#maybe i shoulda gone with stories instead of characters..? | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

prysmartin · 2 years ago

Text

Ready Player One's stuck on my mind again, so

I made this account to post long, ramble-y things occasionally that wouldn't fit on other social media sites. Might as well put it to good use!

Fair warning - Ready Player One spoilers ahead. It's been out long enough that I doubt anyone would care, though, especially after taking a brief look through posts with the tag.

It's a story that's a sort of boogieman for me. Every couple of months, my brain meanders back to this part of the woods, sees the beast, and roasts it relentlessly for how ineffective it is, despite its promising appearance. ...Promising appearance? Shoulda gone Intimidating instead, maybe? I dunno, this metaphor was a weird choice.

A few years ago, our teacher forced us to read it and we all went out as a class to watch the movie. The entire class - teacher included - absolutely hated the book, but found the movie fine. Well, outside of the plot holes, at least... What do you mean no one drove backwards in a race for FOUR YEARS? I'd do that in Mario Kart if I was doing poorly! It's funny!

We unanimously hated the book not because most people hated reading - everyone was pretty invested in the class, as it was "writing and literature in video games", and everyone was more than willing to participate and invest a lot of energy in the class - we all hated it because it was poorly written. We had some other points, but I don't want to get too side-tracked from the main thing I wanna focus on.

In the latter half of the second segment of the story, our Protagonist goes out of his way to play Pac-man. There was, like, an entire page or two dedicated to this. I decided to skim this part, since none of it seemed relevant. That is, until the very end, when our protag gets revived by the random quarter he got doing this sidequest. Turns out, the coin was just a free in-game insta-revive you got for playing pac-man on the buggy 256th stage?

This book was filled to the brim with reference slogfests, and every one before this one was basically one-and-done, having little to no impact on the story as a whole, or even the scene it was tied into. How was I supposed to know this was going to be any different? And even if I did know, why would I want to read through all this when it's not obviously moving the story forward in some way? The coin wasn't even mentioned between its introduction and the final battle! (At least, from what I remember. Maybe I skimmed that over too when it was buried in another reference I couldn't care less about.)

The movie, meanwhile, took the coin and tied it into a relevant point. Our protagonist didn't get it from some random side-quest - he got it from the museum's curator, who gave it to him after he went out of his way to research the guy who set up the main plot about acquiring ownership of the virtual reality world. He learned about something impactful to the guy's life, found a relevant piece of information that would help move him forwards, and THEN got this seemingly innocuous coin that would later save him in the final battle. Sure, it wasn't mentioned until the very end either (at least, not that I recall), but because it was better introduced, it felt like an actually earned moment rather than pulling plot armor out of his rear-end.

...maybe that's where he was hiding the coin in the book?

The weird thing is, the basic plot outline of the story was far more impressive. The movie didn't include any segments of the main villains, IAI, blocking off access to one of the keys with digital Wizards and using the fact that the key was in a no PVP zone to their advantage. It didn't include the main character turning himself into IAI under a false name in order to get high in their ranks and sabotage their grand plans. It didn't include one of the five major key-holders getting thrown off a thirty-story building to his death.

The book had all this and more. Its premise was AMAZING and I love the story it was trying to tell. Emphasis on trying. What the book had in potential, it lacked in execution. The movie, while dulled down in its concept, was better built for its creative medium and better realized as a story, even though it was more of an action movie.

If there's anything to take away from all this, tl;dr: Worldbuilding will only do so much for you. As with any sort of creative medium, it's good to dream big, but better to practice with smaller, more manageable projects.

...that last bit is more just good life advice rather than a real takeaway from everything I said before. Eh, whatever. I could ramble more, as I have MANY more problems with the book, but I think that's enough for one post. Plus, this is only my second post on this site...

#ready player one #storytelling #writing #I still don't know what tags to use :(#writing tips #Fun train fact - RPO stands for Railway Post Office #That fact isn't important but the book's initials are RPO so I thought I'd throw it in

10 notes · View notes

fernweh-s · 1 year ago

Note

I wonder if there a fan edit timeline of just homelander becoming more n more unhinged. I’d totally watch that as a recap when the next season drops

Have you ever seen American Gods / Preacher / Legion. If so what ya think of them.

Just knowing it’ll be be made gets me excited cuz it’s like a little treat for future me. Idk when it’ll drop so maybe it’ll slip my mind untill they announce it n then I get double the excitement like omfg I remember when they were talkin about it n now it’s dropping.

Well of course he would batman and the joker have always been two side of the same coin so they had to make him the overpowered cliche n Barbatos was definitely way cooler. The BWL has cool design but not a fan of his story just very predictable even the brain switching like such a cliche terrible writing all to snuff Barbatos 🙄

N making constructs he should be able to make n tapping I to that darker dimension just A1 writing.

Same with Red Death homie strapped him on the Batmobile like a hood ornament n obliterated him 😮‍💨

Doombreaker shouldn’t even been in the line up tbh so unnecessary. They shoulda gone with something else.

Omfg your the first person I’ve met/come across to have heard of it let alone read it. You seem to have good taste so now I’m extra excited to start it.

You laugh now but I’m so serious, everytime I see shark related things irl I be whispering to myself Chichimatul

Lmaoooo I'm willing to bet that there is definitely one out there somewhere. 😂

I've seen both American Gods and Preacher! I loved Preacher; I really liked all the characters. American Gods was another of those 'its just okay' for me at the start; I initially wasn't really v attached to the characters (besides Mad Sweeney lmao, he was an INSTANT favorite), then by seasons 2&3 I was more invested and tHEN THEY WENT AND CANCELLED THE SHOW.

Lmao exactly! I'll probably honestly forget too by the time it finally drops, so it'll def be a treat for future me also. 😂😂

Yeah; I liked BwL's design (although personally, I would have preferred if he had Bruce's actual body type instead of basically looking like the Joker cosplaying as Batman, like, he's just supposed to be a Jokerized Bruce Wayne, so why was he so skinny and lanky like Joker??—I whipped up a little 'how I'd have preferred he look' concept before:

all the main elements of BwL, just [what I consider], to feel more Batman-y, and less, 'Joker playing dress up as Batman', lmao) and even his concept was a cool one—a Batman driven to Joker levels of madness? Heck yeah, sign me up, but DC definitely took the idea and made him more than what he should have been imo. Esp, again, when Barbatos was RIGHT there, being so much cooler!! Also, yeah, the brain switching was sUCH bad writing, especially since we ended up with basically TWO BwLs after! Since we have the original, now running around as 'Darkest Knight' after the ol' brain-switcheroo, and then when we had Batman use the Black Lantern ring to raise an army, BwL's original body was among the people he reanimated, and, despite NO LONGER HAVING A BRAIN ANYMORE it??? was still basically BwL somehow??? That was when I was just fully DONE with the whole event and like 'okay this is ridiculous, please wrap it up already' lmao. Like it went from such a cool concept to just, okay this is dragging out and just bad writing now.

Yesssss!!! His 'dark constructs' were honestly SO cool!!! I really that wish we'd had stories more of him, instead of BwL taking center stage and Dawnbreaker and the other Dark Knights basically being reduced to like, his lackeys (which was so dumb imo, like they're ALL Batman(/batwoman, in The Drowned case), they should have been more equal. 😤😤

For real!! The Batman who became Red Death doing what he did to the Flash was absolutely brutal. (And the fact that Barry was still present afterwards and basically trapped in there with him, constantly trying to get Bruce to come to his senses 😭😭).

HE REALLY SHOULDN'T HAVE!! Like, I get that they wanted a counterpart for everyone on the JL, but for Superman there really were SO many better choices to choose from who they could have combined with Batman!! I still maintain that a Cyborg Superman or a Metallo version would have been SO cool, but there're plenty others that would have been neat too: a Brainiac/Batman mash-up, or a Livewire or Silver Banshee one. Heck, even a version of Batman combined with Parasite would have worked and been cooler than what they gave us!

😆 I hope you enjoy it!!

Lmaooo. 😂😂

#mel answers;

0 notes

honorable-wanderings · 4 years ago

Text

Word of Honor - Episode 2 Part 1 - Stalking, but in like. A sexy way

(Sorry! For some reason the “readmore” isn’t working right!)

WE JOIN OUR “HEROES”....

exactly where we left them.

ZZS looks confused, offended, and slightly intrigued by the new person added into Smash Bros.

Look at him. Tryin to be all cool. Make a good first impression.

----------

I��m not really sure what kind of a power move it is wrapping up her whip and pulling her closer in a chastising way in front of the man you have already decided to try to seduce but it is a power move none the less.

And it seems to be working! :o

----------

There’s more pouting in this show than I originally anticipated.

“A-Xiang, stop attacking random people on the street. At least wait until your martial arts don’t suck ass first.”

----------

And so the dance begins.

Look at that smirk. He knows exactly what he’s doing.

---------

Waste not your honored thanks on me, kind gentleman. I am but a lowly drunkard lying dirty and prone on the street. The error, therefore, must have been my own!

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

I got my eyes on you!!!!

To quote a kind young lady that I met quite recently. “I don’t give a FUCK”

----------

Oh wait, you’re still here?

----------

Best boy alert is going crazy!!!

We may have just met ChenLing, but I would die for him. That also seems to be the general consensus with the other characters as well.

----------

“It is dangerous outside the town walls, so I cannot allow a child like you to... ...A sword? My apologies, sir. It was wrong of me to treat you like a child. “

What? That’s not what he said?

----------

“Are you injured or ill?”

*looks into the camera like it’s the office*

----------

ZZS out here looking like a tragic renaissance painting.

“Young master can we go now? He smells D:”

“Sure just a sec! Let me just leave him my house keys!!”

“What??? Nooooo”

“What was that phrase I learned today? I don’t give a fuck?”

(On a side note I am trying to learn French atm and deadass almost wrote “fraise” instead of “phrase” even though it means “strawberry” and doesn’t have anything to do with the conversation at hand.)

----------

I came out here to enjoy the sun and some peace and quiet and some good alcohol. The peace and quiet is gone. And so is the sun. Now this dickwad’s saying I might be bad because I dress like shit? I was the nicest dressed royal assassin ever and now that I’m a hobo I’ve never been more upstanding! I haven’t even killed a single person in like a year and a half (other than myself).

At least I still have you, alcohol.

----------

Meanwhile back with these two,

A-Xiang is still mad that she lost a random fight she picked with someone who looked like a pushover.

More pouting ensues

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

“Get good”

Master KeXing reveals he knows more than he revealed to know previously when he was pretending not to know what he has now revealed he knows.

A-Xiang wants to know if he’s making shit up again.

-----------

The plot is driven forward by the playful rhyming chants of children. Honestly that’s top tier horror movie quality plot beat right there. Add a sense of foreboding to your story even though we’re still in ‘lighthearted silly time”

Good job!

----------

Zhou Zishu wonders, surely not for the last time, why everyone in the martial arts world can’t just calm the fuck down.

----------

ZZS then decides that after being accosted by random people on the street while he was snoozing and minding his own damn business that that seems like a lot of fun and decides to accost some random person on the street who was snoozing and minding their own business.

---------

Why doesn’t anyone ever believe that I’m fucking loaded? I’ve got like 2 years left and I’m gonna blow my life’s savings before I go muthafucka. You want 3 mace of silver for a half-mile boat ride? Done motherfucker did I stutter?

----------

“Hello. I’m totally not stalking you. :D”

----------

“You wanna ride my boat? ;)” he asks, shouting it across the river so that he could be heard. “What?” Zhou Zishu replies, not able to understand him over the babbling of the water.

“I said! Do! You! Want! To! Ride! My! Boat? Winky Face!”

“Did you just say “winky face??”

“Yeah I was worried you couldn’t see it from there!”

----------

Somehow today has turned out much more interesting than I had anticipatd

----------

“We’ll meet again if fated!”

“Challenge accepted”

----------

Yes I am only keeping an eye on him to make sure he doesn’t fuck with my plans. And that is the only reason. Yes. that’s why I’m going to follow him. Just this. Only that. No other reason.

----------

This place is pretty! I think this would be a great place to die!

Hun, you still have a couple years. You can always come back to die here later but like chilling in a field of flowering trees for 2 years will kinda lose its novelty if you don’t do other things too.

----------

GIVE ME YO’ FUCKIN’ MONEY!!

----------

You said I’ve already ridden and dashed so what’s the point in my paying you now? Toodles!

-----------

This place is pretty but I love how people never walk anywhere. Like the trees would look prettier if you were in them you know.

----------

HOly fuck! Being rude as shit is so fun! How have I never tried this before?

----------

Uh.. question: How did this get here? It’s clearly dry docked but it’s no where near the water. Why is it here???

Ah well. It’s free real estate

----------

WHY IS THE RUM GONE?

----------

Do I have “attack me” written on my face or something? For the love of fuck! I’m not drunk enough for this!

----------

“Meh”

“Meh? I think not good sir.”

----------

Would you believe that this wasn’t even rehearsed?

-----------

For someone who does not want people to see his chest, this is certainly a lot of chest exposed???

----------

Not sure that’s how fans work, but hell maybe I’ve just been using ‘em wrong all this time

Holy fuck is it heat seeking???

----------

Surprise!!!

-----------

Pff. Okay. Like I will ALWAYS love it when some not sharp object flies into something and sticks like it’s made of razor sharp blades. And I know TECHNICALLY it’s possible - what with a tornado being able to slam a single piece of straw through cinder block. But it will always make me smile.

(And while that is a smile at how ridiculous it is, it is with 100% legit affection and charm. I legit love it)

Just. “Thunk”

----------

Who is attacking me? Were they sent by the prince? Do they know who I am? Do I need to get serious?

Oh... It’s just that random guy again.

Well that’s okay then.

--------

I apologize for once again attacking you randomly and completely unprovoked in the middle of nowhere. My bad.

----------

“My footwork has godlike elegance huh? You shoulda seen me when I wasn’t dying.”

----------

I came here to check out dat ass again and I was not disappointed. ;)

----------

Don’t stand so- Don’t stand so- Don’t stand so close to me ♪

----------

“Why don’t we drink on my boat?“ “I don’t want to sleep with you!“ “Yet ;)”

----------

Why the fuck are you following me? Just say what you want from me already!

Bitch you invited me

-------

“He’s so good at kissing ass”

Oh just you wait.

