know what it wanted, but somehow I was sure it wanted something. There was no presence to it, though, it wasn’t as though another person was there, it was… It made me feel utterly forsaken.

Overall, the description is extremely… typical from what we’ve seen of The Lonely: there was Naomi’s misadventure, Ethan disappeared and nobody even claimed his backpack (MAG048), Yetunde Uthman had “disappeared a year ago. And nobody noticed” (MAG150)…

(But from that description alone, it doesn’t sound very Beholding, despite what Jon said? I’m curious about the Eye aspect of it…)

- Can’t believe that Martin canonically turns out to be the Lonely Eyes love(hate)child, gdi. It really was a custody battle in MAG158.

- Extra-sad that Jon warned Martin that there was meaning in the fact that Martin didn’t know anything about his domain, and wouldn’t even be able to see people in there… It’s just so cruel, both for them, and for Martin, to learn that he’s been unknowingly contributing to their misery (because they fed him and he didn’t even know about them)?

Pretty sure that Martin will stay with Jon to hear that statement, at the very least ;; (Or could he ask for something more? We’ve seen Jon extracting Breekon’s statement in MAG128, I wonder if he could put something into someone’s head like Elias had done, allowing Martin to give that statement himself…)

- I’m wondering about Jon’s own domain, too, now! He said they were heading towards it, so it’s either the Panopticon, the Institute or the Archives, or a mix of those… or something close to it, on their way to it. If Martin’s domain is a mix of Lonely&Eye, is Jon’s pure Eye? A mix of the 14/15? A Web&Eye mix, given Jon’s own personal fears?

I know that Jonny (lovingly) called out the obsessive classification in this episode through Jon, who went off on a rant about the “neat little boxes”, but he’s still using the Smirke classification this season:

(MAG183) ARCHIVIST: It’s a small domain. A swirling mix of The Eye and The Lonely.

(AND IN THIS VERY EPISODE… Jon…)

- On the one hand: feeling directly called out by Jon’s rant about how the divisions between avatars/monsters/humans/victims wasn’t and isn’t working, that reality escapes that division because it’s much more complicated than this:

(MAG183) ARCHIVIST: [HEATED] Avatar isn’t a thing, Martin, it’s not–! It’s just a word. A word used by… fools like Smirke to try and sort everything into neat little boxes, to reduce the messy spray of human fear into a checklist: Human, avatar, monster, victim. Only now, now, there’s a binary. There’s finally a clear dividing line and… [SIGH] Well. I’m sorry you’re not happy with which side you’ve ended up on.

(It felt especially relevant with Callum Brodie: could we really tell that he was an “avatar” when he was still a freshly wounded kid, even if a tormentor himself?)

On the other hand, well, that was still a useful distinction to have to identify servants, and mostly, I’m not extremely convinced by Jon arguing that there is now a Clear BinaryTM in the new world, between the “watchers” and the “watched”, since:

1°) Helen herself explained the dichotomy to Martin (MAG166: “And so, there are now exactly two roles available in this new world of ours: the watcher, and the watched. Subject, and object. Those who are feared, and those who are afraid.”). Given that she mostly tries to confuse them… that’s a red flag.

2°) Despite Jon defending that binary, we’ve run into plenty of examples of things… not fitting into that new classification. He himself acknowledged that Basira’s status wasn’t established yet; we’ve seen Salesa, protected by his camera from the chaos; Jon has been unable to know about Georgie and Melanie, only hypothesising that they might in what-used-to-be-London; Martin, a watcher, could still have fallen prey to another domain… That’s already a lot of special cases around that “clear dividing line”…

3°) Somethingsomethingsomething about how it’s in Beholding’s best interest that Jon believes in a clear, unchangeable, dividing line which serves Beholding’s own interests. If things feel fixed and unchangeable, then there is no point trying to fight against it or find a loophole, right?

Given that a Watcher can get trapped in another domain… does that mean that it could be the case for Jon, too? We got a threat of it in MAG172, when Jon began to give the statement of the following act – if Martin hadn’t interrupted him, would Jon have ever been able to stop?

- Confirmation that Daisy had “trapped” Basira in her Hunt! I was suspecting it since Jon’s first wording:

(MAG164) MARTIN: Is Basira alive? ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] MARTIN: Is she… in… o–one of these places? [STATIC RISES] ARCHIVIST: She’s alive. Out there, not… trapped in a–a hellscape, but… moving. [STATIC DECREASES] Hunting. She’s… she’s looking for Daisy. She’s a few steps behind.

(MAG183) MARTIN: … What about Daisy? Or Basira? ARCHIVIST: Daisy carved through the domains of others. Basira… well… In a very real way she was a sufferer in Daisy’s domain. Maybe the only one. Hunting, following, hurting. Now Daisy’s dead, she’s… free. Sort of. She’s inherited something of Daisy’s ability to move through the other domains. For now, she’ll… feed off what she sees in them. As to whether the Eye ultimately gives her a domain of her own… I don’t know yet.

* And now, Basira seems to have a peculiar status… Is it because she killed Daisy? Is it because she killed the ruler of her domain? Jon explained that a ruler’s death didn’t change much for the domain itself, but maybe it operates differently if a victim kills a ruler (… they become the new ruler?)

* Another reminder that Jon cannot see the future.

* Big Eyeball didn’t immediately give Basira a domain, but Martin got one. I see that favouritism, uh. (Joke, it does make sense given how Martin recorded a lot of statements and had worked at the Institute for years and years.)

- I love how Jon managed to explain why he hadn’t told Martin everything, and how Martin… indeed agreed that Jon had been mostly trying to respect his wishes about not knowing ;; It’s true that Martin had been adamant about not hearing much of the horror:

(MAG163) MARTIN: J–Jon, enough! Enough! [STATIC FADES] … Please don’t tell me these things. ARCHIVIST: I… I’m sorry, I– There’s just so much! There’s so much, Martin, and I know all of it, I can see all of it, and I– It’s filling me up, I need to let it out! MARTIN: I’m sorry, but tough. Okay? Tha–that’s not what I’m here for. [VOICE IN THE DISTANCE: “No… No!”] MARTIN: I can’t be that for you, I–I just can’t.

(MAG167) MARTIN: Oh! Right, obviously. [CHUCKLING] Duh. Hum… What about me? ARCHIVIST: … Would you… like me to… ? MARTIN: No, no. Don’t tell me. I don’t want to know. ARCHIVIST: … Okay!

(MAG183) MARTIN: You didn’t tell her any of that. ARCHIVIST: I didn’t think the metaphysics of her place in the fear ecosystem was something she’d be particularly interested in at that moment. MARTIN: Fair. But you seem very reluctant to tell anyone any of this stuff. ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] I did try, right at the start, but y–you didn’t seem to want to talk about it, so I didn’t push it. It’s hard, I have so much knowledge but… how do I decide what people want me to share, and what they never want to know?. MARTIN: I guess that makes sense.

But Martin seems to acknowledge that indeed, Jon had been trying his best about it…

(And now, I wonder if there is still other stuff that Jon hadn’t told Martin, in the same vein…)

- First choice for Martin:

(MAG183) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] I was going to bring it up at the crossroads. Inside. I only just realised we would be going this way. […] MARTIN: I guess that makes sense. … So what did you mean about the crossroads? When you were talking to Helen. ARCHIVIST: It’s a maze in there, something between a, a Rubik’s Cube and a Magic Eye picture. I can find us the way through easily enough but… well. For us, there are two ways out. Two paths to London. MARTIN: What are the choices? ARCHIVIST: One would be a long, winding route, we’d see a lot of horrors, but remain… personally untouched. MARTIN: And the other is my domain. ARCHIVIST: Eventually. It’s a shorter path, with faces we know along the way. Including Helen. MARTIN: I thought Helen was her domain, wi–with all the doors and that? ARCHIVIST: She is, but she has a… position within this pseudo-landscape, like any other. MARTIN: O–okay. [INHALE] So, so, I mean, I suppose we’ve got to do that one, right? ARCHIVIST: We don’t have to, w–we–we could just– MARTIN: What, what? We could, we could dodge around it? Take the path of denial? I guess, but… what is it you keep harping on about? “The journey will be the journey”? [SIGH] I mean… It’s pretty obvious that this one is my journey.

! Glad that Martin didn’t hesitate and immediately understood what it was about – that it mattered to do it that way, that Martin had to face it, that this is how this world works. No hesitation about it. He got a demonstration with Basira, but still, he was quick to accept it.

I’m expecting a few episodes before Martin’s domain, so… with the overall rhythm of the season, they might reach the Institute by MAG189? And Hill Top Road during Act III?

- Since Jon mentioned that the path Martin ended up choosing had:

(MAG183) ARCHIVIST: Eventually. It’s a shorter path, with faces we know along the way. Including Helen.

I wonder about those “faces we know”, since we’re running super-low on ~avatars~. Different options:

* Institute staff. Rosiiiie?

* Melanie&Georgie. A bit unlikely, given that Jon had trouble knowing what was the deal with them, I feel?

* Since Helen will be there, people who gave live statements to Jon and were trapped in his nightmare zoo. I’m mostly thinking about this one, especially since Jon’s “No one gets what they deserve. Not in this place. They just get whatever hurts them the most! … Even me.”… (And if it’s about an internal and metaphorical journey, I feel like having to face people that Jon hurt, first unaware (he didn’t know about the nightmare zoo when he signed to become the Head Archivist), then partially unwilling but still doing it (he felt guilty about it but still hid it, still chose self-preservation instead of warning the others about it), would have its place…)

- In the same fashion, who is trapped in Martin’s domain? Unrelated people? Live statement-givers? (;; I’m thinking of Jess, who had the misfortune of being compelled by Jon and of giving a statement to Martin…)

… Given that it’s confirmed to be a “journey” for Martin too, I can’t help but squint at Jon’s wording, because. “Faces we know”. The only thing we know of Martin’s father is the fact that he looks like Martin… (MAG118: “The thing is, though, Martin: if you ever do want to know exactly what your father looked like… all you have to do is look in a mirror~ The resemblance is quite uncanny. The face of the man she hates, who destroyed her life, watching over her, feeding her, cleaning her, looking down on her with such pity–”)

- I’ll be having Annabelle’s words stuck in my head (ha) for a long time but:

(MAG181) ANNABELLE: Don’t worry, Martin. We’ll meet again. Hopefully when you’re feeling a little bit more… open-minded…! MARTIN: I wouldn’t count on it. ANNABELLE: I would. MARTIN: [SIGH]

… Was it a reference to Martin learning about his own domain and about how the world operates, his place in it? I think that Martin might be even more resolved to turn the world back at whatever cost, now that he knows that he is himself sustained by fear…

(LISTEN, THIS IS ABSOLUTELY HOW WEB!MARTIN CAN STILL WI–)

- !! Footage of Martin saying “I love you” for the first time ;w; I love how it was the thing he was certain about, both a slight decompressing joke and a true statement, a reminder that he has faith in Jon, that he has something to cling to?

(MAG183) ARCHIVIST: If you’re sure. MARTIN: … I’m sure I love you. [FOOTSTEPS] ARCHIVIST: I love you too. [FABRIC RUSTLES] Let’s go.

(He had mentioned that he was “in love” in MAG170, I’m happy to hear him telling Jon, too!) And the fabric RUSTLED, SO LONG AND SO HARD, AND AT LEAST TWICE!! I love how the tension from right before and after the statement had faded by the end of the episode ;w; Rollercoaster of little emotions…

MAG184’s makes me think of something Leitner had said (more lore about the Fearpocalypse?), and of Vast and Corruption… with very different vibes. If Corruption, and keeping in mind that Jon has announced that they will be encountering “faces [they] know along the way”, it cooould contain Jordan Kennedy, the exterminator from Pest Control…? Especially given that both Jon and Martin had met him (Jon took his live statement, and Martin pleaded offscreen for him to get them the jar of Prentiss’s ashes to comfort Jon).

(Yessss, I am absolutely aware of the irony of still using Smirke’s categorisation after another episode in which we were told again that it is bollocks, but if Jon himself still occasionally labels the domain as one of the 15, so can I ♥)

[nettlestonenell]

Armie Hammer wants a sequel to The Man From U.N.C.L.E.—shouldn’t you?

This post is a long time in coming, Gentle Readers and @jammeke​, but now, though it might be here, before your very eyes, to think it will be well-laid out would be a mistake. It’s set to be just about as messy as Ilya’s misplaced loyalties and murky motivations.

How dare!

I probably first watched this film well over a year ago (courtesy @jammeke​ posting things about it). I used Sling OnDemand (I think on TNT). In the ensuing viewings I also watched it in that way, but as I was sitting down for a fourth(?) viewing, it kept coming to me that I was tired of watching it with commercials I couldn’t skip, and I had a sneaking suspicion that it had been edited for time and I was missing out on scenes. [pointless aside: I was also watching the film in chunks, and never as a whole]

Where is she now? What’s the time stamp? How far along did she get? Are you shagging the hotel hostess yet?

So, I, uh, set out to buy it on DVD—without any luck! In the sense that copies I could find cost more (w/ shipping) than buying it to stream. So, I bought it to stream on Amazon. Do I regret my choice, Gentle Readers? No, no I don’t. I do regret burden of knowledge in learning that TNT was already playing the entirety of the film. That was a hard pill to swallow.

Nope, I’ve looked. That’s absolutely everything. Nothing additional lurking around here...

So here it is, as it is, @jammeke, “My Notes on The Man from U.N.C.L.E.”

Look, I don’t know what this film is. I probably can’t fully articulate its appeal. Or maybe I can--certainly after transcribing four page I’ve tried. Number One thing to know about me and fiction/films is that a top draw for me is seeing something out of the ordinary, such as beautiful locations, a historical era, delicious costumes. There are times, frankly, this can trump weak story and undefined character for me. (The best films, of course, combine all three) Certainly, The Man... delivers in the delight of the eyes. Additionally, I must confess that growing up as a person older than @reblogginhood​ but younger than Miss Fisher, so much of what was on TV was essentially reruns of this film’s iconic Look(tm). So, when I see women dressed like Gaby I am just another three-to-seven-year-old overcome with the drop dead glamour of it all.

Darling, tell me how you really feel...

Some questions I have:

·         IS Armie Hammer a hulk of a man? Everyone in this film seems to think so, yet he always tracks to me as trim (rather than hulking)

·         Why translate via captions some Russian speaking, but not all?

·         IS Napoleon’s backstory directly cribbed from USA’s White Collar?

·         DOES Gaby have a German accent?

·         Does Ilya get preternaturally attached to all the people he’s ordered to look after? Also, what is his bonding rate with kittens?

Sorry, wrong iteration. 

 ·         If Lady Villain knows the lens is wrong—if her technical understanding is that in-depth--does she really need Gaby’s dad to make the bomb?

·         How old was Gaby during the war?

·         What happens when Ilya gets a NEW puppy assigned to him? (please let this be addressed in film #2)

Hooray for:

·         That bathroom fight! *all the Burn Notice feels!

·         Gaby is her own lady, and chooses sides as necessary—not always unilateral in her support for either male character. Case in point: she sides with Ilya over the clothes, and Napoleon over the incident of the wallet.

·         That delicious (speaking as Rusty, here) Ocean’s 11-stylized action. It’s pretty, so I’m not bored with it. Sometimes a sandwiched montage gets shown, so I’m REALLY not bored. I’ve got 18 tiny moving boxes of things to look at!

·         Pinkie rings. There, you’ve told me everything I need to know about that character.

·         Solo in a beret. English has not yet found a word for the feeling it evoked in this viewer. Somewhere between ‘precious’ and ‘oh, no’.

See, there? Now you’ve felt it too.

·         Goggles! All the accessories! Dune Buggies! (I mean, that’s what I’m calling Napoleon’s chase-scene ride)

Things I adore:

·         It seems (after some research) that more than a few folks view Gaby as a third wheel, and though she’s not exactly a Princess Leia commandeering her own rescue and exuding competence and a deserved take-charge-attitude at every corner, she IS a foci for both male characters (though romantically it would seem only for one), just as Ilya is a foci for both her and Napoleon [no one seems to worry about Napoleon, though they should--film #2, anyone?]

·         Mechanic Gaby not needing a beauty makeover, or being dragged into one. She gets some nice clothes, but it’s never suggested that she’s not attractive or acceptable before putting them on, and I respect, nay, embrace it.

Oh, my heart. She’s still not as tall as them!

·         Ilya, drab pigeon Ilya, knowing fashion

·         Oh man, don’t even get me started on the power of the statement, “it doesn’t have to match”

·         You knew it was coming on this sublist: the wrestle-fight. I mean, c’mon. Poor little Gaby, locked behind the Iron Curtain, living a life of always being watched. She’s in the swankest hotel (I mean, Napoleon chose it, so we can be sure it’s swank with an E). She’s trying to celebrate her freedom, her liberation. She’s playing verboten music, she’s drinking to excess. Girl wants—and deserves—a party. And Ilya is…not built for that (that he knows of). For some fun, just imagine if she had been given Napoleon to room with instead.

                            o   I will say that this scene, and some of their other interactions have what I would call early (non-sibling) Luke and Leia energy. Ilya seems to have moments of being struck by Gaby in a way Luke is struck by Leia in the early part of the trilogy. When Leia takes charge, and Luke accepts it. When Leia does something incredible, and Luke is left open-mouthed. *no, I don’t see OT Star Wars in everything. Shut up.

·         “He fixed the glitch.”

·         Again, shout-out to the non-action action.

·         “I left my jacket in there.”

·         The whole race to rescue Gaby I am in love with beyond words. [I have noted it as “Crazy Jeep Drive with Warhead!”] Probably b/c it comes across as totally egalitarian. Both men want her rescued. They’re no longer in competition. It’s just as important to Napoleon as it is to Ilya to catch up to her. Also, it is bonkers, like some sort of X-games version of a commercial for the vehicles they’re driving. And screaming Willie Scott does not make an appearance.

         Someone says “winkle” out.

·         Look! Another note about the screen divisions and how I love it, shout-outs to the original Steve McQueen The Thomas Crown Affair (a contemporary of when this movie is meant to be set), and TV’s 24.

Things that get a great, big NOPE:

·         Jerrod Harris: you’ve been in so much streamable content in the last decade I can’t hate you, but frankly, you’re terrible here—unless you’re supposed to be giving a mannered, not-campy-enough-to-be-enjoyable performance here. Your American English puts me in the mind of Alex Hawaii 5-0′Loughlin where it feels you’re concentrating so hard on your accent that you fail to convince anyone that you’re a harried, over-worked and exasperated spy handler. Your performance is at odds with every bit of dialogue you’re given to say.

·         That awful, mishandled title that doesn’t even connect to the film until the final moments (a sequel set-up, for sure)

·         Look, you don’t introduce Hugh Grant casually mid-way through your film in a throwaway appearance. I mean, he’s HUGH GRANT we all know something’s up now.

·         This is not exactly a great big NOPE, b/c I love a flat cap, Tommy Shelby—but I feel like a less tall man with a far rounder face in a flat cap would track more as Russian to me that AH does. To me, he just looks like he’s about to go golfing.

Over par? Unacceptable!

·         Is Victoria a British-accented Italian? A British woman who married—what? Gaby’s uncle isn’t Italian!? An Italian who went to school in Britain? My head hurts. Also, is her hair meant to be unconvincingly bleached?

Other commentary:

·         Napoleon’s adult ne���er-do-well backstory is so far from being emotionally equivalent to Ilya’s childhood trauma [and his enslavement to the USSR] it seems bestial when he calls it out on multiple occasions. Badly done, Solo.

·         Gaby is the film’s key (sorry, Buffy fans). Everyone is connected to her. Yes, she could have been given a bit more on the character front, but I don’t see her as as much of a flaw in the film as some others/reviewers seem to.

·         Look, essentially (and not very nuanced-ly), Ilya is a stalker. I think the film goes a certain distance in establishing that his early behavior toward Gaby is not normal, but concurrently it does not truly call him out on it. He’s essentially viewed as an odd-duck, sure, but not a true threat to her (should she not reciprocate or tolerate his intensity toward her). I think I might be able to cite his behavior when Gaby comes on to him (that he doesn’t jump at a chance with her) that maybe he’s given a little more nuance than a straight-on stalker, and it helps that he and Napoleon never get into a pissing match over Gaby’s person, only over her new clothes. But overall the film has to walk a fine line (and the jury is still out on how successful it is, I’d say) between playing Ilya’s laser-like attention to Gaby for its humor, and calling it out for the unsettling, threatening behavior it is.

·         Honestly, it wasn’t until I engaged the Closed Captioning that I understood Napoleon was calling Ilya the ‘Red Peril’. So, that was nearly three viewings in.

·         I give the screen credits A+, on both ends. Not to mention the end credits are actually INTERESTING with lots to see and learn! (Certainly we learn more about HG in them than we do at any time during the film)

Things I would have liked:

·         More of fish-out-of-the-Iron-Curtain Gaby moments

·         A better dichotomy shown of East vs. West Berlin/Germany. There’s nothing easy either visually or otherwise to distinguish the two.

·         HC being given a more specific American accent (from an actual locality). This, for an American viewer, works better than the flat, unlocated American accent many a British actor will bust out. *Mind you, HC does a generally good job, but he fails utterly on both “Immediate” which he pronounces at least twice as “immeedeejt” [rather than imm-E-deeot] and “Nazi” as “NAHT-zee” [rather than “NOT-zee”]. And let’s not get started on that late in the film use of ‘earnt’, a word that—well, it’s just not in the American English twentieth century lexicon.

·         C’mon. You gotta tease the Hugh Grant more.

·         Solo is a blank before the war. I’ve read thoughts on the film calling out Gaby as the blank character, but they’re wrong. Solo is the blank. He’s the ‘made’ man, his identity seemingly assembled during the war and after. For example, he doesn’t go into the war a thief, nor (it would seem) a particularly educated or urbane individual. Now THAT’s a juicy backstory I’d love to learn about, perhaps in film #2--or #3? What creates a Napoleon Solo? What would he be doing if he weren’t on the government’s leash/incarcerated? Is anyone left caring about him back wherever he calls home? I mean, who doesn’t love a gender-flipped 60s-era Holly Golightly backstory? [And yes, I would love there to be an ex-wife or even a current wife mixed up in his origins as well—Guy Ritchie, call me!]

Notes I have that I’m not sure if they still make sense to me:

·         Only mom calls me Napoleon (do he say it ‘mum’?) Is he a secret Canadian?

·         Solo’s torture, 1st view recall Napoleon’s childhood? *I think this means that after watching the first time I somehow erroneously believed that during the torture Napoleon’s childhood was a topic gone over. This was wrong. HOWEVER, this would have made far more story-sense than the backstory we’re given on an easily disposeable villain.

·         “Even the average Russian agent. You’re special.” ?

·         Uncle is Baddie (*so glad I made this note to myself)

·         Ilya’s dad IS an embarrassment. I’m not sure what genius commentary I had in my mind, here. Perhaps that Ilya himself is embarrassed of him? Not just Ilya’s handler’s? [Also, aside: Napoleon totally slut-shames Ilya’s mom, which is the doublest of double standards from ‘I got myself the biggest and most ornate suite b/c I-wanted-plenty-of-space-for-my-random-seductions’ and I really wish Ilya had thrown that back in his face] *yes, of course I know that Ilya and Napoleon would not likely equate a wife/mother’s sexual exploits with that of Solo’s, but let’s be honest, this film tweaks the nose of (I won’t say reverses, it doesn’t go that far) plenty of tropes and gender expectations, and this certainly seems like a missed opportunity to call Solo on the carpet (which I hope film #2 does far more)

Things I wrote down so long ago I don’t recall what they mean:

·         CC-save

In conclusion:

What does film #2 look like? What title does it get? Will the Peter/Neil White Collar dynamic continue to grow? *note that I have no confidence a second film will ever come to pass...

In the end, all I know is, “It didn't help when American Tom Cruise, who was slated to play U.S. spy Napoleon Solo, dropped out, prompting the casting of Cavill (who had previously read for the Russian role).“ I would not have watched that film.

[saudadeonly]

never doubt never fear

Read on ao3. Part seven. 

Death Eater!Sirius Black AU

The year after Andromeda Tonks and her family are declared dead to the rest of the Wizarding Britain is the most confusing, most unnerving year she's experienced in her life but she wouldn't change it for the world.

(Spans from February 1982 to March 1983.)

Word count: 11577

___

Andromeda Tonks, formerly Black, which she still has trouble forgetting on the worst of days, considers herself to be a fairly put-together person, able to keep her wits about herself in the direst of situations and her cool even when faced with emotional turmoil.

(“Maybe usually,” says Marina, her friend of too many years, sipping her whiskey, probably the third or fourth one since she arrived. She drinks like it’s a lifeline and has for longer than Andromeda has loved her, but she’s the only one that’s ever cared enough to stay. “But you do have some very specific exceptions.”

“You’re going to die from that,” Andromeda tells her in lieu of an answer, taking a sip of her tea.

Marina laughs, raspy around the edges. “I’ll be gone long before that,” she says.)

(The Dark Mark appears above her apartment three weeks later, the walls painted with her blood, so she’s right, in the end, as she always is—was.

For the first time, Andromeda resents the fact that she can’t sit and listen to Marina tell her, I told you so.)

But waking up in a house she has not been able to visit in a decade, her daughter and husband nowhere in sight when her last memory is of her sister’s manic laugh as she flees through the woods away from her, then walking out of her room only to find her cousin that’s been presumed dead for years in the kitchen is a bit of a stretch, even for her.

Let alone the fact that said cousin, one Regulus Arcturus Black, is currently wearing sweatpants and a T-shirt and stirring a pan full of what look like scrambled eggs. He looks up when she enters, black hair sleep-messy around his face, grey eyes bright. “Good,” he says, blinking slowly at her. “You’re awake.”

“Regulus—” Andromeda starts, then finds she has no words yet and sits down on one of the high stools at the island counter. She goes over the previous night in her head. Dinner, riddle-solving with Ted, getting Dora to bed, pouring tea in the kitchen; then a group of wizards inside her house, Bella’s grin, the dark woods around her. After that, nothing at all—certainly not anything involving Regulus.

She watches as Regulus ladles the eggs onto two plates, adds an abundance of bread slices to both, and sets one of them in front of Andromeda. He flicks his wand and a kettle from the stove flies toward the counter, pouring tea into the two mugs resting there. Once poured, Regulus pushes one toward Andromeda and takes the other one for himself, putting it down beside his plate of eggs as he starts to eat.

He nods toward her plate. “You should eat,” he says. “You’ll feel better.”

Andromeda stares and finds she has no energy to stop, which, considering the years of etiquette lessons her mother imposed on her, is a surprise in itself. It’s not so much the fact that he’s here as it the fact that he’s here like this, domestic and relaxed as she’s never seen him, at ease with himself and the space around him. He’s taller, too, and broader, a new weight to him that only age could have brought along. Age that, as far as she knew only a few minutes ago, Regulus never got to experience.

“Am I dead?” she asks, clearing her throat. It’s the only explanation that comes to mind.

He huffs a breath between two bites and looks up at her, brows and the corners of his mouth raised. She doesn’t remember his smiles, however small, coming as easy as they do now. “Not unless I am, too,” he says.

Andromeda blinks. The irony isn’t lost on her, nor him, judging by the remains of his smile. “Well, legally,” she says, slowly finding footing on this rocky ground, “you are.”

Regulus considers, mouth pulling to the side. “So are you.” He points his fork at her and adds, “Legally.”

“And Dora?” she asks, voice barely above a whisper, the name like a jolt of that peculiar thing Muggles call electricity. She can’t believe it’s taken her this much time to ask about it. “Ted?”

Regulus’s eyes darken, mouth settling into a firm line. “Alive but, like you, considered dead to the majority of the wizarding world. And in much worse condition.” He nods toward the room at the beginning of the hall, the one Cissy always claimed as hers because it had the best view. “In there.”

Andromeda makes to stand up but Regulus catches her wrist before she can take a single step. She reaches for her wand, only to find it’s not in the inner pocket of her robes where she usually keeps it. “Where’s my wand?”

“Let them sleep it off, Dromeda,” Regulus murmurs. “Bella got to them before she got to you.”