--------

Still gonna stalk you btw! ♥♥♥

#word of honor #Shanhe Ling #zhou zishu #wen kexing #Gu Xiang #zhang chengling #spoilers #episode 2 #Long Post #Writing WoH

33 notes · View notes

kitkatopinions · 4 years ago

Note

Honestly, shooting Oscar was the closes they got to an acceptable ‘good guy does evil thing’. The key being that there’s enough interesting tragedy to explore, and since Os didn’t actually die Ironwood could be easily redeemed. We’re at the scene, as Ironwood stares at the Vault. He hears someone coming down and let’s out a painful sigh because he fully understands the pain Winter is going through (the same he is with abandoning Mantle). As he turns around to comfort her, he sees Oscar. /1

You know, I fully agree that James shooting Oscar is the most ‘good guy does bad thing’ we ever needed from James. By piling on evil thing after evil thing, not only did it take away from Ironwood’s character (and the character of everyone close to him like Winter and Qrow,) but it made it so that very little that he did actually gets any focus, including shooting Oscar. Did Ruby ever even know about it? Did we ever see Oscar grapple with the fact that James had tried to kill him? Did we ever see Ironwood even acknowledge that it happened? The moment feels entirely passed over. Then again, with Sleet, the Ace Ops are all shocked about Sleet, Winter looks hesitant, but then steely and accepting, Marrow is alarmed... But ultimately that goes nowhere. Winter having stood by Ironwood even while he murders unarmed civilians and not considering it a deal breaker, along with the other Ops (yes, even Marrow,) isn’t really gone into and is brushed under the rug, because the focus quickly changes to him working with Watts. But do we see Penny in a moment of clarity forced to grapple with the fact that a former mentor and someone she probably saw as a friend had forcibly taken control of her body? Does it even have a long term affect on the story? Considering Penny could’ve died due to Cinder trying to steal her powers just as easily as a robot as she did a flesh-person (with Pietro claiming he couldn’t restore her again,) I’d argue that Ironwood hacking Penny had zero real effect on the plot. At least our main cast freaking knew about it, though, instead of the other scenes of Ironwood’s descent being mostly for the audiences sake it feels like. We quickly move on from the emotional weight behind Penny getting hacked by a mentor/friend, because then we get some rabid fire “what the heck” moments like Ironwood being like “huh, shoulda tortured Qrow. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ And I could’ve tormented some teens.” And Winter is freaked but then we only have like a minute of sitting with that before there’s a bomb threat, and James is threatening to bomb the people of Mantle for... Reasons, standing in his backlit light with the black background so you know it’s spooky villain time. This at least gets some more focus, but even then, in the fight with Winter when she’s listing grievances, she doesn’t really get into the whole torture/bomb thing. And James is still not the focus, the primary threat of the last two episodes is Cinder. Everything in season eight was just so rushed and hurried we didn’t get a chance to focus on anything for the time that it needed with the exception of possibly Renora’s makeup/breakup? which was also badly handled, but got like, the appropriate amount of screen time imo. But we definitely didn’t have any time to get into the meat of a good hero-does-bad concept. Which is a shame, because it could’ve been good.

You’re right that shooting Oscar was all they needed. They established a really good base conflict: James believes they’re in a no-win situation and is trying to save as many people as he can while Team RWBY believes they need to come up with a plan that will save everyone all at once / because of Team RWBY’s actions, Ironwood doesn’t trust them and tries to have them arrested, Team RWBY are fugitives who no longer have Ironwood’s resources to rely on and must grapple with those consequences of their actions. Then, they want to - imo unnecessarily - drive the point that due to the terrible situation, the recent perceived betrayal of Team RWBY and co, his own deteriorating mental health, and pushed by his TOTALLY UNMENTIONED semblance, James falls into destructive actions that cause harm. Having him shoot Oscar/Oz in a moment of paranoia does this without wholly ruining his character. It breaks Oscar’s aura, but nothing worse, and one could argue James didn’t mean him to go over the side (you know, except that the writers did mean for him to mean to, but for the sake of this narrative, we’ll say it was maybe unintentional.) It could’ve been something that Oscar/Oz then have to process or struggle to understand, or forgive, while it’s something Ironwood could regret and possibly come back from while still clearly being in the wrong in that situation, and it could’ve been treated more sympathetically. We could’ve actually paid attention to that moment, rather than having it (and every single further jump into villainy) swept away. James could’ve been an antagonist for the season without being a full villain. Not everything has to be “Team RWBY against pure evil.”

We already had Cinder, Watts, Tyrian, Emerald, Mercury, Neo, Hazel, and Salem for god sakes. Most of those villains had to get taken out by fellow villains - in fact, all of the villains that we dealt with in V7 and 8 that got taken out of the picture were by the villains, including Emerald abdicating, which happened because of Salem’s motives and Tyrian confirming them and Oscar literally just said a sentence and then sat around. None of these villains were used well or got the focus they needed except for possibly Cinder, who wound up not growing at all anyway. But they could’ve been a great, compelling threat if they hadn’t gotten trounced by a fifteen year old with a magic deus ex machina after doing almost nothing this season, because they had to get pushed aside so Ironwood could have his moment as a villain. And then even Ironwood got pushed aside too. Even the built up and dreaded ridiculously stupid grudge Qrow had that made him want to kill James just up and vanished. It’s almost like James never had to be a villain at all since it amounted to nearly nothing and there was very little emotional depth tied to it. It’s almost like the writers could’ve actually made their existing large amount of villains more interesting and do something with them.

Like, don’t get me wrong, Watts was amazing. And the temporary team up of Watts, Cindy, and Neo had me thinking CRWBY would do something interesting and compelling with the villains for once (I’m putting on the appropriate clown paint for it.) They could’ve used the volume 7 momentum to go into an actually emotional arc centered around this one violent act, how people feel about it, how James might come back from it, all while giving the focus to the actual main villain of the series and presenting her as the real threat. But instead...

Anyway, this wound up being a pretty long post. Sorry about that. :P

#rwde #anti rwby #anti-rwby #anti crwby #rwby criticism #rwby bashing #pro ironwood #ironwood defense #pro James ironwood #james ironwood defense

21 notes · View notes

mansionofmuses · 4 years ago

Text

Alright fuck it I figured it's time to put my nuts in the ring when it comes to writing up rwde reviews about shiddy writing.

I already made a post about how closure doesn't exist in rwby, so that SHOULD trim this a bit. Hopefully.

These last two of seasons of rwby have been ASS and idk even know where to start. So lemme do some character progressions instead of jumping all over the place. Let's start with my fav: Neo. And I'll be as unbiased as possible.

Starting from v6, she came back and teamed up with Cinder. Cool? Cool. Fair enough. V7 onwards she's been treated like a BITCH by Cinder and has visibly shown her disdain for that on screen. And yet she still chooses to hang with her? Why? Like... Genuinely why? Is Neo not like the stealth queen? And the driver of a thousand vehicles? Why does she even need Cinder? Could she not have just jacked an airship herself, flown to Atlas after getting the info from Cinder, and began her hunt there? Instead she's just some minion to her now? Okay fine so let's say their team up makes sense in some odd world. Why the fuck would Neo agree to go to Cinder in the Satan Whale? Why? Why the fuck is she there? After being denied multiple times to get to Ruby and even being treated like shit with visible disdain, she should have absolutely left with a middle finger to Cinder. But nope. We get to see her be visibly uncomfortable in this cult and clearly wants out. Which she does, so good shit. She snatches the lamp and heads out. Fair enough, I guess? I don't know why the fuck she trusts Cinder to go back to her after being treated like shit. After Cinder's doodoo attitude towards her, Neo should be like "wow maybe she's lying to me about roman lemme check with this genie bitch" but no. And don't say "oh well she can't talk so jinn wouldn't be able to answer her." Fuck that. 1. I should hope that the password wouldn't be so ableist against mute people. 2. Neo's resourceful as hell. Text to speech and boom. There ya go. Instead she goes back to Cinder like a lost puppy after being shown multiple times how much she hates her. Why the fuck does she need Cinder to get to Ruby? I have no fucking idea! And then everyone's favorite scene. I know I know she killed Blake's hip atta-- I mean character devel-- I mean Yang. That scene. Was doodoo. And I'll get into more intricacies about it much later. But for now, why the hell was Neo so sloppy in that assassination? Like gurl you revealed yourself so early from, apparently so far away? Pretend to be a passerby with everything disguised (I saw that lamp) impale her and boom. Done. Not sure why she went for a slash either when a thrusting weapons like that would be best for a quicker impale. It would have made any on screen death so much more confirmed instead of up in the air bullshit.

Next we have Ironwood. Oh James. How far you've fallen. I don't really understand what the hell they're doing with this character any more. Like... At all. I fully expect him to turn into the joker and join salem at this point lmfao. At first he was complex, but cool, right? Ok a stern leader who still wants to help people and see team rwby in beacon grow and be successful. Fair enough. Then came v4 and he was like "hey yang. Heard about the arm. Here ya go homie." That was pretty cool to give to a young veteran. Fair enough. But good god once v7 hit, everything just went haywire. He started making the dumbest decisions. Kind of. I understand how he's like "aite let's sack mantle to ensure atlas lives cause otherwise both parties will be dead." except idk why he didn't just make a plan to evacuate everyone to mantle first but whatever. I mean team rwby did it like... In a day? Shouldn't have been hard. Then he started losing his fucking mind. There was an entire thing about trust issues and plans (ngl I didn't care enough to pay much attention) and he ends up wanting to arrest the kids more than actually stopping Salem. Like homie. Why. You have a gang of strong ass hunters on your side, don't just throw that away. They could say "acab fuck the police anarchy reigns" and you should still keep them just to fight literal satan on your doorstep. But he fucking drops everything and resources and materials on arresting them. Like why???? And then he just shoots a child just because? And he goes around full fascist mode and his character is just gone at that point. He literally actively wants to kill the people of Mantle now instead of stopping Salem and I don't fucking get it. He could literally plot with salem about how to nuke mantle and I'd be like "shoulda seen it coming". And then when he gets outta jail he kills Jacques... Just cause? Like why? I understand Jacques let Salem's forces in and eventually led to this shit show, but like... Atlas was falling. Just leave. I don't understand. But I guess it's to show how hateful he is towards those who oppose him, so whatever. Idk I'm so done with him. This man is just so boring I just can't wait for him to get killed off so we can be done with him. I'm sure I missed a fuckload of intricacies about Ironwood but I really don't care at all about this schmuck.

Next on the shitlist is the entirety of team rwby. Just to compact it all into one. Ruby has been getting on my nerves SO much. She is so holier than thou and always right. If she had just openly talked with Ironwood about all these secrets and shit, none of this would be happening. Yeah there would be panic, but homie what's the alternative? Fight in secrecy against the police and Salem?

"hey Ruby I noticed that lamp you keep hanging around. What is that?"

"oh uhhhh definitely not a grimm magnet HAHAHAHAH"

Like no shit everyone's gonna be pissed when you lie to them and keep these secrets. Also these plans are dogshit. "We gotta get a message out." To who??? The rest of the world is gonna see some lil kid be like "hey Ironwood's gone crazy and some evil witch bitch is here tryna kill us all." Like who are they gonna believe? A random girl or the fact that ironwood is the head of the largest military state in the world? For all they know it's just some prank and it's totally unbelievable.

Team RWBY sippin team for v8 and doing nothing all volume? Nice. "But they needed to protect Nora." You mean to tell me Ruby, May, Blake, and Weiss all had to be there to protect someone. The Grimm attacked once and that was it. You guys have no medical history. At all. All you did was wrap her up and drink tea during the volume where there's a literal war happening outside. You don't just "wait for help" you ARE THE HELP you're hunters you fucks! Go out and get shit done. Have like one person stay behind just in case shit goes wrong. Preferably Weiss so she can have those meaningful conversations with her family members she never fucking had. But whatever. Ruby and Yang get into... A fight? That lasts for five seconds when they leave and then when they see each other again it just doesn't matter so I'm not sure why the fuck it was brought up at all. It had no impact whatsoever. And there's a ton more I'm sure I'm just burning out at this point. But let's just talk about the big shit. Yang's death. Everyone's saying she'll come back because plot armor but I'm in the "I genuinely think she's dead" group. She turned to Dust as she fell. I mean who knows maybe Deus Ex machina rears it's convenient head. I hate hate hate how that scene was done. That was such an unbelievable death. Weiss, Ruby, and even Blake all have ways of catching her. Easily. Weiss has like fifty ways of catching someone between summons and semblance. Ruby can teleport around the world. And Blake can just shadow clone jutsu her way there but WHATEVER. I guess everyone was too busy being nerfed and sucking ass. Again. And the reactions? Dog shit. Even when she sacrifices herself for Ruby, it's still all about the bees. It's so genuinely annoying. Ruby just whispers her sisters name and that's pretty much it aside from a >:( face here and there. Weiss doesn't even grieve she just comforts Blake who's losing her shit. And I don't know why Weiss doesn't grieve cause SHE WAS HER HOMIE TOO LIKE C'MON RT LET'S SEE SOME UGLY SOBBING DAMN so now everyone's gone feral (except Weiss who just doesn't give a shit about Yang apparently.) And despite Blake saying "yo let's not kill people aite Yang?" She's gonna say fuck that and have it out for Neo and Cinder out of revenge. Alright I guess. That's fair honestly. Challenging ones own morals based on emotions. Good enough. But god I just wished we could see more from Ruby and Weiss during that. Also I'm so sick of the "oh this character fell are they dead are they not?" Thing that rt keeps doing. Just have Neo impale her and go. Easy as that. On screen confirmation. I'm sure team RWBY has a fuckload more to crit but I'm done with this topic.

Winter. Bootlicking to the extreme that she casts aside her own sister and doesn't care if her friends die. Nice. No closure at all after she turns back to being a good guy I guess. I'm done with her. Not a whole lot to say.

The aceops are just so dumb. I'm done with them. Everytime they talk about genocide for the good of atlas I'm just rolling my eyes. Just say you're fascists and move on. And idk why the fuck harriet is gonna bomb an empty mantle. Atlas is already falling on it, you literally have no reason to do this. And this plot point is stupid as hell. Next.

Cinder. I'm not sure why they decided to randomly drop her background story into the mix. Like I don't think anyone gives a shit after all the crap she's done. I'm so sick of rt trying to make her some "uwu woe is me" woobie after doing so much shit and killing so many people. Her uwu crying moments are just stupid. Honestly watts is one of my fav characters just for telling her how crappy she is. Next

Hazel. Homie is dumb as hell. He hates Ozpin because his sister died in a mission. Fair enough. Why the fuck would you ever join Grimm Hitler when Grimm are what killed her in the first place??? Like??? Just hate him on your own time dude, jesus. And he is consistently hypocritical and it's so stupidly funny how bad this character is.

"HOW MANY MORE CHILDREN WILL YOU HURT OZPIN" as he beats the piss outta Nora, Ren, RWBY, Oscar, and probably some random five year old on the street while shouting OZPIIIIN to the skies. It also didn't take a whole lot to convince him how stupid he was thank god. His character was so cool in design and in theory but good god he got executed soooo fucking poorly. Kinda glad he's dead just so we don't have to deal with his stupidity. Next.