Andromeda’s heart slams against her ribcage, as if it could jump out and reach Ted and Dora all by itself. Bella’s cruelty has always aged like fine wine and Andromeda dreads to find out what new expanses she’s discovered in the years since they parted ways. “Then let me see them,” she says, ripping her wrist out of his grip.

He draws his hand back, letting it rest against his side, but he doesn’t back down. “Eat first,” he insists with a stubborn frown that is at once familiar and strange; she’s not used to it on his face but she’s seen it plenty of times before on another. “You need it. You won’t be of any help to them like this.” He runs a hand through his hair, the waves an enviable mix of elegant and mussed. “Your wand broke,” he adds in a quiet, careful voice, so much more like the reserved boy she remembers, “when they got to you. I’m sorry.”

Andromeda’s throat closes up. That wand was one of the few constants she had been allowed for most of her life. From that first summer before her first year, through all the years at Hogwarts, through her elopement, her pregnancy, every good and every horrible part of her life. It was the only thing given to her by her parents that she still truly adored.

“We’ll find you a temporary replacement later,” Regulus says. “I promise.” He nods toward the plates, the food probably cold by now. “Now you sit down and eat.”

Andromeda looks up at him. The last time she properly saw him he was only eleven years old, more skin and bone than anything else, all sharp edges and big eyes, small enough she could use him as an armrest. Now he towers over her, looks at her with patient eyes, all that skin filled out, that sharp edges softened.

She collapses onto the stool. “How did you pull it off?” she asks before she brings a spoonful of eggs into her mouth. They’re not bad, certainly worse than she could have made but they might as well be the best thing she’s tasted in years. They’re not yet cold, at least.

He copies her, then takes a sip of his tea. “I didn’t,” he says, shrugging with tense shoulders, which is a contrast that she can’t find strange, not on him. “Sirius did.”

Andromeda is suddenly grateful that she’s sitting down. Her knees might have gone out from underneath her otherwise. Finding out that Regulus is alive is one thing but to know that Sirius, who has despite her best efforts to convince herself and others the opposite always been her favourite family member, is the one responsible for the survival of her entire family, the only thing she still cares about in this wretched world, feels larger than life. She's spent years of anger at the betrayal he seemingly so carelessly executed, not only at her but at his friends. It hurt more than finding out about Bella’s admittedly expected affiliation with Voldemort or Cissy’s marriage into the Malfoy family. She's never been able to put a finger on why exactly.

“Let’s talk,” Regulus says, giving her a soft smile that she might have once thought shy or unsure. “There are so many things you don’t know.”

***********

Andromeda gets used to the old house slowly at first, then quicker every day. It was always a warm, welcoming place but it was slowly falling apart when she last saw it. Uncle Alphard, always a bit eccentric, had never had much interest in keeping a house elf or keeping up the house himself—a trait that was later only amplified by his years-long sickness. But now, with Regulus as the main resident, the house has been fixed up, the rooms put to good use and all of Alphard’s peculiar collections thoroughly sorted through. Andromeda enjoys finding the unfamiliar in the familiar, the little changes that tell her that the shelter of her childhood has become a haven of her adulthood.

Regulus, however, demands a little more adjusting. Andromeda learns quick enough that any change she might have thought superficial at first goes deeper than she could even imagine. There aren’t just the wardrobe change and the growth spurt in play. He’s still distant and considerate, but there is a new sense of strength in him, like his spine has become unbreakable, like it’s been coated in steel and tempered in fire. He dotes on Dora, redresses her wounds, coaxes her to drink her potions and is nothing but patient with her. He’s more reserved with Ted but no less respectful, no less mindful of his newly-obtained injuries – broken ribs, gouged face, cracked spine – and Andromeda can only marvel at the kindness, the one that has despite his mother’s best efforts always simmered inside him, he can so freely give now; there was a time she never would have dared to hope of such a kind fate for her little cousin.

He has his secrets and, as he always has, guards them well, with smooth, easy-flowing movements and an impassive face but Andromeda still manages to catch little glimpses of dark books and large maps he pores over early in the morning or late in the night when he thinks everyone else is asleep.

She doesn’t mind, is quite used to it after years of having to keep secrets herself and even finds comfort in the fact that this is a part of Regulus that hasn’t changed, a part that she still—quite ironically—knows.

*********

Dora, wedged between Andromeda and Ted in the large bed, is just drifting off to sleep when the door to the cottage bangs open. Andromeda’s first thought is that Dora was finally, finally calm enough to have fallen asleep and she is going to kill whomever just woke her up. Then it occurs to her that she might actually have to.

She jumps up and is out of the room before she remembers to grab for the wand Regulus found in the old study. It’s not fit for her at all but it’s better than nothing, especially in a situation like this one.

Ted calls out after her, unable to follow her, but Andromeda ignores him. She trusts him to keep Dora safe while she deals with the intruders or if it comes to the point where he has to take them on by himself. She’ll be damned if she lets her family get hurt again just because her sister has some kind of a desire to get rid of everything she considers to be tainting her past.

But it’s not Bellatrix or even a barrage of Death Eaters that stand in the living room. At first glance, Andromeda almost mistakes the tall, lean man for Regulus; but his hair is too long, his face too pale. He is swaying on his feet and he is much too thin under the cloak he’s taking off. The spike of recognition is more pain than relief.

“Sirius,” she breathes, her wand lowering with the frantic beat of her heart.

Sirius gives her a slow, small smile, an alien thing on his hollow face that was so full of life the last time she saw him. Years have passed since then, long, difficult years for him; she shouldn’t be surprised that he is so, so different now. “Hi, Dromeda,” he says, voice scratching against the walls of her heart. “How have you been?”

Andromeda takes a breath, then another. In between, Sirius throws off his robes with shaking limbs, revealing a white shirt underneath. A white shirt that is, from the side of his ribs down to his hipbone, stained red.

“Sirius,” she chokes out, taking one staggering step forward.

“I know,” he says, glancing at her before he rips the shirt off as well, grey eyes glassy.

For a moment, all she can notice is the ribs pressing up through the too-pale skin, the scars littering the expanse of his torso and his arms, white on white, blades of grass through paper. Then she sees the long, narrow gash down his side, streaming red, and it’s so much worse.

Sirius coughs, a dry, heaving thing, and sways back on his feet. He’s always been a steady boy, unperturbed in the harshest of conditions, resilient where all others failed. It’s the first time Andromeda thinks that that strength will fail him, that he might crumple in on himself.

Funnily enough, that’s what snaps her out of the trance she’s fallen in. She steps forward, wand once again poised but with a different intention this time. “Let me help you,” she says.

Sirius huffs a laugh but he doesn’t stop her as she taps her wand against the wound and murmurs a low incantation, pushing against the will of the wand as it seeks to evade. The gash simmers at the edges, the flesh almost knitting together, but then spreads further back, the blood more like a river now. A leaden ball settles in the pit of Andromeda’s stomach.

“Hardly can be helped,” Sirius says, looking down from the wound towards her with dark eyes. If possible, his face has paled. “It’s cursed, probably.”

Before Andromeda can say he should have told her that before she made it worse, the door bangs open again, this time indeed announcing Regulus with flushed cheeks and wind-tussled hair. His eyes take the scene in within seconds, his hands already throwing off his cloak. “What happened?” he asks, calm despite the situation. He reaches for Sirius and catches him just as Sirius’s knees buckle.

“Bloody Dorcas,” Sirius rasps as Regulus deposits him on the sofa. The plush soft-blue material is dark with blood within seconds. Sirius bares his teeth in what might be a self-deprecating smile, the sound that escapes him almost a laugh. “Knew she’d get me back for Marlene eventually.”

“Talented witch,” Regulus murmurs, turning Sirius onto his side, fingers skimming along the edges of the wound. He reaches for his wand, hidden in the inner pockets of his robes, but Andromeda catches his wrist.

“Magic makes it worse.”

Regulus blinks, swallowing as he tucks the wand away again. “Blood-replenishing potions,” he mutters instead, then gets up and disappears into the kitchen.

“Andromeda,” Sirius says as his eyes flick away from Regulus and towards her, clearing and blurring almost in time with his breaths. He presses his hand over the wound, blood seeping through his fingers. His voice is steady despite all of it. “Right pocket of my robes. There’s a book. Get it.” He coughs, his chest heaving with it, and adds, “Please.”

Andromeda’s eyes burn as she reaches for the robes, blindly digging through the pockets until she grabs a leather-bound book. The thought of losing Sirius just as he’s so close turns over her stomach. She makes to give it to Sirius but he shakes his head.

“Page 23.”

She dutifully flips it open, finding the pages filled with a familiar, elegant script. There are sketches, too, quick but precise, more beautiful than Andromeda would have managed to draw in her entire life. She looks back at Sirius. “These are spells.” Newly invented spells, from the looks of it – Andromeda has never heard of any of them.

Sirius nods, swallowing. “Healing spells, mostly,” he says.

Regulus appears back in the living room, levitating a number of potion vials beside himself. He grabs a dark red one and shoves it at Sirius. “Drink it.” He glances at the book in Andromeda’s hands. “What’s that?” he asks as he hands another potion to Sirius.

“A spell Andromeda will try out on me,” Sirius answers between gulps of the potion. He makes a face and leans his head back against the armrest. His hair lies plastered against his forehead, perspiration gleaming down his neck and chest.

Bile rises in Andromeda’s throat, her fingers shaking. She closes them around the book, refusing to be anything but useful here. She cannot afford to be anything else. “You mean to tell me you haven’t tested it yet?” she asks, managing to keep her voice even.

“Not that one, no. Haven’t had the time.”

“Sirius,” Regulus says, locking his jaw as he glares down at Sirius. They look so alike in the bright room, the lines of their regal faces nearly matching, both of their mouths set in a stubborn frown. “You can’t.”

“What is it going to do?” Sirius shoots back, lifting his chin as far as he can in his reclining position. His voice trembles but his eyes on Regulus’s remain steady. “Kill me?”

*********

After, Andromeda sits by Sirius’s bed, watching the rise and fall of his chest, tightly bound with Muggle bandages. She fiddles with the book, fingering the pattern pressed into the soft leather to set herself at ease; it’s a beautiful, intricate thing – a stag, a dog, a wolf, and a rat, standing side by side, the moon arcing high above them. It’s nearly as peaceful an image as the one before her.

Sirius’s breaths are slow and deep, his heartbeat steady. He is in no danger of dying, at least not from this wound, but Andromeda can’t bring herself to walk away. It’s been so long since she saw him, since she heard his laugh, since she listened to one of his stories. She only now notices the gaping hole in the side of her heart that has existed since she first heard the news.

In the months after Remus and James stopped by for tea, with darker bags under their eyes than Andromeda had in the first year of Nymphadora’s life, Andromeda stayed up for hours at a time, finding ways to berate herself for not having foreseen it, for not doing more to stop it, for not helping Sirius. She was just a renounced heiress back then, struggling with relying on anyone but herself and discovering the difficulties of having a child, but there had been so many occasions Sirius had found the time for them, for her, and she never repaid the favour. The guilt tore its way through her for a long time before she found a way to check it, burying it underneath her love for the only family she had left.

To know now that that was all an illusion is a relief but the guilt has broken through the dam she so carefully built around it, the one that remained firmly intact even after Regulus told her everything, and it now burns like acid, clawing its way into every crevice of her body.

Andromeda takes Sirius’s hand. It’s long-fingered and elegant but even the back of it is flecked with tiny scars. She bows down low over it, forehead touching his wrist, and murmurs, “Je suis désolé, Sirius.” The tears are not unexpected but they feel wrong somehow, too hot and heavy for someone who did so little to help at all. The tightness in her chest eases, though, and her next breath is easier to draw in. So she lets them spill over, lets the acid burn and hopes that tomorrow she can begin to make amends for her mistakes.

*********

Sirius more or less sleeps for the next few days. He wakes intermittently, sometimes murmuring names Andromeda can’t decipher but mostly reaching for the refilling glass of water they deposited on his nightstand. He just lies there, filled to the brim with various potions Regulus practically had to force down his throat, looking more dead than alive even on the best of days.

Dora glides by his room most of the time, drawing back at the smallest of sounds Sirius makes, and Andromeda’s heart aches with the knowledge that her daughter would have been the first to spend her nights watching over her uncle only a week ago. Now, she is just a girl whose normally vibrantly pink hair has remained short-shorn and dark brown since the night she had the misfortune of meeting her older aunt.

She inches her way into the room after a couple of days, drawing herself up against Andromeda as soon as she’s close enough, and watches as Sirius’s eyelids flutter in his sleep. He looks, for a lack of a better word, different than the last time Dora, only five years old then, saw him but when she reaches out to touch the ends of his hair, dark against the white pillows, Andromeda knows she remembers the boy who used to upend her by her ankle and make her shriek with laughter, who spent hours listening to her babbling and answering every one of her concerns with utmost honesty.

“Will Sirius be alright, mum?” she asks quietly, curling into the warmth of Andromeda’s arms in the small armchair. She smells like the sea and chamomile tea Regulus must have just made her. She'll have to remember to thank him later for so diligently taking care of her daughter.

“I hope so, sweetheart,” Andromeda answers, curving her body around Dora’s, and presses a kiss to the top of her head. Here, in the quiet, in the dimness, the memory of Dora’s small body, broken and beaten, is clearer than the daylight skies. Andromeda shudders. She cannot lose another person she loves. She will not. “We’re doing everything we can to help him and Papa.”

*********

There is a tapestry of the Black family tree in the dining room. It is reminiscent of the one at Grimmlaud Place, with the vastness and the pompous names, but this one has no scorch marks. It is strange to see her own name, written out in a slanting, copperplate script, right between Bellatrix and Narcissa’s. She can’t imagine that its twin was so lucky.

It’s the first time Andromeda has even been in the dining room since she came here. She usually avoids it like the plague because she nearly suffocates with the memory of long, stuffy family dinners she had to endure in here but it is the fastest way from the kitchen to the small wooden terrace in the back where Ted and Dora are and she stepped right into the rabbit hole of their beloved family. She readjusts her grip on the tray with tea and glances at her name again, eyeing the golden thread proclaiming her death to have been in 1982. She has yet to step beyond the border of the Fidelius charm guarding the house so it might as well be true, for all anyone in this world knows. Although only a few steps away, the prospect of it seems daunting now that she’s got used to this small haven, unaffected by the war raging on outside.

“I was all for painting over the damn thing but Regulus insisted we keep it,” says a voice from her left and she whirls on the spot, miraculously managing to not slosh the tea all over the place. Sirius stands in the doorway, half leaning against the frame, dressed in a loose shirt, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. He grimaces as he pushes off of the frame and steps further into the room, adding flippantly, “Something about tradition and legacy.”

“Sirius,” she says, pausing long enough to put the tray down on the table. She turns back around to find she has no idea what to do next. She’d like to hug him but she doesn’t know how well he would take it, or if at all. The few feet between them feel like a chasm, started by war and gouged by time.

Sirius saves her the trouble and positions himself next to her, shoulder-to-shoulder. She can feel the rhythm of his breathing, just a tad quicker now that he is awake. “At least this one is complete,” he murmurs, reaching out to touch the names of the people whose faces had been burned off in Grimmauld Place. Isla. Phineas. Marius. Cedrella.  All names the two of them spent their childhood searching, if only to know what things they had done to have earned to be cast out of their family. Their findings only ever offered a horrible insight into what kind of family they had been cursed with. Andromeda had barely been able to look at her father for weeks after.

Sirius’s finger touches uncle Alphard’s name and stills.

Andromeda’s hand trembles and she clenches it into a fist, tight enough to hurt. Her favourite uncle, the dearest soul she has ever known. “He left me some money,” she says, then adds unnecessarily, “In his will.” She chances a glance at Sirius, finding his jaw firmly set. “Is that why—?”

Sirius nods. “Cygnus flew into a rage when he found out. It was the last straw for him and mother dearest wasn’t about to disagree with him. She didn’t waste her time either.” He scoffs, though the corners of his mouth turn up with it. “Alphard left most of the money to me but he wasn’t about to go out of this world without one last dig at the two of them.” He taps his finger against the tapestry, once, twice, then drops his hand. “Stubborn man,” he murmurs, looking all over the tapestry with dark, grey eyes; eyes that, now that they are not closed or glassy with the haze of pain, Andromeda can barely recognise.

“How are you?” she asks softly. She reaches out a hand and hesitates. She keeps it still mid-air for a moment then decides to damn it all and puts her hand on his shoulder. “Sirius, comment tu te sens?”

Sirius glances down at her. He’s been taller than her for some years now, even before they last saw each other, but he seems small now, stooped over in the kitchen where they spent some of their best years, finally, finally not just groomed to be scions of the House of Black, but allowed to be children. He touches her hand, lightly, with the tips of his fingers. “Ça va.” He looks out the window, his chin lifted as he watches the clouds roll past. “I should go,” he says, the words like a splash of cold water in her face; his duties don’t end here, not by a long shot, and she cannot save him from them. “They’ll be wondering where I’ve been.”

Andromeda doesn’t let herself look down at his forearm where the mark rests, dark and too alive across the veins rising against his thin skin. “Not right now.” She grabs his upper arm again and doesn’t let go as she levitates the tea tray with her other hand. “Come outside, for a little while.”

“Are the others there?”

“Just Dora and Ted. I think they’d both like to thank you while you’re awake.” She pulls at his sleeve gently, bites back the urge to beg him to stay. She’d go in his stead if she could. “Come on.”

Sirius glances at the window again, then sighs and lets her lead him out into the sun. He seems a stranger to it.

*********

Regulus doesn’t settle for days after Sirius has left. He is quicker with his movements, more intense when he studies his books, constantly looking between them and the door from the couch he’s nestled himself in.

“It’s been a hard couple of months for Sirius,” he explains softly when Andromeda nudges him. “I always fear I won’t see him after he goes.”

“Not hard years?” Ted asks from where he’s stretched out on the couch. Like this, underneath a red blanket, he looks nearly as he once did, content and dozing in the afternoon, not confined to the couch and a prisoner in his own body.

Regulus looks up at Ted, his hand almost absent-mindedly reaching up to touch the scar resting across his throat. His fingers move when he swallows. “Not like this.” He taps the corner of a small, dark book resting on the coffee table. “He lost a lot.”

And Andromeda finally sees something that she can recognise in Regulus – the fall of his eyes, stubbornly firm, the way he pulls his mouth to the side as if he’s biting the inside of his cheek; guilt has always been easy to notice with Regulus and she can do little to hold down the wave of her own that whirls up at the bottom of her stomach.

“He’ll be back, Regulus,” says Ted. His eyes are dark and gentle, even with a boy that he never met before two weeks ago, and Andromeda’s chest feels tight with the appreciation for this kind, patient man she was thankfully not stupid enough to let go. “He still has you.”

“Yes,” Regulus agrees softly. “Yes, he does.” He readjusts himself when Dora slots onto the couch between him and Andromeda and only once she’s safely curled against the two of them does he add, “I just hope he knows that, too.”

*********

Sirius comes back, of course.

He puts his hand on Regulus’s shoulder when he comes into the kitchen, quiet and unassuming; he moves like a ghost sometimes, half-there, half-alive, trapped between two worlds and welcome in none. Though Andromeda has seen ghosts who suffered a kinder fate. He goes to draw his hand away but Regulus turns toward him, giving him a slow, sad upturn of lips, and puts his hand over his, squeezing it once, quickly.

“Alright?” Regulus asks after he’s let go.

“Alright,” Sirius says, nodding. He reaches around Regulus to steal a piece of bacon from his plate and bites off half of it. “Bella is still on a rampage so they were all sufficiently distracted.” He looks at the remaining piece of bacon, frowning, then up at Andromeda. “Did you make this?” he asks.

Andromeda nods, still not finding the right words to say anything else, too busy scrutinising Sirius. He seems better and worse at the same time – he’s paler than he was when he left but he holds himself upright now and doesn’t grimace anymore when he moves.

“It’s good.”

Regulus glares up at Sirius. “Are you implying mine isn’t?

Sirius shrugs. “I’m not not implying it,” he says and Regulus shoves him.

*********

Sirius and Regulus filter in and out of the house from then on. Regulus, who used to disappear for scraps of time during the day, now stays away for hours, although he always comes back before the dark has settled in, usually smiling softly at himself or humming under his breath. On some days, even both.

“He has someone,” Sirius says on one of the rare days he’s with them. He’s gone for days at a time and unlike Regulus, rarely spends the night and even then, he is gone before the sun has risen. He spends most of his time with Regulus and his books and parchments, scribbling in the margins, or with Dora, playing chess with her or showing her various wand tricks to entertain her. He is always kind, always patient, but the scars and wounds underneath are visible even on the best of days. Andromeda wonders sometimes if he sees Bellatrix when he looks at Dora with her dark hair and high-cheeked face, or when he looks at Andromeda herself; she doesn’t blame him for getting lost in the pain sometimes. “He won’t tell me but I see him.”

“Are you sure?” Andromeda asks. It seems unimaginable, not because Regulus would be incapable of forming such a relationship, but because it seems almost bizarre that he might allow himself such a comfort, such a liability when he and Sirius are clearly mixed up in something that goes beyond Sirius’s affiliation with Voldemort.

Sirius nods, dragging on the cigarette he’s lit. “I don’t blame him for it,” he says, puffing out the smoke, his voice caught with it. “I had things I didn’t tell him about, too.”

There are so few things Andromeda thinks Sirius has left to keep to himself, to cherish. She cannot imagine the pain he must have felt leaving his friends in the dark and with every loss after it – there can’t have been just a few of them. Her heart aches with the thought of how alone he must have been that first year before Regulus joined him.

“He’s happy,” Sirius says, pressing his shoulder against Andromeda’s briefly. “I can never resent him for it.”

“I’m glad,” Andromeda says and pushes the question bubbling up her throat back into her lungs, squeezed between her ribs, storing it for a day she might get a satisfactory answer. Are you happy?

*********

Days bleed by, then weeks, during which Andromeda learns to exercise a degree of patience she has never known before. It takes hours to put Dora to sleep sometimes, days to help Ted master a new level of mobility, but Andromeda never for one second wishes it were any different; she has them still and that is more than she can ask for.

Sirius examined Ted the second time he came back and his diagnosis, coming from someone who Andromeda has known to be exceptionally talented at healing, offered little hope; but Ted is trying with everything he has, religiously doing all exercises and drinking his potions—the results are defying all expectations.

Currently, he’s learning to use the wheelchair Sirius has procured and magically enhanced for him, using the wheels to propel himself backwards and forwards, back and forth, back and forth. “This is quite nice,” he says, smiling up at Andromeda with tired eyes, set strangely into his thin, scarred face. He’s always been a bit on the stout side, but he’s lost a lot of weight during his recovery, his rehabilitation; it’s not a bad change but the reasons for it are. She misses, sometimes, her cheerful husband and her bubbly daughter but always catches herself before she wishes to go back. There are so many things she has gained now that she would never have managed to see otherwise. It is hard to be resentful of that. “Come on,” he proclaims as he tugs on her hand and then lets go to push himself forward, past the kitchen and towards the front door. “Let’s take it out for a test drive.”

Andromeda follows, opens the door and steps out. It’s a beautiful day, cold but not unpleasant, the sun shining high up in the clear sky. She hasn’t made it a habit to remind herself of it lately.

Ted is a bit unsure in the wheelchair, rolling over the grassy knolls and dips, but it is wonderful to see him enjoy the outside world without having to rely on anyone’s assistance, to be self-sufficient, if only for the time being.

She stands next to him once he’s stopped and reaches for his hand on the armrest. “I love you,” she tells him. “And I’m sorry I’ve caused you so much pain.”

Ted smiles at her, wide and unrestrained, but weak around the edges. He wraps his fingers around her and brings their joined hands up to his mouth to kiss the back of hers. “My Dromeda,” he murmurs. “You’ve only ever brought joy to my life.” He pulls on her hand until she gives and climbs into his lap, curling into his firm torso, into his smell of chamomile and healing potions. He wheels them forward, slowly and unsurely, but Andromeda trusts him enough to keep her eyes closed until he stops. He’s brought them all the way to the end of the path leading to the village below, where Regulus has taken Dora, heavily masked, for the day.

It takes her a moment to realise that they’ve crossed the border of the Fidelius charm and there’s a painful tug in her chest, an old panic finally rearing its ugly head; but it’s Ted and she trusts him. So she noses against the curve of his neck as he wraps his arms around her and she breathes him in, lets the sunrays wash over them. With him by her side, she isn’t afraid.

*********

“How’s Cissy?” she asks Sirius when she finally dares.

He looks up from a parchment, depicting strange, mangled creatures. He and Regulus have been becoming more open with their research, leaving them to lie on the table even if they’ve left their spot for longer than a minute; she thinks they might tell her what they’re up to soon. “Good,” he says, grey eyes unreadable. He takes a bite of the sandwich she’s made him and it seems almost absent-minded or at least not deliberate. Regulus told her Sirius practically has had to have food forced down his throat for months, if not years. “Surviving,” he adds after he’s swallowed the bite; then, even softer, “She fears for her son.”

Andromeda thinks back to the family tree in the dining room, the gold thread tracing down from the line connecting Narcissa and Lucius. “Draco,” she says and he nods.

“He’ll be two soon,” he tells her, a distant look crossing his face; it seems at once caught between reminiscence and regret. “I’d help her if I could but Lucius would kill her before he’d let her go and she won’t risk Draco.”

Andromeda’s throat burns, a familiar sensation by now, older even than Sirius’s servitude. It’s been a constant companion since she last closed the door of her childhood home. Bella, she had little qualms about leaving behind, but Cissy, pliable Cissy who would do anything to please their parents and Bella; she would have taken her with if she had been able to. She cannot blame Sirius for having the same conflict within himself, for failing to come up with a solution when his circumstances are so much worse.

“I’m sorry you’re alone,” she says, leaning back against the counter, gripping the old, hideous wand like it’s her lifeline; she hates it, its history, its character and everything in-between—but it’s all she has right now and it has to be enough.

“I wasn’t always,” Sirius says, the long, elegant lines of his face shifting as he reaches up to touch a small carnation pendant resting just below the hollow of his throat. She has the sudden image of the boy he was, rising from the stool at the Sorting, equal parts elated and terrified. She really thought that he was safe then, that he would get away. “But I am now.”

*********

Regulus teaches Dora to fly on a broom, leading her high up into the sky and guiding her through easy manoeuvres. It makes her laugh, makes her giddy with excitement and she comes back into the house rosy-cheeked and with shining eyes.

Ted reads bedtime stories to her, has her tucked against his chest until late in the night, until she’s been asleep for hours and not mere restless minutes. He kisses her hair and tells her he loves her and doesn’t let go of her unless she asks him to.

Andromeda sings her lullabies until her throat hurts and brushes her hair and plays with her. She shows her all the wonderful things Alphard kept in his house, all the knowledge he kept in his books. She teaches her to dance every ballroom dance she remembers and doesn’t once mind any antiquity Dora breaks.

But Dora’s hair remains dark, her features familiar and painful not because they remind Andromeda of a past she’d rather forget, especially now, but because they are not her daughter’s, who has made it her personal mission to be her own and no one else’s since the day she first figured out how to control her abilities. They are a reminder that Dora lost something – that she was robbed of it – she can’t ever get back.

Then Andromeda goes for a glass of water in the middle of the night and she finds Sirius sprawled out on the couch, a thin blanket over him. He rarely goes to his room to sleep, instead preferring to crash in the living room; Andromeda hasn’t dared to ask him why yet. His chest is rising and falling steadily, his breaths blowing his hair away from his face. He has his arm around Dora, who is snuggled into his chest, her own arm barely reaching up to be wrapped around him. The embers in the fireplace cast a soft, warm light over the two of them, just enough that Andromeda can see that there, just above the swell of Nymphadora’s ear, her short hair glows pink.

*********

Snow melts under the relentless onslaught of the sun and gives way to blooming flowers. The days grow warmer, longer.

Andromeda starts tending to the old garden and Dora, with her hair a beautiful, beautiful pattern of pink and brown, joins her. They work while Ted sits in his chair nearby, reading or simply watching them. Sometimes he tells them stories or jokes; on other days, they are all content to stay in silence, to enjoy all the things that they nearly lost. Here, in the small world they’ve built for themselves, occupied and protected by people Andromeda loves most, they start healing.

*********

The newspapers grow darker and Regulus’s eyes become stormier, his face worn with frowns. He stays inside day and night, digging through old texts that probably haven’t seen the light of day for decades.

Sirius doesn’t come home for weeks.

*********

It’s nearly June when he does. The garden outside is blooming, bright with colours and life, but the house doesn’t light up until he bursts through the door.

“I got it!” Sirius yells. He’s smiling, honest-to-god smiling, when he barrages directly into Regulus and knocks the two of them off-balance, nearly onto the floor. “I got it, Regulus,” he says into his shoulder, muffled and fuzzy with the shock. He’s still grinning when he pulls back but now, so is Regulus.

“How did you get it?” Regulus asks, reaching out a hand.

“I convinced Narcissa.”

It’s not until Regulus takes the small black book from Sirius’s hands that Andromeda even notices he had it. It’s an old, unassuming thing but Andromeda spent nearly half her life in houses where she learnt the hard way that most things weren’t what they appeared to be; even just looking at it makes the hairs on the back of her neck stand up, her chest heavy with the weight it has brought to the room. Whatever it is, it isn’t harmless.

“What is that?” she asks.

Regulus and Sirius exchange a dark look, an old sort of connection she remembers the two of them sharing since they were children; they have always known best how to exclude others from their conversations without even trying. Sirius’s face remains for the most part impassive, but Regulus’s mouth twitches to the side.

“I’m not stupid,” Andromeda tells them, which they should already know. She was the mastermind behind most of their pranks in their youth, after all. “You’ve already done it now.”

Sirius sighs, a deep, long thing that seems at once strange and usual for him. “Fair enough,” he says, sweeping his hair out of his eyes with practised ease. It’s getting long again; Andromeda should make him sit down and cut his hair. “You should sit down.”

*********

Sirius brings a dagger that Andromeda’s seen in one of the display cases in the study and offers it to her. It’s goblin-wrought silver, he tells her, coated in basilisk venom, a thing a friend of his managed to procure for him. It is one of the few things that can destroy the soul inside the diary.

“Your honours, Dromeda,” Regulus says softly, standing against the wall next to the fireplace. She only now notices the golden chain of the locket resting against his chest, the shape of it obvious underneath his white shirt now that she knows what to look for.

“This is how we end it?” she asks, looking between him and Sirius, unsure at whom the question is directed.

But it’s Sirius, with his eyes like shards of ice, his back like a pillar of steel, that says in a firm, cool voice, “Yes.”

Andromeda nods, steeling herself, grips the dagger and stabs it into the middle of the leather diary. Black ink bleeds out, pulsing in time with the shrill, dull screams that tear out of it. Andromeda dives to the side, the dagger clattering to the ground as she covers her ears. Sirius catches her, pressing her against his chest with a quiet, soothing murmur, the sensation unfamiliar after so many years but Andromeda can’t look away from the horror before her, knowing that it’s a piece of someone’s soul dying, something she caused. Voldemort was, despite everything, human once, too.

The diary heaves one last spurt of black blood, then goes silent and lies there. The weight in the room lifts.

*********

“What else could be a Horcrux?” she asks Regulus the next morning. Ted and Dora are still asleep in their rooms and there’s no one else to overhear them.

Regulus looks up from his breakfast, swallowing before he answers, “Anything. Voldemort seems partial to sentimental items – his diary, Slytherin’s locket, Hufflepuff’s cup, his family’s ring.”

“Items relating to Hogwarts?” Andromeda muses, taking a sip of her tea. “Sword of Gryffindor?”

Regulus shakes his head, eyes sharp. Andromeda doesn’t doubt that everything she might come up with he has already thought of. “Only a true Gryffindor can get his hands on that one.”

“Ravenclaw’s Diadem?”

“In theory. But it’s been lost for centuries.”

Andromeda knows, of course, so she nods and doesn’t mention it again; but something trickles against her mind, an old memory, a passing thought, and it doesn’t let go.

*********

Regulus pokes Sirius, dozing on the couch next to them, while they file through different texts. It’s tedious and gruesome work, Horcrux hunting, and no one can blame him for not wanting to participate in it after having to deal with the Death Eaters for weeks. “How did you convince Narcissa?” he asks.

It makes sense that he would; if Sirius was Andromeda’s favourite cousin, then Narcissa was Regulus’s, the feeling no doubt mutual. Although years apart, they both found solace in the quiet things, the unassuming ones; they have always been the counterweights to Sirius and Andromeda. Regulus must have kept the worry for her despite everything that happened—or perhaps exactly because of it.

Sirius blinks open his eyes, languid. The dark bags underneath them are a horrible sight to behold but not an unusual one. “I mentioned Draco – that it might help keep him safe if she did what I asked.” He makes a face, absent. “I’m not proud of it.”

Regulus glances at him, then back down at the parchment in his hands. “Had to be done,” he murmurs.

“He’s a good kid,” Sirius says, a tinge of fondness creeping into his voice. “Happy.” He adds, to Regulus or Andromeda, she doesn’t know, “You’d like him.”

Andromeda knows he doesn’t mean to hurt them but it stings, the knowledge that he gets to know their nephew, gets to see him grow up while they are stuck here, grasping at dragon’s breath. The darkness rises up in her for a moment, two, then dies down. It doesn’t disappear exactly – but Sirius has sacrificed so much for them and still does, on a daily basis. Having that small reprieve, that one little gift, is the least that he deserves.

He’s happy. I can never resent him for it.

Besides, it is just a matter of time.

*********

Regulus turns twenty-one years old in the hottest week of the summer. Andromeda forgets sometimes, how young they all are, how much they have already suffered.

She bakes him a cake, the cranberry one he so adored as a child. Dora draws him a picture of him, Sirius and the three of them, prouder of it than she ever has been of any other accomplishment. Sirius buys him a set of books and even hugs him, a quick, brief thing that nonetheless makes Andromeda’s eyes sting.

He blows out the candles and Dora asks him, “Did you wish for anything?”

Regulus cradles the back of her head, fingers carding through the purplish hair there. “Oui,” he says, “I did.”

He doesn’t tell them, of course, and Dora is content with that, but he slips out of the house in the evening and Andromeda has an inkling anyway.

*********

Andromeda doesn’t look at the newspapers anymore. She stopped long before Bellatrix came crashing through her front door and the idea is to never start doing it again until she dies or until Voldemort is defeated, whichever comes first—and she’s having her doubts.

But it’s pointless not to look at newspapers when she can just take one look at Sirius when he comes through the door and know how bad it is anyway. Given the fact that most of the media is currently already controlled by the Death Eaters, that way is even more accurate than the Daily Prophet itself. She wishes she didn’t have to know, that she could just curl into the space between Ted and Dora and stay there forever, the rest of the world be damned.

There are people in the rest of the world, though, people she loves, people she knows, people she wishes she could make amends with. Sirius. Narcissa. Lucretia. Her classmates, her colleagues. They’re all fighting, in their own way, she’s sure of it. It seems unfair that she gets to step away from that.

The thing is, she could. Sirius is the Secret Keeper of this house and she knows he would let her if she asked; even if his cover was blown, even if he was tortured to death, she knows he would not give them up and they would all be safe for the rest of their lives.

But at the end of the day, Andromeda knows who she wants under the roof of this house if the worst time comes and it’s not just her small family and Regulus; it’s Sirius and Narcissa and a dozen people in-between. So she covers Regulus with a blanket, kisses the top of his head as he moves and murmurs in his sleep, and brushes Sirius’s hair away from his face, presses a kiss to the edge of the scar across his cheek. Then she settles against them, opens the book again and starts reading.

The war isn’t going to end itself.

*********

“He has the Ministry,” Sirius says with a hoarse voice on a November morning. He came sometime during the night, slept on the couch again. It’s the first thing he’s said since they woke up.

Regulus frowns. “There hasn’t been any indication—”

“Imperius,” Sirius says, shrugging. “Bagnold and most of her office – I don’t know exactly who, though. He didn’t put me on the job.”

“Who then?” Andromeda asks and dreads the answer even before Sirius’s eyes, dull and dark, catch hers.

“Lucius. Bellatrix. Rodolphus.”

“Why not you?” says Regulus. “We wouldn’t—” He rubs a hand across his face, makes a soft, agitated noise. “We were doing so well.”

“I know, Reg,” Sirius says softly. “Believe me, I know.” He worries his lip and sucks his cheeks in; they look even more hollow now, his face as white as death. “He’s sending me to the werewolves.”

Regulus blanches. “Again?”

Sirius’s nod is short, curt, like he’s already resigned. “He wants them ready. He has something up his sleeve, I don’t know what. He’s not telling me. I don’t think he’s telling Bellatrix either.”

One short conversation, a few scraps of information and the world is already infinitely worse than it was mere minutes ago. A lump gathers in Andromeda’s throat. The Ministry being done for was to be expected, of course it was, but it’s worse now that it’s actually happening, when the possibility of the people outside being protected is completely gone, not only because the government has fallen but because Sirius won’t be there either.

“I’ll be fine,” he says, trying for a reassuring smile but his mouth trembles. “They’re not such big bad wolves as they’re painted to be. Preferrable to the Death Eaters, really.”

*********

Dora cries when he tells her, throwing her arms around him and clinging to him long enough that Andromeda has to look away.

Sirius holds her, murmuring soft words to her, shushing and rocking her to the side. “C'est d'accord, ” he says, soft against the wild purple of Dora’s hair. “It’s just a couple months, Dora. I’ll be back before you know it.”

“But it’s your birthday tomorrow,” Dora tells him between sniffles. “I haven’t finished your present yet.”

Sirius blinks, mouth open, and Andromeda wonders if he even remembered – or maybe he didn’t expect that they would remember, that she and Regulus would care enough to tell Dora. Oh, Sirius. “Your presence is present enough, Dora,” he says finally, pulling her into another hug. His head is tucked against hers, his eyes closed, the gentle expression on his face at odds with the strength he’s holding her against him. “Besides,” he says, slowly drawing back, “you can give it to me when I come back.” He pokes her in the belly and that makes her crack a reluctant smile. “Gives me something to look forward to.”

*********

It’s worse, somehow. It’s not like he wasn’t gone before but at least they knew he was around somewhere. Regulus could reach him when the need called for it and it was a matter of days, or weeks, at worst, before he came home. Now, it’s months, an endless stretch of time that only seems to draw on longer with the lack of success their research offers.

Then Regulus says, “A Horcrux can be a living thing.”

Andromeda looks up from her parchment, the image of Ravenclaw’s lost diadem now permanently scorched into her mind, all too familiar, then blinks at Regulus. “What?”

He stretches across the coffee table to hand her the piece of an old text. It’s in Ancient Runes, her brain blanking for a second before it starts translating, but Regulus has already continued by the time she’s halfway through. “The soul can be placed inside a living thing – an animal, a plant, a human, probably.” His eyes are shining when she glances at him. “Sirius said Voldemort found this snake, Nagini. He always keeps her at his side and with his obsession with being the Heir of Slytherin—” He tilts his head to the side, like a cat, giving a slow one-shouldered shrug.

“He made her a Horcrux,” Andromeda finishes, her mouth tugging up at the corners.

Regulus nods, running a hand through his tousled hair. His cheeks are flushed, his eyes twinkling. “We’d have to check— Sirius  would have to check,” he corrects, his forehead creasing up, his eyes blinking closed for a second, “but it’s likely.” He takes a quill and scribbles a quick message onto a small piece of parchment lying to the side. He slices the tip of his finger open and presses it to the top of the parchment, leaving behind a bloody fingerprint when he pulls it back. He taps his wand against it, once, twice, then sits back. The parchment disappears in a puff of blue-black smoke.

*********

“What will you do, Andi?” Marina asks, her voice velvet-smooth. She’s sitting on a throne in front Andromeda, leg crossed over the other, her sea-blue dress barely reaching the bend of her knee. Her chest is splashed with red, her brown hair tangled around her bruised face. A tiara rests atop her head, it, too, speckled with red.

Andromeda pushes back the urge to throw up. She’s dreaming, she knows she is, but Marina’s death is still an aching scar; she will never forget the emptiness of her eyes as they stared up at the ceiling painted in her own blood. “I don’t know,” she whispers.

“You? You, Andromeda Black, don’t know?” Marina says with a laugh, a high, breathy thing that sends chills down Andromeda’s spine; it is not the familiar, throaty sound she remembers. “I don’t believe it.”

“You know how you can help. Of course you do.”

“I don’t, I don’t.”

Marina shoots her an unimpressed look, eyes dark. She reaches up to move a stray strand of her hair out of her face, tucking it behind her ear. “Where is it, Andi?”

A sob builds up in Andromeda’s throat. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Marina was always a sharp person, a no-nonsense kind of one, but she never demanded more of people than what she knew they could give.

She shakes her head, fingers gripping the edge of the throne until her knuckles are white as bone. “You know,” she says. “Now you just have to remember where it is.”

*********

They celebrate Christmas without Sirius.

Regulus, rosy-cheeked, drags in a Christmas tree, tall enough to reach the ceiling and make Dora jump around with glee, her hair changing colours every time her feet touch the ground. They adorn it with ornaments Ted and Andromeda, despite her wand acting up, manage to conjure up and spend the day before Christmas baking cookies. By the end of the day, they are all so full they nearly forget anyone is missing at all. Come morning, they are all starkly aware of it again.

New Year’s Eve comes around and that passes without Sirius, too. Regulus sits outside on the cliff until they drag him in and even then, his eyes seem hollow, his voice empty when he says, “I forgot—it’s been a year—more than—since—” He puts his face in his hands and whispers, “Evan.”

It’s a sombre affair, New Year’s Day.

*********

Dora’s birthday is looking to be the same kind of subdued when no one is around in the morning—just the two of them, curled up on the couch while Dora opens the gift Andromeda managed to get for her. Ted and Regulus disappeared down into the village a couple of hours ago.

It should be better, Andromeda thinks. It’s her tenth birthday, the last whole year before she’s set to leave for Hogwarts and she deserves better. The knowledge that she can’t give it to her presses down on her chest, too heavy.

“I love you, little one,” Andromeda tells her, kissing the crown of her head. At least she’s happier now, at least she’s safe this year. At least Andromeda can be thankful for that.

“Love you too, Mum,” Dora says back absently, fingers skimming over the Quidditch book she’s unwrapped. She smiles up at her, though, bright and sudden. “Thank you, I love it.”

Dora is not a naïve child, has never really been, but Andromeda sees how much calmer she is now, how much more she considers everything she says or does and it makes her want to get up and find Bellatrix herself – to do to her the unspeakable things that she did to her daughter, to show her that she took away something from an innocent bystander in the name of something as trivial as blood. But it doesn’t matter to Bellatrix, it never has, and it isn’t worth it, not when both Andromeda and Nymphadora would lose so much with it.

“We’re back!” Ted shouts as he wheels himself into the living room, his lap full of presents. He’s grown stronger in the past months, his muscles building back up once he started moving around; but more important than that, he’s happier and not resigned but at peace with this big change life has brought for him.

“We even picked up a renegade,” Regulus adds, following in after Ted and carrying a load of things, the beginning and end of which Andromeda cannot for the life of her figure out. He frowns at someone behind him. “He’s refused to help us carry the gifts.”

Sirius steps in after him, dressed in clean, pressed dark robes, everything about him sleek and polished. He shrugs, his too-long hair falling in his eyes, and says, “I am the gift.”

Dora shrieks and ricochets herself off of the armrest, slamming into Sirius with enough force to make him stumble back a step; and he is. He really is.

*********

Sirius bends down low over Regulus and her, each of his hands on their shoulders. He doesn’t look unwell, not for a man who was supposed to have been dealing with feral creatures for the past few months. “You were right,” he murmurs, low enough Dora and Ted won’t hear. Andromeda thinks Ted probably knows anyway. “Nagini is a Horcrux.”

*********

Sirius is sitting eerily still for someone who could not be forced to calm down as a child. Then again, there are many aspects in which Sirius has changed and settled; this can hardly be any different. He’s letting her cut his hair, which is, although soft and glossy for the most part, damaged enough she will have to cut off at least a half of it.

“Don’t the werewolves have any tools to keep themselves in order?” she grumbles, sniping off half of a strand. Once it falls in place, it just reaches his earlobe.

Sirius breathes deep. “They live in poverty, Dromeda,” he says, rolling his shoulders back. Through the thin material of his white shirt, she can see a scabbed wound stretching from one shoulder to the other. “They can hardly afford such luxuries.”

Andromeda has, as a principle, made it her main objective in the last decade to be as different from her family as possible. In large part, that involved successfully relearning every ideology Cygnus and Druella had done their best to instil in her. On the rare occasion, however, Andromeda, in her admittedly bull-headed pushing, came to the limits of her own morality, to the grey zone that she could not move out of solely on the basis of being far away from the Blacks’ mentalities. Werewolves and similar dark creatures fell into that grey zone because at the end of the day Andromeda, as a child from a deeply dysfunctional family, felt she didn’t have the ability to make the judgement for herself. She fears such moments most, when she realises that she can escape her family, but some shackles can never be fully stripped away.

Sirius’s voice is soft but rather lost, a boat far out in the open sea. “They’re not bad people, not most of them,” he murmurs into his hands covering his mouth. “Those that are, were bad people before they were ever Turned.”

*********

Andromeda stands in a vast room, with no end in sight. There are piles of trinkets around her, large piles of every little thing Andromeda can think of and yet larger ones of things she couldn’t name to save her life. They are arranged in lines, leaving narrow rows for passage in-between.

She steps forward, down one of those rows, her fingers skimming over the things scattered atop. A book, glasses, a quill. A frame, a wand, a tiara. A piece of string, a wig, a bust.

Marina appears in front of her, dressed as she was the last time, only her hair is woven into a crown of brown and red now, her fingers taut with dried blood. “You are far more foolish than I thought you were,” she says, looking down at her with hooded eyes and curved mouth. “I thought you were the observant type.”

“What are you talking about?” Andromeda asks. She’s tired of these dreams, these nightmares that plague her even in the daylight. If she’s not dreaming about them, she’s thinking of them. She wishes they stopped.

“Where is it, Andromeda?” Marina says, huffing impatiently but not in the way Andromeda is used to. “Where are we?”

Andromeda looks around. The ceiling of the room is high and dark, plain and unassuming, the walls too far away or too covered to be made out. She knows this place, she’s certain of it. She’s been here before. This meant something to her once, once, a long time ago—

And then it hits her. The seventh-floor corridor, the left one—the tapestry with the room that was never not there, the one she hid all the evidence of her relationship with Ted in, then later on of her plan to escape. I need a place to hide my things.

She turns, eyes searching for the thing she should have remembered a long time ago. The wig, the painting, the frame.

It’s resting on a precariously-put set of old, leather-bound books, covered in dust, all the glamour that should have been there long gone; but she knows where it is and what it is. She knows, she knows.

Marina has moved to stand next to her, her breaths steady. The blood has disappeared from her dress, has been washed out of her hair and off her hands. “I knew you’d remember eventually,” she says, fingers curling around Andromeda’s wrist. Her voice is once again the harmony of warm, raspy tones Andromeda knows. “It’s high time the war ended.”

Andromeda is stumbling out of bed before she’s even fully awake.

*********

Regulus grumbles when she shakes him and tries to burrow himself deeper under the covers. The sun is beginning to arc across the sky, far too early yet, but this is important. Andromeda cannot wait when she knows every minute wasted is a minute more that the people she loves have to suffer.

“I know where the last Horcrux is,” she tells him and he’s sat up within the next three seconds.

He looks up at her, grey eyes wide and just the little bit glassy, but his voice is strong. “Where?”

“Hogwarts.”

*********

Regulus sends a message to Sirius, the words smudged with sleep, messy with haste. We know where the last one is. Come as soon as you can.

After it’s disappeared in the burst of smoke, Andromeda asks, “What do we do now?”

Regulus sits down in front of the fireplace and opens a book, the picture of restrained calm. She shares none of it; her body is alive with the need to get up, to pace, to do something. “We wait.”

*********

Hours pass. Then days.

Sirius doesn’t come.

*********

The door to the terrace slips open so quietly Andromeda almost doesn’t hear it. She thinks for a moment it’s Dora or Regulus and she doesn’t even deign to open her eyes. Then she remembers Dora has taken off on a broom, diligently supervised by Ted, and Regulus is sitting next to her, gently rocking the garden swing they’ve settled on for the morning.

She stands up, just a second after Regulus, and whirls towards the door. She’s never felt anger like this before, pulsing in her belly like a fresh seal, scratching against the walls of her throat, as if it might tear them apart if she doesn’t let it out. She hides her trembling hands in the pockets of her dress.

Then she sees Sirius. His hair is a mess, haphazard around his face, his chest heaving with quick, rash breaths. The beat of his heart is not nearly audible but even so, Andromeda can imagine its fast pace just fine. He’s holding their message in one hand, his fingers dark with blood, a stark contrast to his pale face once he brings them up to it.

All the fight drains out of Andromeda.

Regulus doesn’t seem to share the sentiment. “Where have you been?” he asks, voice at once lower and louder than Andromeda’s ever heard him use. “We sent the message nearly two weeks ago.” He pauses, eyes flicking up and down Sirius’s body. “No matter.” He steps forward, grabbing Sirius by the shoulder and shaking him lightly. He cracks a smile, unsure in the face of Sirius’s indifference. “Sirius, we found it. It’s the Ravenclaw Diadem. It’s at Hogwarts.”

That does get Sirius to blink and shake his head, like a dog getting water out of his ears. “Oh good,” he says, voice hoarse. “We can kill two birds with one stone.”

Regulus’s smile fades as he steps back, his arms falling back to his sides. “What do you mean?”

Sirius clears his throat. He looks down at his hands, at the bloodied message, then up at Dora, laughing in the sky. Once his eyes move, they flick towards Andromeda, then settle back on Regulus. “Voldemort has had a spy at Hogwarts since September,” he says, his face crumpling with a desperation Andromeda hasn’t seen on him, probably ever, opening up like a chasm after an earthquake. “He’s going to attack Hogwarts at nightfall.”

[st4rlings]

The Black Widow movie...

I absolutely loved the first fifteen minutes. They were just beautiful.

The rest however… *heavy sigh*

Don’t get me wrong. I wanted to love the film as a whole and without reservations. I do love some parts of the film. There are many fantastic aspects to it. I love Natasha. I love Yelena. I love Melina. Some of the shots were very pretty. The set-design was great. I love we (kinda) found out what happened in Budapest. I love how many female characters there are in this movie, and some of the fight scenes were a lot of fun.

I’ve waited for a Black Movie film since at the very least 2013. And when I saw the first few minutes I was all “nothing that will happen can take this glorious opening away again.” 😭

Unfortunately it feels as though the original creative vision as it is presented in the first quarter of an hour was watered down by concessions to the Marvel action formula, i.e. unnecessary comic relief and even more unnecessary, dragged-out action sequences like the rooftop/car chase and the prison break/freak avalanche and then the never-ending showdown as the Red Room (HQ) explodes.

I’m not against action scenes. Actually, I love action scenes. But either in moderation, or they have to contribute something to the plot, otherwise they’re just redundant and, well, boring. We already got a few minutes of Natasha and Yelena fighting when the Black Widows show up and the fight goes on, and then “Taskmaster” shows up again, and at this point I was already getting tired of it. Like, we know the characters won’t die and they’re not fighting against characters they have any sort of personal connection with or even just antagonists with an agenda – so why should we care?

I wanted the film to be utterly heart-wrenching, but they never let us feel that after the intro. Like, the fact they gloss over all the extreme violence of the Black Widow training by using a miracle chemical as a plot device to explain why they’re all mind-controlled – that felt oddly sanitized to me. And it’s basically all we get to know about the current Black Widow programme.

“Taskmaster”, or rather Taskmistress seems like she only is another diversion. At first she’s mostly gimmicky with the copy cat behaviour. And then we’re supposed to feel something about the reveal that she is a cyborg-version of the girl Natasha sacrificed to get to Dreykov. But that particular subplot was so underdeveloped that I found it difficult to care. Especially since Taskmistress never gets to be anything but another murder doll and the person Antonia never makes an appearance.

I’ve seen people draw comparisons with CA:TWS, and one of the more interesting aspects of that movie was much of the story revolved around Bucky breaking out of the mind control through his connection to Steve. I would have loved to see any form of self-awareness from Antonia, or get a bit of backstory on her character, instead of, well, avalanches and explosions. In the end her whole story line only existed to create a bit of a half-baked redemption arc for Natasha.

The real villain was supposed to be Dreykov anyway, but… again, TWS-comparison: when Alexander Pierce and the STRIKE team were revealed to be the modern, sleeker version of HYDRA, it was easy to connect them to the larger story arc and fill in the gaps. (Obviously, since then we got a ton of excellent fiction about them, so that probably colours my judgement quite a bit.)

The Red Room however was barely mentioned in the MCU before. (There’s a flashback in one of the movies… the first Avengers film?) And then, in Black Widow, a movie that should be explicitly about this topic, all we get is a music video and another flying headquarters to fall out of the sky? (Also gets a bit old tbh.)

I mean – what exactly are the motives behind the Black Widow programme. The cold war is long over in ‘95. What are they doing apart from kidnapping girls and turning them into murder dolls? Why are they doing it? What’s the goal? What’s the ideology?

All we get for an answer is Dreykov is the mastermind of it all and he’s a power hungry sociopath and he also used to be a general at some point.

Which is a bit ???

I fucking love Ray Winston, and I would have loved to hate Dreykov or hated to love him or however it goes with villains, but instead I felt nothing. Because the film didn’t give me anything to love or hate.

He barely made an appearance before the end of the film by which you were already expected to hate him. But we were never shown a reason why we should hate him. (Unless you count him killing one of the Widows after she became useless to him – but since neither Yelena nor Natasha were emotionally attached to her that didn’t leave much of an impact.) We were mostly told to. In the credits montage. In conversations between Natasha and Yelena. In conversations between Natasha and Melina.

Perhaps it’s too much to ask but I really, really wanted to know more about Natasha’s backstory and the film skirted around that A LOT. Maybe they thought it’d be too exploitative, idk. But when it comes to character development and plot, we’ve got more reasons to hate Alexei and Melina for betraying Natasha and Yelena than we have reasons to hate Dreykov. Which is not ideal.

Oh, and last but not least, probably my biggest pet peeve with the film: I don’t get why they chose to replace the Ohio-version of Alexei (competent, serious, tough, and from the looks of it a caring father and husband) with sad clown!Red Guardian making sexist jokes and being essentially useless. Also, why give them all a funny Russian accent when they used to be apparently quite proficient in English?

The comic relief ruins so much of the wonderful atmosphere the movie built in the beginning. Whyyy?

In the end it boils down to the problem I have with almost all action movies: the actual plot and character development is cut short to make room for gratuitous chases and shoot-outs and things exploding. And I’ll have to rely on fanfic writers to answer my burning questions and spin gold from straw again and makes sense of all the loose ends and underdeveloped ideas and… I can’t really complain about that, but then I feel Marvel could do a lot better...

[junkyardlynx]

As the wind stroked his boyish face, Gran found himself smiling softly. Not one of previously unrealized joy, nor the fragile countenance of someone on the edge of sorrow. No, it was a smile of resignation. Not over anything huge, really, but more a persistent fact of his strange life.

He would always be underestimated.

The breeze’s affection turned fickle and slipped away, leaving only stillness and birdsong to fill the tree he was perched in. The light armor he wore fit him well - a black ensemble, decorated with geometrical splashes of red and trimmed in gold. The plates were near-weightless, but they were tough enough to take all manner of punishment; the master artisan six islands back claimed the whole set was forged from adamantite. The matching gauntlets fit him like a second skin, responsive and pliable and even as he leaned forward on the spindly branch, the greaves gave not a creak or a groan.

By all accounts, the armor was fit for a majestic king, or perhaps a revered general. Not a boy who barely looked sixteen summers. So, who then? One would be forgiven if they mistook him for a prince, or perhaps an up-and-coming knight-commander. His features were handsome, if boyish, and people always told him that he had a “very dashing” air to him. As if that actually meant anything.