Emerald. This bitch. I can't. I LOVE how easily rwby just forgave her. It was so stupidly funny. "oh but yang was ready to fight her at first and snatched her weapons" yeah for five fucking minutes. Then came the part where she helped stabilize Penny and gave a half assed speech about switching sides. Meanwhile everyone's just magically forgiving of her like OH THAT EMERALD AHAHAH like she didn't help orchestrate the fall of Beacon, the death of many, including Penny, and all the terrible shit that's gone down. No resentment from RWBY except for my favorite line delivered this volume. It was Weiss's ever so beautiful "SHUT UP" LOL (I play Smite and I love how her VVGQ Quiet voice line sounds the same. So when I heard this line, I thought of Smite and immediately laughed. Kudos to you Weiss.)

Salem. The hound attacked Penny in the mansion... Why? You already established connection with Watts in jail. Did he not tell her "ay she cool with us." And in turn did she not tell him "ay she cool with us don't hit her"? I guess not? Cause the hound and penny shoulda bounced together the second they met up lmao. Other than that, salem's done nothing this volume except try to be scary and get her ass beat by hazel. She could easily just go out in the field with her grimm and blasts some people or SOMETHING GOD so far our main villain is just so boring and unimposing that literally every other villain, including her subordinates, feel more like threats than her.

Now I'll just talk about scenes.

The scene with ambrosius was COATED IN CONVENIENCE. Apparently Ozpin didn't tell the gang about the WinMore button they could just fucking walk to until now because??? Idk. I LOVE how team rwby just assumed that penny would be okay when they took her robot parts out. Realistically she should just be a floating husk of aura and nothingness. Like she never had organs. I don't understand how she's a real person now? Which, by the way, I'm pretty fucking insulted about how they handled that. Why make Penny human? She was already a real girl and accepted by her loved ones. Like shit, she was a character that a LOT of transgirls, myself included, could relate to on a personal level and we LOVED how Ruby handled it in v2. It was cute! It was sweet! She said she was a real girl back then and it made all of our collective kokoros go doki doki. Fun stuff!

But now? It feels like none of that was validated until she got an actual human body. Like damn I wish I could just get my ideal body within seconds. Shit. I've seen and heard a lot of upset from my fellow tgirls about how doodoo that scene was, because it's implying penny wasn't a real girl until after she got her human body and that's probably how most of the rwby fandom is gonna see it too. "oh wow penny's a real girl now!" And just forget Ruby's cute speech in v2. So annoying. Minor nitpick, if she's got the aura of a black man inside of her (her father), and her robot body is gone, why the fuck isn't she black? Like? Idk minor nitpick I guess. But anyways back to ambrosius scene. I love how rwby had the answers for everything within the hours worth of planning they were given by Ironwood's motive. Totes believable. And yet the "one way ticket to vacuo" thing was the simplest shit they could have avoided lmfao. Like THAT is what you trip up on? Not the portals you're trying to make or the assumption that penny lives without her robot parts? Insane. (side note: how did oscar have a flashback to that scene if he wasn't even there?)

And now everyone's favorite scene. Yangs death. Already covered it early I just wanted to add more on. This scene is insane. Like... If they actually go through with killing her (i don't see how she could have survived turning into dust) then roosterteeth is dumber than I gave them credit for. Like... They have to realize the shitstorm they're gonna receive right? First they kill off clover, an lgbt+ coded character. Next is Yang? A main character who is WIDELY loved by all. Apart of their most pandered ship in existence: bees. (Both the ship and the character make them so much money in merch btw so this was stupid from an objective standpoint.) You can't just kill a main character that is heavily lgbt+ coded in THE most popular ship in the show. Like... How dumb can they be? They're gonna lose so many fans at the very least. Sales? Down. Death threats? Way up. It would be astonishing if they weren't up to their necks in shit in backlash by that decision. Bury Your Gays trope strikes again folks. But this time with everyone's favorite! Like I just... Idk that decision was stupid and that scene hardly was given any real pomp or circumstance it deserved. She's a major title character and that scene lasted like a minute lmao. It's gonna be RWBY without the Y. RWB. As in rt is a bunch of rubes for making that decision. A cynical part of me thinks they did that just because they want an excuse to off Neo, another really loved character. (Well if everyone hates her now we can kill her off cause god knows we don't know what to do with her), but I'm not gonna make this about her. I honestly don't know how to feel about this death tbh. On one hand it's shitty and *points to essay above*. On another it lets Blake be her own character for once. We get to see who she is on our own. And we can finally shift gears from The Bees Show featuring Some Plot to RWBY without the Y. But again that scene was done horribly with doodoo writing already explained up above. They're gonna use this as some edgy excuse to have the heroes start killing again or grieve or whatever bullshit shock value.

(now that I think of it tho, Neo shoulda killed yang in v2. How the fuck did Raven know she was finna die again. Lmao)

Anyways, that's my two cents. I'm sure there's so much more I forgot. Love or hate my ramble idc these are just my thoughts. I'm sure I made doodoo arguments at some points so feel free to call me an idiot and point them out. Imma bounce. My fingers fucking hurt lmfao

#rwde #rwby spoilers

9 notes · View notes

suitofvibraniumarmor · 4 years ago

Text

Boston Boys [Part Two]

Summary: Chris and his crew hit a prominent Boston bank, but not everything goes to plan. Pairing: Chris Evans x OFC, John Krasinski x OFC Word Count: 2215 Chapter Warnings: language, bank robbery, kidnapping, guns. Square Filled: The entire series (bits and pieces of it) will fill my Crossover square for @marvelfluffbingo. A/N: This story contains a character who lost her hearing as she got older. I do work closely and regularly with the D/deaf community (I’m a sign language interpreter), but my own hearing problems do not involve significant hearing loss. It is not my intention to offend anyone, only to bring in a character with a quality I don’t see often in other fics. If you have questions about her, feel free to ask :)

Boston Boys Masterlist

Monday morning, bright and early, Chris walked the short distance from his apartment to the barber shop his father owned. He got out his key to unlock the door, but when he saw the door slightly ajar and the lights already on, he stuffed his key back into his pocket and reached for the gun at the back of his waistband instead.

Carefully surveying every inch of the place as he walked through the main lobby, with the chairs and mirrors and other supplies, Chris kept his gun trained in the direction of the back room. That light was on too, and he could hear someone fiddling around in the office.

Going through the doorway to the backroom, Chris immediately spotted a body, sitting at the table, eating a bowl of cereal. He groaned in frustration and hit the safety back on his gun before tucking it away again.

“Fuckin’ A, Scotty! You gotta tell me when you’re coming in early!” Chris admonished, slapping his brother upside the head. “I coulda killed ya!”

Scott only laughed. “You shoulda seen your face, big brother. That was priceless.”

Chris shook his head and got the coffee pot started. After that scare, he was going to need double his daily dosage. “The hell are you here so early for, anyway?”

“Late night, got home, didn’t have milk.”

“New boy toy?”

Scotty smirked as he walked his bowl to the sink to rinse it out. “Couple of ‘em.”

Chris rolled his eyes. Leave it to his brother to share more than what was necessary.

As the time moved on towards opening the shop for the day, the brothers worked to get everything set up and ready, then enjoyed a cup of coffee to themselves. Slowly but surely, the rest of the crew -- Scarlett, Seb, and Shanna -- came rolling in.

“Shan, you talked to Carly this morning?” Chris asked, fastening a cape around his first customer of the day.

“Yeah, she’ll be here in about thirty. Her typical Monday morning routine.”

Chris smirked. He and Scott shared a special connection, being the only brothers in the Evans family, but he was just as close with his sisters. When Aurelie had come along, Chris wasted no time in pulling her under his wing the same he had done with Shanna and Carly. He loved his siblings, and especially after their father had been put away, Chris had stepped up to make sure they were all taken care of. At any rate, knowing Carly was happy to live her life with little to no worries made Chris feel like he was doing his job.

The day wore on. Mondays were usually busy, seeing as how a lot of men liked to start their week with a fresh cut and/or shave. Between busy Mondays and Fridays, and the steady flow of customers on the in-between, the shop did all right for itself. Of course, the family side business didn’t hurt anything.

As they were wrapping up for the day, Robert Downey, Jr., Chris’s father’s best friend, came into the shop and sat down in Chris’s chair. He was well-known throughout town as a do-gooder, a philanthropist. The man was very private about where his money came from, and that boded well for all of them. Although, in this part of Boston, no one much cared where the man got his money, since so much of it was channeled back into the community. For that, everyone was willing to turn the other way at the potentially suspicious way the money came through.

“Went and saw your dad today,” Robert began, setting his glasses on the counter in front of Chris’s chair before taking a seat. “The old man’s not looking so bad. Staying out of trouble.”

“That’s new,” Chris snorted. “Did you get the money on his book?”

Robert nodded. “Of course. Just a touch up today, yeah?”

Chris nodded and got to work. He focused on what he was doing, half-listening to the sounds of the shop: Scarlett and Seb bantering back and forth, Carly’s nails tapping away at the keyboard, Shanna and Scott sighing as they watched and waited for closing time to approach.

“Hey, Shan, Scotty. Why don’t you get out early? You’ve got no more appointments, right?”

They both confirmed they were done for the day, so Chris gave them the go ahead. After finishing with her current customer, Scarlett scooted out as well. Carly was the next to go, until only Seb and Chris were left behind.

Robert paid with his credit card but left a cash tip; paper-clipped to the bill was a set of coordinates. Chris and Seb exchanged a glance. This would be their next job.

“Call me when you finish with that referral,” Robert instructed. “This is a big one, boys. Don’t screw it up.”

With that, the man was gone. Chris locked up behind him and turned the sign on the door to Closed. He turned back to Seb, who was already checking out the coordinates.

“Shit,” Seb muttered, “Boston Private? They’re no joke. The kind of cash flow that goes through there …”

Chris didn’t like the idea of a big hit, but he did like the idea of maybe being set up for a while. He was proud to take care of his siblings in his father’s absence, to live up to the responsibilities his father had raised him to, but he was also ready for a break. He was ready to settle down.

“We gotta give it at least a week for us to scout that one out,” Chris decided out loud. “Then we’ll get Scar and Scotty in on it. We don’t say a word to Shanna or Carly.”

“As usual,” Seb sighed. “How have they gone their whole life not knowing this was a thing?”

Chris shrugged. “My parents had Carly early on in life -- this didn’t start till after she was born. Me and Scotty were always expected to go in Pop’s place once we were old enough, and Shanna’s the baby. She gets protected.”

“And what about Aurelie?”

“Aurelie’s a different story. So listen, we good on that plan then?”

Seb pursed his lips. “Can’t we do this with a three-man team? Scar doesn’t need to be in on this.”

Chris smirked. “Still going after that tail, huh?”

Seb rolled his eyes. “She’s not just tail and you know it. Besides, she’s never been off your nuts long enough to notice anyone else.”

“Please,” Chris said, reaching for his keys and shutting the lights off. “Scarlett and I were a thing in high school, and it wasn’t even a serious thing. You gotta have more confidence in yourself -- and by the way, you’re not gettin’ anywhere with that girl by suggesting she doesn’t need to go on jobs. That’ll piss her right off.”

Seb agreed that was true. Once the shop was locked up, they hit the sidewalk, heading over to Stan’s Pub for a drink or few before heading home for the night.

After their last day casing the bank, Seb headed back for the barber shop to try and catch some afternoon appointments. Chris was headed in that direction, too, but first he stopped at the corner store for a pack of cigarettes and maybe a fountain drink.

Next to him at the drink counter, a familiar face was filling a to-go cup with coffee. Chris smirked at the timing of it.

“Johnny, haven’t seen you around this area in a while,” Chris commented, not even bothering to make eye contact with the other man.

“Chris, hey. It has been a while. Don’t worry, I won’t be sticking around for long. Came by to see a friend.”

Chris nodded. “I’m not worried about you, man.”

John snorted; Chris didn’t need to look at the other man to know that tensions were high. Oh, there weren’t exactly boundaries in this part of town, but they knew enough to stay away from each other. Chris put the lid on his drink and stuck a straw through the hole. John capped his coffee cup, then nodded to Chris.

“Hey man, you haven’t seen my sister recently, have you?”

John frowned. “Carly or Shanna?”

Chris studied John carefully. Had he really forgotten about Chris’s stepsister, or was he playing dumb? In the interest of not creating a scene so close to a job, Chris decided to give John the benefit of the doubt.

“Shanna.”

“No, I haven’t seen either of them recently, actually.”

“Hmm. Been to MassGen in the last couple of weeks?”

John shook his head. “Nah, man, I’m great. Listen, I’ve got to get going, but I’m sure we’ll cross paths again.”

“I’m sure we will.”

John paid for his coffee and left the shop. Chris got his cigarettes, paid for the pack and his drink, then walked down to the barber shop. Whatever reason Aurelie had asked about John, Chris had bigger things to worry about for the time being.

The morning of the job, the four of them -- Chris, Seb, Scott, and Scarlett -- donned their usual attire: hoodies, masks, gloves, dark jeans, steel-toed boots. They approached the bank in a van, parked in the alley to the south of the bank, and made their way to the front door.

Inevitably, screaming, running, and tears took over. It was chaos, but they all had to keep it managed if they were going to get their payoff. Seb had already overpowered the aging security guard, and Scarlett was in the tech room working on cutting off the cameras and frying the footage. Scott was backing Chris up. They knew that a different teller got the code to unlock the safe every morning, and by their calculations, it should have been the middle-aged man on the end who had the code.

“It’s not me!” he pleaded, hands in the air. “Elsa! Elsa has the code!”

Chris looked in the direction the man was pointing. A young, blonde woman, eyes wide and her whole body trembling, fought against his gaze. Chris marched down to her window and climbed over the counter.

“Are you Elsa?”

She closed her eyes and nodded. “Yes.”

He pointed with his gun towards the safe. “Open it, Elsa.”

Tears were running down her cheeks. Chris felt horrible; scaring people came with the territory of this sort of work, but this girl seemed especially terrified. Her fingers shook over the keypad, and she struggled to remember the numbers in the correct order under this kind of pressure.

“C’mon! Open it!” Scott yelled from behind her.

She jumped, and the tears rolled harder. Chris glared at his brother, then put a hand over Elsa’s.

“You know the code,” he told her quietly. “We aren’t gonna hurt you, okay? We’re here for the money, not for any of you. Take a deep breath, try it again.”

Elsa closed her eyes and drew in a deep breath through her nose, then let it out through her mouth. Chris was momentarily distracted by the minty scent that wafted his way with her exhale. By the time he was focused again, she had the safe open.

“Good girl,” he said, gently moving her aside. He and Scott went straight into the safe to collect their bounty. It was all done in less than two minutes. They returned to the main part of the bank to gather their colleagues and get the hell outta Dodge.

But Elsa wasn’t there when they went to leave, and neither was Scarlett. Chris and Scott exchanged a look of concern.

“She’s already out,” Seb informed them, pounding on the counter. “Five-oh is on the radar. Let’s go.”