No, Gran was none of those things. By birth, he was a nobody from the edge of the known sky, left with his friend that was definitely not a lizard. By trade, he was a skyfarer captain. By destiny, one who shared his life with the Girl in Blue. And by effort? Well, that was the one he was most happy to share. Not that anyone ever believed him at first. 

By effort, he could be summed up in four words. 

Conqueror of the Eternals. 

A boy of sixteen, now going on twenty-two, was the one who bested all ten Eternals in single combat? Even to himself, it sounded like a nice story and nothing more. Even though he lived every moment of it. The more spectacular details, like the defeat of the Erste Empire and his rejection of the True King’s offer were public knowledge. Though, well, it was true that they tended to draw his likeness a bit taller, and his face a bit more rugged. Artists paint what they feel, even if they don’t know it, even if they try and hide it. The bias creeps in. Surely whoever performed these fantastic deeds couldn’t be a sixteen year old kid. It was probably a part of the tale added later to spice it up and make it marketable for local papers.

Well, they were sort of right. When he rejected the “True King” and his poisoned wish, Gran was just about to turn twenty-two. Four months later, he now found himself intervening in a messy war between two kingdoms with his friend and crewmate Altair.

Six years. Six years had passed. Six years that showed nowhere on his face, his countenance. Nowhere save his eyes. 

It started six years ago. He’d died protecting a terrified girl. A girl he didn’t even know. Even now, if Gran was left to his own devices, he could taste that choking pain -- not the way his lungs seared from the hydra’s flame, nor the gash in his side from the hydra’s claws. No, it was the pain of being powerless. The pain of not being able to reach his hand up to the sky and ask his father in hated grief if he was proud. Proud that unlike his old man, Gran didn’t abandon a child in their time of need.

So when that girl in blue did something impossible, he made two little promises inside of his weak heart. 

One, never let anyone hurt her again.

Two, never feel that way again. 

Six years and four months showed only in the tone of his muscles and the strength of his gait. The softness of his steps, the way he would round a corner like a prowling lion due to the endless combat he found himself engaged in. How long was it until he figured out the peculiarities of his resurrected body? His hair and nails grew, he still had to eat and sleep and still smelled awful when covered in silverslime after a successful hunt. Open wounds bled and illness forced him to bed. 

But he didn’t age. 

He probably realized it after teasing Rackam about his patchwork scruff one day. Rackam had lost his razor and was pilfering through the kitchen for a spare, muttering about the “damn gremlins” who “sneak aboard even though people are on watch duty.” 

The exchange wasn’t noteworthy, really. Rackam had laughed and jabbed his index finger into the captain’s cheek, wondering when his peach fuzz would finally pack its bags and leave for more hairy locales. 

Rackam’s voice echoed in his head. 

“C’mon cap, aren’t you eighteen now? You gotta have more than this in ya!” 

---

Weird how such a statement could open a can of worms. Last he checked, he wasn’t in the worm business, either. Well, unless Altair’s little solo mission for me involves worms somehow. 

Gran hadn’t honestly asked for details since Altair didn’t seem to think they were important. The gist of his part in the greater plan amounted to “stop the western advance.” Simple and concise, really. The field he was scouting below the tree was still and peaceful, seemingly unaware of both the passage of time and the rumblings of war. The breeze kicked up again, carving gentle waves through the grass, and memory pulled him back under.

---

After that, it was impossible for Gran not to notice everything strange thing going on with his body. Despite nearing the age of nineteen, not a single hair managed to grace his face. Meanwhile, he could still tan (and burn) under the blazing sun and if he chose, he could grow the hair on his head as long as he liked. As an experiment, he’d left one toenail to grow as long as it could, just to see what happened. Other than a supremely stubbed toe one early morning followed by a string of swears angry enough to make Eugen blush, nothing came of his experiment.

If was as if nobody has given his body the blueprints for life after sixteen, as if the existence of “Gran as a person” was tied to his current general appearance, as if something altogether removed from natural biology had decided that “this” was Gran. Whatever was supposed to come after simply...didn’t. Naturally, Gran lost his mind a bit. Only a bit, though. He had the good sense to seek out the  famous alchemist and self-proclaimed cutest girl in the world, Cagliostro. She’d joined the crew a while ago and had a keen intellect when it came to matters of the body and it’s intricate workings. After all, she’d made one for herself, probably countless times. Her verdict?

She was stumped. 

Apparently, senescence - the process of cells deteriorating after copying themselves over long amounts of time, leading to aging - had stopped in Gran. Sort of. The truth was much stranger. She’d been having him report to her little workshop on the Grancypher twice a week, taking blood and tissue samples much to his immediate and mildly painful dismay. This process continued on for three months before her exasperation and wonder lead her to discuss her findings with “cute, baffling little Gran.”

“Basically, captain! You’re aging just right for the first eight samples. The only way to tell is to be able to “find” the itty bitty little bit of info that goes missing from the blueprint of “you” every time your cells divide. I imagine the Astrals put it in as a sort of safety fe-errrrr, moving on! So! Being the inimitable genius I am, I noticed something about the ninth set of samples. They’re alllllmost the same as the first. Way too close. You don’t just get that bit back for no reason, and you really don’t get THAT much back for any reason.”

Gran nodded slowly, already onto what she was talking about. However, knowing that Cagilostro loved a.) having a captive audience and b.) herself, he let her continue.

“I didn’t say anything because I wasn’t sure, and positing a hypothesis that early on when I might have just mixed up the samples would be irresponsible. So I waited until that Saturday when I got to stab and slice you again, triple-checking that alllll the samples were out of my workshop. Same result! They looked just like the second sample, even fresh farm-to-table.”

She turned an adorably calculated and seemingly malicious smile to Gran as her explanation ended. Though it wasn’t exactly news, her words were still unnerving. After all, his cells were basically rolling back the clock of aging every four weeks. You know, normal things.

“You know how much I’d give to figure out your secret? Even ignoring the fact that it certainly has to do with whatever Lyria did to you three years ago, this is a discovery so amazing you’d think I’d invented it. Your body is pretty much just removed from time! It’s almost envious enough to make me cry. I can’t believe you, making a genius cry. It’s honestly ridiculous. You can obviously still put on muscle mass and your brain isn’t fried like one of those Golden Friday SHRIMP.”

For a bit there after that, Gran lost a...well, a bit more of his mind. If he had to be honest. Three days locked up in his room, not letting anyone in, not even Vyrn. He poured over alchemical texts, medical documents, arcane and state secrets, anything the Grandcypher had that might be pertinent. After three days of intense study, stopping only for the necessities of life, Gran came to an answer. Well, his answer. 

Did it matter?

Had his sword arm stayed the same over those three years? No. Was his cut not deadlier, his stab not sharper, his fist not faster? Had his body not taken on the tone and muscle of someone who fought primals -- and prevailed? The difference between the weak Gran of three years ago and the Gran of today was immeasurable. The young man who had once fallen to a single tortured hydra now found himself battling ancient primal beasts of war and guile on a monthly basis.

He may not ever have a thick Draph-sized mustache and his cheeks might permanently retain their tender charm no matter his age, but his body was fit to fight. To protect. To chase his absent father until the end of the sky. That’s what mattered. Though he was quite sure Cagilostro would tease him endlessly for his answer.

With newfound determination, Gran threw himself into what the rest of the crew considered hellish training simply because he knew he could endure it. It was a way to prove himself - even after death, even after abandonment, he was worth something. He had value and merit and talent, but also the drive and yearning to turn it into something. In the wake of this new regiment for himself and his little visit to a certain alchemist on board, rumors crept up. Slow and steady at first, they soon burned like wildfire through the decks of the Grandcypher, spreading out of context and control. He finally became privy to a good chunk of the downright goofy rumors via his afternoon footwork training on the vast open deck. 

His footwork training was simple. He would empty his mind and fill it with visions of attackers, then repel those attackers as they came at him from all sides and angles. Though it didn’t hold up to real battles, it offered a sort of vision training and group combat scenario that duels never quite could and best of all, it could be performed anywhere with ample space as the only thing required was himself.

Being simple in those relative terms, it provides opportunities for a capable multitasker to easvesdrop things they shouldn’t, like the hottest Grandcypher gossip. On one such afternoon, in the early days of summer, things came to a head as crewmates found themselves unable to contain the rumor mill around their captain any longer.

“I heard the captain’s immortal!” 

Not entirely inaccurate. His nonexistent blade swung a tight arc, lopping off the head of something never there. With his arm extended, he challenged the thin atmosphere between the islands. Nothing came.

“Yeah, I heard he was like a six thousand year old primal beast?” 

Missed the mark a bit there, he quipped internally. It seemed both directed at the conversation and himself as he danced between the attacks of no ones and nothings. His sweeping kick, though near-flawless in form, barely grazed the torso of his last imagined attacker in that scenario. With a click of his tongue, he noted to himself that an actual attacker couldn’t simply stop on a dime like the one he imagined did. Even in his mind, he was tough on himself, as no one else seemed to want the responsibility. With a little consternation, he ended up giving himself the point for his made up little game. The points didn’t matter, but they made him feel better.

“We have a few of those in the crew, so it makes sense.” 

It would, but that’s not the case. Gran’s feet shuffled to and fro, dancing softly across the wooden deck of the Grancypher. To the casual observer, it almost appeared as if he was simply rehearsing one of the dances Anthuria had choreographed with him. He ducked under an imaginary bullet, fist rising from below to smash the jaw of the illusory gunman.

The nothings and nobodies fell to his invisible sword strikes, his matchless kicks and punches, to the spells he snap-conjured between the thrust of a lance and the flight of an arrow. Finally, panting hard with exhilaration and the flow of combat, Gran slew the final “attacker” with a quick reversal and stab to the gut, ending the dream with its own weapon. Nothing and no one fell, other than comfortable silence, but he still felt a measure of success as he picked up the warmed vacuum flask that had his lunch in it.

“No, no, he’s only thirty-six and he’s the son of that one legendary adventurer. It’s his hero’s blood. I hear his dad bathed in the entrails of the primal beast he slew, though, so maybe that’s what caused it in the end?” Why would a hero be forced to stop aging before he could legally drink?  The snort of his barely contained laughter sent soup up his nose, straight from his vacuum flask. Hot soup. Hot, spicy soup. 

“That makes a lot of sense.” 

More than the six thousand year old primal beast bit, yes.

“He’s still our captain, so who cares? That’s good enough for me.” Oh. Ah. I...

That last overheard comment had humbled him, but the clear ring of all the affirmations that followed from crewmates in it’s wake shook him to his core. Somehow, he’d gained the loyalty and friendship of some of the most accepting people under the great blue sky. His training, already considered to be a form of self-punishment by the rest of the crew, grew in scope and desire. If there was a mountain in his way, he would cut it. If there was a river in his way, he would part it. If even the great ocean of stars spanned the distance, it would be crossed. 

For all the things he could still protect. 

For the dreams he had thought beyond him.

For the sake of surpassing the absent father that had abandoned him long ago, leaving only a note.

When still a boy in a backwater nothing, Gran wielded a simple short sword and fancied himself a sort of knight as he grew up. Wearing a slightly ragged blue tunic with a hood, a few pieces of spare platemail strapped to his right arm, and holding a sword containing more rust than blade. Training with Vyrn in the forest every day, the boy dreamed of something bigger.  A fighter, a protector, a guardian of what he loved and treasured, not a bandit that cut and run from his family. That’s what he wanted to be... That dream was, for lack of a better term, driven from his chest. By a hydra. Just so we’re clear. 

He abandoned defensive posture after that, seeking to end fights as quickly as possible. An axe found it’s way into his hands and for a time, he was satisfied by the devastation it wrought. Teenage postmortem angst seemed to be quelled by a felling cleave to an enemy’s collarbone, and chunky plate scraps held together with red leather and white fur served him well enough as protection from the elements and the enemies he faced. 

Nothing so simple satisfied for long, though. Gran took to himself in a sort of hermitage for a while, studying magic under the occasional tutelage of his talented crewmates. There was a certain ripple of insecurity in his scouting party’s mood when he’d shown up late one day, his usual armor stripped down to basic protection and his axe nowhere to be found. They tossed light jeers at his green cloak and the staff he carried, even as they set off for their destination - a bandit camp they had been hired to uproot. Peace talks were attempted by the bandit’s leader and an Erune comrade of Gran’s, one better suited for diplomacy than the boy-faced captain.

Things deteriorated quickly. Gran had quietly stepped forward once the leader made it clear he had no intention of retreating peacefully. With the green hood still covering half his disappointed face, Gran slashed the tip of the staff in a dismissive motion to the right, as if telling them their time here was over. Before they could protest or retaliate, wild magic burst into life around them, sealing off all escape and action. Concentric rings of frost and fire cradled in the stony embrace of the earth, carved into being with the fierce wind tore at everything inside the bandit’s camp. With the oxygen burnt out, the earth lashed and the encampment in shambles, the dazed and injured bandits were easy prisoners. 

No one jeered after that. 

As his prowess grew and the crew took on more work, that cloak had weathered with time. It faded to an almost dull grey, and with this Gran had added a black half-mask to the ensemble. Admittedly, it was mostly to hide his youthful features and force enemies to take him somewhat seriously for once, as the sting of his blessed curse grew more apparent as he approached his twentieth year.

For combat, a middle ground was found. He embraced not pure swordsmanship, nor did he place his trust only in magic. Instead, he channeled his power into debilitating his opponent’s often unworldly vigor and vitality, then coaxed those weaknesses open with his unmatched swordplay. Victory after victory piled up at the crew’s feet, and the legend of the “boy captain” grew.

It also provided the fodder for what Gran considered a highly embarrassing piece of “art.” Somebody had caught him resting his right hand on his jaw, leg crossed over the other almost lazily as he read a scrap of paper in his left. It was a failed betting ticket, so close to winning millions of rupees, save for the upset victory in the sixth match. An enterprising somebody, who’s name begins with L and ends with -unalu, had committed this terrible and dreadful sight to memory. She then committed that memory to paper with her talent. 

Only, well. 

She’d used her license of artistic interpretation to replace the slip of paper held in contempt with a comically oversized sword. Stabbed unceremoniously in the ground. The barstool? That was now a throne carved of stone. The title of the piece, an unknowing and fortunate soul might ask? 

“Chaos Ruler.” 

The print she made was reproduced and sold to more than a handful of people on and off the Grandcypher. Copies of it hung from stray support beams and walls on the ship, as if to lovingly taunt him and people switched their mode of address from “captain” to things like “my liege” or “ruler” or “chaos kid” for the better part of a month. Gran said nothing, choosing to keep what little of his dignity he felt he had left.

Nobody saw Gran wear that outfit again. 

In hindsight, he had to agree that the metal half-mask was a little much. But, ah, Ejaeli and Predator had convinced him it was cool. They made masks look cool, after all. The palpable disappointment from them almost made him walk back on that decision. Almost. 

From then on, he’d taken to wearing a simple outfit when on duty, reminiscent of his teenage years. Having turned twenty some time ago, he decided to make a simple blue hooded tunic the mainstay of his combat attire. On top went a basic but functional steel breastplate, covering his heart and ribs. His arms were covered in gauntlets of the same make, and steel greaves offered his feet and shins ample protection as they went on over a pair of loose beige pants. What it lacked in flair it made up for in comfort and capability. A sensible choice. It gave nothing about his combat style away either, other than the obvious caveat that he might engage in it at some point.

---

Funny to say teenage years, he supposed, looking down at the peaceful field. Fires were beginning to rise and march in the distance, headed this way. An army. For now, though, he had time, and the world seemed to move so perilously slow. Memory reeled him in once more, as if the grass and the trees of this island made him long for another time and another place.

---

Thinking seriously on it, the reason his legend had spread as that of the “boy captain” probably had to do with two things. One, the Grandcypher traveled an awful lot between three different skydoms, and two? The crew of the Grandcypher loved events. 

It probably had to do with a third thing, too. 

His crew really, really loved to tease him about his age. 

Every birthday, it’d be “Happy sixteenth, Cap!” They reused the same banner six times now, adding a tally mark just above “sixteenth” every single time. It was as endearing as it was maddening. Eugen and Rackam pulled the same thing at every new bar, ordering three beers and then pretending to flip out at Gran when he took his. It caused its fair share of problems for Gran, so sometimes Gran would flip the script before they got the chance and get angry at his “dad” and “brother” for getting drunk while “mom” was at home alone. 

Some of the Grandcypher ladies would tease him with lines about “when he was older” and what an “earnest young man he was” if they saw him during the more romantic holidays, much to his chagrin. He learned to reverse that too, going on the offensive by playing the straight man to their act. He paid them straightforward compliments with toothy grins and presented them with chocolates during White Day as a form of playful revenge. 

A few times every year, the crew would be called to an ancient island where a sort of...war game took place between skyfaring crews. An Astral experiment run amok meant that otherworldly and ferocious beasts overwhelmed the singular island now and then, and their presence courted the attention of primal beasts. As the people of the skydoms always sought to turn misery into growth, they established a way to turn it into a competition. Extremely rare treasure was brought in from all across the skyrealms and the monster problem on the island was handily taken care of in what they called Guild Wars. 

Ten times, the Grancypher emerged victorious. Each time, for his troubles, the Captain would receive an ancient weapon of unparalleled power, power that courted disaster - and inevitably the attention of those that would protect the sky from unparalleled threats. 

The Eternals.

Ten times over the years, Gran wore his convictions on his sleeve and fought the strongest people in the sky, all to prove that he would remain himself in the face of that dread power. In truth, Gran didn’t plan to use those relics of war. He simply reveled in the chance to face those brilliant, blazing souls in single combat. 

It was a way to prove himself. Both to those who he had grown to admire after hearing their legends, and to his eternally absent father. Surely, even his father would have to notice if he conquered the ten strongest people in the sky--

He didn’t, but it didn’t matter. 

In the end, the people he met and bonded with mattered.

After an incident involving the mafia bearing down on Stardust Town, the Eternals got together and presented Gran with a suit of armor and his own cloak, signifying his status as the eleventh Eternal, an irreplaceable part of their group. While Siete was still the de-facto leader and Uno was the first of the Eternals, Gran - given the new title of Jedenáct - was the end-all-be-all when it came to pure combat strength. As they had joined the Grancypher’s crew, they wanted him to join the crew of the Eternals and share in that camaraderie. 

He might have felt sixteen behind those misty eyes when they draped the white jacket over his shoulders and popped the celebratory drinks open, but he’d never admit it. Openly. Nio knew, because of course she did. His heart’s plaintive melody was clear to her ear from the moment they’d met. He’d been seeking a place to belong, a place that respected him since the day he understood that his father had abandoned him. Between the Grancypher and the Eternals, he’d finally felt like part of a family. 

A family more real than the blood that spawned and abandoned him, all the while burdening him with purpose. 

This is where I belong.

---

Of course, it was just after this heartfelt moment that Altair had been roped into this awful and brutal war. As a member of the Grancypher family, Altair’s problems were Gran’s problems. And now, that advancing army was coming into ambush distance. Concentrating his mana for a second, Gran summoned forth an ethereal bow, shaped like the one Song used but made of pure, blue light. Standing up on the branch of the tree, he took aim at the ground some twenty metres in front of the enemy general’s advance. Luhua was said to be a fearsome combatant, and Gran secretly hoped for a chance to resolve things with a non-fatal, honorable, one-on-one duel. The best kind of fight. 

Of course, he would always be underestimated. There was a chance that no such duel would be found, and it might turn into a bloody melee.

Either way?

Time to keep the sky’s sweet peace.

[disasterdeacy]

Lavender Knots

A/N: somehow managed to get this up 4 hours before I said that I would! I’m gonna keep this AN short, but I do want to tell everyone that your recent love and support and messages have meant the world to me, and interacting with y’all has made me smile SO DAMN MUCH! Ilysm <3 Pairing: Present Day!Brian May x Young Reader Word Count: 17.7k (Its 40 pages on word lol how do you write small things?) Summary: The media is cruel, and while Y/N can deal with the pressures and nasty words, Brian doesn’t want her to have to... so, he decides to try and help her, by breaking up with her.  Warnings: A N G S T (soz), Fluff (i’m not a sadist), Smut (oh boy its nasty), Age Gap, mentions of mortality, mentions of suicidal thoughts, unprotected sex (wrap it before you tap it unless you’re tryna get Bri to give you a baby, in which case, you do you sis), Major FDA Violations.

Throwing down the copy of the daily mail onto your office desk with a huff, you slump in your seat, groaning and picking up your phone to see 2 text messages from Brian. What usually would’ve made your face light up with a smile makes you frown. Since the two of you had started dating 5 months previous, Brian had completely changed your life for the better. You’d practically moved in together after 2 months, not wanting to be apart for a single moment of the time that you had together. Your family and friends had accepted the relationship with mild confusion, but once they saw how much you smiled when Brian was beside you, they understood exactly how you both felt about one another and never said an ill word about the relationship. Surprisingly, Brian’s kids had been very supportive as well, they had been slightly off putting at first, but after an emergency grandkid sleepover, the 3 May children decided you were as incredible a person their father could find, welcoming into the May family with open arms. The media however... had been less than friendly. Which is why today’s Daily Mail article wasn’t exactly a surprise, yet still managed to burn a bit. No woman wants to be called, in not so harsh words, a gold digging whore, for holding her boyfriend’s hand. And based on the text messages that Brian had sent, he wasn’t taking it too well, asking if you would come to his place immediately after work. A nervous pit formed in your stomach upon receiving the message, and stayed there the remainder of the day until you arrived back at his home around 5.

“Bri? Love...” You sit your bag down, wringing your hands as you walk along the foyer, confusion etched on your face; usually Brian was waiting for you at the door.

 “In here, Y/N...” He calls from the living room. He was pacing back and forth by the fireplace for what seemed like hours now, feeling sick to his stomach. He’d been thinking all day after seeing the article—articleS. They were never ending it seemed. He’d tried to ignore them at first but.... they were starting to make sense. Who was he to hold you back the way he was? To tie you down in the worst way? He was old, ancient, dated; he couldn’t give you children, give you lifelong support and stability, couldn’t provide for you. Yes, that last thought alone was proof of how old he was, but... still. Even if you could provide for yourself financially (he had no doubts about that)—a relationship was supposed to be a partnership. Was supposed to be about helping and supporting and fulfilling one another. Any day now could be his last. Perhaps that was being a bit dramatic, but in all honesty? It wasn’t too far from the truth. How long did he have left before he lost mobility, lost his mental state, lost HIMSELF?

And you’d be stuck with him. No. No, he wouldn’t do that to you. He couldn’t. The thought was unbearable. Smiling a little when you hear his voice coming from the living room, you quickly head in there as soon as you’ve taken your shoes off. “There you are, I was beginning to think you’d ran off.”

Trekking over to him, you move to wrap your arms around him like you did every single day, only to have him flinch away and turn towards the fire, his hand on his chin, eyes glassy with the tell tell sign of unshed tears. The action sends your  stomach plummeting into your  knees, he’d never been so cold or distant, and every insecurity that you’d buried deep for so long came rushing to the surface.

“B-Bri, what’s wrong?” Your voice sounds pathetic, small, weak, and the complete opposite of your normally cheery and boisterous tone. You reach out for him unconsciously, something you were beginning to do a lot of lately, before realizing what you were doing and holding your arm firm to your side, a cold chill running up your spine despite the heat from the fire. “Please, I-I just.. you’re scaring me...”

He swallows hard, closing his eyes a little, but regretting the movement when tears spill down his cheeks. He doesn’t try to wipe them away—the least he can give you right now are his true emotions

“Y/N, I think... I think maybe we should—should take a step back. From things.”

God, he was pathetic. He couldn’t even say it. Couldn’t even give it to you straight. He loved you so much—this was the last thing he wanted! But he wasn’t good for you. That old cliché “if you love something, let it go?”. He never thought it was true. But... maybe in this situation, it was… In your relatively short life, you’d never had to experience something that had the potential to break your heart, never been subjected to a time when you could physically feel your insides disintegrating, so you didn’t know how it felt.. not until Brian’s words sunk in.

“W-what do you mean take a s-step back.. Bri..” Your hands were shaking, hell your whole body was shaking, you knew what he meant, you knew what he was saying, you just…didn’t want to believe it.

“Y-you’re not... Brian, you can’t do this…” Your voice is heavy and choked with tears, every feeling you’d been subjected to over the past 5 months was crashing through you like a goddamn cannonball, and it wasn’t a good feeling. Everything had been for nothing..

“D-do you j-just not love me? Is that it? Did y-you... was all of this a lie” You can’t even make it to the couch to sit down, collapsing onto the floor as the weight of the situation takes hold.

Brian is  shaking himself. He’s scared to touch you—scared of how you’ll react, of how HE’LL react. So he slowly sinks down to the floor next to you, sitting there, utterly defeated.

“I do love you. I love you more than anything else in my life,” His breath hitches; breaks. He tries to keep speaking.

“I love you more than anyone I’ve ever—" More tears fall, and he stares at his trembling hands.

“I’m no good for you, Y/N. Who are we—who are we kidding? You need someone else. You need things I can’t g-give you. You’re going to be 30, taking care of your boyfriend who can’t walk, can’t think for himself—will I even live to see you reach 40? Do you want to be a 40 year old woman tied down to a 91 year old?? How is that... how is this...”

His voice cuts out, and when he speaks again, it’s more than obvious how much pain he’s in.

“How could I do that to you? How could I let myself just... burden you?”

You can’t even look at him, hurt, betrayal, anger, sadness, goddamn near every emotion is washing through you now, taking your heart and smashing it against a rock. I want to be rational, to talk this out with him, to be an adult… It was obvious that he didn’t want this, that his heart was breaking just as much, if not more, that your’s…but you were just so goddamn HURT.

“Y-you said you w-would never hurt me Brian, you PROMISED that you w-would never I do a-anything to make me cry, a—" The dam breaks and you’re sobbing, hands moving to cover your face as you draw your knees closer to your chest, just trying to hide yourself away from the world, from your own embarrassment.

“I love you Brian, only I g-get to decide what’s g-good for me! I-I can’t believe you’d do this to me... a-after everything...” You feel horrible, more than horrible, because you know he means well, deep down you know that... but you can’t help it. You’re pissed, you’re hurt, and you’re not looking to spare any feelings, no matter how much you love and care for Brian.

“Fuck you Brian.. goddamnit, I gave you everything I had, and you j-just... I hate you..”

Its immature, not poetic, and certainly not something you’d ever thought you would say to him, but it’s what you were feeling, and those feelings were valid. Before you even know what you’re doing, you’re standing up on shaky legs, basically running to the door, somehow having enough of a mind to grab your purse before walking right back out into the cold London air, your tears nearly freezing against your cheeks.

Brian flinches at your words, a small sob bursting from his chest. He just sits there; why should he stop you? You hated him. You HATED him. The words kept echoing through his mind. He’d been right—he was bad for you. This proved it. He hurt everyone he ever loved. Every time he tried to do the right thing.... He’s suddenly overcome with a wave of nausea, and he fumbles for the wastebin that was luckily over to the side of the wall. As soon as he gets it in his hands, he’s throwing up into it, his stomach emptying itself. He just feels completely numb. He knows he’s still crying but he can barely feel it; can honestly barely feel anything. Not the heat of the fire, not the hard ground below him hurting his legs. All there is in his head is your words. He can’t even fucking move.

You don’t even know how long you’ve walked for, tears streaming down your cheeks. You were hurt, betrayed, gutted, and immensely guilty at what you had said to Brian. He had been through so much in his life, had lost so many people, he didn’t deserve to be told that someone hated him.. he didn’t deserve that from you, not even when he’d hurt you so badly… You knew why he had said what he did, why he wanted to end your relationship, and if you had just stayed and talked it out with him rationally, like an adult, the two of you would’ve been eating dinner together now. But instead, you’re walking up the stairs to Roger’s house, surprise etched onto your face at the fact that your feet had led you to Brian’s best friend’s door. The two of you had developed an incredible relationship over the span of you and Bri’s, and you knew that you could come to him if anything went wrong, but.. you still felt bad for doing this. When you buzz the gate, he’s outside within 30 seconds, noticing your distraught appearance and quickly ushered you inside, holding you close as he can while you cry. He asks no questions, just comforts you with his embrace before settling you into a guest room.

Brian sits on the ground for a long time—until the fire dies down at least. His phone rings several times, and he can see that it’s Roger, but he doesn’t answer. He’s literally just staring off into space. He feels pathetic and shitty and horrible—but he’s not thinking that because he feels that way. He’s thinking it in the sense of being a horrible person. He knows he should get up and brush his teeth and shower and maybe eat something, but it’s like he can’t. He hasn’t felt like this in... well, he knows when. But thinking about that makes everything worse. The thought crosses his mind that he has nothing to live for anymore, but his logical brain knows that’s not true. That it’s just the depression talking. That he still has his kids. His grandkids. Roger. Unless they all take your side. He wouldn’t blame them if they did.

There had never been a moment in your life where you’d cried yourself to sleep as fast as you did that night. As soon as your head had hit the pillow, the floodgates opened again and every horrible emotion you’d felt that day came rushing right back. You were nauseous, throwing up into the toilet of the en-suite bathroom three times before you managed to calm down. You can hear Roger downstairs, and for some reason just knowing that you weren’t alone was comfort enough. You somehow managed to crawl back into bed despite the debilitating pains in your stomach, head, and chest. This was never a situation you’d thought you’d find yourself in, not with Brian, you’d been so strong and sure in the relationship. Sure, you had only been dating for 5 months, it felt like you’d known him your whole life.. you had been waiting for a proposal any day now…but now.. now it was just over. By some miracle, you manage to fall asleep that night without any nightmares, because for once, your reality was scarier than anything your mind could dream up.

When Brian finally hauls himself up off the floor, his joints creak and bones ache. He gets rid of the mess in the wastebin, and heads upstairs to his bedroom. He showers, doing his best not to eye the razor sitting inconspicuously in the corner. He needed to shave, but didn’t want to chance anything. He wouldn’t backslide; not that far. Still, he doesn’t allow himself to eat after his shower is done. It’s some level of self punishment he’ll allow, even if he shouldn’t. His phone is still ringing off the hook so he finally answers. It’s not very polite, his telling Roger to fuck right off and stop calling him. He knows he sounds absolutely horrible, but... that’s who he was, wasn’t he? A horrible person, who didn’t deserve you in the first place, and definitely doesn’t now.

The first thing that registers when you wake up is that it’s still dark out, and your head is pounding worse than any hangover has ever caused, probably because you’d cried yourself into dehydration. Checking your phone, you’re a little shocked to see that it’s 4am, and that you had about 400 missed calls and texts from Louisa. The sight makes your  heart shatter even more, knowing that you and her father were over... Sighing, you sit up in bed, smiling a little at the Panadol and water that Roger had left by your bed before throwing it back and getting out of bed. Your legs are wobbly, but you needed to do something. You were stronger than this, you had to be the strong one in the relationship relationship, you always had been.. and when you read the texts from Louisa, that Roger had called her, that Brian wasn’t answering any of her phone calls or the door to their house, a sinking pit forms in your stomach, one that you’d only felt the time you’d had to pull your best friend out of the bathtub.. Quickly opening your Uber app, you grab my things and head downstairs, shooting a text to Roger thanking him for everything before you walk out the door, locking it behind you. You hoped that he was strong enough not to do what you were fearing, and you desperately hoped to god that the Uber driver didn’t mind breaking a few laws.

Brian is still laying curled up in bed even after he wakes up, the drapes still closed, everything dark. His stomach was screaming at him to eat something, but he didn’t think he could bring himself to if he tried. He just kept thinking about everything—your words, your crying, the look on your face. You’d been so... angry. God, it made his stomach curdle again just thinking about it. He’d left his phone unplugged, and all the ringing and messages had eventually caused it to die.

 Thankfully Roger’s London home wasn’t too far from Bri’s, and the Uber driver could obviously tell that you were distressed, and kindly stepped on it. Once you were at the front door, after a quick thank you, you shakily pull the keys from your bag, unlocking the door before going to turn off the alarm, only to realize it’d not been turned on. Furrowing your brows, you sit everything down on the dining room table before moving around the first level of the house, searching in vain to find Brian, and with every room you exited with no sign of him, the pit in your stomach grew. You don’t even know how you’d managed to climb the stairs with your legs shaking the way they were, but once you reach the upper landing, you take a deep shuddering breath and head towards Brian’s room, pausing outside the door, just trying to prepare yourself for what you might find. However, what you find is better than the alternative, but still breaks your heart; well, the shards that were left of your heart. Brian was lying still on your side of the bed, curled around your pillow, his body shaking with sobs you weren’t even sure he knew were happening.

“B-Bri.. love…” Your voice is soft, you don’t want to scare him as you tentatively approach the bed.

He barely registers your voice; it literally doesn’t even compute in his brain. It’s not until he sees you that he blinks up at you, frowning, trying to process what he’s seeing. He feels light headed honestly. He was probably dehydrated from crying and puking, and weak from having not eaten.

“I—Y/N? What’re y’doing here?” His words are literally slurred, and he’s embarrassed by how rough he must look.

You can feel the familiar sting of tears threatening to cloud your vision as you look down at Brian. He had obviously taken a shower, which was good, but he was as pale as a ghost, shaking all over, and based on the way his body was curled up against your pillow, he was just as upset and distraught as you were, probably more. Sighing, you drop to your knees beside him, brushing a shaking hand through his hair before resting it on his cheek, swallowing hard, not wanting to scare him or give him any other reason to feel shitty. “I-I couldn’t just leave you like that Bri, I was horrible to you, said things in anger that I never should’ve said... that I never meant..” Your voice cracks a little, worry and pain working it’s way back inside of your chest.

“I should’ve been m-more mature, not walked out like that.. we needed to sit down and talk this out, and instead I-I just blew up and hurt you so much…” Leaning down and place a kiss to his cheek, your tears start to fall.

“I don’t even know how to begin going and asking for your forgiveness.”

He shakes his head weakly, lightheaded as he does so. He’s shivering, freezing cold even under his thick duvet. “I d-deserve it. I deserve for you to h-hate me. I hurt you—m’not good for you, I...” He hitches out a breath, though it’s more like a sob. He curls further in on himself, party hoping you’re just his imagination; that maybe you actually do love him after all. That you can convince him that none of it matters except their love for one another.

“Oh Bri, look at me honey, please…” He doesn’t, only shoves his face further into the pillow, body shaking with sobs, the sound making your own tears fall heavily, clouding your vision.

“I love you Brian, I don’t hate you, I n-never could.. I was angry, and hurt, but I don’t hate you…” He only cries harder, so you quickly crawl into bed behind him, wrapping your arms tight around his body, pulling him as close to you as you possibly could, just wanting to comfort him.

“You don’t deserve for me to hate you, you don’t deserve for anyone to hate you honey, I love you so much, and I’m so so sorry I acted like that…” Your stomach was hurting something fierce, like 10,000,000 tiny knives of regret were stabbing you over and over.

He turns and just clings to you, sobbing into your neck, fear and anxiety and worthlessness all mixing together inside of him. He hates himself for hurting you, for clinging to you, for being so goddamn pathetic. But he’s crying so hard he can’t breathe, and he doesn’t deserve your arms around him but he somehow has them.

“I- l-love y-you” It is all he manages to rasp out between sobs, his hands clutching your back so hard he is sure bruises will form… another reason for him to hate himself.

You breathe a small sigh of relief, squeezing him tighter as you sit up against the headboard so he can breathe better, your lips pressed firmly into his hair, your hands brushing up and down his naked back.

“Shhh, it’s okay Brian, I’ve got you honey, you’re okay.” Your tears are still falling, being absorbed by his curls.

“I need you to breathe for me honey, in and out, in and out.. cmon Bri, I don’t want you passing out, it’s okay…” You start to rock him back and forth as you talk softly to him, just wanting him to calm down enough to where you knew he wouldn’t have a panic attack.

“I-I-Im s-s-so-sorr-y.” He is shivering, trying to following your breathing techniques, trying to get ahold of himself. Jesus, he was so pathetic. “I l-l-love y—" He can’t finish it, his chest clenching painfully, which scares him. He couldn’t have a heart attack now; it was the absolute worst time. So he starts frantically trying to do the breathing exercises, vision still blurry with tears.

Noticing his panicked expression, the way he’s clutching his chest, you know he was already too far gone to avoid the panic attack. “C’mon Bri, let’s get you in the shower.” The shower was the only thing that you’d found worked on him, would help him calm down.. a nice warm shower. Somehow you manage to get him out of the bed, his arms still tight like a vice around you as you try your best to get him into the walk in shower, turning it on as fast as you can, not even caring that you were fully dressed and he was naked still, more than likely from his earlier shower. “Come here love, breathe baby, look at me and breathe, you’re gonna be okay, I’m not going anywhere.. I love you.” You sit down beside him, taking his cheeks between your hands, eyes level and staring hard into his, breathing in and out to show him how to do it

He just feels like he’s spiraling. Like he can’t get anything back under control. He’s fucking terrified; he’s SURE that he’s dying. That this is it, it’s a heart attack, and he’ll be dead on the floor soon, and you’d be happy about it. And yet, the more you encourage the special breathing, the more he does it, until finally, his brain has come back down to his current state: sitting down under the hot spray of the shower, doing purposeful, structured breathing. He still feels numb, but it’s not.... everything, like it had been

“There we go honey, good job...”

You hold him close, pressing a series of kisses to his temple, his cheeks, his forehead, just trying to ground him in any way you can. His arms are still wrapped tightly around you, holding you like a vice.. you don’t even think he truly realizes he’s doing it.

“I love you so much Brian... I know I sound like a broken record, but I’m so fucking sorry, and I’ll spend the rest of my life trying to help you see how much I love you, how much you mean to me…” Your voice cracks, emotions seeping out despite how hard you were trying to push them back to focus on Brian. “Please believe me Bri, I’m so so sorry, and I love you more than anything...”

“I love you too. I love you, I love you, please don’t h-hate me, please. I know I d-deserve it, but I—I love you so much I only want what’s b-best for you.” He presses his face into your neck, kind of choking a bit on all the water streaming down onto y’all, but he doesn’t care

You turn a little to maneuver it to where the water is hitting your backs, your arms still tightly wrapped around him, head resting on his

“Shh, no you don’t Brian, you don’t deserve me to hate you, and I don’t, I could never.” You start rocking him back and forth like a child in need of reassurance and comfort, which was basically what he was now, desperate for care.

“I know you only said those things because you wanted what was best for me, but you’re what’s best for me Brian.. I was only away from you for 11 hours and I felt like a piece of my soul had been cut loose, I can’t lose you..” You let out a deep breath, trying to steady your emotions. “ H-How can I be what’s b-best for you when I m-make you feel like this!? How can I—" He swallows hard, trying to chill out, feeling humiliated that you’ve seen him like this, but knowing deep down this is what a relationship was supposed to entail; being vulnerable. If you couldn’t see him like this, nobody could. That didn’t mean he felt necessarily good about it, that the thoughts in his brain didn’t try to skew every little ounce of happiness he felt.

“How c-can I be best f-for you when I can’t even b-BE there for you?” His voice is weak and defeated, his true feelings finally coming to the surface after hours of trying to suppress them. Brian’s sobs weren’t as loud anymore, but his voice was still shaky and hitched, and it cut you like a knife to hear his words.

“Bri.. love, yes you made me feel bad, but that’s one time in a whole cornucopia of times you’ve made me feel so much better…” Reaching up, you cup his face in your hands, making him look into your eyes.

“Just because you’ve hurt me once doesn’t mean you meant to, or will do it again.. you meant well Brian, I know that.. I know that you love me and you only wants what’s best...” You try to steady your voice and keep calm, but you can’t help but sniffle at his last words, the weight of them pressing down on your very soul.

“You ARE there for me Bri, you’ve been here for me since the beginning, and I-I love you! I love you so much, please believe me…”

Tears are still falling from his red rimmed hazel eyes, though he’s not sobbing anymore.

“Y/N it’s not... it’s not about now.” He closes his eyes; he can’t look at you, too ashamed and guilty to see the tears and pain behind your eyes. “It’s about later.” He sighs. “I’m 72, Y/N. 72.”

A cold shiver runs up your spine at the implications of his words, tears springing to your eyes as well as you try to push back the thoughts you’d fought for so long.

“I-I know that Brian, I knew what I was getting into when I decided to love you...” You grasp his hand, the action shaky and unsure, your poor heart aching.

“I know we won’t have forever together, t-that I m-might only get 20 years tops with you, b-but I don’t care Bri, I would rather spend 20 minutes with you than 50 years with someone else.” The sob you’d been trying to choke back finally manages to release itself, and you have to duck your head to keep him from worrying. He already had enough to worry about without you blubbering.

“I-I love you, I love you more t-than I’ll ever be able to love anyone else, a-and I-I just, I want to spend every single m-moment we have together loving y-you.”

The older man is  quiet, listening to you. He doesn’t know what to think; what to believe. He knows his own brain—his own thoughts—are intruders. But it makes everything so much harder. He just wraps his arms around you tightly, eyes clenched shut “I’m s-sorry. You deserve better.”

His voice is quiet, hopeless. He just... doesn’t know what to do. He wants you, but feels selfish for doing so. Doesn’t want to push you away, but isn’t that the responsible thing? Or is his mind just tricking him into thinking that?

You just sob harder when he pulls you close, resting his head on yours as you bury your face into his chest. You’re clinging to him like he’s the only thing keeping you connected to gravity, because in a way he is. The two of you stay like that for a while, you sobbing, him holding onto you for dear life, but after god knows how long the water starts to run cold. Sniffling, you reluctantly pull away from Brian, standing on wobbly legs to turn the water off, clothes absolutely saturated.

“W-well, guess I don’t have to worry about washing these later.”

You try to make a joke, chuckling lightly. Brian just stares at the tiled floor of the large shower, and you can practically see the gears turning in his head. Sighing, you crouch down beside him, taking his hand in yours. “C’mon honey, let’s get you dried off and in bed while I go make you some toast okay? I know you haven’t eaten…” He never ate when he got like this, and it was something that scared you tremendously.

He sniffles, struggling and stumbling to get to his feet “Don’t wanna eat.” He’s quiet, his eyes trained on the ground

“I don’t want you to have to take care of me. Don’t wanna be a burden.” Swallowing hard, his stomach curdles again. He has to stop moving; has to balance himself against the wall, otherwise he knew for a fact that he would collapse. “I’m sorry.” He repeats again, wincing when you sigh at him.

“And I’m sorry for apologizing.” His voice shakes, he’s shivering from the cold, and you immediately head over to him, rubbing his arms with your hands, just trying to create some friction/ “I can—I’ll s-stop.” He’s a little dizzy, but still, he moves to grab two towels, one for you and one for himself.

“Here, Brian, just—just let me help you.” You rush to the door, grabbing the towels from him and wrapping him tightly in one. He winces and flinches away from you, making your stomach churn involuntarily.

Stepping  in front of him, you grab his biceps a little harder than necessary, well actually it was the proper amount of force that Brian needed to pull him out of his mind, but you still felt a little bad for the bruises you would probably use.

“Brian. Look at me, and listen to me okay?” Your eyes are hard and stern, you only want to be soft and sweet to him, but sometimes when he would get too far into his head, he needed hard. “You. Are. Not. A. Burden.. you don’t have to apologize for how you feel, you NEVER have to be sorry for how you feel... I love you Brian, I am your girlfriend, your partner in life, and I am going to stay right here, beside you, for the rest of our lives.”

His breath hitches, fresh tears somehow filling his eyes. He winces a little at your grip, but doesn’t really mind it, even if it’s bruising. He just nods, wordless. It’s silent, and then he finally stutters out a word. “O-okay.” he swallows. “I’m sorry—" he cuts himself off, wincing at his automatic apology. “I mean— I’m trying,” it’s stupid to say. He knows words are empty without action. “I love you, too.”

“I know honey, I know you’re trying.” You smile at him gently, moving your hands from his arms up to his face, thumbs rubbing the tears away from his cheeks. “I love you, and I’m going to help you okay? I’m not going anywhere, and you’re never going to be alone in this.” You sniffle, willing your tears away. He’s shivering in the cold, the fluffy towel doing nothing to warm him.

“Come on honey, come lay down.. it’s late, well, early… but, you... you need to sleep.” You grab his hands gently, bringing them to your lips to kiss. “Please?” Your words are desperate, you just want him to be okay, that’s all you ever want.

He nods, letting you pull him back into the bedroom. He’s quiet as you dry him off, his hands on your shoulders to balance himself. He feels... brittle. Like one false move and he’ll break into a million pieces. When you come back from throwing the towels in the hamper, he speaks “Will you... would you stay?”

Nodding gently, you strip out of your clothes before slipping on one of Brian’s oversized sleep shirts. “Of course honey, here...” You bring back the covers, sliding in and pulling him in beside you. “Come here Bri, let me hold you.” He nods and sniffles, wrapping him up in your arms, pulling him close to your chest.

Brian cuddles in close, clinging to you. He’s naked and cold, and essentially tries to bury himself into you and the blankets. He ducks his hands under your shirt, trying to warm them against your skin. You smelled good; smelled comforting. He lets out a shuddering breath, his body slowly warming up.

You shiver a little at Brian’s touches, smiling when he curls in deeper “There ya go baby, just let go.” You drop a kiss to his head, sighing deeply as his hands move up to cup your breasts, your heart pounding at the simple motion.

“You okay baby? What do you need me to do for you honey?” You speak gently, hands moving up and down his naked back

“I need—" He shivers, hands squeezing your breasts gently. “Need you to punish me. He murmurs the words, embarrassed. He doesn’t know how to explain it. His brain was working nonstop, all sorts of negative thoughts and horrible feelings settling in his mind. He couldn’t hurt himself—knew he shouldn’t. That’s what he used to do, when he was younger, when things got bad. But, maybe this would work.

You freeze your movements, eyebrows raising into your hairline at his words. “A-are you sure honey? Are you up for it?”

You were definitely concerned about why he was asking this of you, but you also knew that when he got into this headspace, one thing that helped bring him out was intimacy, but this? Trailing your hands up to his face, you tilt his eyes up towards you, concern written clearly on your face. “Brian, I-I need to know you’re not asking this because you think you deserve to be hurt.. I want to help you, b-but I need you to know that you don’t deserve to be harmed because of how you feel.”

He swallows hard, looking up at you warily “I don’t know about what I deserve but... it’s what I need.” He quiets.

“I need you to hurt me. I can’t do it myself, and it—It’s the only thing that... that helps,” He feels ashamed of his words; of himself. But this was the best alternative to other things. “you don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

You quickly sit up, brushing your hands through his hair. “Hey, it’s okay Bri, I just—I wanna make sure you are sure and you’re okay with it.” The idea of him hurting himself made you nauseous, and if you could do something, anything... to help him feel better and more at ease, you would do. “I want to help you, wanna do whatever you need me to do honey.” You move to straddle his hips, running my hands down his chest, scraping my nails over his nipples, trying to build up to the punishment. “Now... tell me what you want baby, how do you want mommy to punish you…”

He whimpers, back arching up into your touch. He lets out a shuddering breath, trying to think.

“I—I don’t—" He swallows, throat clicking. He wants to feel something, wants something sharp to cut him out of his head

“... spank me.” He flushes, embarrassed at his request.

You can’t help but let out a deep moan at his words, your hands moving to his face to bring his lips up to yours.

“That’s what you want honey? You want mommy to bend you over her lap and spank you for being so naughty?” Speaking against his lips, you bring his bottom lip between your teeth, biting down gently. “Can’t believe you’re such a little slut for me Brian, I can already feel your cock throbbing just imagining my hand on your pretty little ass.” He whimpers, nodding quickly. “Please. I wanna—wanna feel your hands on me—' His breathing is a little shallow, his cock chubbing up despite itself. “Want it to h-hurt to sit down tomorrow. Want to have w-welts.” He’s blushing; he’s never asked for something like this from anyone before. Sure, maybe he’d been dommed, but not this.

“Oh baby, you’re gonna regret asking this...” You smirk wolfishly, sliding off of him, making sure to drag your naked cunt over his cock, pleasure and pride filling your stomach at the whimper that leaves his mouth.

“Come here slut, lay down on my legs...” He eagerly does as you say, rutting his cock against the mattress. “No sir.”

You bring your hand down hard on his ass, biting your lip at the sound the clap of skin makes. You’d dommed him before, been really rough, but never once had you hurt him because he was desperate for it. “You don’t fucking move understand? You don’t deserve to get any pleasure do you? You only get to be spanked like the little whore you are.”

 “ N—No. No, I don’t deserve it. I don’t.” He stutters out, grabbing a pillow and pulling it over to him, shoving his face into it. He clings to the fabric, spreading his legs a little, trying to get into a position he could hold. Please—Please, Y/N— Please, Miss!”

The title sends a rush of arousal in between your thighs, a small moan escaping your throat as you bring your hand down again, harder than before, smirking when he whimpers into the pillow.

“God Brian, you’re such a goddamn slut, look at you all spread out for me to spank.”

You slap his cheeks harder and harder with every go, feeling a little bad about it, about causing him pain.. but, you fucking loved it, loved how hard he was clenching the pillow

He cries out into the pillow, trembling all over, but moaning all the same. He feels messy and dirty and nasty and he loves it. “Fuck, Th-thank you, Miss. I’m a little s-slut. That’s a-all I am.”

He shifts again, trying to move further into your lap from where he was slipping a little. His legs slip open a little more, just as your hand aims for his lower cheek, and as a result, half of your slap lands across his balls. He cries out louder than before, tears springing to his eyes—and yet, he’s never been so hard in his life. “Oh f-fuck—"

Your eyes widen and your persona drops just a fraction, concerned for Brian. “Oh god, honey are you o—"

He’s whimpering and rutting again, his breathy moans going straight to your cunt. “You liked that didn’t you you little whore? You liked me slapping your balls?”

He just whimpers and nods, biting down on the pillow to stop his noises being too loud, which you were having none of. Reaching over you grab his chin and turn his face towards you, your eyes stern, voice hard as you grab hold of his balls in a grip that was just borderline mean.

“Don’t you EVER cover up your noises honey, I wanna hear how hot you are for me.” One firm smack on his ass later and his voice is choking out a sob, begging for more.

He feels dizzy, but in a better way than he had been feeling. He sobs out your name, his hips moving against his will, trying to rut his cock against your thigh. Each movement of his hips caused you to tug on his balls, which were still stinging from the slap earlier. His ass felt like it was on fire, but he loved it. “P-Please... Please!”

His whole body jerks when you spank him again, and he gasps out your name once more. “Y/N I—Oh fuck, I might c-cum—"

Pride swells inside of you, knowing that you had this effect on him, that he trusted and loved you enough to be so vulnerable with you. “Yeah? You gonna cum just from me spanking your slutty ass?”

You start to deliver blow after blow, one hard slap after another, rotating between pulling on his balls and slapping his ass. “Of course you are baby, or course you’re gonna cum just from this.. goddamnit you just love being punished by me don’t you honey, just love having your little man cunt absolutely destroyed because you know it’s what you deserve...” You’ve leaned down, whispering in his ear as you continue to smack and tug, knowing he’s close as can be, just hoping to send him over the edge.

Your final words do it, humiliation streaking through him. He lets out a sob, feeling the dirtiest he’s ever felt in his life as his hips jerk, his cock pulsing out cum messily all over your leg and the bedspread. He’s gasping for air, tears blurring his vision so much that he just closes his eyes. His hips continue to twitch, his balls pulsing in your hand.

“There ya go honey, just let go—breathe for me baby…” You run your hands up and down Brian’s back, gently scraping your nails along the slightly tanned skin to try and bring him back to earth. His entire body was shaking, and his hot cum completely coated your leg, only a few drops seemed to have gotten on the bed, which was a miracle in and of itself. You spare a glance down to Brian’s poor cheeks, wincing a bit as you take in just how red and welted they are. You’d need to get him an ice pack and some salve ASAP, but, you couldn’t move just yet, not with him clinging to your legs the way he was. “Baby, you did so good for me, I’m so so proud of you honey.. such a good boy.”

 He’s panting, trying to catch his breath, his head spinning. His ass hurts, but it feels good at the same time. No regrets. And despite his spinning head, his mind feels clearer than it has in days. “Fuck.” He murmurs, wiping his face on the pillow below him. His hand comes down to fumble at you, finally settling on your side. “T-thank you. I love you s-so much.”

 You bend over, pressing a series of kisses to his back and neck, your hands running up and down the cool skin before moving to rest on the hand he’s placed on your hip.

“I love you too Brian, so much…” Taking one last look at his red bottom, you sigh a little.

“C’mon baby, let’s get you cleaned up and then you can lie down and I’ll rub some salve over you okay? I don’t want you being in too much pain.” You make a move to stand, helping Brian do the same as you lead him to the bathroom, cleaning him and yourself up as quickly as you can before grabbing every moisturizer we own, plus making a quick get away downstairs to grab a few ice packs. Returning to the bedroom, you smile gently when you see him standing beside the bed, hands crossed in front of him, a deep red flush from his hairline to his thighs. “Okay honey, you lie down on your tummy and let me take care of you okay? Just relax and I’ll make you feel good…”

He nods, doing what you say easily, happy to follow your instructions. He lays down gingerly, wincing a little but trying to hide it; he doesn’t want you to feel bad.

He jumps at the first touch of your hand to his skin, but soon he’s sighing happily, relaxing into the mattress.

“That feels nice, love. Really good.” He moans softly, your hands lulling him into security.

 You can’t help but feel a little bad about the welts already forming on Brian’s ass, the redness making my heart clench, but seeing how calm and at ease the action had made him gives you a sense of peace... besides, if it helped him, you weren’t about to refuse him.

“If this is going to be a regular occurrence, I’m gonna have to invest in some top notch blister lotion for you honey.” You chuckle lightly, massaging the lavender lotion deep into his red skin, the sounds of his soft moans filling the room.

 He lets out a sound that’s an honest to god giggle, still feeling a little lightheaded, but this time from the subspace he was floating in.

“Maybe that would be a good investment for us, then. Though I like this...” He trails off, as if losing his train of thought, only to speak again after a long pause. “It smells nice.”

You chuckle “It does smell nice doesn’t it? Lavender helps relax you and soothes the skin, it’s exactly what you need honey.”

You keep kneading his ass for a little bit longer, smiling widely at his little noises, loving that you were making him feel good and relaxed. “You want me to get your back too Bri? Since I’m already back here.”

It just seemed logical, that you would continue the massage. It was about 5:30am at this point, and you knew we both needed to sleep, but Brian was loving this massage, and he seemed more relaxed than he had in weeks, so you weren’t about to stop now.

He pulls himself up on his elbows to look back at you, expression open and vulnerable. “You... you don’t have to.”

He feels a bit of guilt creeping in—nothing like the feelings he was having earlier, but... you’d done so much for him, and he’d done nothing for you.

You reach forward, scratching his back gently.

“I don’t mind baby, I wanna make you feel good.” You know he’s reluctant to accept, he always wants to be the one to take care of you, but he just.. he needs to be taken care of, and you didn’t mind “If you don’t want me to, I won’t Bri, but I just wanna make you feel special.” You lean down and place a single kiss to the middle of his spine, the action gentle and reassuring.

He thinks for a moment before settling back down into his pillow, nodding, his curls bouncing a little.

“Okay, love. If you want to, it would—it would feel nice.” His muscles still ached from his long period of sitting on the floor of the living room earlier.

“Thank you. I love you.” He murmurs into the soft fabric under his face, savoring the words, remembering how just a couple hours ago he’d lost the right to say such a thing.

You move your lips up his spine some more, nipping the skin just a little.

“Of course baby.. you deserve it.” You lean back, squirting some of the lotion onto his back, giggling a little when he jolts.

“Sorry, it’s a little cold.” He snorts, shaking his head against the fabric of the pillow. Shaking your own head, you start massaging his back, straddling his lower back as you work on his traps, digging in hard, working the knots out, your brows furrowing at how tense he was.