The three men scrambled out of the bank and back to the van. Before they even made it all the way, they could hear pounding noises coming from the back. Scott took his place in the driver’s seat, Seb in the front, and Chris climbed into the back where Scarlett was giving Elsa a proper what-for.

“Hold up!” Chris said, pushing himself between the two women. “What the fuck are you doing?”

Scarlett pointed at Elsa. “She pushed the alarm! That’s why the cops were coming!”

“So you dragged her along for the ride?”

Scarlett groaned. “We need leverage if they catch up to us. Now can we please just get the fuck out of here!”

The van squealed down the alley. Reaching for a zip-tie, Chris secured Elsa’s hands behind her back. Scarlett used two bandanas -- too readily available -- to blindfold and gag her. It at least allowed them to shed the suffocating masks.

Once they were away from the police and on a quiet street completely north of where they lived, they let Elsa out of the van. Scarlett swore they knew her address and where her family was from, and there would be hell to pay if Elsa helped in any sort of investigation. Chris waited for Scarlett to be back in the van before instructing Elsa to sing her favorite song to herself before taking off her blindfold. He took one last look at her, trembling and crying quietly to herself there on the curb, before climbing in the back of the van and instructing Scott to get them the hell out of there.

AllOfTheThings: @captain-s-rogers @star-spangled-man-with-a-plan @letsgetfuckingsuperwholocked @hurricanerin @horsesandbandsforlife @im-not-an-armrest-im-short @captain-rogers-beard @shynara51 @sea040561 @anxiouskore @pinknerdpanda @xtina2191 @jackryanplz @beakami @heartsaved @fullprunerebelstatesman @blackwidowismyhomegirl

Boston Boys: @atc74 @the-murder-strut-murdered-me @becs-bunker @shield-agent78 @patzammit @crazyandanonymous4u @ntlmundy

#marvelfluffbingo2020 #chris evans #john krasinski #fanfiction #crossover #criminal!au

53 notes · View notes

subarublue · 4 years ago

Text

Sparda Family Bonding Time Series - Part 3

Series Description: It’s family bonding time! Sparda family style! A series of short stories revolving around platonic familial relationships between the members of the DMC crew. Warning: Lots of fluff and bonding ahead.

One Shot

Title: A Place at Our Table

Fandom: Devil May Cry

Timeline: Post DMC5

Rating: Teen

Word Count: 2655

Read on Ao3

Summary: She’d had a rough day. At least that’s what Nico told herself when her vision started getting blurry. She was just stressed and nearly dying tended to have that kind of an effect on people. She wasn’t about to cry over Nero calling her family, no of course not. It was just stress. Yeah, just stress.

Notes: At first I thought I would hate Nico’s character, but she grew on me really fast and now I just love her.

Nico grunted as the stubborn bolt refused to come off. The van was in dire need of an oil change and instead of spending the money to take it to a shop, Nero had asked if she would do it. She should have said no.

Scratch that. She should have said, Fuck you.

Was this all she was good for? Being everyone’s pet mechanic? That’s all anybody asked of her; do this, fix that, why isn’t this working?

Would it kill any of ‘em to show a little appreciation now and then?

The bolt gave way so suddenly that she dropped her wrench right on her face knocking her glasses off. She almost screamed, but just barely managed to let out a loud, closed-mouth groan instead.

Well, that hurt like a bitch.

She took a deep breath to calm herself. She inspected her glasses after picking them up, relieved they were unbroken, then set about finding the renegade bolt. She finally located it after what felt like a long-ass fifteen minutes, as it had been hidden under her toolbox where it had rolled way farther than it should have. With all the bolts holding it in place now off, she pulled the bottom panel off the van, and began the process of removing the filter and draining the old oil out when she heard the garage door open suddenly, startling her. She jerked, spilling oil on her shirt and she held her tongue from cursing, not knowing who was at the door since she couldn’t see them from her spot under the van. Nero would give her hell if she swore in front of one of the boys.

Fuck, now what?

“Hey, Nico! We gotta job! When’s the van gonna be ready?”

She gritted her teeth. Five minutes...he couldn’t have come five minutes earlier before she actually started draining the oil out? She wouldn’t have been pissed if she’d just had to slap the bottom panel back on. Well, okay maybe that was a lie. She still would have been pissed, mostly because of that stupid bolt.

It was probably a good thing he was too late, though. She didn’t want to be driving it down the road to who knows where and have it run out of oil. She was not in the mood to fix the problems that would cause.

“You’re too late! Already got the oil drainin’ so this piece of shit ain’t going anywhere for another half hour!” She couldn’t hide the irritation in her tone, but Nero seemed to be ignoring it.

“Make it twenty minutes. We got an emergency situation.” His tone was serious and demanding and that was the last straw for her. She wheeled herself out from under the van and looked up to glare at him.

“You want this done fast then come do it yourself! I’m gonna do it right, so that when we’re driving down the road, the damn engine don’t seize up, stall the van, and force us to build a fucking new one!” She was yelling now, but Nero had dealt with her so long now he wasn’t fazed much.

“Geez, who pissed in your cereal this morning?” All he got in response was more glaring. “Whatever. Just do what you can so we can get going.”

He turned to go back into the house to get ready when he barely heard her mutter something about ‘ungrateful, demanding people’ over the sound of her wheeling herself back under the van. He frowned at that. He’d known her long enough now to realize what was bothering her, but they didn’t have time. He’d have to deal with it later.

Nico felt she deserved a pat on the back, but she figured the only one who’d give her that was her own self. She’d got the oil change finished in just under twenty minutes; a record for her with this hunk of junk. It was a good thing she’d gotten it done, too. There was no way the van would have made it this far out to the middle of nowhere with what little was left in it. It was burning oil off like there was no tomorrow and she groaned at the thought of having to figure out why.

“Yet another shitty-ass problem I’m gonna get stuck fixing,” she said aloud to no one in particular. Nero was around somewhere; off dealing with whatever demons were running amok in the area they’d driven out to while she waited for him leaning against the side of the van, having a smoke.

“Would it kill someone to say please or thank you once in a while,” she said to herself angrily. She took a long drag from her cigarette, completely wrapped up in her horrible mood. So much so, that she failed to notice that her talking aloud to herself had attracted the attention of a red empusa, which was now approaching her from the side.

She’d barely had time to register that Nero was suddenly yelling something at her before she turned and saw the demon too little, too late. Time seemed to slow as she felt her adrenaline rise. It felt almost like one of those moments that people talk about where you see your life flash before your eyes, but the only thing Nico could see in that moment was her death at the hands (or was it claws?) of this demon. The empusa was bearing down on her and she was unarmed; not that there would have been much she could do even with a weapon, but still, there was definitely no way she was getting out of this alive unarmed without a miracle.

Luckily, one in the form of Nero happened to reach her in time. He jumped in between her and the demon and took the hit that was meant for her, suffering a fairly serious injury to his side. He was far from incapacitated though, and he managed to kill the empusa before it tried to run away from him after it realized a greater threat had just interrupted its attempt at killing its prey.

Nico was stunned for only a moment before her brain caught up with what happened. She registered the sight of Nero clutching his side, which was bleeding profusely and immediately sprang into action.

“Shit, Nero! If you wanna kill yourself there are better ways to go out than getting killed by an overgrown maggot!” She grabbed him by the hand on his uninjured side, still running on adrenaline, looping his arm over her own shoulders to help him into the van. Remembering there may have been other demons around, she took a cursory glance of the area finding it clear.

“Last one. Shouldn’t be any more.” Nero gritted out when he saw her scanning the area. She let out a huff of relief. Thank goodness there weren’t any more so she could focus on his injury without worry. He grunted in pain when she hefted him up to his feet and began helping him into the van.

Once inside, she got him to the couch before pulling out the first aid kit, then helped him out of his shirt so she could assess the damage. She grimaced when she saw the wound. Something like that would have surely killed her. Her momentary lapse of attention in her anger had nearly ended her life. Maybe she didn’t fight demons herself, but that didn’t mean she shouldn’t be on her toes when out in the field. Nero was lucky he was part demon himself, otherwise she’d have a lot more to feel guilty about than just an injury.

“You didn’t have to do that, ya know?” She told him as she wiped the wound clean and set about patching him up. It was mostly unnecessary; the wound would likely be completely gone in a few hours, but it was the thought that counts, right? Plus, it gave her something to focus on. The adrenaline from that tense life or death moment was starting to wear off and she realized she was starting to tremble.

“So…what? I was just supposed to let the thing skewer you? I can take a hit like this, you can’t.” He shrugged it off like it was no big deal, but she didn’t miss the wince he made while she wrapped his injured side.

“Still, ya didn’t have to jump in the way. If you were that close, you shoulda just killed the thing without takin’ the hit.” She finished wrapping his wound as he stood up to find his torn shirt.

“Couldn’t guarantee you wouldn’t have still been hurt, so I made the best decision given the situation.” He stated matter-of-factly.

Nico just scoffed. “I may be human, but I can recover from injuries too...just not as fast as your clumsy ass.”

“Yeah? But then you’d be out of commission for a while. Can’t let anything happen to my ‘pet mechanic’ now, can I?” He made air quotes around the nickname she’d effectively dubbed herself with. “Besides, that’s the kind of thing you do for family.”

Nico’s head shot up at that to look him in disbelief. “F-family?!” she half-squeaked, half-yelled out. She was flabbergasted at his remark. Did he just call me family?

“Yeah? You’ve hung around this long, put up with all the crazy shit that goes along with being a part of this, and you haven’t turned tail and ran. What else would you be?” He located his shirt and started putting it back on once he finished speaking.

She’d had a rough day. At least that’s what Nico told herself when her vision started getting blurry. She was just stressed and nearly dying tended to have that kind of an effect on people. She wasn’t about to cry over Nero calling her family, no of course not. It was just stress. Yeah, just stress.

Nico took her glasses off to rub at her eyes in an effort to keep the tears from falling. Unfortunately for her, Nero had finished getting his shirt back on and caught what she was doing and he was grinning when she put her glasses back on.

“It’s okay to cry, you know? It doesn’t make you a crybaby.” She cringed as soon as those words left his mouth. She knew exactly where this was going. “Does make you a little bitch though.”

She punched him in the arm, though Nero noticed that not only was she careful to avoid his injured side, she also didn’t punch as hard as he knew she could. “Shut the hell up! If anyone’s a little bitch here, it’s you.”

“Hey! Is that how you thank someone for saving your life?”

“Is that how you say thanks for me patchin’ you up?” They were just taunting each other; fighting almost like siblings, Nico noted; trying to get under each other’s skin, but not really meaning any of it. Just like a brother and sister…

“Hey, for real though, you okay?” Nero’s worried tone brought her out of her thoughts.

“Y-yeah, why wouldn’t I be?” She didn’t understand why Nero was suddenly so worried. She hadn’t been hurt because he’d protected her; jumped in front of a demon for her, in fact. Though it was unlikely since it was just an empusa, he still could have been killed. And it would have been her fault. What if it hadn’t turned out alright? What would she have done? How would she have told everyone? How would she have broken it to Kyrie?

It wasn’t until he grabbed her hand to hold it steady that she realized she was still trembling…and Nero had noticed, of course. “I’m totally fine. It’s just the adrenaline wearin’ off. I’m fine…t-totally fine.” She couldn’t keep her voice steady as finished talking, the stress from her whole day, nearly dying, and the thoughts and worries that brought out making her voice break.

It wasn’t until Nero was pulling her into a hug that she realized she was actually crying now. When his arms closed around her back, the dam broke loose. She couldn’t stop the sob that tore through her throat and she clutched the back of his shirt as if it were a lifeline.

“Hey, relax,” he shushed her as he comforted her. “You’re okay. I’m okay. We’re both okay, got it? We’ve been through a helluva lot worse. Beside you’ve been around long enough you know me better than that. If I’m gonna die, it ain’t gonna be to some ‘overgrown maggot’ as you so eloquently put it.” Nero’s joke brought a bit of a laugh out of her and helped to calm her nerves a bit. She pulled away and stepped back, drying her eyes as best she could. He was right; they were both okay, even if one of them was slightly injured.

Nico grimaced at that. They were sure to catch a scolding from Kyrie for being careless. Nero seemed to be on the same wavelength as her and made a similar face. “Maybe she won’t notice?” He offered. Nico only gave him a deadpan stare and he shrugged in response. “She’s probably busy fixing dinner right now, so if I don’t hang around when we get back, I doubt she’ll even see it.”

“And if she catches on, I had nothin’ to do with hiding it.” Nico held her hands up as if to absolve herself of any part of the crime of concealing injuries from Nero’s girlfriend.

“Whatever you say. Guess it’s a guy’s job to look out for someone who’s like a sister to him anyway, right?” When he said that, Nico knew he was talking about more than just the scolding they’d get. After all, you don’t jump in front of a demon for just anyone.

“Hey! A girl’s gotta look out for her clumsy-ass brother too, ya know?” They were both laughing now and Nico, having realized she’d calmed down enough to drive, took her place in the driver’s seat. She started the engine, but waited for Nero to sit down before setting off back down the road.

They didn’t get far before he spoke up again. “Thanks.” She turned to look at him briefly before setting her eyes back on the road. “For the patch up, the van…and everything else you do around here.”

She could feel the emotions welling up inside her making her eyes water again and blinked back the sudden tears. It wouldn’t do to start crying while driving. “Yeah? Well you’re welcome. And...thanks for savin’ my ass back there, too.”

“Like I said, it’s what you do for family.” He said it so casually, like she should have already known this. In hindsight, maybe she should have. They’d been through a lot together already. And not just her and Nero, but everyone else, too. Incidents like what happened in Redgrave tended to make a big impact on people’s lives and their relationships with each other.

Neither spoke the rest of the way home, which left Nico to her own thoughts as she drove.

Family, huh? That doesn’t sound too bad.

It didn’t really hit home for her though, until they got back. They came in the back door, through the kitchen and dining room. Nero only stopped to give Kyrie a kiss as she finished up dinner, taking care that she didn’t see the bloody tear in his shirt. Then he went on to put his stuff away, change, and probably throw his shirt away so his girlfriend didn’t find it in the laundry.

Nico, however, stopped as she passed through the dining area and looked at the dinner table. They were six places set, not five like there used to be for just Nero, Kyrie, and the three orphan boys they looked after.

There was one more: for her. She smiled.

← Part 2 • Part 3 of this series • Part 4 →

#dmc #devil may cry fanfiction #dmc nero #dmc nico #devil may cry #my writing #suby scrawls

6 notes · View notes

lullabieswrappedinlies · 4 years ago

Text

Boston Boys [Part Two]

Boston Boys Masterlist

“Fuckin’ A, Scotty! You gotta tell me when you’re coming in early!” Chris admonished, slapping his brother upside the head. “I coulda killed ya!”

Scott only laughed. “You shoulda seen your face, big brother. That was priceless.”

Chris shook his head and got the coffee pot started. After that scare, he was going to need double his daily dosage. “The hell are you here so early for, anyway?”

“Late night, got home, didn’t have milk.”

“New boy toy?”

Scotty smirked as he walked his bowl to the sink to rinse it out. “Couple of ‘em.”

Chris rolled his eyes. Leave it to his brother to share more than what was necessary.

“Shan, you talked to Carly this morning?” Chris asked, fastening a cape around his first customer of the day.

“Yeah, she’ll be here in about thirty. Her typical Monday morning routine.”

“Went and saw your dad today,” Robert began, setting his glasses on the counter in front of Chris’s chair before taking a seat. “The old man’s not looking so bad. Staying out of trouble.”

“That’s new,” Chris snorted. “Did you get the money on his book?”

Robert nodded. “Of course. Just a touch up today, yeah?”

“Hey, Shan, Scotty. Why don’t you get out early? You’ve got no more appointments, right?”

Robert paid with his credit card but left a cash tip; paper-clipped to the bill was a set of coordinates. Chris and Seb exchanged a glance. This would be their next job.

“Call me when you finish with that referral,” Robert instructed. “This is a big one, boys. Don’t screw it up.”

With that, the man was gone. Chris locked up behind him and turned the sign on the door to Closed. He turned back to Seb, who was already checking out the coordinates.

“Shit,” Seb muttered, “Boston Private? They’re no joke. The kind of cash flow that goes through there …”

“We gotta give it at least a week for us to scout that one out,” Chris decided out loud. “Then we’ll get Scar and Scotty in on it. We don’t say a word to Shanna or Carly.”

“As usual,” Seb sighed. “How have they gone their whole life not knowing this was a thing?”

“And what about Aurelie?”

“Aurelie’s a different story. So listen, we good on that plan then?”

Seb pursed his lips. “Can’t we do this with a three-man team? Scar doesn’t need to be in on this.”

Chris smirked. “Still going after that tail, huh?”

Seb rolled his eyes. “She’s not just tail and you know it. Besides, she’s never been off your nuts long enough to notice anyone else.”

Seb agreed that was true. Once the shop was locked up, they hit the sidewalk, heading over to Stan’s Pub for a drink or few before heading home for the night.

Next to him at the drink counter, a familiar face was filling a to-go cup with coffee. Chris smirked at the timing of it.

“Johnny, haven’t seen you around this area in a while,” Chris commented, not even bothering to make eye contact with the other man.

“Chris, hey. It has been a while. Don’t worry, I won’t be sticking around for long. Came by to see a friend.”

Chris nodded. “I’m not worried about you, man.”

“Hey man, you haven’t seen my sister recently, have you?”

John frowned. “Carly or Shanna?”

“Shanna.”

“No, I haven’t seen either of them recently, actually.”

“Hmm. Been to MassGen in the last couple of weeks?”

John shook his head. “Nah, man, I’m great. Listen, I’ve got to get going, but I’m sure we’ll cross paths again.”

“I’m sure we will.”

“It’s not me!” he pleaded, hands in the air. “Elsa! Elsa has the code!”

“Are you Elsa?”

She closed her eyes and nodded. “Yes.”

He pointed with his gun towards the safe. “Open it, Elsa.”

“C’mon! Open it!” Scott yelled from behind her.

She jumped, and the tears rolled harder. Chris glared at his brother, then put a hand over Elsa’s.

“You know the code,” he told her quietly. “We aren’t gonna hurt you, okay? We’re here for the money, not for any of you. Take a deep breath, try it again.”

But Elsa wasn’t there when they went to leave, and neither was Scarlett. Chris and Scott exchanged a look of concern.

“She’s already out,” Seb informed them, pounding on the counter. “Five-oh is on the radar. Let’s go.”

“Hold up!” Chris said, pushing himself between the two women. “What the fuck are you doing?”

Scarlett pointed at Elsa. “She pushed the alarm! That’s why the cops were coming!”

“So you dragged her along for the ride?”

Scarlett groaned. “We need leverage if they catch up to us. Now can we please just get the fuck out of here!”

Tags: @themtbmbgirl @keithseabrook27 @ulovemelightsout @rosie2801 @professorkrasinski

#john krasinski #chris evans #crossover #fanfiction #criminal!au

10 notes · View notes

osmw1 · 5 years ago

Text

Crowbar Nurse Chapter 2 — A Gun, A (Zombie!) Virus, and an Out of Place Hottie

“Argh, Sera this time?! This isn’t some sort of web novel! What is happening in here?!”

Barrelling into the room was an unbelievably handsome guy. By “unbelievable”, I meant it quite literally. He was unrealistically handsome.

“… huh? Kiryū?!”

I was just as shocked seeing him as he was seeing me… that's because he’s definitely a fictional character.

Kiryū Sōichirō. The most popular character from the hit dating sim released in 2014 on social media platforms, Rainbow Dreams High School☆Fantasia.

His dark brown eyes, black hair, and a soft smile gives off a clean-cut look. When combined with his calm demeanor, it made for a perfect young mastermind character like him. Kiryū would act as your mentor, guiding the player along with hints and tips. Because he helps the player perhaps a little too much, he would always come out on top of the character popularity rankings.

… but he was a secret unlockable love interest.

In other words, Kiryū is only unlocked after clearing all other routes first.

Players would begrudgingly clear characters they weren’t interested in to finally get the chance to date him… well, not that this really matters though.

“Hey, stop spacing out! I’ll explain everything later, but first, we gotta shake off these zombies!”

Kiryū lifted me up by the shoulders right as he shouted at me. He sure is strong in real life, I thought to myself.

“Can you move?” “Mm… I’m really sleepy, so… maybe?” “You shoulda gone to bed earlier last night! Oh, whatever, just hide behind me!” “Uh… okay!

I was shocked when I first saw him, but now I was stunned at how he spoke to me. It was completely wrong. The Kiryū I knew was soft-spoken and perceptive. But this guy was snappy, if not brusque.

Weird. It’s as if it were someone else in Kiryū’s body…

—hmm?

—wait, zombies?

“… whaaaaaaaat?!”

Just as I screamed out loud, Kiryū grabbed a crowbar lying nearby and then struck a zombie with it.

Blood splattered down onto the ground… along with various other fluids.

A single swing of the crowbar was enough to silent any groaning zombie. He then kicked the dead-again zombies aside to create a path before forcefully grabbing my wrist and dashing through the door.

—his hand was so warm.

I had questioned whether this Kiryū was a figment of my imagination, but the warmth of his hand seemed to prove otherwise. And even though I realized I was in a dire situation, his warmth was comforting.

He seems so used to fighting. Wait, was Kiryū a bad boy-type character?

We ran through the door together as I questioned my memory of the game. The familiar nurses’ station should be just on the other side… except, it wasn’t. Instead, my eyes opened wide as I found an unfamiliar alley in a busy, cloudy part of town.

…! No, I recognize this! I’ve been here before!

“—run!”

He grabbed my wrist and started running before I even had a chance to reply.

“H-Hold on!”

I hadn’t been eating or sleeping nearly enough. I might actually die if I suddenly broke into a full sprint…! Or so I thought, but I actually felt quite agile.

… huh?

In fact, I felt great running. It’s as if the exhaustion I felt until were but mere lies.

Strange… I don’t feel tired at all. No way I’ve had enough sleep to feel this good…

That’s so weird. Was I in the afterlife? I confusedly scanned my surroundings while running.

A narrow alleyway. Worn-out walls.

The buildings are so decrepit, they made me wonder whether they were still structurally sound.

Countless air conditioning units and broken gutters were dangling on the side of them.

I instinctively looked over my shoulder and realized that there were zombies staggering—or rather, scurrying—and chasing us. It probably wouldn’t take more than ten seconds for them to catch up to me if I had stopped running right now.

No surprise that one hit with the crowbar wasn’t enough to take them down… we probably have to do something about them though…

Even though I still didn’t have any idea of what was going on, I knew that we definitely didn’t have the time to sit and think unless we killed the zombies first. I looked at my surroundings once more as I tried to calm myself down.

—I have definitely been here before.

I… remember seeing this area on a map before.

… we’re in a game…

Realizing the truth sent shivers down my spine. The streets and the area around it were just how I remembered… we’re in a level of Dead Man’s Conflict 3. The 1998 game was a Japanese classic in which the player has to slay hordes of zombies while trying to escape from the infected Confi City.

“Downtown”.

This was the first stage of Dead Man’s Conflict 3. The graphics look a lot better, but otherwise it was the same. The door to Uptown should be just a little farther ahead.

The roads here twist and turn like a maze. It sure makes it difficult for beginners…

I remember how tough it was all those years ago where I would be lost in these streets while being chased by zombies and ultimately being eaten over and over and over again. But perhaps thanks to that, the layout of this town had been deeply burned into my memory…

… hmm? Hey, hold on, you can’t go this way…

I blinked at the path before me. The road ahead splits into three… and the middle path that Kiryū headed towards was the wrong way. I panicked and yanked at his hand to stop him.

“—whoa, hey! What’s wrong?!”

He looked down at me in confusion.

“We gotta hurry, or else the zombies—” “That way is a dead end, my dea—err, Kiryū!” “What?!” “I-It… it’s this way!”

I pulled Kiryū towards the left path as I told him which way we should go.

“Wha—but isn’t that way a dead end? I can’t help but feel we shouldn’t go where it’s clearly marked ‘KEEP OUT’, y’know…?” “Normally, it’s only open after you complete the second week in game! We’ll… rip through the tape!” “What?! Rip through it?!”

If this were a game then there would be no way to get past the black and yellow tape with “KEEP OUT” written in big, Helvetica letters. This path is locked until after the second week is finished. The tape doesn’t budge no matter how much the player cuts or runs into it.

“Hyaaa!”

But seeing how we’re not bound by the rules that the protagonist should be, I easily torn down the tape.

“Just who are…”

Kiryū blankly stared at me but now’s not the time to care about that. It took me five seconds to take down the tape before we could hurry on through.

—I haven’t touched a single game in this past six months.

All I did after getting home was either check social media or pass out. But… my body remembered. Dead Man’s Conflict 3 is second nature to me.

“But Sera, we can’t open windows in this world.” “Windows are another story!”

A large window was on the wall right beside us. I hooked my fingers on the frame and pulled on it, but it did no more than jostling it. It’s a little weird how he addressed me as “Sera”, but that’s not important right now. Neither pushing nor pulling the window had any effect so I resorted to borrowing Kiryū’s crowbar and smashed away at the window. … crowbars are heavier than I imagined.

“Aaaaargh!” “… you some sort of runaway gorilla or something…?

I ignored Kiryū’s comment on how I’m swinging at the window. I sure am glad to have played all these zombie games and have researched all the strategies. Having been swamped by work for the past half year, the gamer didn't get to unleash all the knowledge I stored for future use, until now!

“Can we really go through this?!” “Yes, we can! Just be careful of the broken glass!”

We crawled through the window and into the room, and if my memory serves me right… there it was! The corpse of an old man (which I couldn’t smell in a game unlike now) sat on a dining chair and in his hand was his assault rifle with unlimited ammo!

It tough enough to pry it out of his hand, but the old man suddenly turned into a zombie as well. I delivered a swift kick to his head before sending bullet in his brain. It was an instant kill. It’s not like I did it because I’m actually that savage in real life. The protagonist had to do the same thing else he gets eaten by the old man.

… I never knew rifles were this heavy either.

“Tch, still alive, huh? Why don't you stay dead already!” “… what in the world are you…”

Kiryū was dumbfounded after seeing me like that and muttered to himself again, but I didn’t have the time to respond. The zombies should have almost caught up to us by now.

“… crap! The damn zombies are here already!”

I flashed a smirk just as he shrieked out. Just as I expected, the zombies were here.

“Don’t worry… the old man’s dead for good but let me clean up the rest of them!”

My skirt fluttered as I whipped around. The zombies came crawling and lumbering to meet my machine gun.

—blam blam blam!

The sound of gunfire masked the sound of the zombie falling over after being shot between the eyes. Not only did I flip the fire selector switch to burst, but by also going for headshots, I should get double the points. I acquire my next target and fired. And at the next zombie. And the next one…

“Just what kind of creature is she…?”

Kiryū seemed to be taken aback at how casually I’m slaying these zombies. He stood there with a with his mouth wide open.

“You can’t hold back when dealing with zombies, Kiryū. They’re tougher than you might think. They will pretend they’re dead and then ambush when you’re not expecting it… they’re sneaky bastards, eh?!”

I kicked each zombie as I said that to make sure none of them were feigning death.

“When the zombies in this game don’t bleed after keeling over, that means they’re just faking it. Then when you walk close to them, they’ll get you and bite your legs. Be careful about that, okay?”

Right after I felt like I cleared this area, I came back to my senses.

“…”

Then, Kiryū—who was standing there speechless—and I looked at each other.

“…” “…” “… umm, uhh, Kiryū! We’re good now! We’re safe!”

Kiryū could only fake a smile as he stared wide eyed at me as I switched back from the gamer me to being a proper human being.

■This isn’t some sort of web novel!

Web novels are novels which authors post online on dedicated forums or personal websites. Many authors do not have editors to help and instead tend to upload whatever they scribble down. But because of that, there are many elements in their writing which may represent the authors' desires and frustrations. Some may be off-putting, but many readers appreciate web novels for that very reason (and of course, many don't). When Kiryū mentioned to "web novels", he alluded to the popular theme of everyday characters being transported into game worlds for reasons unknown.

contents: /ch001/ /ch002/ /next/

(leave me a tip on Patreon?)

1 note · View note

waywardrose13 · 6 years ago

Text

The Hunter Diaries- Chapter Ten

Series Masterlist // Rose’s Masterlist

Warnings: None I don’t think. Maybe a little angst?

Summary: Sam and Dean Winchester had been your best friends for as long as you could remember. Being Bobby Singer’s adoptive daughter, it was sort of inevitable to know the brothers. You knew you’ve had a crush on the elder brother for a long time, but you always thought nothing would happen between the two of you. You’re not the picture perfect model and you aren’t the image every girl strives to be. But maybe, just maybe, you were wrong, and he would like you too. But could your happy ending be cut short?

SERIES TAGS, CHARACTER TAGS, FOREVER TAGS, FLUFF BINGO/ANGST BINGO TAGS ARE OPEN. SEND ME AN ASK!

*PLEASE EXCUSE ANY AND ALL GRAMMAR MISTAKES*

A/N- We’re cutting it down to the wire y’all. Maybe 2-3 more chapters? This chapter is pretty important. Shit is going down guys.

Dean raked a hand through his short cropped hair, a bottle of jack in the other hand and a large book on the table in front of him. You had been gone for nearly three days and the men had no leads on your whereabouts. Sam had to sit by and watch as his older brother went crazy, drinking himself through the day with his nose buried in every lore book he could find, desperately looking for Aamons name within one.