“Oh my god Brian, you’re so tense.. I’m gonna have to start doing this more often.. can’t have you getting knots like these on tour.”

He grunts a little at your ministrations—they kinda hurt, but in the best way. Just like earlier.

“Well, I’m an old man, lovely. I’m surprised my entire body isn’t one big knot.” He stretches a little, his muscles rippling under his skin, under your hands. “They work themselves out on tour, mostly. At least I’m moving around on stage. Rog has to sit most of the time.”

You have to bite your lip at the feeling of his muscles moving and tightening underneath your hands, your naked cunt still pressed firmly against his lower back. You were praying, for the first time in years, that he couldn’t feel your wetness, that he wouldn’t be freaked out by you being turned on by this.

“If you were one big knot, I’d spend everyday unfurling it for you.” Leaning down, you place a kiss to the back of his head, nuzzling his silver curls just a tad.

“You’re just gonna have to bring me with you to be your personal masseuse then.. I don’t want you “working out” your knots in stage, you need to be cared for... tenderly…”

“Personal masseuse hmm?” He chuckles softly, sounding thoughtful.

“Sounds like that’s a job that benefits you more than it does me.” He teases lightly; it felt like every nerve of his was alight, feeling every touch of yours—and he did mean EVERY touch. Besides, he knew by now what you sounded like when you were turned on

“Still, I’d be more than happy to offer you the position. You’re more than qualified, you know.”

Chuckling lightly at his words, you move your hands down further on his back, closer to where you were straddling him, yet you were still leaned over, your lips presses against the back of his neck.

“Yeah? Am I just that good or are you trying to butter me up?” He adjusts himself, bucking up into you just a little, causing your clit to rub deliciously against his back. The resulting whimper was one that you couldn’t keep back, and anyway, your mouth was so close to his ear there was really no sense in you trying to hide it... besides, you wanted him to know now, wanted him to know that you wanted HIM.

He groans at the noise you make; at the soft, warm slickness of your cunt against his skin

“Well I’d say you’re the best damn masseuse I’ve ever had, love. You’ve just got a.... unique touch.” He smirks to himself at his dumb innuendo

“.... here’s an idea. How’s about a head massage?”

You stop your movements, sitting up just a little bit as confusion washes over you at his words…you think you know what he’s saying, but.. you’re not entirely sure “H-head massage?”

You hitch out a gasp as he bucks his back again, your clit caught between his skin and your own. “I-I can g-get the head scratcher if you want honey, if that’s what you n-need.” Your head lolls forward, hitting his upper back, a breathy moan escaping your mouth.

He laughs before wriggling himself around under you. You climb off him in confusion, your brows arched at him. He rolls onto his back for tugging at you again.

“Okay, come back.” You straddle his hips, and his hands settle on your waist

“No, up here.” He tugs at you, urging you further up his body, a little smirk on his face.

“You can put your hands in my hair the way I like, but I want you—" You’re straddling his stomach now, and he pouts, trying to get you up to his face. “—closer.”

You raise your eyebrows, smirk wide on your face when you finally understand what he wants. “Oh really? How much closer?”

You slowly drag my pussy along his stomach, inching your way towards his chest. “Here?” He pouts and shakes his head, pulling you closer to his face. “Hmm... here?”

You slide up closer, your legs over his shoulders now.

He hums as if considering it, his hands squeezing your ass as he arches his neck to press a gentle kiss to one of your thighs.

“Well I’ll admit, I like it. But I think I’d like you even closer.” He smiles when you pretend to act surprised, and he looks up at you through his lashes, Hazel eyes wide and innocent.

“What? You don’t want to be closer?” He lets his head flop back down against the pillows, sighing wistfully.

“Wouldn’t wanna make you do anything you don’t wanna do.”

 You hum in false consideration, burying your hands in his hair, your fingers locking into a few of his curls, tugging gently.

“I mean... I GUESS I can move a little closer…” You do just that, not giving him any warning before you settle your cunt right on his mouth, groaning at the friction.

“T-this close enough f-for you baby?”

He moans, the sound still loud even though it’s muffled by your cunt. His hands move to clutch at your hips, holding you down firmly so he can start licking over your folds. He’s eager and quick to find your clit, latching on and sucking on it while his tongue flicks against the little nub. You tasted so fucking sweet—he wanted more of it

The noise that escape your mouth at his ferocity and eagerness is borderline obscene.

“F-fuck Brian! Oh baby, y-you, FUCK!” You have to move one of your hands to the headboard to keep myself upright, your orgasm already fast approaching thanks to the sensitivity of your clit from your grinding earlier.

“C-cmon Bri, y-you can do b-better than that honey, e-eat me like you mean it.” You loved talking to Brian like this, it always made him go harder and be more intense.

Brian lets out a noise akin to a growl at your teasing words, his teeth brushing over your clit gently before he tugs you closer to him, his tongue pressing into you as deep as he can get it while his long nose nudges against your clit. He moves his head back and forth quickly, curls bouncing, one hand moving from your hip to slap your ass hard. He wants you to cum on his tongue; wants to have you soak his face; wants to taste you for hours.

You’re gasping for breath as he slaps your ass, both of your hands now clenching the headboard so hard that your knuckles were white. Brian’s nose bumps your clit as his tongue digs hard inside of you one final time before the dam breaks, and your orgasm hits you like a goddamn truck. “B-Bri—o-oh my god!” His groans send vibrations through your clit and up your body, pulling whimpers from your mouth as you ride his face, riding your orgasm out as long as you can.

He makes a desperate sound, licking through your folds over and over again, taking everything you have to give him. His hands move your hips to help you ride it out, making you grind smoothly onto his face. He continues until your grip in his hair turns to pushing away, and only then does he pull away, heaving breaths in. Still, he doesn’t let you get far; pressed hot, sucking kisses over the tender skin of your pale inner thighs. He has his eyes shut, a dreamy sort of smile on his face. He loved eating you out; not only did he love pleasing you, but he always actually enjoyed it, too

You all but collapse against the headboard, your  hands gently holding onto his hair as you try and catch your breath.

“B-Bri, I-I.. fuck honey…” Chuckling lightly, you sit up and gaze down at him, a soft and pleased smile on your face. “Help me lie down please? I-I don’t think I can move my legs.”

Brian tosses his head back at your words, laughing joyfully

“Well then that’s a job well done on my part, yeah?” You tug his hair pointedly, and he hushes up, moving to help you lay down beside him. Once you’re all comfy, he curls up around you, on his side. He settles a large hand onto your stomach, splaying his fingers out. He swore if he focused hard enough he could feel your still racing pulse under your skin.

“Thank you for the head massage.”

Burying your face in his neck, you let out a bright laugh, shaking your head at his words. “I’m more than happy to give you a head massage every single day for the rest of time if you want.”

You press a kiss to his neck before sighing and burying yourseld further into the pillows, winding your arms around his shoulders, bringing him closer so he can rest his head on your chest. It’s comforting, being this way with him, and it almost makes you forget the intensity of earlier.. but not completely.

“Ya know, we’re gonna have to talk about what happened earlier right? I think it’s safe to say that we’re not breaking up.. but, we do need to talk about everything…” As much as you don’t want to... but, you were adults and needed to communicate like them.

He tenses at your words, anxiety cutting through his stomach sharply. But he tries to ignore it; to breathe out long and slow and nod

“I know. I know we do.” He’s quiet for a moment before speaking again. “I’m sorry.”

You give him a squeeze, sighing along with him.

“I know honey, I know you are. And there’s nothing for you to be sorry for. You have valid feelings and reasons to be upset and worried.” Your voice is light, you weren’t scared anymore, you knew we would be and stay together… but, you still needed to talk

“You do still want to be with me right? I know that’s probably stupid to ask, but, I just want to make sure that you still want this.. to be with me, have a life with me.”

He’s quiet for a long time after your question, thinking about how to answer. It’s only when he feels you tensing up that he realizes he’s been silent much too long. He rubs his hand over your side, voice soft when he finally speaks, his stomach fluttering nervously

“Y/N, I want to be with you for the rest of my life. No matter how short of a time that will be,” He sighs, “That’s what’s so scary.”

Closing your eyes, you breathe a sigh of relief, relaxing completely against Brian’s body.

“I want to be with you for the rest of your life too Brian, and I-I know that might not be the most lengthy time.. but, it’s still time that we’ll have together, a chance to be with one another until we,” You release a shuddering breath, not wanting to imagine a future without Brian in it, but knowing that in the next decade or so… it could happen.

“But that’s in the future.. and, I could marry someone my age and them die the day after our wedding, or have them develop cancer 5 years into our marriage.. we aren’t guaranteed tomorrow Brian, Hell, I could die on my way to work in the morning... it’s not about how much time we have with someone, it’s about why we do with the time we have.”

He swallows hard, nodding once more.

“I know... I know, you’re right. It’s just... well, no one likes discussing their own mortality I suppose.” He sighs, reaching blindly for one of your hands to hold.

“I should have... have trusted your opinion. It’s not that I didn’t or don’t, I just... I want you to be happy and taken care of. And I’m always worried I won’t be able to—I know someday I won’t be here. And I just... I don’t know. It was stupid I suppose” He drops his head, laughing humorlessly. “If it was what you were feeling, it’s not stupid Brian.. you’re not stupid for being scared, or worrying about me.. it makes me feel loved and cared for, which is all I know you want for me.. I trust you, love you, and appreciate beyond belief the fact that you care so much about me and my well being, that you were willing to sacrifice your happiness...” You squeeze the hand resting on your stomach, wanting to provide him with just a small ounce of comfort.

“You’ve made me so happy just in the short time we’ve been together.. like, I swear to god Brian it feels like you’ve shoved 10 years of love and happiness into 4 months, and—god, I just—I love you so much..”

  He feels a little bit of relief at your words; that you weren’t still angry with him. Sure, maybe your “I hate you” still rang in his head, but he knew it would slowly fade if he gave it time. He brings your hand up to his lips to kiss it softly

“I love you, too, Y/N. More than anything.” His words are quiet and reverent, like a prayer.

You smile gently at him, leaning forward to drop a kiss to his forehead, still feeling absolutely horrific for what you’d said to him, he didn’t deserve that…

“Bri…” You choke back a shuddering breath. “I’m so sorry for what I said to you.. y-you didn’t deserve to have me tell you I hate you, especially when I could never, EVER, hate you. You’ve given me nothing but love and understanding, care and affection... and I-I’ll spend the rest of time reconciling what I said to you…”

He nods, not wanting to think about it, but knowing he had to. “It’s alright, Y/N.”

His voice is still quiet; he doesn’t want you to be upset. He doesn’t want you to beat yourself up over it. He’d hurt you, and you’d said it, and it was all.... in a rush of emotions… something he definitely understood, and he couldn’t fault you for it.

“It’s okay, love.” He pulls away from you just a little, tugging at the covers “Let’s just go back to bed, yeah?”

You still feel like a shit girlfriend, but you know he doesn’t blame you, you know he isn’t holding it against you, and you’re 100% positive that he knows he didn’t mean it...

“Okay, yeah.. bed does sound good.” You allow him to cover you up with the blanket, snuggling up against him.

“Rog’s guest bed is comfortable, but the best bed in the world could feel like a goddamn bed of rocks when you’re not there with me.”

He laughs a little at your words, but then frowns.

“Oh, I should...” He sits up, but makes sure the covers stay tucked over you.

“I’ll be right back, okay? I need to call him. I sort of... yelled at him, earlier.” He barely remembers doing so, but he knows he did.

You try your best to stay awake while Brian calls Roger, but the emotional and physical drainage of the day wacks you in the goddamn face, and before you know what’s happening, you’re falling asleep to Brian’s sheepish voice on the phone with Roger. Brian returns to bed about 20 minutes later, after a rather irritated Roger had given him a dressing down that only his mother’s could rival. He appreciated what his best friend had done for you beyond measure, that he had taken you in and made sure you were safe… he could never repay him for that, and the drummer would never ask him to do so. Curled up in bed next to you, Brian falls asleep in no time, his heart finally healing from the gash that he had inflicted on himself earlier that day. He sleeps for a while, finally waking up around 11:30. So, about 5 hours. Not bad. He’s surprised when he finds you still asleep next to him, though I guess you’d been awake just as long as he had. He lays there for a little bit to wake up more before stretching and getting out of bed. He throws on a pair of underwear and a cozy robe and slippers, trying to keep quiet so not to wake you. Then he sneaks downstairs to the kitchen, digging in his fridge to find something to cook for breakfast, he just felt like he still had a lot of making up to do.

You wake up to the smell of breakfast, tea to be more precise, being made. The smell brings a smile to your face and you roll over and stretch widely, groaning a bit. Grabbing your phone as you sit up, your eyes widen a tad when you see that’s it’s close to noon, and that you have approximately 1350 missed calls and texts from various members of the May and Taylor family. After taking a bit of time to respond to Emily, Jimmy, and Louisa, reassuring them that you and their father were completely fine, you put on a robe and my, well technically they were Brian’s, house shoes and head downstairs. Brian is stood in front of the stove, humming as he cooks, the sight brings a smile to my face as I walk towards him, wrapping my arms around his middle “Mmmm what did I do to deserve this?”

He smiles when he hears you come in; relaxes back into your touch. He chuckles at your words.

“Hmm? Well, you deserve this every day just for existing.” He pauses, flipping over the pancakes he was cooking.

“But specifically? I think what I put you through last night is reason enough for a big, yummy breakfast.” He frowns, sighing, looking down at the pan.

“Although apparently my waffle maker is broken. I guess it’s about time. I think I’ve had that thing since the early 90’s, it’s probably a fire hazard.”

Your eyes widen dramatically and you smack his stomach.

“Brian! You’re an international rock legend, you have more money than the bloody queen, and you’ve been using the same waffle machine for 30 years?” You laugh loudly into his back, squeezing him tightly*

“Could you imagine the headline? Legendary Queen Guitarist and Astrophysics Legend Brian May burns down multimillion-dollar home in Waffle Machine electrical malfunction.”

 He grins, shaking his head, his curls brushing your face.

“Hey, it was a great waffle maker! Besides, they get better with age, I’ve been told. There’s more flavor.” You make a disapproving sound and he grins “Well, Anita and I did have a newer one, but she took it with her. It’s not like I needed it.”

You chuckle and give him one final squeeze, pulling your phone out of the pocket of my robe “YOU got better with age, WINE gets better with age, CHEESE gets better with age… Not waffle makers babe…” Opening up the Postmates app, you tease him while and ordering a waffle iron from Waitrose.

“There, got one on the way now, hopefully one that won’t set your house on fire and kill us all.” You reach up and peck his cheek, showing him the delivery notification.

He pouts when he sees the notification, but leans into your kiss.

“Well I’ll pay you back for that, I swear.” He turns back to the multiple pans on the stove.

“Could you get out some plates? And maybe some drinks? Mimosas sound good, if you’re up for it.”

“You will NOT pay me back for that! A £30 waffle iron pales in comparison to all of the things you’ve given me. Consider it a mutually beneficial gift.” You slap his ass and head to get the plates and cups out, moaning in appreciation of his suggestion for mimosas.

“God yes, mimosas sounds incredible, I’ll make a pitcher?” You shoot him a look of questioning, smiling when he nods. It doesn’t take long for you to run downstairs and get a bottle of Moët, aka the only champagne that Brian drank.. a little cliche but definitely something that made you smile. Bouncing up the stairs, you hyperventilate dramatically, leaning against the fridge

“Okay, with pulp or without?”

By the time you come back up, he’s starting to plate the food. He scoffs at your question. “In mimosas? No pulp please.” You grumble something about him being picky, which makes him laugh.

“Yes mum, I’ve always been picky. That’s what you get with me.” He carries the plates to the little dining area still within the kitchen, before going to get things like syrup and jam and butter.

You shake your head at him, pouring the orange juice into the pitcher, followed by some ice cubes, and the champagne, jumping when the cork pops.

“Ya know, I’m never gonna get used to that.” You mumble it to yourself, but Brian laughs and drops a kiss to your cheek when he passes.

“I guess I’m just going to have to get used to your pickie little ass then hmm? If I’m gonna deal with you for the rest of time, I should get used to the fact that you only like no pulp orange juice and chilled, but not cold, cheese...” You raise your eyebrows at him as you put the pitcher on the table before taking a seat beside him.

He pouts. “Cold cheese is too hard and dulls the flavor, but warm cheese is...” He shudders, before taking his glass from you. “Chilled is the happy medium.” Brian winks at you before sipping his drink. “Delicious. And I hope breakfast suits you. The pancakes have a little cardamom in them this time.”

You give him a look of disbelief, smiling before cutting one of the fluffy pancakes and sticking it in your mouth, groaning in pleasure at the taste.

“Jesus Christ Brian, these are amazing, thank you.” You lean over and peck his lips, mouth still full of pancake.

“I think you should hang up red and just become my personal chef...” You wriggle my eyebrows at him, taking a big bite, throwing your head back while moaning in pleasure, licking the fork.

He snorts. “I wouldn’t make much of a personal chef if all I can really make is breakfast food.” You give him a look and he grins.

“Alright, and noodles. Listen, I lived with three other men most of my life and two of them couldn’t even cook an egg. John was wildly talented in the kitchen, so I didn’t have to be anything special.” He takes a bite of his own, groaning a little.

“That IS good....”

“Told ya so.” You send him a wink, eating as fast as you could, going back for seconds within 10 minutes of sitting down.

“Don’t you dare say anything.. I’m a growing girl, and you made wayyyy too many pancakes for me to only have 3.” You pour some syrup on them, your tongue sticking out in concentration Brian grins and takes a bite of his own food. “I made more because I knew you’d eat them. Plus, who doesn’t love leftover pancakes.” He shrugs.

“I don’t have anything to do today, miraculously. If you don’t either, maybe we could just... have a day to ourselves?” It was rare that the two of you had that, even on the weekends. But the tour was on a little break, and Brian was trying to make the most of it.

“That sounds amazing Bri.” You smile over at him, taking another bite, happiness flooding your body just thinking about the possibilities of what the two of you could do with a whole day to yourselves.

“What do you wanna do? As long as I get to sit in your lap for a majority of the day, I don’t give a shit.” You loved, and I repeat, LOVED sitting in Brian’s lap.. it just.. made you feel safe and loved, plus it didn’t hurt that he usually ended up with a boner, and you usually ended up face down on the couch while he fucked you relentlessly.

He shifts in his seat at your words, smiling a little. Was he already horny just from those words? Yes. Listen, he might be an old man, but his cock still tried to be 20 years old…

“Well we can certainly do that, love. I was thinking of maybe watching a movie or something, and eating ourselves silly, and...” He sighs.

“Well maybe that sounds a bit boring. I just thought we could spend some time together. I miss you, when you’re gone.”

“ Aww, Bri…” You set your fork and knife down, scooting your chair back so you can climb over into his lap. Wrapping your arms around his shoulders, you lean  forward to press a series of kisses to his cheeks and forehead.

“I miss you too when you’re gone.. more than you know…” You sigh, remembering how sad you’d been when he’d gone off on the first leg of the tour, leaving you all alone in the big house.

“Wish there was some way I could come with you, the bed is just so empty and cold when you’re not here with me.”

 He looks up at you sharply, arching his brows at your words

“You—You’d want to come?” He honestly hasn’t thought so. Not because of anything you’d done, but just because you had your own life and career you loved, and touring was hectic. It was a hard life to live; always on the go, never any sleep, night after night. But it was his passion and he loved it. But again, he knew it wasn’t for everyone.

 You stammer a little at his words, slightly embarrassed. Sure you’d desperately wanted to go with him when he left on tour.. but, you’d never brought it up because you didn’t want to make him feel like he HAD to bring you.

“I-I mean, I’d like to.. but, I understand if you wouldn’t like that! You’ve been doing this for 50 years, and you probably have a set way of doing things, and I’d probably just get in the way.”

Biting your lip, you shake your head.

“I have 51 days of vacation from work, a-and I could always use that, but…” You chuckle, scratching his head. “I don’t wanna make you feel like you have to let me.”

 His breath leaves his chest in a big huff, hazel eyes wide “51 days of vacation?? How???” You shrug and he shakes his head.

“Okay, well, we’re definitely talking about that later, but...” He smiles up at you.

“Of course I’d want you on the road with me. You might get sick of it, but you could always go back home if that happens. I—I’d love it if you were there. And I know Rog and Adam would like you there too, and the crew won’t mind as long as you don’t sabotage anything.” He winks.

You breathe a sigh of relief, smiling before pressing your lips to Brian’s, tasting the maple of the syrup he’d just eaten.

“Well, I can’t promise that I won’t destroy the dressing room with you...” You bite his lip gently, smirking when you feel his cock thickening under your ass.

“But are you sure? I don’t want to be in the way or do anything that could cause people to be uncomfortable., it’s YOUR space, somewhere you’re most at ease in your element.”

 “It IS my space, and my world. But I’d like to show it to you and share it to you. I want to share everything with you…” He’s quiet, voice open and innocent.

“I’ve never been able to share it with someone I loved before. Chrissie never liked it, Anita already had her own stage... It’s something I love and I’m proud of and I enjoy, and I’d only love it more if you were there.” Though his words are conversational, he’s gently grinding his hips up into your ass, lids fluttering at the feeling.

Your eyes close at the feeling of him beneath you, your breath hitching in your throat.

“I-I would love to do that Bri.. it s-seems so fascinating and fast paced.. I-I think I would really like it.” You open your eyes, hands going into his hair, tugging his lips towards yours, groaning when his arms tighten around your waist, holding you close.

“Besides, I really wanna fuck you against an amp…it’s not fair how goddamn hot you look on that stage.”

He laughs, wrinkling up his nose a little.

“Fuck me against an amp? That doesn’t sound very comfortable.” He teases, cheeks flushed a little at the thought. He always got amped up after shows, his adrenaline pumping. The thought of fucking you after coming off stage, the crowd still roaring.... fuck, he wanted that.

Noticing the blush on his face and chest, you can’t help but smirk, leaning forward to lick a stripe from his Adam’s apple to his ear, loving the way he shuddered under you.

“No? Well... I guess I can just take care of myself backstage if you don’t want me to fuck you.”

You love teasing him more than should probably be allowed, the way he would stutter and blush, and sometimes just absolutely lose control and fuck you senseless… it was a nice game of roulette.

He clenches his jaw, growling a little

“No you won’t. You’ll wait for me to be done performing like a good little girl.” His hands move to your ass, squeezing gently.

“You’ll wait as long as it takes and you won’t touch yourself.” He hums softly, as if thinking.

“Sometimes I’ll practice beforehand in my dressing room. I’ll turn up the volume and let you ride the amp, if you’re that desperate.” Bingo.. that’s exactly what you had been hoping for.. God, you loved it when he was dirty and degrading with you.. usually he didn’t do this, he felt bad for it.. but fuck did you love it. Biting your lip, you start to grind yourself against his cock, trying to look as innocent as possible.

“But what if I don’t wanna be a good girl daddy? What if I wanna be a brat and make you mad? What if that’s what your baby girl wants?” You have to admit.. riding his amp.. feeling the vibrations from red.. god, it was unlike anything you’d ever imagined.

He slaps your ass, jaw clenching.

“Then you can have your own fucking fingers, and I won’t touch you.” He arches a brow at you. “That’s what you want, right? To get off whenever you want?”

A shocked gasp escapes your mouth at his smack, arousal folding your cunt. “N-no, wanna get off with you, wanna have you fuck me until I can’t walk anymore daddy...”

You clench your eyes shut when he smacks your ass again, a small whimper breaking free. “But I-I wanna be naughty too daddy, wanna be a brat.”

“Well naughty girls don’t get this fat cock.”

You whimper and he cocks his head to the side.

“Maybe I’d fuck your throat. Use you, and then leave you be.” He sighs.

“Because no matter how bad you are, I suppose I can’t find someone else. And I’ve got to get off some way.” He says the words lightly, sighing as if put out, but he squeezes your hip gently, hoping to get across that it’s part of this game you’re playing. That he’d never dream of fucking someone else; never want to. You were it for him, and he knew that you knew that.

You’re genuinely surprised by his words and how insanely hot they’re making you.

“No, daddy, no I’ll be good for you, I promise, d-don’t want you going to find someone else, o-only want you to use me as a cum dumpster daddy.” You whimper loudly, grinding harder, loving the way his robe was rubbing you.

“Only want you to use me to fill up with your cum.. p-please daddy I’ll be good for you, I’ll take every drop.”

He is absolutely breathless, your words making him feel hot all over.

“Jesus, Y/N…” He swallows hard, moaning a little as your roll your hips against his.

“Well you’re not being very good right now, are you? Grinding against me right here in the kitchen. Naughty little thing.”

You bite your lip, hands tightening in his hair.

“I-I’m sorry daddy, I’ll be good, b-but your c-cock is just so fucking addicting, and I n-need you!” You halt your grinding even though you know you’d catch more flies with honey than vinegar.

“W-will you pl-please fuck me daddy? P-pretty p-please? I’ll be so good for you, I-I promise.”

He arches a brow, leaning back in his chair.

“Get off my lap.” His voice is more even than he thought it would be, and he’s thankful for it. You don’t move and he smacks your ass, voice hardening. “I said, get off my lap, Y/N.”

You know that your eyes are probably as wide as saucers, your breath catching in your throat at his harshness, but, you do as he asks, stumbling off of his lap, falling to the ground in your haste to move.

“Shit, I-I’m sorry daddy, I-I didn’t mean to make you mad... I’ll be good I p-promise.” You scramble to get up, only wanting to do whatever you can to please him, to make him know that you would be good.

Brian swallows hard, his head a little dizzy from how much blood was rushing to his cock. Jesus, he was so turned on it wasn’t even funny. And you hadn’t said no, or safeworded out. You were a dream. He scoots his chair back from the table before gesturing to the empty spot in front of him. “Take off your robe and bend over the table. Legs spread.”

You quickly do exactly what he says, shakily taking off your robe and throwing it on the chair you’d previously vacated, leaving you stark naked in front of him. You’re surprised that your legs are actually working, and you stumble your way to the table, bending over exactly as he’d requested, your naked cunt and ass on full display.

“N-now what daddy?” You were so eager to please him, and GOD was this a stark contrast to last night’s events. But that’s what you loved about your relationship with Brian... it was never the same thing, always evolving and always changing.

 He bites his lip, hands coming up to palm your ass before spanking it, watching it jiggle.

“Fuck you look so good like this, honey.” He tugs his robe open, leaning back in his chair and starting to play with his cock.

“What do you want, baby girl?”

You don’t think you’ve ever been so goddamn turned on in your ENTIRE life, the way he was treating you, how rough and dominant he was being? You’d never seen this side of Brian and you were praying to god you never had to go without it ever again.

“W-want you to be rough with me daddy, want y-you to fuck me until I can’t w-walk and c-cum inside of me please” You whimper when he spanks you again, your cunt leaking heavily. “Want you t-to fill me up, I NEED your cum d-dripping out of me please daddy, I’ll do a-anything.” You knew that you should be embarrassed by your begging and desperation.. but you weren’t, not even close.

“God, you’re a whore.” His words are harsh, but his tone is impossibly fond. He sighs, moving his fingers to your dripping cunt, rubbing through your folds.

“You’re absolutely soaked.” He pulls his fingers away before giving your cunt a gentle slap, but a slap nonetheless, much like the slap you’d delivered to his balls the night before.

“O-oh! G-god—daddy please, need your cock!” Your head is firmly placed on the table, hands grasping the corner of the wood as hard as you can without hurting myself.

You had never been so desperate before, usually you were a champion for as much foreplay as humanly possible, but for some reason his attitude and words were just causing you to have a fucking aneurysm.

“Fuck me l-like the dirty little fucking w-whore I am daddy, need y-you to breed me and teach me a goddamn lesson!”

“Breed you?” His voice cracks a little, and he stands, palming your ass, spreading it and your cunt open,

“Want me to fuck a baby into you?” He doesn’t know why he’s saying it, especially when he knows he more than likely can’t do that.

“I’ll bring you on tour with me just to fuck you full of cum every night.” His voice is hoarse as he steps closer, his cock brushing your thigh.