Sam flipped through a spell book across from Dean, his hazel eyes scanning each page carefully. It was an old grimoire, written by a witch in the early 1600’s. Elizabeth Gatton, one of the most powerful green witches that had ever walked the earth, had written down all of her spells in this book. It was easy magic, for it was used with herbs and energies, but the spells worked, and Sam hoped a few of them would be helpful for him.

Sam was desperate. You had been his best friend for as long as he could remember. He loved seeing you and Dean together, yourself and his brother needing love and something good in your lives. He loved you like a sister, and it would kill him if you died.

And then there was Bobby; you’re adoptive father who loved you more than anything. Granted, he loved the Winchester boys as his own. But you were different. You were the sunshine that came into his life after his wife died. You were the one who ultimately brought a smile back to his face. He was the one who held your hand when you got your first surgery. He was the one who watched with a wide smile as you had your first violin solo in your orchestra at age thirteen. He was the one who watched as you got your high school diploma, his gray blue eyes teary as his heart filled with absolute pride. He was the one who watched chick flicks with you and held you as you cried over your first heartbreak. Bobby Singer was the only father you had really ever had, and you were his only child. Just the thought of you in the hands of that evil son of a bitch made him sick to his stomach.

Sam sat with a picture of you in his hand. You were eleven years old then. He smiled at how young you looked. Your plump, rosy cheeks and short cropped, shiny hair stood out against the dullness of Sam’s own features. You were a bright spirit, noticeable in even photographs.

You had gone to live with Bobby a year prior the picture was taken and it was the first day you met the Winchesters. His eyes clouded over as he remembered the events that went down.

You were brushing your short cropped, H/C hair, your young eyes trained on yourself in the mirror. The soft creaks of Bobby’s old house calmed you as you swayed slightly to the song on the radio on your dresser.

“Birdy? Can you come down for a moment?” Bobby called. Your lips twitched at the nickname he began calling you and you set down your hairbrush, bounding down the stairs and into the library.

An unfamiliar man stood in the room. He had brown hair and brown eyes, a starting of a beard dusting his face. The hard look in his eyes made you cringe, and you took Bobby’s hand in your own.

“Who’s this, Bobby?” The man asked, his gravelly voice piercing your ears.

“Y/N,” Bobby answered. He glanced down at you for a moment. “She’s my daughter.”

“Daughter?” Another voice said. A young boy, around thirteen walked into the room then, a sandwich in hand.

“I’m adopted,” You said, all the men looking down at you at the sound of your bell like voice. “I’m Y/N Y/L/N-Singer, pleased to meet you.”

The man smiled. “I’m John Winchester. This here is one of my boys, Sam.” Sam nodded at you and gave a friendly smile, taking another bite of his sandwich, his shaggy hair flopping at the movement.

“And I’m Dean,” Said yet another voice. Dean walked in, a beer and his own sandwich in hand. His green eyes locked on yours, a kind smile quickly spreading on his face. “You’re tiny!”

“You’re just big,” You bit back. Sam sniggered and you earned a smirk from Dean and a nod of approval.

“You got a nice kid here, Bobby,” He said.

“I know.” Bobby squeezed your hand.

“Hey kid, wanna go play outside?” Sam asked. You furrowed your brows and looked up at Bobby.

“Go ahead,” He said. You smiled and took off with Sam hot on your heels.

“So where are your parents?” Sam asked, his stick drawing designs in the dirt. The hot sun beat down on you two, baking the ground and your skin. You took a deep breath and began drawing the petals of your flower.

“They’re dead,” You said. “Bobby took me in. He’s more of a dad then my biological one anyway.”

“He’s a good guy.” Sam nodded. “How old are you?”

“Eleven,” You answered. “You?”

“Fourteen. Dean’s eighteen.”

“Where’s your mom?” You asked.

“Dead.”

“Oh. Sorry.”

“‘S okay. I never really knew her.” He shrugged sadly. “How’d your parents die?”

“A demon,” You said. “He was looking for me but found them instead.”

“Oh.”

“How’d your mom die?” You asked.

“A demon set her on fire on the ceiling of my nursery.”

“Oh… Yikes.”

“Yeah.”

“Sammy!” Dean’s voice rang through the junkyard. Sam sighed and got up, you following him. “Sam! Time to go!”

“I gotta run,” Sam said. “Thanks for hanging out with me.”

“Right back at ya,” You said. He gave you a quick hug and jogged over to his brother.

Bobby took a picture of you and Sam when the two of you weren’t paying attention. Your arms were around each other, embracing the blossoming friendship with open arms and warmed hearts.

***

Sam smiled at the memory. He thought you were a neat little kid. You were sarcastic and witty, but kind and gentle at the same time. Every now and again, the Winchesters would roll through town and the brothers became closer to you. He watched you grow, watched as your small crush for his older brother evolved into something much deeper. He had been rooting for you two since you were eighteen.

“I’ve got something,” Bobby said, his voice breaking Sam’s train of thought. The brothers glanced at each other and then got up from their seats, striding over to the older man. The peered over his shoulders, their eyes focusing on the page of the book he was reading.

“What is it?” Dean asked.

“Aamon. He’s a hybrid all right,” Bobby said. He let out a breath and shook his head. “Shoulda seen it coming.”

“Seen what coming?” Sam asked. The boys sat at the table with Bobby, their eyes trained intensely on the man as he began to tell Aamon’s story.

“Aamon is one of the oldest demons to ever live. He was in charge of his own legion in hell’s ‘military’. He’s the only hybrid Demon, which means there’s got to be some flaws to his making. Basically, Aamon’s hybrid side is partially dormant. It’s not at full power. However, there’s a spell that can be casted to awaken the hybrid side, bringing forth its full potential, inevitably leading to Aamon being one of the most powerful beings out there.”

“So, where does Y/N fall into all this?” Sam questioned.

“Well, for the spell to be casted, there are a handful of ingredients needed. For example-” He glanced down at the book- “Sulfur, hellebore, dragon’s blood, claw of a Chimera-”

“A Chimera?” Sam’s eyes widened. “Like, the greek mythological Chimera?”

“Yes, idjit, now can I read please?” Bobby gruffed. Sam slumped in his chair and let Bobby read. “And extracted Angel’s grace from an indirect source.”

“An indirect source?” Sam furrowed his brows.

“Yeah, which basically, it says here, can come from anywhere other that directly from an angel.”

“I still don’t understand where Y/N falls into all this,” Dean said. Sam and Bobby looked at each other, understanding suddenly dawning on the green eyes hunter’s face when he saw the looks his companions gave each other.

“It’s Y/N, isn’t it?” Dean choked. He felt as though his chest was tightening, fear and anxiety hitting him like a tidal wave as he suddenly felt the walls closing in on him. “She’s got the angel grace? She’s the final ingredient?”

Bobby nodded, a sullen weight falling heavy on all the men’s shoulders. No wonder Aamon had been so desperate to get to her. She was the final ingredient, the final key to unlocking his true powers.

“But there’s something else,” Bobby said.

“Jesus.” Sam dropped his head into his hands, his heart crashing in his chest with pure fear.

Bobby gulped and took a steadying breath, knowing that what he was about to say would be a game changer. He knew that the brothers would do anything to save Y/N, especially Dean, but with what came with Aamon’s spell, Bobby wasn’t sure even the Winchesters could stop him.

So gathering up his courage, he licked his lips and looked up at the boys. “Since hybrids are so rare and the spell is so tedious and powerful, unlocking a hybrid’s other side, allowing it to come to full power, is one of the potential sixty-six seals that could break Lucifer from Hell. If Aamon is successful, it’s not only allowing something incredibly dangerous into the world, but it’s allowing the devil himself one step closer to getting topside.”

THD series tag list:

@volleyballer519

@francezka10

@anime-music-is-life

@super–dale

@diariesofthebeautyobsessed

@weirdoblogger69

@hardworkingmidgetartist

@superdeadlucilenatural

@wingedcatninja

@waywardnerd67

@donnanoblerocks

@thewaywardvalkyrie

@docharleythegeekqueen

@fralackles

@blonde-ambitions

@lovelyrocker

@gracefullcowgirl

@arses21434

@deangirl7695

@raining-murder

@rubynationwins

@sammedeansandwhich

@lunasage96

@jotink78

@ashleydivine

@amanda-marie-1997

@brewsthespirit-blog

@dammit-brii

@imagine-inc

@jendee05

@moonstar86

@toomuchtv95

@jo-l-ab

@katsanders

@ms-sith

@mystriee

@mirandaaustin93

@nessadominquez

@woodworthti666

@aimee-ginge

@xristina-gkika

@carryonmaywaywardstar

@allykat2108

@just-a-fiction-lover

@gh0stgurl

@jules12345678910

@angelsandwinchesters

@shamelesslydean

@leah2901

@tiquismiquis

@vickyfarley

@marilynnlew

@mirandaaustin93

Forever tag list:

@jennalyncarrigan1230

@mogaruke

@kittyk26

@lurelarry

@luciferslucille

@cookiecakeslive

@wheres-my-cheese

@supernatural-strangerthings-1980

@sunnysaysbookreviews

@nyxveracity

@raining-murder

@just-a-supernatural-sister

@hi-my-name-is-riley

@thehufflepuffblog

@donnaintx

@pisces-cutie

@waywardnerd67

@waywardbaby

@alex-zeppelin

@jotink78

SPN tag lists:

@impatient-witch

@sandlee44

@blackcherrywhiskey

@ain-t-bovvered

Dean/Jensen tags:

@aubreystilinski

@whimsicalrobots

@dean-winchesters-bacon

#dean winchester #supernatural #angst #plus size!reader #dean x reader #dean winchester x read #dean x plus size!reader #dean winchester x plus size!reader #supernatural x reader #spn #spn x reader #supernatural fanfiction #sam winchester #jensen ackles #jared padalecki #misha collins #castiel #dean winchester fanfiction

140 notes · View notes

nivq87 · 6 years ago

Text

Deltarune thoughts

so I launched the survey program, and then after completing it, it pulled a flowey sorta and closed itself down. WHICH is how I learned that there’s save slots!

[spoilers on ahead]

which is neat cause I wanted to do some different stuff this time. specifically the mean stuff, and ALSO I was hoping I could access my file again because I forgot to go back and find the last piece of the key so I could unleash the basement freedom dude.

also it wasn’t until after I finished the survey program that I noticed that deltarune is an anagram of undertale. which is... really sad imo since we already knew about the delta rune back IN undertale. I am just that big a dumbass.not noticing for literal years.

ANYWAY, some thoughts from the first playthrough

the reason my save file is MEGAN instead of my usual handle is because I totally got tricked by toby again, the vessel got the name niv, and then when it asked about me, I was just kinda

first thing, Kris is cute, and I was super thrown by how empty their half the room was, it was pretty sad and i’m concerned for this kid too, how unhappy they must be. Seeing toriel gave me all kinds of :D feels, and the drive through town was nice, I thought maybe this was a post undertale game, this world they built.

then school and almost getting murdered by bullies and going to the underworld. The characters are cute and super funny. if you saw my post that was 90% punctuation, the happy face was about hugging raslei and then the dummy, it was just so super adorable.

I can’t remember any concrete thoughts about the story line itself, it seemed to speak for itself pretty well, until the end when ralsei did his teary goodbye, and revealed himself to look a lot like teen asriel. which, shoulda been obvious to me, but I think I already established that I need anagrams explained to me or I won’t notice.

walking back around the town was super disorienting too, because aside from toriel and asgore being divorced and having their kid asriel (who is at college apparently?) and besides the NEW characters, none of frisks old friends seemed to know each, other. Grillby is gone, and Sans bought the place and turned it into a grocery store (but at least is still a troll and I am a bonfide idiot baby). The brothers home didn’t have all their lights on it, and good ol papyrus won’t even open the door to talk to you. Apparently they just moved in the other day.

alphys and undyne don’t know each other, bratty and catty hate each other, I found the graves of gerson and snowy’s mom, the dog leader, and shyra. It was all very melancholy and othering and wrong. I explored the town and couldn’t find susie again. At the beginning, I forgot the classic undertale controls, so it wasn’t until after getting back to the school that I noticed up top in the light that it had the classic undertale interface.

Eventually I just go back to toriel, and to bed, and the part where kris just yanks their soul out, and caged it, and gives the fourth wall that murder look scared the shit out of me, and I just have SO MANY QUESTIONS. WHAT IS HAPPENING??

why is everything so wrong? why is everything so christian? why is everything so heteronormative? why is kris the only human in monster town? why is deltarune the beforus of homestuck? the WoD of WoW? (which is extra apt to me since the last boss of the game has the mouth stomach and gorefiend was a wod raid boss then lol)

then I went all the say back to go find the last key piece and apparently there’s just this optional boss fight way back here, who reminds me of of lil cal. stupid laughing murder clowns. stupid murder jesters named jevil. stupid me taking way too long to notice he can use all the card suites because he’s a jester.

unfortunately, I suck at games too much to win, and I am sleepy and have a cold. when I went to try and Be a Douche, I realized that I can’t, not really, that’s not a choice I can make in this game. At most, people seem a little meaner. I was curious for sure if susie would still leave even thought I was fighting everything else.

The only significant change was that at the end, instead of a moshpit, the king is tired and ralsei casts pacify on him. Lancer doesn’t even seem perturbed about the beat down he got? he’s just like, ‘yeah that’ll happen, oh look he’s even having a beauty nap!’ but the people we beat up are beating down the doors to the throne room to get at us, and ralsei hurries us out, does the face reveal, and there’s no time for good byes, ‘because we’re the bad guys so we only have bad byes’ thanks lancer. anyway, the king is still in power, no governmental overthrow this time.

the town and the end scene in the bedroom was no different after doing all that, but I might have to and redo the last fight a few times, see if the end is any different after being a douche and then talking down the king

#Why am I rambling #undertale #deltarune #technically typed this all up ON halloween #but I'm not posting until tomorrow anyway #and then I went and added more anyway on the first #oh well

6 notes · View notes

arabian-bloodstream · 6 years ago

Text

Shoulda ended with Adam/Hannah

My final summation could be completely wrong, total bs. I admit that freely. I am a huge Adam Driver fan, but I didn't plan on watching Girls because I dislike Lena Dunham *that* much, however my adoration and lust for him grew too strong that I couldn't resist. I wound up bingeing the show in a week. Unsurprisingly, I loved Adam Sackler. Very surprisingly, I loved Dunham's character, Hannah, and I loved Hannah/Adam as a couple. I can't say I "enjoyed" watching the ups and downs so much because I wasn't horribly fond of Jessa, but as the final season drew to a close, based on the narrative, I expected some sort of conclusion that promised some kind of path towards Hannah and Adam.

That such didn't happen was very disappointing because that narrative was so there not only throughout the series, but yeah, in that final season quite pronounced. In that final episode, I understood why all four of the girls weren't there because they had grown apart and it was Hannah's journey, but three people accepted/loved and/or grew to love Hannah from the first episode (Hannah herself, Marnie and Adam). Those three should have been there at the end.

As I wrote above, I was not expecting a happily-ever-after. Girls was not that kind of show, but I really do think that Adam should have been there. And it would have made perfect sense because Adam always came back and the narrative was there ALL SEASON LONG. During the final season several things happened that made an inevitable reunion of sorts between Adam and Hannah, as well as the dissolution of Adam and Jessa. It simply made narrative sense. Including what happened between Adam and Hannah the few episodes prior that did NOT provide closure of any kind. Sorry, not sorry, but it did not. Let's make a list, shall we?

1. We found out that it was Jessa who had pushed Adam towards Mimi Rose while Hannah was away. This A) presented Jessa in a not very good light in that it showed her not respecting Hannah as a friend, and B) not respecting Adam as a person, and C) not respecting Hannah and Adam's relationship.

*That* is likely why Jessa had no problem setting up Adam with Mimi Rose, or getting with him after he'd dated one of her supposed best friends. She clearly never thought that he and Hannah were anything more than fuck buddies who hung out and watched stupid movies occasionally and ate junk food. Jessa had no clue that Adam and Hannah were *actually* in love. Like deeply, truly IN LOVE. That they shared like in depth, down deep stuff together, were there for one another, encouraged one another, became better people with one another and for one another. She had no fucking clue.

2. And that is what we found out in the final season: That Jessa was entirely ignorant as to the depth of Adam and Hannah's relationship. While Adam was filming scenes during his film about said relationship with Hannah we saw twice that Jessa had no idea as to what had actually gone on during that relationship. The first was during the spanking/sex scene. After it was over, Jessa suggested that Adam wasn't playing it right, thinking he should be playing it annoyed with 'Hannah' and not quite enjoying the sexual antics, while Adam blithely assured her that it was totally cool and that it was as he remembered it.

Later, during a scene when Adam was with 'Hannah' while she was recovering from her OCD and Adam was comforting her during some major insecurities about his love for her, Jessa had quite the issue with that. She didn't understand why this film was playing out like some great Adam/Hannah love story since according to Jessa all Adam and Hannah supposedly did was, yeah, watch stupid movies and eat junk food on the couch.

What was also interesting--and again, the show made a clear point of this twice--was that Adam did not get or care what Jessa was saying. Adam didn't get that Jessa was upset or why she was upset. He didn't get or care that Jessa was bothered that he was making an ode to his love story with Hannah and that the film wasn't in any way about his supposed love story with Jessa. Nor did he seem to get that Jessa didn't understand his relationship with Hannah, nor did he get that she was bothered that he had remembered having that kind of relationship with her. This showed a complete lack of communication and understanding between Adam and Jessa, not just about Adam and Hannah, but about his film, thus his craft… and the only things that we were shown *ever* that Adam truly cared about were Hannah and his craft. And Adam didn't care that Jessa was clueless about both.

3. Adam needed, desperately needed, Hannah to watch his movie. He said it was about closure. But was it really? They were over and had been over for quite some time. So it wasn't that; it was just Adam once again needing Hannah. Full-stop. Period. Like always. Because Hannah and Adam always go back to one another. And that was clear when Hannah watched the movie. And the moments that Adam chose to write, and film. "Bed's getting cold." His look of love and longing into the camera… to a departing Hannah. And Adam wanted… NEEDED Hannah to watch this. And Hannah was indeed watching and this is how the episode ended, leaving that final impression not only on Hannah, but on the audience as well. And *that* was the impression left *for* the audience in the show too: Adam was looking into the camera, i.e., looking at the person watching him and who was watching him? Hannah. The real Hannah. Just as Adam had begged her to and Adam was telling Hannah in so many words, You are gone and I miss you. That is why Adam needed Hannah to watch his film. He needed her to know that.

4. When Adam and Hannah briefly got back together for one day, he told her when discussing him and Jessa that the two of them would have flamed out in about four months anyway. Where were we at series end? Oh, about four months from that point.

5. Adam and Hannah spent literally ONE DAY trying to get back together. ONE DAY in which they dealt with exactly ZERO of their issues…

Not the fact that Hannah couldn't handle no longer being the only thing that Adam cared about anymore.

Not the fact that Adam moved out on Hannah to practice his craft instead of dealing with Hannah's insecurities.

Not the fact that Hannah left Adam to go to another state to study her writing despite his emotional issues and inability to handle such a thing.

Not the fact that Adam began dating someone else without telling Hannah and moved her into Hannah's apartment.

Not the fact that Adam dated one of her best "friends."

Without trying to deal with any of these they couldn't truly even begin to enjoy the positives of why they were together again, the growth they'd both experienced. Because they KEEP COMING BACK TO ONE ANOTHER through the years, because they completely get one another. Because, no matter what, they have each other's backs. Because they love one another, are in love one another, sure, they fall out of love, but yet, they keep falling back in love with one another.

6. Jessa and Adam worked better as friends. When featured in a romantic or sexual situation, they were not good. Their first sexual encounter was plain bad. They had rampaging, horrible, violent, sexually-tinged fights. They were only presented two times romantically in a good light and neither were *for* Adam and Jessa as a couple. The first was when meeting Jessa's sister; that was all about Jessa's character, revealing a bit of her history, telling us who and why she was. The other was during Adam's play (with Jessa watching from across the apartment) and that was all about Hannah figuring out that Jessa and Adam were fucking. OK, to be fair, there was one romantic interlude that was about them. The day they went to the fair, but they were still friends who were teetering on the edge of becoming lovers... and Adam was the ex of one of Jessa’s best friends, which, again, *is* problematic!

Other than that we saw Jessa and Adam as friends who fucked or as combatants who fucked. That was pretty much it. There was no actual love story there. Jessa and Adam didn't have any semblance of an actual romantic love story. No, neither were the main character, but we saw more of that kind of romance for Jessa and her husband (their wedding really was beautiful, Adam was right), and Marnie, and Shoshana with various guys they were involved with than we ever did with Jessa and Adam–one of the main four "Girls" and arguably the main "guy" of the series. Yes, yes, they were more "popular" than this couple or that couple, but honestly, can we not say that a potentially big part of that isn't because of Adam Driver/Sackler's popularity and Lena Dunham/Hannah's lack thereof and the desire to see one without the other?

So what changed? I don't know. Because the narrative was freaking THERE! It. Was. There! Maybe Adam Driver wasn't available at all for the final episode. Maybe Lena Dunham really is as petty as she's come across time and time again and Adam Driver's success made her decide, 'Fuck it! He has all this success now, I'm not giving him the girl too in *my* show!' Maybe I’m just thinking it’s that because I'm still pissed off by her calling him out in that speech she gave at SXSW in 2014 because she missed a fairly important detail, I feel.

"People are ready to see Adam play a million different guys in one year – from lotharios to villains to nerds. Meanwhile Allison Williams, Jemima Kirke and Zosia Mamet are still waiting for parts they can get interested in."

That quote would have a lot more girl-power and feel less like an attack on Adam Driver and 'Wah! Why does Hollywood keep casting HIM?!!' if she hadn't had another male series regular in her cast (Alex Karpovsky, Ray) at the time and another who was recurring (Andrew Rannells, Elijah), but currently or just about to begin filming the next season in which he too would be *another* male series regular in her cast. So... three male series regulars in her cast opposed to four female series regulars and she mentioned (aside from herself) only the other three female regulars which makes it a fair ratio and only one of the male series regulars was getting roles.

However, that one actor out of three getting roles is an attack on feminism because the three females on her show are not? What about the two other males who weren't getting roles? Were they chopped liver? No, Lena, Adam Driver was/is just THAT FUCKING GOOD. Remember, his role was supposed to just be the "handsome carpenter" in the Pilot episode, but he was THAT FUCKING GOOD to you too that you wound up expanding his role to that of essentially the show's male lead… *that* is why "people are ready to see Adam play a million different guys in one year." Pfft!

Of course (see disclaimer at the top of the post), I could be wrong. Dunham could have just decided that a miserable Hannah, unable to breast-feed her child, alone with only Marnie--triumphant as THE ultimate best friend--was the way to go while Adam was stuck in a problematic relationship with Jessa, despite all narrative signs pointing to an eventual reunion of some sorts with Hannah. I don't know.

Whatever.

As far as I'm concerned the series didn't end where it did. I tack on an additional 30 seconds. Cut to that final scene of Hannah trying to breastfeed Grover and she hears a noise. She looks up and there's Adam walking towards her. She has a WTF? look on her face. He stops, says 'Hey, Kid.' There's one final shot of Hannah, and this time there's a slight smile on her face, slightly confused, slightly hopeful. End scene. End series. Boom. That's my ending.

#adam driver #adam/hannah #lena dunham #girls #i haz a theory #shoulda been adam & hannah #adam sackler #hannah horvath #adam & hannah

53 notes · View notes

andthentheresanne · 6 years ago

Text

Fic: raised on the edge of the devil’s backbone

Title: raised on the edge of the devil’s backbone Fandoms: Overwatch & Leverage Characters/Pairings: Jesse McCree, The Leverage OT3 (Parker/Eliot/Hardison) Summary: Jesse grew up on fairy tales where the bad guys are good guys and all justice needs is a little leverage. He hasn't believed in fairy tales for a long time.

They hadn’t meant to leave their children a war, the three of them, but that's the way the world crumbled.

Aka the Leverage/Overwatch crossover that no one actually asked for.

Blame a re-watch of Leverage, McCree starring in my other current WIP, and a certain line about a huckleberry.

(I'm aware the timeline doesn't quite work out (as far as I can tell), but I'm not one to let a plot weasel go to waste.)

The stories that his folks told him and his sisters, growing up, Jesse knew that they were nothing more than bedtime stories. Fairy tales to try and convince a couple of kids that the world was not always as bad as it had once been. Or rather, that it had, but that there had been heroes once. That someone had cared enough to do something. That before the world had fallen apart, there had been heroes, and champions, and people willing to do what was right.

His mother and fathers had thought the world of the three of them, their kids. They never told the kids which one of them was whose--it didn't matter, they were family. Sophia had gotten their mother’s blonde hair, curling out in a frizz. Maggie never freckled, saw systems with her startlingly blue eyes like a game she could beat. All three of them got their mother’s light fingers, their fathers’ quick minds, their own unique talents. All with that big heart lying under everything that would’ve buried it deep beneath the simple business of trying to survive in a world gone mad.

They hadn’t meant to leave their children a war. Jesse once remembered a whispered argument, or so it had sounded, between his folks, late at night when the kids were all in bed, supposedly. His mother, insisting they could have done more. Papa reassuring her in hushed tones, Dad gripping the back of the chair like it could give answers if he squeezed hard enough.

His mother’s final foray into blaming herself in some way was met with Dad thumping the palm of his hand onto the back of the chair. “Gonna check on the kids,” Dad muttered to the other two as he walked toward where Jesse had been hiding on the stairs.

Dad hadn’t been fooled for a second at Jesse’s curled-up form under the blankets, feigning sleep. He’d heard the thumping of little feet trying to not thump. Unlike his sisters he hadn’t quite learned that skill yet. Dad sat down on his bed, ruffling his hair with a fond hand. “Hey, kiddo. What’re you doing up at this hour?”

Jesse had given up the play-acting immediately, sitting up in bed, giving a shrug. “Dunno. Couldn’t sleep.”

“Were you eavesdropping?”

“Yeah.” He didn’t even think of denying it. “Mom says it’s how you learn things sometimes.”

Dad laughed, but it didn’t sound like the kind of laugh you gave when you were happy. “There is that.”

Jesse twisted up his mouth in a frown, not understanding most of what he’d heard. “What’d mom mean? When she, when she was talking about stopping the robots?”

His father’s calloused hand stroked through Jesse’s hair as he thought, soothing. “There are a lotta woulda, coulda, shouldas in this world. Your mom’s just thinking about one of those. That’s all.”

Jesse didn’t understand it, but couldn’t figure out how to get around that not-understanding in his head, so he let it go. Years later, when he was older, there were so many questions he regretted not asking, but back then he was a child, and if Dad said it was so, then it was so.

Jesse once remembered a time when he thought his parents had stolen the stars to hang in the sky, believed his mother when she said the moon was the greatest heist she just hadn’t pulled yet, thought his fathers could protect him and his sisters from the rest of the world.

That had been a long time ago.

He always knew his parents were criminals of some kind, but then, who wasn’t, in this new world? There were the criminals and the dead, eventually. Even if some of those crimes were small, petty things, things that a court, if things still worked the way they once had, wouldn’t even bother with. Neglect and little cruelties that leaked through into his sheltered world on occasion. He was the youngest, the baby, but he had a good eye. Jesse never missed much, growing up.

Jesse feels like his world should have been shattered in a single moment or maybe night of high drama, fleeing and blood and darkness. Something suitably dramatic, like something out of one of his parents’ stories. But instead their safety had seeped away, drips and drabs and long nights sleeping in the back of Papa’s van as his folks drove.

He remembers his folks arguing long and low with Sophia, that night she left. That she felt she could make a difference in this fight, and wasn’t that what they had always taught her? And Dad’s eyes seemed so far away and Mom seemed like she was gonna cry and Pops circled back to the arguments he’d pulled out forty minutes before.

In the end, she had left with one of Dad’s friends, Mom whispering advice into her hair and Pops reassuring her that if she changed her mind, at any moment, they’d be there, all she had to do was say the word, and…

“You’re really going?”

Sophia crouched, ruffling his hair. Jesse swiped it back into place. “I got to, baby bro.”

Jesse crossed his arms, half-self-consciously trying to mimic one of Dad’s poses. She just laughed, gathering him into a hug. “Don’t give me that look. I’ll keep in touch. And I’ll be back.”

“You promise?”

“I promise.”

Jesse learned later not to make promises he couldn’t keep. He never blamed her for that one, but it had still hurt. Never officially declared, of course. Things had been too chaotic, by then. But Pops had looked and looked, and every time Dad would come back without Sophia and it seemed like something in Mom went behind a locked door, after that. A door he didn’t know how to open, even with all his parents had taught him.

Maggie hadn’t even been a victim of the war, not really. First responders went into dangerous and deadly situations all the time, Jesse knew that. That building could have collapsed on anyone. Jesse knew, but it didn’t make it any better.

Not for his folks, either. They clung to him tighter, but got more distant, Jesse the one thing they hadn’t lost yet, besides each other. They whispered in secrets to each other more often, Dad going hard-eyed and tight-lipped whenever Jesse was around. No more easily-forgiven eavesdropping in those days. The other problem was that the tighter they held onto Jesse, the more his budding teenage rebellion grew. He stopped trying to listen in, stopped trying to get behind those doors and walls all three of his parents had hidden themselves behind, and so he drifted away.