Your noises are pathetic, desperate and wanton.. the kitchen sounds more like a bordello at this point.

“Y-yes Brian, p-please fuck a baby in me daddy, wanna be so full of your cum, and t-then full with y-your baby!” The two of you hadn’t exactly discussed this aspect of your relationship but... you wouldn’t complain if it happened.

“I-is that a promise daddy? You promise to fuck me hard as full every night before and after? I wanna b-be dripping with your cum w-while you’re on stage p-performing for thousands.. me-meanwhile I’m backstage, your cum running d-down my leg...” You press your ass into him, wiggling a little, just trying to get some relief.

He just pushes your legs further apart, making you rest completely against the table. He slips a hand up to your shoulders, pressing against you while his other hand wraps around his cock. He strokes the head up and down your folds, shuddering a little at the feeling.

“Only if you’re good for me, baby girl. You can have all the cum you want as long as you’re good.” He murmurs, teasing at your entrance.

You shudder completely at his words, at the tone of his voice, how his hand feels splayed completely across your back, the way his breath is hot on your neck.

“I-I’ll be good! I-i promise daddy, I’ll be s-so good for you.” You’re near tears at this point, just so incredibly desperate for his cock to be inside you that you can’t control your emotions anymore.

“P-please n-need to feel your cum s-seeping out of me daddy, please, n-need your baby inside of me...”

He can’t take it anymore—shoves himself inside you with one quick stroke and doesn’t let up, not letting you adjust. He just holds you down on the table, one hand on your neck, the other gripping your ass, slapping it every now and then as he absolutely rails you. He doesn’t know where his energy is coming from, but he’s fucking you hard, as if his life depended on it.

“Fuck, your greedy little cunt is taking me so good. You’re such a fucking slut—"

The little scream you let out at his ferocity and sudden intrusion would be enough to garner attention from neighbors if it hadn’t been lunch time on a Thursday. Clenching tightly around his cock, your hands grip the table like it’s the only thing on earth that can keep you from disappearing into the atmosphere. “F-fuck—daddy, y-you’re s-so f-fucking big!” You somehow manage to hitch out the words, your face firmly smashed against the overly expensive wood of the table. Our breakfast was still lying right beside you while Brian went to town on your cunt. He’d never been this hard and rough, but you wanted more.

“C-cmon daddy, y-you can do b-better than that! F-fuck you’re little g-girl’s cunt like you m-mean it!”

 He slaps your ass again, thrusting somehow harder, putting his whole weight into it, grinding a little into you each time. “You’ll fucking take what I give you.” He growls, his hand moving from your neck to your hair, tugging on it, making you arch your back a little.

“Wish I could tie you up all day—leave you open and wanting for me. I can just use you whenever I want. Make a mess of you.” The noises filling the kitchen are obscene, his hips crushing against your ass, going so hard that his balls are swinging to slap against your clit.

 You’re already so close, his cock was pressing deliciously into your g-spot, his balls slapping your clit at a speed and harshness that was sending you closer and closer to tipping over the edge.

“W-want that so much d-daddy, wanna h-have you u-use me whenever you w-want!” You’re trying your best to push away your orgasm, not wanting to cum just yet, and knowing that he probably wouldn’t let you, you had to be good for him, had to do what he wanted…

“D-daddy, I-I’m so close c-can I c-cum all over your cock? P-please daddy?”

 Brian hauls you up a little by your hair, just to let his hand slip over your throat, holding you there, making you balance yourself at an angle where all your weight is essentially onto his cock. Still, he pounds into you, eyes sweeping over the scene you make in front of him.

“You wanna cum already? What a little whore you are.” He makes a disappointed sigh, tutting at you.

“Fine. Cum if you need to. But I’m not stopping.”

The new angle somehow sends him deeper into your cunt that he’s ever been before, his tip prodding your cervix.

“C-cumming for you d-daddy—" You gasp out, his hand closing a little tighter on your throat as you do so, your head leaning back to rest on his shoulder as your orgasm hits you, the intensity of it causing you to genuinely feel like you’re passing out, and you genuinely think you blackout for second.

He curses up a storm as you cum, but doesn’t let up his thrusting. He just plunges himself over and over into you, biting at your neck and shoulder as he lets out strangled moans. He holds you up against him, one hand on your neck, the other on your hip “There’s my naughty girl—just can’t fucking help yourself, can you? God, I can feel you dripping down my balls, even. You’re so dirty.”

 His incessant pounding brings you back to earth, your overly sensitive cunt clenching around his cock again and again.

“I-it’s all for you daddy, m-my cum I-is all yours!” You reach behind you, grasping onto Brian’s neck to try and hold yourself up a little. You can feel his cock grinding and bumping your cervix with every thrust, the noises bouncing off of the overly large kitchen making your cunt tingle even more. You were faster approaching another orgasm, and you knew he was close too, but you didn’t want this to end.

His hands moves from your hip to your clit, rubbing the slick little nub quickly. You gasp and try to arch away from the touch, oversensitive, but you’re literally impaled on his cock. You can’t really move, and he knows it

“Fucking take it, Y/N. You’re gonna take it, and you’re gonna cum again, and maybe then—maybe then I’ll give you want you want.” God, he was so close, his balls tight against his body. It was taking all he had to hang on.

“Y-yes sir, I-I’m g-gonna—" You cut yourself off with a scream, cunt spasming, ejaculation shooting from your pussy, covering Brian’s cock, his thighs, god y-you’d just fucking squirted all over him, in the KITCHEN. It was just as intense as the first orgasm, probably because of how insanely sensitive you already were, your cunt holding his cock hostage inside, your walls tightening around him, the only thing keeping you standing being his arms which were tight around your neck and stomach.

“Oh, fuck—yes, there’s a good girl.” He growls out, eyes rolling back in his head as you squirt all over him, drenching his cock. It’s what he’d wanted; what he knew he could get you to do if he tried had enough. You’d done it once before, completely on accident, and you’d been completely embarrassed and didn’t want to talk about it. But to him? God, it was the hottest thing he’d ever felt. And to feel it around his cock? Well needless to say, he was cumming pretty quickly soon after, still pressed right up against your cervix, coating your insides as his balls pulsed. He moans into your neck, legs trembling, but managing to keep you both upright.

“T-there ya go d-daddy, o-oh my god, f-fuck daddy, f-fill me up!” You gasp and whimper as his cum shoots into you, the warm and strange feeling coursing through your abdomen, filling you completely. God, he’d cum inside of you before, but never this much, he had NEVER cum this hard before...

“G-gonna give me a baby aren’t you Bri? Oh yes baby, god—you’re gonna fuck me full until I’m pregnant baby, fuck!” If it happened, it happened, and I wasn’t going to complain, certainly not if it happened from THIS.

 He just lets out an undignified whimper, hips still rutting into you. He can feel his legs around to give out, so he falls back clumsily into the chair, taking you with him. He lets you rest your head back against his neck as he pulls your legs open, spreading you out. God, if anyone were to walk in right now, you’d be on full display. He groans at the thought, his cock twitching again inside you. He’d never thought about sharing you before—why was he in such a mood today? He sneaks a hand down, fingertips toying with your slick clit, humming when you whimper.

The whimper is weak and barely audible to you, your head lolling to rest on his shoulder, your mouth wide, cunt aching in the best possible way.

“G-god B-Bri I-I’m s-so sensitive...” You didn’t want him to stop necessarily, I mean, his cock was still hard and twitching inside of you... that had NEVER happened and he was.. he was so fucking hard and horny today, and you had no idea what was causing it, but you started to grind against his cock, riding him,.

He coos to you, shushing you softly.

“I know, baby girl. Do you want me to stop?” He presses a kiss to your shoulder gently, just using his thumb to rub up and down on your clit, breath hitching as it makes you squeeze around his cock. He knew he’d slowly be softening, though this was the longest he’d stayed hard in a long time.

You shake your head frantically, whimpering as his fingers continue rubbing you “N-no! G-god no Bri, w-wanna cum on your cock again, w-wanna keep y-you hard a-as long as I c-can!” You knew that he was usually so self-conscious about his ability to stay hard, so you just wanted to make him feel better about himself. You also just wanted to see how many times he could make you cum.

He shudders, nuzzling into your shoulder.

“You’re such a greedy girl.” He murmurs. He’s rubbing your clit quickly, but trying to keep his touch light. He wants to make you feel good, not hurt.

“You’re so good for me, Y/N, love. You’re such a good girl.” He moans, feeling you squirm and flutter around his cock. “You feel so good.”

Your cunt is clenching and quivering around his cock, his fingers softly grazing your clit, and thanks to your previous 2 orgasms, that’s all it takes for your third orgasm to wrack your body, sending you clenching hard around his cock, your hands clutching into the back of his head, your hips moving involuntarily on him.

“I-I l-love you so much Bri, o-oh fuck honey! Y-you’re so good to me!” This orgasm isn’t as intense as the first 2, but to be honest you weren’t sure anything could ever compare to those.

He moans, gasping for air as you flutter around his softening cock, squeezing some of his cum out of you. It drips dirty down his thighs and balls, and he curses.

“F-fuck, babygirl—I love you too, so much— Such a good girl, honey. There you go. It’s alright.” He rubs your stomach gently.

His words and actions are so soft and gentle, causing a small smile to pull at your features.

“Jesus Christ Bri, w-what’s gotten into you honey? That was insane…”

You giggle, turning your head so you can place a sloppy kiss to his stubbly cheek, hand running over the other side of his face. “Amazing and incredible... but insane.”

Brian blushes, leaning down to press a million little kisses over your skin.

“I’m sorry, honey. I... I don’t Know, really. We were just talking and it.... escalated.” He snorts at his own description of what had just happened.

“Are you alright? Let’s get you up and get you clean. I’m sorry I was so rough.”

You chuckle and shake your head, squeezing his thigh.

“I’m fine honey, god, I’m more than fine. I liked it, SO much.” You’re still trying to catch your breath, his hand on your stomach. The touch is making you think about the words you’d exchanged, the implications of what you’d just done.. the evidence of which was running out of your cunt.

“Bri... I meant what I said earlier..about you…” You clear your throat, a little embarrassed. “About you fucking a baby in me...”

 His breath catches, fingers splaying out over your stomach. His heart sinks a little, and he rests his chin on your shoulder.

“I... I wish I could give that to you.” He’s quiet, voice a little sad.

“I just don’t know that’s possible for me, anyone.” He hides his face into your neck, trying to apologize.

Your own heart sinks a little as well, not at the implications of his words, but at the fact that he felt so guilty about it, the fact that he might not be able to give you a baby.

“Hey, Bri, honey…” You turn around in the chair, his soft cock falling free, a combination of your cum flowing freely from your cunt now. Brushing your hand over his face, you trace your thumb under his eye where a single tear has fallen. “It’s okay.. I-I don’t need anything else but you… if a baby happens, that’s great, but if not, I’m perfectly content with just having and loving you.”

 He sniffles, nodding quickly, embarrassed that he was crying. He hugs you tight, arching up to press a gentle kiss to your lips.

“ know... I know, I just... I wish...” He swallows hard.

“I wish we could. I wish I were younger.” He murmurs. It’s all dreams and nonsense, he knows, but it doesn’t stop him from wishing.

You give him a gentle smile, leaning in to kiss him. “I don’t…” He gives me a look, eyebrows raised in disbelief. You laugh, kissing him a few hundred times.

“I’m serious Brian, we met right when we needed to.. if you’d met me 20 or so years ago we never would’ve worked, mainly because I was a baby...” You try to be funny, giggling at your own joke.

“And that would’ve been a little bit more intense in the media than us today, if you can believe that.”

He scoffs, rolling his eyes. “You know that’s not what I meant.” He pokes your side, shaking his head. He sighs, looking up at you.

“Maybe we wouldn’t have worked out. But maybe we would have. Maybe we would’ve been good. Maybe you would’ve... kept me good.” His eyes are a little watery, his insecurities showing through.

“Oh honey.” You wrap your arms around his head, pulling him close, allowing his head to rest on your neck.

“You are good Bri, yeah you’ve made some mistakes in your past, and you’ve done something’s that were less than okay…” He sniffles, making your arms tighten.

“But they made you who you are today, they made you the Brian that I love more than anyone else in the world.. without the mistakes you made, you wouldn’t have learned from them, and you probably wouldn’t be able to cherish and love me the way you do...”

He nods, listening to you for once, just holding you tightly. He was always... overly conscious of his mistakes. His past self and past behavior. He missed being younger, especially with you. He wanted to do so much more than he could with his old body. But then again, he’s sure his younger self would have done something unforgivable. He was stupid. He still was; last night had proved that, but he thought it was a little better.

“I love you…”

You pull him back enough to place a kiss to his forehead, threading your fingers through his hair.

“I love you too silly, so much.” His hands are running up and down your sides, his lips pressing into your neck. You felt so loved and safe, almost like everything that happened last night was just a dream, a bad dream, but only a dream. With Brian, you felt like a better person, which you guess was the best thing to say, because when you’re with someone you love, you’re supposed to feel like a better person… He brought out the best side of you possible, and you were beyond lucky and blessed to have him in your life, holding you in the kitchen of your London flat, the breakfast he’d made you turning cold. Breakfast that he’d fucked you  within an inch of your life next to.

“I just can’t believe you made me squirt in the kitchen Brian.. sounds like a song from fucking Aerosmith…” You chuckle brightly, kissing his nose.

Brian laughs loudly, his head thrown back against the chair.

“If Freddie’d had his way, it could’ve sounded like one of our songs. But even Roger veto’d some of the dirtier ones.” He sighs, stretching his legs a little.

“I’m actually quite proud of myself for the mess. But I’ll clean it up. Do you want to get into a bath?” He squeezes your hips, smiling up at you.

You moan at the thought of a bath, the wetness between your thighs starting to get a little nasty. “You should be very proud of yourself, maybe you can make me do that once a week from now on.”

You wriggle your eyebrows, smirking when he blushes before leaning forward and giving him a quick kiss, getting up off of his lap with shaky legs, you actually greatly resemble a baby deer.

“A bath sounds great by the way, I feel like a French whore at the moment, so some lavender bath salts would really do the trick.”

He can’t help but laugh at your unsteady gait, but quickly masks his smile when you give him a glare. He stands, walking over to put an arm around your waist and lead you up the stairs.

“Well, I’ll make you a lovely lavender bath, and while you’re doing that, I’ll clean everything up downstairs. Maybe I’ll make us some tea, too. How’s that sound?”

 You give him a pleasure filled smile, cupping his face before placing a sound kiss to his lips.

“It sounds like you’re making me the most spoiled and loved woman in the whole of London.” You giggle when he starts kissing your neck, your arms wrapping tightly around his neck as he dips you. “Brian! Your scruff is gonna give me beard burn.” You’re laughing hard, my heart lighter than its felt in years.

“Love, I hate to break the news to you, but I think you probably already have beard burn—everywhere.” He chuckles, kissing you once more before heading for the bathtub, busying himself with making you the nicest bath in the entire world. He had a plethora of different bath salts and bath bombs, etc, and he wanted to make everything perfect for you.

You sit on the counter, on a towel of course, watching Brian get the tub ready, feeling beyond happy and at ease. After a while he claps his hands together and helps me down, helping me into the tub.

“Godddddd, you always get these so perfect honey…” You sink into the water, allowing the smells of lavender and oranges to sooth you, the warmth of the water making your sore legs and pussy relax and feel 100x better.

“Please hurry your cleaning so you can come keep me company...” You pout at him, your eyes big and innocent. He laughs, and leans forward to give you a quick kiss, his hand threading through your hair. “I’ll try my best.”

He moves to clean himself up as well, watching you in the mirror, smiling widely when he sees your head drooping to the side. Shaking his head, he bends down beside you, bathing you while you sleep, your mouth open just a tad. Once he’s bathed you, he brushes a strand of hair from your forehead and grabs a bath pillow from the cabinet, for once incredibly excited that you had such an obsession with bath gadgets. Propping your head up, and once he’s satisfied that you wouldn’t drown, he stands, wincing a bit at the pain in his knees, before heading to the door. Brian spares you another look, smiling fondly… Sure, things were tough, it wasn’t going to be an easy go of things… but he didn’t care. Last night, the earth shattering pain he’d felt when you ran out, it only confirmed to him that he couldn’t live without you, and he knew you wouldn’t let him.

tags: @meddows-taylors @toomuchlove-willkillyou @brianmayoucease @leah-halliwell92 @rogertaylors-lipgloss @mariekuuuuuh @unofficialbillnye @stephydearestxo @goodoldfashioned-rogerboy @danamaleksworld @dereones98 @glasgowkisschelseasmile @awkwardangelshezza @bellamy1998 @psychosupernatural @warren-lauren @womanwithahotdogstand @oujiacallme @harrisunn @anotheronebitesthedeaks @stormtrprinstilettos @get-on-your-bikes-and-ride @amor-libre @marymaia00 @ellywritesfics @simonedk @queen-see-ya-in-valhalla @sam-mercury-sixx @horrorsinwonderland @toomuchtellyneck @asgardianvamp21 @crazylittlethingcalledobsession @marvelstuck @softboydeacon @a-queen-on-her-throne @roger-bang-the-drum @frannyxc @mrsmazzellotaylor @reedusteinrambles @drowseoftaylor @doubledeaky @indieblair @freddiedearfriend @subbysharkbabe

[motherhenna]

Writers Rants: Backstory

How to Smoothly Integrate a Character’s Past into the Narrative

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If you are even remotely interested in the process of writing, then you’ve probably heard this phrase at least a hundred times over: show, don’t tell.  Such a vague sentiment, but hell if it doesn’t pack a punch. In fact, it’s probably one of the only “rules” of storytelling that ought to be followed as closely as possible and as often as possible—at least in my opinion. But what, exactly, does it mean? In layman’s terms, show don’t tell is a simple recommendation: that authors should actively illustrate a concept rather than passively explain it. Why? Simple. One leaves the reader more room for interpretation and draws them deeper into the action at hand, and the other just…well, tells them what to see and what to feel in the same way a set of DIY instructions describe how to make a quirky set of kitchen lights out of mason jars. While yes, you got a straightforward idea of what to expect, did you actually have fun reading it?

These basic concepts are important to understand if you consider yourself a writer of any kind, as they function as the foundation for a) improving your prose, b) strengthening your characters, and c) forming a flowing narrative that will catch and keep readers’ attention.  And naturally, this also applies to the art of exposition.

Most people with even a cursory knowledge of telling a story know that characters should never be blank slates. If you have any desire to portray even a facsimile of real life, you have to put at least some effort into fleshing out the main characters. And when I say ‘flesh out’, I mean do more than just describing what they look like, a laundry list of personality traits, and what they’re wearing. I’m not going to go into this process deeply, as that’s a matter for another think-piece entirely, but it’s a starting point for the more convoluted parts to come. What I’m building up to is that your characters need a backstory, especially if they’re the one(s) through whom we, as readers, experience the story, i.e., the point of view (POV) character. This applies to both first- and third-person limited narratives, unless you’re going for a more anonymous / incidental narrator, like Mr. Lockwood in Wuthering Heights.

Now, these backstories don’t have to be a strict, detailed, chronological transcription of every year in that character’s life (though doing so certainly doesn’t hurt!) Rather, you should write it much like you would describe your own life if you had to plot it out on a timeline. At first, just stick with the most essential elements: where and when in history they were born, whether they have siblings or present family, and a simple list of significant events from various periods in their life. What specific things have most influenced who they are as a person, for good or ill? Next, it’s time to look at the family, since nothing impacts an individual more than how they were raised and how they were treated during their formative years. Were their parents present during their childhood? What was their parents’ relationship like before and after your character’s birth? Are they natives of the country in which the story is set, or did they immigrate—and if they immigrated, why did they do so? All of these and more are, to me at least, vital to developing a well-rounded and realistic character. I’ve even gone so far as to type out entire timelines for each character as well as their parents. Personalities, quirks, trauma—these are all just as hereditary as one’s genes, though this doesn’t mean that this inheritance has to be through blood. Nature vs. Nurture: they’re both equally important in the formation of an individual.

…So, what to do when you’ve finished all that? Do you dutifully transcribe it into the first chapter of your story? Absolutely not. Copy it into a separate document window and keep it there. A large chunk of this is for your benefit: most likely, less than half of it will make it into the written canon of the novel, and for good reason. All of that detailed history isn’t for the reader, it’s for you to use as a framework. Some of the most powerful elements to realistic characters are the unseen, the implied: all the hidden little things that lie just under the surface, but are never fully visible to the naked eye.

What a lot of inexperienced writers may not realize is that everything doesn’t always have to be stated unequivocally through dialogue or info-dumps. How often, in real life, do acquaintances explain upfront that this specific behavior they often exhibit is a result of how they were abandoned by their father and raised by an emotionally distant mother? Most people don’t psychoanalyze everything, nor do we ourselves do it to others—at least not often! Plus, it’s boring. Getting to know characters over the course of a story should be comparable to meeting a new friend. You find out the surface things at first, but pick up bits and pieces along the way that hint at what lies deeper inside. Little by little, you learn about their family, their hopes, dreams, fears…not always directly, and sometimes even in spite of their desire to keep up a front of normalcy.

With all this said, I think it’s become clear where I stand on backstory: it should be subtle, woven gradually into the narrative rather than stated by the character themselves or described by an omniscient narrator. Not only does this make the process of reading about it flow better and progress more naturally, it’s also far more interactive. Instead of being told why a character acts the way they do, the reader can catalogue said character’s actions, motivations, dialogue, and the way they interact with their surroundings, gradually putting the puzzle pieces together for themselves. In a sense, it’s almost a reward for those who read with a careful, inquisitive eye, and can be just as satisfying as solving a mystery before the detective does in a murder mystery.

I’ve used—and will continue to use—a lot of metaphors in this section because it’s the most thorough way I can to explain this process and why it’s so important. That being said, I approach backstory in the same way I might organize a scavenger hunt. It’s not about a treasure map, but rather an ongoing set of little discoveries without which the ultimate prize can never be found. But in keeping with this analogy, why would anyone want to take part in this if a) they’re just given the prize’s location outright, or b) don’t really care about the prize anyway?

When you’re straight-up told about character’s backstory within the first few chapters, there’s no groundwork for investment. Why should I care about this character’s history if I don’t even know them yet? Investment is a gradual process, and ought to be an interactive process too. One of the best strategies of implying backstory without stating it directly is illustrating how a character reacts to specific triggers. Yes, you can tell the reader in the character’s introductory paragraph that he was almost killed in a house fire as a child, which still haunts him to this day—but how else can you impart this information more effectively and poignantly? For some examples, he might…

Be too frightened to turn on the stove.

Avoid any type of matches or aerosol at all costs.

Get anxious when filling up his car at gas stations.

Constantly check and re-check the smoke detectors throughout his apartment

Panic when he smells her neighbor’s lit fireplace.

Why would we need to explain to readers what made him this way when we have all the evidence we need to figure it out for ourselves? Of course, there’s nothing wrong with, later on down the line, this character actively opening up about this trauma to a friend or therapist, as this is only natural and also supplies us with details we would have never known otherwise. This just shouldn’t be the first way we find it out.

Another efficient and interesting approach to gradual backstory incorporation is through dialogue. The way a character responds to nosy questions, criticisms, or simple observations tell a lot about the kind of people they are and how they’re coping (or not coping) with potentially painful parts of their personal histories / insecurities. For example, Character A can ask Character B, “Why don’t you want to go out tonight?” In truth, B is trying to back out of these plans because she can’t fit into a dress she was supposed to wear for the party, and is trying desperately not fall back into the pit dug by the various eating disorders she has suffered from since adolescence. She is afraid her friends will want to take group pictures, or remark on what’s she’s eating or not eating, or notice the extra pudge in her stomach. She remembers how her mother would chide her for eating second helpings when she was young, or all the times her ex called her fat. But B is not going to be capable of explaining all of this to her partner. So how does she respond?

1.     “I just…feel tired all of a sudden…but don’t let me keep you from going.  I don’t want to spoil your night.” Implication: saving face—she doesn’t want to reveal her real insecurities, so she uses a physical illness as a cover story.

2.      “What’s it to you? If this stupid party so important to you, then you can just go without me!”  Implication: defensiveness—she is uncomfortable being vulnerable, and lashes out instead.

Now obviously these are just two examples of a plethora of different responses a person might have to a question like this. But what matters is that each answer should give the reader some sort of information as to why said character reacts the way they do. And these reactions don’t have to have traumatic roots, either! Perhaps, because Character C’s older sister always encouraged them to stick up for and respect themselves, C is able to take that positive reinforcement and pay it forward, inspired to protect others who may not know how to protect themselves.  Positive change ripples and spreads just as much as negativity, and should never be discounted just because a character has gone through their fair share of tragedy, too.

 ---

In short, there is nothing simple or easy about creative writing—there is so much nuance involved in every aspect, though that shouldn’t discourage newcomers from experimenting and taking everything step by step. There are no absolutes in writing, and every rule can be challenged, so take what I say with a grain of salt. But still, I cannot emphasize enough the importance of backstory when developing strong characters, nor how much more natural a narrative will feel when these things are integrated with subtlety and grace. Your characters should never be objects, concepts, or a means to an end: if you want to make them seem real to your readers, then they must first seem real to you.

...And real people all have their own stories: to find them, all you have to do is watch and listen.    

[quicksilversquared]

Crash and Burn: Chapter 2: Glowing Embers

Everyone in Paris had always assumed that if Hawkmoth were to die, it would be mid-battle with the superheroes, or maybe in a jail cell years down the road, after being defeated. No one expected him to die suddenly in a car crash on a sunny afternoon.

Least of all, his son.

links in the reblog

                                                                                           oi staff where’s the page break line

By the time Chat Noir got home- the next morning, after falling asleep in Ladybug's arms on top of the Eiffel Tower and both of them sleeping soundly there for the entire night- several responsibilities had been lifted off of his shoulders.

The Gorilla had stepped in as Adrien's guardian and the runner of the house, as he was both Adrien's bodyguard and (apparently- Adrien hadn't known this before) his mom's cousin. He was going to make all of the arrangements for the burial, and had offered to set up a funeral until Adrien told him that he didn't really want to bother with that.

The Gorilla didn't look as surprised as Adrien had thought, but then again he had seen the relationship between father and son deteriorate through the years. More than anyone in the house, he had cared for Adrien, letting him escape to spend time with his friends as long as Adrien wasn't being chased by mobs of people. And the last several times when there had been interest in Adrien after a commercial aired, the Gorilla had opted to just accompany Adrien wherever he wanted to go around Paris rather than trying to drag him back home.

(Nooroo had also cleared the Gorilla of all guilt the previous day in a rare bit of actual good news- he had never suspected his employer's supervillain activities at all, and he had been an avid supporter of Ladybug and Chat Noir.)

As a bonus, the Gorilla also knew who all of Mr. Agreste's legal people were, and what needed to be done to start transferring bank accounts and deeds and everything. It was just one more big thing that Adrien didn't have to take care of.

In fact, now that Ladybug had told Chat Noir that she could do the announcement to Paris on her own so that he didn't have to be there and struggle to keep a neutral expression in front of the crowds of reporters and that she would bring the two recovered Miraculous to Master Fu, Adrien didn't really have anything left on his list of things that he had to take care of. He just had to sort through his own feelings and try to get back to some sense of normalcy, which...

Well, it was still a lot, but it wasn't an overwhelming lot. And as a bonus, Ladybug had suggested a nightly meet-up so that they could cuddle and he could have a safe place to talk through his feelings and everything that had happened.

(She. Was. Amazing.)

"You don't have to do this right away, kid, you know that, right?"

Adrien shook his head as he picked his way through the graveyard, following the instructions that he had found tucked in the last journal. "I want to see Mom's gravestone. I've not gotten any closure with that, and this- even if I never got a funeral for her, this- this is something."

Maybe he was upset with his mom right now, upset that she apparently hadn't been the person that he had thought she was and heartbroken at the lies. But in his memories, she was still a caring mother, not- not the lady that the journals had described, who used the hypnotic powers of the Peacock (powers that Adrien hadn't even been aware existed, even though- well, peacock, hypnotism, that did make sense) to pull more investors onboard with supporting Gabriel and to get influential fashion columnists to write favorably about the company in their columns, advancing the company far faster than it would have gotten on its own otherwise.

It had been supremely selfish and manipulative. Maybe there were no real lingering negativeeffects since Gabriel was a strong company even without the help and all the pushes had done was speed up the rate at which the company joined the topmost fashion brands in Europe- the investors certainly hadn't lost any money, and it was hardly as though the columnists had gotten in trouble for writing about Gabriel- but that didn't make it right.

"Seeing a stone is closure?"

"It's an ending, at least." Adrien checked his copy of the instructions again before taking a turn and heading up another path, pulling his hoodie tighter around himself. "I'll know where she is, which is more than I've been able to say for the past several years."

The plot that Adrien finally arrived at was tucked into the back of the cemetery, far out of the way of prying eyes. It was surrounded by old stones, from people who had long since passed and whose immediate family had probably died long ago, too. That meant that the flowers sitting at the small, relatively plain gravestone stuck out all the more.

Adrien had thought that his father would have gone for something large and gaudy. Subtle had never been his thing- the giant portrait above the stairs, the multiple paintings of his mom, and the statue of Emilie Agreste near their house attested to that, as did the two (two!) lairs of his that Nooroo had told Adrien about- but clearly he hadn't wanted to draw any attention to the grave, not when Emilie Agreste was still officially listed as a missing person.

"He was here recently," Plagg commented, flying over to the flowers. "These are fresh, probably from a couple days ago."

"Yeah." Adrien fingered one of the flowers, inspecting the fairly fresh petals. There were orchids and fern leaves and several other kinds of flowers that he didn't recognize in it, all fresh. It was so fresh that Adrien wouldn't be surprised if his father had put out the bouquet before leaving for the investor's meeting that he had never returned from. "He left the house only every couple days unless he had company stuff that needed him to attend in person, and I bet that this is where he went whenever he left. And this is an obnoxious bouquet- I bet every last one of them were like this."

"The next plot over is empty," Plagg said, flying around. "I bet your father bought both at once. And he intended to be buried in the second one."

Adrien let out a huff, sparing the empty plot a quick glance. "Well, if the Gorilla finds the paperwork for it, fine. That's one less thing to bother with. Otherwise, who cares what his wishes were?"

He didn't stay at his mom's grave for long. There were things he wanted to say, maybe, questions he wanted to ask- why hadn't she just been content with what she had? Why did she have to mess around with magic to get more? Wasn't the money they had and their lifestyle and him enough for her?- but she wasn't there to answer those questions. Not anymore.

Not for a while.

Adrien headed home and, for the first time since his trip to the hospital, responded to Nino's texts himself. Plagg had clearly gone through his phone already so that all of the texts and calls from his friends and classmates were listed as seen and weren't staring Adrien in the face and overwhelming him when he opened his messages. Nino's response was immediate, even though he was meant to be in the middle of class.

"I bet he's had his phone out all day and none of the teachers are going to say anything about it," Plagg told Adrien when he said as much. "I mean, the news broke pretty fast, didn't it? They know what happened."

"Yeah." Adrien didn't know how, exactly- he had thought that it was policy for the family to make a statement when a famous person died, but maybe not. Or maybe it was pretty obvious at the scene that his father wasn't going to make it, or- he didn't know. A buzz from his phone caught Adrien's attention, and he looked down to see another message from Nino. "He wants to know if I'd be interested in having him and Alya and Marinette come over after school, either just to hang out or so I can catch up on school stuff."

Plagg considered him. "Are you ready to see them?"

Adrien didn't even have to think about it. "Honestly? No. Not- not yet. I mean, it would be a distraction, maybe, but- I mean, the teachers have sent me my assignments, I've seen the emails. I can work on that as a distraction on my own."

"Are you worried that they might decide to talk about the superheroes as a distraction and that would be hard?"

Adrien had been about to say no, when he gave it a second thought and- yeah, that was part of it. He needed another day's distance before he could handle that kind of conversation without being worried about giving something away. "Something like that. Alya's going to talk about nothing but Hawkmoth when Ladybug does her announcement, whenever she does it."

Plagg made a face. "You need less obsessed friends."

"It was funny to listen to before I found out about Father." Adrien tucked Plagg into his jacket as he headed for the subway. "And I'm sure it'll be similar in the future, once I have some distance. But I'll be able to handle it tomorrow, I'm sure of it."

                                                                                            oi @staff why’d you get rid of the page break line

 "Dude, we've been so worried!"

Adrien managed a smile as he let Nino and Alya in. Marinette was nowhere in sight, which meant that either she had overslept or she had been roped into either helping at the bakery or doing something else. "Hi, you guys."

"We were really sorry to hear what happened," Alya said more formally as Nino gave Adrien a hug. "It's just so- so unexpected."

"That's one way to put it," Adrien agreed with a tight smile. "Unexpected." He glanced between the two of them as Nino stepped back. "Is- uh, is Marinette coming?"

"She's running late," Alya said at once. "She was practicing some sort of speech in her room when I stopped by to get her and wanted to finish her run-through all the way before coming over."

Nino frowned, glancing over at Alya. "A speech? Is it- is it about what I think it is? Because it's really not the time."

Alya only shrugged, not elaborating at all. Adrien frowned as he glanced between her and Nino, sensing that there was something there that he wasn't being told. "I don't know. I didn't catch any words before she heard me coming and stopped. Maybe it's something for the class president thing. She did say that she was coming, though, and to just start without her."

Adrien couldn't help but slump. He had rather been looking forward to getting a Marinette hug right away. She hugged with her whole body, just like Ladybug did, and it was the best.

At least she was coming eventually. He would get his Marinette hug soon enough.

The three of them headed up to Adrien's bedroom. He had been sure to put away everything of his father's in the safe before they came, just in case, and so all that was out was the printed-out assignments that his teachers had sent. Adrien had finished up a lot already on his own- his Literature assignments were easy to bang out, and Philosophy was easy enough considering that he had been sent lecture notes as well. There were a couple other classes that had just had readings to complete and lecture notes to review (Plagg had helped Adrien actually absorb the information by stealing the lecture notes from him and reading them off like a professor so that Adrien didn't just absently skim over all the notes without taking anything in; while Adrien had been more than a little skeptical about the strategy at first, he had to admit that having to actually take his own notes like normal helped.). With the end of the year and exams coming up soon, though, it was still important to be studying everything and making sure that he understood it.

(His father had the worst timing in the world, honestly.)

Marinette arrived twenty minutes later, flushed from running and carrying a bag with both pastries and leftovers from her parents. She immediately wrapped Adrien up in a hug, and he practically melted into the embrace.

(Seriously, she gave the best hugs. Well, with the possible exception of Ladybug.)

"I lost track of time," Marinette told him as they headed back to his room. "I was practicing a thing and I wanted to get it right and memorize it while I was on a roll, and I didn't realize how much time was passing."

"No worries," Adrien said, wrapping his arm around hers. "I'm just glad you could make it. That way I have someone to talk to when Nino and Alya start making eyes at each other."

Or, as it turned out fifteen minutes later, when Nino and Alya got bored of discussing their science unit and brought up the topic of Hawkmoth and the lack of akumatizations lately.

"It's been, what, a week and a half?" Alya said, and it took Adrien a second to figure out what she was talking about. When he did, he stiffened. "I know he's gone for stretches without akumatizing anyone before, but it's always strange- he must be planning something. That's always what he's doing when he goes silent."

Adrien had to think about it, and- actually, Alya was right. Even though his father had only died several days before, he hadn't akumatized anyone for a week before that. He probably hadn't been plotting anything big, though. There had been a bunch of meetings with investors lately, some out of the city, and that meant that his father couldn't slip away. It had been a welcome break in akuma-fighting, and Adrien had taken full advantage of it to study as much as he could before the next wave of akumas inevitably showed up.

Well. Not so inevitable anymore.

"Yeah, I kind of hate it when more than a few days pass by without any akuma," Nino agreed at once, and Adrien tried his best not to listen. He had told Plagg that he would be fine with hearing talk about Hawkmoth, really, but that- that clearly wasn't the case yet. He wondered what it would be like once the news broke that Hawkmoth was dead. Everyone would be talking about it then, and he wouldn't be able to escape. Adrien would skip school to keep away from it, but he couldn't avoid the conversation forever.

"Oh, no kidding. I mean, evil planning aside, there's so much less traffic on the Ladyblog when there aren't any akumas-"

"Adrien, I'm on the same problem that you're on, and I'm stuck. Do you want to work through it together? I thought I might read that section in the book and see if it gives me any ideas."

Adrien startled, glancing over at Marinette. She had moved closer to him when he wasn't paying attention, and now was sitting at his elbow, open science book in front of her. One look at her expression told Adrien that she had caught on that Alya and Nino's discussion was making him uncomfortable (actually, it was making him sick to his stomach- Alya thought not having akuma attacks was inconvenient because they were good for her blog and that- that just didn't sit well with him, not when so much of his life had been interrupted and uprooted thanks to Hawkmoth) and she was trying to distract him. The effort was very much appreciated, especially considering that Nino and Alya clearly weren't going to drop their topic any time soon.

In the end, his friends only stayed for two hours before having to leave. Alya had babysitting duty, apparently, and Nino had promised to help her. Marinette hung back, turning to Adrien once their friends had vanished out the door.

"My parents wanted me to let you know that you're welcome to come stay with us for a bit if you want to get out of this house," Marinette told him. "If it feels too empty or has too many memories, or- whatever, really. We have a guest room that you could use, so you could have your own space."

Adrien blinked, blown away by the offer. It went above and beyond, really. "I- thank you, so much. I'll consider it, I promise, I just- right now-"

"Don't feel like you need to make any sort of decision right away," Marinette said at once, resting one hand on his arm. "We just want you to know that you have the option there, in case you decide that you want it. And if you ever want company, either to talk to or to just be in the same room so it's not so empty- seriously, just call me or come on over. Our door is open for you."

Adrien could only wrap Marinette up in a grateful hug, at a complete loss for words.

                                                                           staff are dumb for getting rid of the page break line pass it on

 On Sunday afternoon, Ladybug called a press conference. For the first time ever, she showed up alone at the mayor's podium.

Adrien watched from at home, so thankful that his partner had assured him that she could handle it alone. Even though he was feeling better- even though he was coming to terms with, well, everything- he didn't trust himself in front of a microphone and dozens of cameras yet.

"She doesn't look nervous at all," Plagg commented as he settled down on the back of Adrien's couch to watch. On screen, Ladybug was clearly exchanging some small talk with the mayor while they waited for all of the reporters to settle. Based on the mayor's usual expression, she hadn't broken the news to him yet, either. "I bet she is, though, and she's just gotten good at hiding it."

"She's gotten really good at public speaking," Adrien agreed, leaning forward as Ladybug turned her attention back to the podium, smoothing out a piece of paper there as though they were about to start. He caught sight of the mayor trying to glance over her shoulder to see what the conference was about, but it was obvious that Ladybug's hands were covering the paper enough that he couldn't make things out. "I can just barely hear another reporter talking near Madam Chamack. It sounds like they're thinking that something happened to me."

Plagg yawned widely. "Yeah, it's one of those gossip reporters, and they think that you died and that's why Ladybug is there alone."

"If I had, Ladybug would have picked out a new partner before making any announcements. They probably would have been out for a fight first, too. No point in exposing weaknesses like that." On screen, things settled down. "Oh, it's starting."

"Thank you for coming today," Ladybug started confidently, straightening and glancing around the audience. "I know that this is last minute, but Chat Noir and I have some news that we wanted to share with you. He's not able to make it today because he had a civilian obligation that he couldn't get out of, but he didn't want it to delay our announcement." Ladybug paused to take a breath, and then she looked out at the audience, chin high and confident. "Because Hawkmoth is gone. Paris is safe."

The room exploded. Ladybug waited patiently for the fuss to die down, her expression giving nothing away even as reporters shouted questions in her direction. Her quirked brow told them that they had to wait for their questions, though, and they settled quickly enough.

"There was no final battle, as I'm sure you noticed," Ladybug continued once the room had quieted to her liking, her voice even and calm. "Hawkmoth died suddenly of reasons unrelated to his misuse of the Butterfly Miraculous, and his remaining family found the Miraculous among his possessions following his death. They brought the Miraculous to Chat Noir and I so that we would know and could return the Miraculous to their proper spot. We talked to both them and Hawkmoth's former kwami and there are no other willing accomplices still alive."

Adrien made a small face at that. It wasn't strictly true, even ignoring Nathalie's only somewhat less-than-entirely-willing involvement. He had found a note in one of his father's journals that Lila Rossi had willingly worked with him or at least had had some sort of informal agreement with Hawkmoth about causing more akumas and becoming one on a regular basis, but Lila had been exposed as a liar and had left the country in disgrace with her mom over a year ago. Dragging her back into things- at least publically, neither he nor Ladybug had ruled out reaching out to her mom and administering punishment that way- would just complicate the whole situation.

Plagg cackled. "Oh, Ladybug is slick. She's not mentioning the Peacock at all, or giving away that there was more than one Miraculous recovered. She could be a politician like that, not lying exactly but not reminding the public about Mayura."

"It'll help that the Peacock hasn't come into play recently," Adrien said absently, watching as Ladybug made a few more quick remarks to assure the public that they had investigated properly. "She hadn't come out for more than a month when we fought the last akuma. And like Alya said, even that was a week and a half ago. More, now."

"I thank Hawkmoth's family for their bravery in coming forward to us with the Miraculous," Ladybug continued onscreen, her voice rising just a hair to be heard over the grumble that was starting to fill the room. "And we send them our best wishes that they can heal from the death and the discovery."

"But who was Hawkmoth?" one reporter yelled out at once. "You haven't told us yet!"

Ladybug's expression was flat as she answered, leaning a little closer to the microphone so she would be picked up. "That is staying confidential information. He is gone, and-"

"The public has a right to know!"

"Yeah, and the police should interrogate the family!"

"He is gone, and releasing his name would only punish his family," Ladybug repeated, her voice louder. "And they are innocent, Chat Noir and I already investigated. They knew nothing about his supervillain activities."

Madam Chamack scoffed, her voice coming across loud and clear. "And we're supposed to believe that Hawkmoth's family didn't suspect anything? That's ridiculous. They lived with him, they must have-"

Ladybug's stare- a stare almost bordering on a glare- was piercing. "I've been a superhero for years and so has Chat Noir. Our friends and family have suspected nothing. If people aren't expecting it, it's easy enough to hide."

"Paris deserves to know who tormented her for years-"

"Paris does know: it was Hawkmoth."

"But-"

Ladybug was doing a good job of hiding the irritation on her face. Adrien suspected that she knew that this was coming. "You all want to know who Hawkmoth was out of curiosity. That's understandable. But you would get a name, a face behind the mask, and then you wouldn't care anymore. In a week or a month, you would move on and having the name out there wouldn't matter to you. But if Hawkmoth's name got out, I have no doubt that his family would face all sorts of backlash and be targeted by no fault of their own, and I refuse to have innocent civilians targeted just because people were curious. End. Of. Discussion."

There was a discontented murmur at that, one that made Adrien frown in concern. Ladybug might be Paris' darling, but public opinion could change really fast.

"Plagg, are you charged up?" Adrien asked, leaning forward to keep a close eye on the screen. "If people get any more riled up, I might move over to the City Hall area so that Ladybug has backup nearby."

Plagg swallowed half of a wedge of Camembert in one bite. "On it, kid."

"Will you be doing an identity reveal now that the danger is gone?" another reporter called out as Adrien transformed, apparently having sensed that Ladybug wasn't going to budge on her position. "We would love to know who's been protecting us all of these years!"

This time, Ladybug actually did frown. "A identity reveal to each other, perhaps. To Paris? No. There will always be people out there in search of power, and there's no point in making it easy for them to find it."

"Can you comment on your relationship with Chat Noir? You both have been seen out and about lately looking very close-"

Chat Noir headed out the window (carefully, of course), jumping over several rooftops before he had the time to pull out his earpiece and tune it in to the news so that he could follow along. Ladybug was dismissing more claims of the two of them being in a relationship, pointing out that they had been friends and partners for years and of course they were close. The real reason that they had been so cuddly over the past couple days was, of course, because she had been comforting him and her hugs were amazing, but they couldn't say that unless they wanted to give away the fact that Hawkmoth had been Chat Noir's father.

And just in case it ever came out that Hawkmoth had been Mr. Agreste, if anyone ever managed to work that out on their own or even suspect it- yeah, they didn't want to give his identity away.

The press conference ended without any incident just as Chat Noir reached City Hall. He landed on a rooftop nearby, out of sight as reporters started to file out. There was no sign of Ladybug yet- no doubt she was taking a back exit and then heading to the rooftops so that no one could bother her- so he settled in to wait for her, thinking about the news conference.

Ladybug had done really, really well. She hadn't flinched at the barrage of questions at all and hadn't even looked down at what had to be her prepared sheet of remarks. Clearly she had memorized the entire thing. While she had said that Hawkmoth had died suddenly, she hadn't specified that it was in a car accident, and her wording hadn't given away that there was just one family member left, even though Chat Noir knew that he had mentioned that it was just him and his father at some point. She was making it as hard as possible for people to figure out who Hawkmoth had been, while giving out just enough information to make it seem like she wasn't hiding more than necessary.

Of course, she didn't know who Hawkmoth was, either. Chat Noir had offered to tell her, since she was his partner and deserved to know more than anyone else, but she had told him not to feel obligated to reveal himself if he wasn't entirely ready yet. Since there weren't going to be any more threats from Hawkmoth, it wasn't necessary for her to know.

He was thankful for that, actually. After his secret identity had been secret for so long, just up and sharing it all of a sudden would have been a shock. He needed some things to stay the same.

"Chat Noir! I wasn't expecting to see you out and about right now!"

Chat Noir grinned as Ladybug dropped down next to him. "Oh, you know me. I just can't stay away. And I was worried," he added when she rolled her eyes at him in fond exasperation. "The reporters seemed to be really upset about you not telling them anything, and I wanted to be close by in case anyone tried anything. I was listening in," he added, tapping at his earpiece and turning it down at the same time. Madam Chamack was saying something about the press conference, but he didn't bother to listen too closely. He could look it up later and see what Paris' attitude was towards the news. "And if anything happened..."

"My protective bodyguard," Ladybug said fondly, giving him a warm hug. "I was ready to bolt out of there at a moment's notice. Before the conference even started, I mapped out all of the things in the room that I could latch my yo-yo to in case I had to get off of the ground."

"You're always so prepared." Chat Noir let himself lean into her side. "And I know that you can defend yourself, but I just- part of me still felt like I should have been there."

"Mm-hmm." Ladybug rested her head against his shoulder. "That's not the last that we'll hear of it, I'm sure. There were not a lot of happy faces in that room when I left. I'd say that we'll probably have reporters harassing us about Hawkmoth's identity for a while."

She sounded tired. Chat Noir felt bad for her. Ladybug was no doubt planning on shielding him from the worst of the inquiries, which wasn't fair on her. She was studying for her final exams, just like him, and she no doubt had other things going on in her civilian life that needed her time and energy.

"But if we stay on the rooftops and only tell them that we've already said all that we're going to at today's press conference, they should give up eventually," Ladybug continued. "It's just curiosity. They'll find something else to take up their attention."

"I hope so, Bug," Chat Noir said, peering over the side of the rooftop just enough to see the hordes of reporters still down below, each talking eagerly to a camera. "I really, really hope so."

                                                                                            oi staff where’s the page break line

 The talk of the school was Hawkmoth's death and Ladybug's refusal to tell Paris who he was. Oddly enough, Chat Noir's absence at the press conference and what it might mean was also a popular subject.

No one had guessed the truth. Instead, they thought that Chat Noir had disagreed with Ladybug about releasing Hawkmoth's name and that they had fallen out, maybe, and Ladybug had decided to do the conference by herself so that Chat Noir wouldn't act out behind her.

That- that was worse than the truth, actually. Ladybug had just been helping him by doing the conference by herself, and this was her reward.

Alya was talking about the conference when Adrien entered homeroom, her voice animated as she held most of the class's interest. She was firmly on the side of revealing Hawkmoth's identity, which Adrien had known before he even came in. The Ladyblog had had a very upset article about Ladybug's refusal to tell the public, one that he had just skimmed before exiting the page.

"Maybe the superheroes aren't going to say anything, but his identity can't stay secret forever," Alya was saying as Adrien slipped past her to sit next to Marinette instead of in his normal seat in the front row, which Alya had taken. "I've been trying to figure out who it might be, looking through obituaries for people who 'died unexpectedly', but there are a lot of people in Paris and a lot of deaths and the obits don't always specify in Paris versus out of Paris, and it's been almost two weeks since the last akuma attack. There's no way to tell when during that he died. And he might have died during that akuma battle, too, from a heart attack or something. It was impossible to tell what was going on on his end of things unless he actually came out."

"And Hawkmoth's family might have not given the superheroes the full story," Nino chimed in. "He might had been ill and that's why he wanted to use the Miraculous to- to cure it somehow. Like, it could have been anyone."

Alya groaned. "Oh, that would be the worst! How am I supposed to figure out who Hawkmoth was if they've given us misleading information? That's not fair!"

Adrien's eyes flashed to Alya. Once again, all she cared about was the scoop, and it made him a little ill. She was one of his friends. If she actually managed to figure out who Hawkmoth had been, would she care that she knew him and keep it secret for his sake? Or would she post it anyway?

"There's a petition about that, actually- I just saw it this morning and linked it to the Ladyblog, and it's gotten so many signatures already!" Alya was grinning again. "It's to make Ladybug and Chat Noir release the information about who Hawkmoth was. They're so close to hitting their target goal, too!"

Adrien's stomach dropped.

"Oh, that's great!"

"Cool!"

"Lemme find the link, I want to sign it now-"

"No petition is going to be able to make Ladybug and Chat Noir release anything."

The chatter around Alya stopped immediately and everyone turned to look at Marinette, who looked less than happy with them. Her arms were crossed across her chest and she was glaring. "Petitions are a show of support for a cause, not something legally binding. And even if the mayor tried something- the Miraculous are Ladybug and Chat Noir's jurisdiction, not the police's or anybody else's. No one can make them release any information, nor should they. If Ladybug said not to worry about who Hawkmoth was and to leave it alone, then you should leave it alone."

Several people exchanged uncertain looks, taking a step back away from Alya.

Alya crossed her arms right back. "Uh-huh, and what about the right of the people to know? Hawkmoth possessed a ton of people across the city."

"He's dead. It's not like it's going to make any difference to him. It's not like he's escaping a punishment or anything."

"I think there's something fishy there," Alya countered at once. "I bet the family knew about Hawkmoth, but they decided to hand over the Miraculous in return for anonymity and getting away scot-free."

"That's ridiculous."

"Why else would Ladybug and Chat Noir keep their secret, hmm?" Alya challenged. "If Hawkmoth's family isn't guilty- if they honestly didn't know- then the police can decide that and let the public know."

Marinette's scowl was fierce, and Adrien was very, very glad that he wasn't on the receiving end of it. "I think that this whole push for the reveal is just trashy tabloid interest. Look at you- you're ignoring real-world consequences in your search for a scoop! How would it be worth destroying a family's life over a scoop for something that someone dead did?"

Adrien blinked, somewhat taken aback by Marinette's tone. The whole fight had escalated really quickly, especially considering that Alya and Marinette were friends.

"They got into a big fight about this last night," Nino whispered in Adrien's ear, making him startle. "After Alya posted about the press conference on the Ladyblog. Marinette is firmly on Ladybug's side. Alya... is not."

"Trashy? You're calling the Ladyblog trashy?"

"If you've decided that a scoop for it is more important than actual human beings, then yeah!"

"Actual human beings who got akumatized want answers and they deserve them!"

Marinette rolled her eyes at that. "Uh-huh. Just this weekend, you were complaining because there hadn't been any akuma attacks lately and that meant that traffic on the Ladyblog was slower than usual. Where was the concern for the akuma victims then, huh?"

Alya spluttered, going red. "I- no, that was just a general observation-"

"And in the Ladyblog's first year, you wanted to expose Ladybug and Chat Noir's identities, never mind the consequences that would have!" Marinette countered. "You're just all about the scoop, forget the consequences to other people as long as you get your hits!"

"The public has a right-"

"And I think that that is just a weak excuse for you to hide behind instead of admitting that this whole search for Hawkmoth's identity is selfish!"

"Okay, class, to your seats!" their teacher called before Alya could respond. "Class is starting now, settle down!"

Much to Adrien's relief, that was the end of the fight, at least for the time being. Alya kept her back to Marinette, who looked like she couldn't care less. Neither of them spoke to the other for the rest of the day, which meant that Adrien got to be Marinette's seatmate for the entire day.

That was really good, actually. Marinette was a quiet, supportive presence, there without being overwhelmingly smothering or anything. Best of all, she understood the importance of just sitting there in a quiet hug.

"If I ever tell any of my normal friends about Father, it's going to be Marinette that I tell," Adrien told Plagg over lunch. "Not anybody else. Nino is dating Alya and I can't trust that he won't for sure ever not say anything about it, and Alya is an obvious no. Marinette might be best friends with Alya, but she wouldn't say anything, I know it. This isn't the first time that she's had issues with the way Alya was reporting things."

Plagg sniffed. "As is only right. Reporter girl's not got a firm handle on reporting ethics yet, or the ability to take a step back and see beyond the immediate effects of certain information going public."

Adrien nodded. He had hoped that the journalism camp that Alya had gone to the previous summer would have helped curb that particular tendency of hers, but apparently there was no such luck. Or maybe this was just too big of a potential scoop for her to really think ahead that far.

That afternoon came with a request from the police department that the superheroes tell them who Hawkmoth had been, so that they could interview the people close to him themselves to check for any potential collaborators. This time, Chat Noir accompanied Ladybug as she headed over to police headquarters to-

Well, to tell them to shove off, essentially. After all, she had already said that she and Chat Noir had looked for collaborators and come up with no one who had been a fully willing helper. The Miraculous were their jurisdiction, and they took care of the investigation. End of story.

None of the police officers looked very happy when they left. And none of the reporters who had crowded in around the station looked particularly thrilled with the brisk brush-off that the superheroes gave them when they shouted questions about Hawkmoth's identity and how all of Paris wanted to know and how there were petitions, so obviously they should be sharing-

Ladybug looked like she was considering throttling someone as they shot away from the knot of microphones and cameras.

"How are you holding up, kitty?" she asked as the two of them headed across the city, faster than cars could chase them. "I'm sure it's not easy, since Hawkmoth has kind of been the topic of the day. It's practically all I heard about all day, it seemed."

"It's hard," Chat Noir admitted. "Especially because everyone is making such a big deal about not knowing his identity. I'm lucky that I have a friend who understand the why and she called out people who were making a big stink about it. So then people were kind of avoiding us with that conversation, which helped."

Ladybug looked pleased. "I like your friend already."

Chat Noir couldn't hide his grin. He definitely wanted to introduce Ladybug and Marinette sometime. He was sure that they would get along well. "She's very likeable. Also scary when she wants to be. I couldn't believe it when people kept arguing with her. I mean, she's kinda the same size you are, but I wouldn't want to cross her, either."

The smug look on Ladybug's face made him laugh.

The two of them tried to curl up on a secluded rooftop together to hang out (and maybe get some homework done- after spending two days not being remotely productive, he needed to get back on top of things), but no matter where they went, people spotted them and started shouting questions at them. Soon enough, they spotted a news helicopter lifting off across the city and decided to each head their separate ways for the time being before the helicopter started trying to follow them home.

It was frustrating, Chat Noir reflected as he dropped back down into his room and detransformed. He needed his Ladybug time right now, because aside from Plagg, she was the only person who knew all that he was going through. Maybe they didn't just talk about his feelings- because that wasn't going to help, just lingering over what was making him feel bad- but she understood if he suddenly went quiet when they were chatting about something, or if he cuddled up to her side in search of a wordless hug. If the public and the press didn't let up soon, it could become dangerous for the two of them to transform and meet up. If people tried to track their trips home...

They would figure him out in a heartbeat, and it wouldn't be long before someone pieced together that Hawkmoth was his father.