He remembers the last time he saw them, though maybe not exactly as it happened. He isn’t sure how much of a teenage asshole he was. A fair bit of one, he knows, from the way Pops had rolled his eyes, from Mom’s pained smile. He remembers Dad was serious, drilling Jesse on where the emergency cash was, how to get out, what to do, when, how, Jesse playing along in pre-teen irony.

Dad caught the irony, of course. Did that thing where he looked like four different things tried to come out of his mouth at once, and finally gave up, grabbing Jesse in a crushing hug. “Dad!”

Despite protest, Dad hadn’t let him go for a good long moment. “Hold down the fort for us.” Abruptly he released Jesse, bracing him, then turned and grabbed up his duffel in one swift motion.

Pops watched him go, then pulled Jesse into a hug too, far less over-bearing than Dad’s had been. “What your dad said.”

Jesse was a little unnerved now, the weirdness of the situation seeping through his ironic detachment. “Y-yeah, of course, Pops.”

Then it was mom’s turn for a brisk squeeze of a hug and she was leaving too. House to himself for a weekend, that’s what they had told him. He had believed them.

“We’ll be back,” Mom nodded firmly, then shut the door behind her.

At least she hadn’t promised, Jesse thought later. After.

Jesse was never sure what happened to them, still isn’t. Heard rumors, of course. He could have found out, he was sure, sifted through everything and found the truth hidden among the lies. But he chose to believe the stories he’d heard, the ones that sounded like a fairytale, full of justice and honor and a little bit of payback. He’d been worried, then scared, then everything his folks had taught him had kicked in. Before he knew it he was going down the only path open to him, the one to survival.

Later on, after the blood on his hands and a second chance, Jesse still chose to believe in something. Maybe it wasn’t your traditional fairy story, but a man had to have something to cling to. And what Jesse knew was that maybe there was justice to be found in the world, and maybe there wasn’t, but you couldn’t do a damn thing without leverage

#leverage #overwatch #the leverage ot3 #jesse mccree #my fic #crossover fic #fic weasels #¯\_(ツ)_/¯#angst #timeline what timeline #no editing we die like the heroes we are

3 notes · View notes

jamesongrond · 6 years ago

Text

ADAM

The machine is broken... and so is he.

A short story about robots, and what gets left behind. (2660 words)

“ADM-119, full diagnostics.”

“Of course,” the machine said with a smirk that should not have been, the left side of its face remaining resolutely neutral even as it tried to smile. When the right eyelid slid shut, the left only drooped, leaving a crescent of white and gleaming mahogany brown.

Partial left side paralysis, Sal thought, wheeling his chair around the machine in a rough, jerky circle. Looks like it continues down into the neck, from the way its head tilts. Could be a defective nerve-line. Sal couldn’t remember if the ADM-Models had old-fashioned central trunks or the newer radial systems, and Peterson Robotics had gone out of business so long ago even the International Technical Archive didn’t have copies of the schematics. All he had to go on was a quick-start guide he’d found on a hobbyist’s forum for old first-gen ‘droids, and that didn’t contain anything more useful than reset instructions and a handful of general error codes.

The wheel of his chair scraped against the battered wall and he cursed as another dusting of plaster scattered across the faux hardwood. He was in the middle of an awkward three-point turn when the ‘droid chimed, a merry little tune somewhere between a midi file and birdsong.

“ADM-119!” Sal called over his shoulder, muttering a curse as he fumbled at the controls and slammed the footrest of the chair into the wall. Good thing I don’t have fucking feet. “Gimme audio.”

“Of course.” The machine tried to smile again, and began to read out the codes, long alphanumeric sequences that might have been helpful as hell if Sal could interpret anything beyond the first five characters. E-5512 meant the ‘droid couldn’t sense heat for shit; M-1N54 meant unresponsive mechanics (no surprise there); FC-19C was some kind of module crash, probably the gastronomic subroutines, if his mother’s constant complaints about horseradish on her pasta were any indication.

Sal had told her to get rid of the busted old junker half a hundred times. He’d even bought her a replacement, a shiny new CASSIDY model she’d never even taken out of the packaging, just stowed under the porch until a stray dog came running out with a mouth full of sparking meta-fiber.

“Adam’s family,” she’d wailed at him. “You don’t throw away family!”

He’d bit his tongue at that one, so hard he tasted blood.

“Shall I attempt repairs?” the machine asked when it finished reading out the codes. Sal had his chair turned around by then, but he was still to the thing’s left, and when it turned to look at him its head twisted queerly to the side, like some kind of shiny plastic owl.

“Who fuckin’ knows, maybe eighth time’s the charm,” Sal muttered, jerking his chair back in front of it. What I need is a system restore drive, he thought. Too bad they stopped making them during the fucking Almasi administration. “You know what, fine. Go ahead. Can’t fuckin’ hurt, can it?”

The machine gave him another aborted attempt at a smile and knelt, joints creaking. One and a half of its eyes slid shut. It should have remained upright, but instead it slumped to the side like something dead, arms and legs at strange angles.

Sal stared through it for a while, then forced himself to look down at his wrist. The display on his medi-bracelet read 3:02 PM. I need a fucking drink, he thought, jabbing at the controls of his chair with a hand beginning to shake.

Rickard the Wonder Aide wouldn’t let him buy anything harder than individual cans of weak, watery Jefferson Red, and even that he had to ration, lest the mighty eye of the disapproving motherland fall upon him. He only had one left, shoved into the back of the fridge behind the latest load of lab-grown simulacra that Rickard called food. Reaching in as far as he could, his fingertips just barely brushed the cool bio-plastic rim.

“God damn it,” he muttered, reaching for the controls of his chair — but no, if he moved forward any farther, the footrest might get caught in the fucking freezer handle again. Just a couple more inches, he thought, undoing the buckle around his waist.

Some time later, the machine chimed, calling out in its lyrical, buzzy voice. Sal hissed a curse and fumbled desperately at the blood-slick brake.

“Hello,” the machine said pleasantly as it appeared in the archway, a shadow with a trio of blinking stars in the center of its chest. “You appear to be in distress. May I be of assistance?”

“Fuck off,” Sal spat through gritted teeth, pawing at the handle. “I don’t need your fucking help.”

“Of course,” the machine replied, with what might have been a head-bow or might have been a curious tilt or might have been a misfiring component making its head rock on its shoulders like the stupid bobble-heads Jason used to collect. Sal forced himself to take a breath, grabbed hold of the brake as tight as he could, and pushed.

The slick plastic slid out from beneath his hand. The chair rolled backwards. He fell forward hard, chin cracking against the linoleum.

“Fuck,” he shouted through his teeth. The heel of his hand pounded against the wheel of the chair, each blow pushing it further backward. “Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.”

“May I be of assistance?” the android asked.

“No!” Sal made a fist, fingertips digging into the gash the cheap wire fridge shelf had left in his palm as he tried to catch himself. “I got myself into this, I can get myself the fuck out. Just fucking… Don’t touch me.”

“Of course,” the machine said with another wobble.

The effort of dragging himself forward by the only limb he still had left left him sucking in air with ragged, heaving breaths. His vision blurred. The LEDs in the machine’s chest blinked like eyes, like monitors, measuring his progress with the same cold clinical efficiency as the VA butchers. The handle within reach, he shifted as much of his weight as he could stand onto the aching stump of his right arm and tried to push it down with the left.

It started to roll, then stopped.

The shadow of the machine stood over him, hand resting lightly on the back of his chair. A curse came to his lips. He bit it back, and grabbed for the brake. This time, the lever went down.

He half expected the machine to come over, scoop him up, plop him back into his seat as if he were a child, the way the VA staff did every time he fell. It didn’t. It watched him, and when he finally managed to pull his torso up onto the padded, sweat-stained faux-leather, it gave him one of its strange lopsided smirks.

“Fuck off,” Sal mumbled. “Stupid… Stupid broken piece of shit. Shoulda thrown m… thrown you out years ago.”

The machine smiled, but did not reply.

— — —

“Well,” Sal sighed, “that module is irretrievably fucked.”

He had asked for pancakes. The things before him matched the definition on the whole, but in their specifics, they rather missed the mark. Black bits of liquorice studded the golden-brown pancake fluff, barbecue sauce glistened in artful designs across the top, and the whole plate smelled strongly of garlic.

“If you would like me to attempt a re-install—”

“Don’t bother,” Sal said, wincing at the pain in his bandaged palm as he pulled back from the table. “Servers have been down for decades.”

I need that fucking system restore drive, he thought as he wheeled back into the living room. He’d been looking for days, had three different bots and two RS feeds pinging him at any mention, but so far all he had were component sales: an arm here, a knee-joint there, the occasional hip. All the processors and memory banks had been bricked, discarded, or simply stopped working years ago.

He pulled in behind his desk. The machine had moved it farther from the wall, giving him enough room to maneuver without cutting new gouges in the sheet rock. He hadn’t asked it to — hadn’t asked it to do much of anything, aside from diagnostics and tests — but the ADM models had been designed as home care specialists, given a little more leeway in their decision-making than other first-gen ‘droids in order to compensate for a generation of crotchety Pre-Revolution holdouts too proud to ask a glorified appliance for help. Like me, Sal thought with a huff, though he had been born twenty years too late for that particular moniker.

He’d wanted to get into the bleeding edge of AI research — sentience sims, genuine emotion, evolutionary robotics — but by the time he graduated, the Sanderson/Wodehouse bill had passed and that ship had sailed into the less-regulated third-world horizon. The army had still been working on artificial analytics and he’d figured it was the next best thing.

His medi-alert bracelet buzzed and flashed a little red pill. Sal frowned, blinking away the afterimages in his head, and thumbed at the controls. His meds were—

On the desk.

The four bottles were half a foot away, the proper dosages measured out and placed neatly on the caps. Beside them were a glass of water and a cup of pudding with a spoon on top.

“Huh,” Sal said. Against the far wall, ADM stood, one side of its mouth drawn up in that stupid, somehow knowing smirk. His eyes on the machine, Sal scooped up the pills, tossed them in his mouth, and swallowed.

— — —

For the last three years, Sal’s prosthetic arm had sat beneath his bed, slowly gathering dust. The VA would only pay for the cheapest model, and grit and dust and bits of bullshit were always getting into the mechanics, gumming it up and turning the robotic limb into little more than an extremely complicated hook. It needed to be cleaned every day to be usable, half the mechanism disassembled in order to replace the lubricant, and he couldn’t do it one-handed. Rickard the Wonder Aide had done it for a while, but he didn’t come in person anymore. No-one did.

ADM cradled the arm in his lap like an infant. The stiff fingers of his left hand slowed him down, but only to the point where Sal could follow the motions, one flowing into the next like ink on waves.

Sal tapped his fingers against the control panel of his chair, thinking. His mother had called — she wanted her Adam back, was getting impatient. Rickard wanted to know why his food budget had suddenly tripled. Two of his freelance programming gigs were overdue, a third on the cusp.

He’d found a system restore drive.

The listing had been up for six and a half years. He’d assumed it was inactive, but the poster had responded to his query letter eight hours ago. The drive had been sitting in their garage for almost two decades, but they’d plugged it in to an old Peterson desktop they had lying around and swore it worked. They could have it delivered by Monday.

He’d left the tab open. The thin line of the cursor blinked in the periphery of his vision, waiting for him to respond.

He had no idea what he wanted to say.

With a faint pop, ADM disengaged the elbow joint and began to wipe away the crust of blackened lubricant with a cloth. The paralysis on the left side of his mouth made the right look quirked up, as if he were pleased with his work.

Stupid pile of junk, Sal forced himself to think. For the first time in years, the words felt wrong.

His parents had insisted on meeting him at the airport, the day he came home. Jason had been there too. Sal would never have let him come if he’d known, but they never told him. They wanted it to be a surprise.

There had been calls. Emails. Physical paper correspondence, for fuck’s sake. They knew. They’d been warned. Somehow, it never got through to any of them that ‘lost’ meant lost.

Jason had been holding a sign with Sal’s name on it in rainbow letters, surrounded with hearts and dinosaur stickers. It had blocked his view as Sal came over the crest of the escalator, and when Sal’s mother screamed, he’d looked at her first, giving Sal enough time to find their faces in the crowd. Giving him enough time to witness Jason’s expression shift from confusion to horror to disgust.

By the time Sal reached ground level, Jason was gone, the sign trampled under half a hundred feet. He was supposed to drive them all home, so they waited; one hour, two, a third. Sal’s mother couldn’t look at him. His father couldn’t do anything but. They went out to look for Jason’s car, but that was gone too, which meant a taxi, which meant another hour and a half stranded in the middle of the surging, staring crowd while they waited for one large enough for three people and a chair. Even then, it took another fifteen agonizing minutes for his father to beat the chair into submission. It had never rolled right after that.

Rickard talked a lot about vicarious traumatization, emotional exhaustion, survivor’s guilt. Sal had shouted at him, cursed and raged, and when he was done Rickard got up and left without a word. He’d never come back, any more than Jason had.

Once the joint was clean, ADM applied the new lubricant in one graceful swirl, then fit the pieces back together. The elbow moved smoothly now, with none of the crackling stickiness it had had before. The android’s head wobbled on its shoulders in a motion that might have been a nod.

Someone programed that, Sal thought as he watched the android reassemble the arm. Someone designed it to smile. The thought felt strange, somehow. No-one had ever designed it to smirk, but when it held up the completed arm it did, with a wryness that had never been planned, never been intended, that never would have been at all if not for a broken nerve.

Swallowing, Sal held out the stump of his arm. The android strapped the prosthetic in place. The socket didn’t fit quite right anymore, but it was close enough for the electrodes to meet. He’d forgotten which muscle moved what, and for a moment the arm twitched and spasmed and bile rose in his throat, tasting of smells he couldn’t forget and sensations he didn’t want to remember. Then ADM touched his shoulder, and the knots in his stomach went away.

A few minutes later, he was making a fist, curling in his fingers one by one, making rude gestures. He huffed, and then for the first time in years he laughed, a strange hiccup that became a sob halfway up his throat.

“You appear to be in distress,” ADM said softly. “May I assist you?”

Sal nodded.

The android undid the straps. Scooped Sal up in his arms, carried him through the strips of old sheet that served as his bedroom door. Lay him down in the nest of rumpled blankets that was his bed. The ‘droid wrapped the softest around him, so tightly he could barely move, then padded off to fetch a glass, a bottle of water, and, for some reason, an entire miniature watermelon.

This time, when Sal laughed, it came out all the way.

— — —

Sent 8:46 16/10/2067 by [email protected]

thanks for the reply. unfortunately im no longer interested in the drive. the problem sort of fixed itself.

gl selling it tho

sal

——————

Sent 9:16 17/10/2067 by [email protected]

No Problem Man

BTW I Have Other Old Peterson Tech If Your Interested. Even Got An ADAM Model. Mostly Intact — Just Needs A New Power Source. Could Salvage From Yours For Complete Unit?

——————

Sent 8:46 16/10/2067 by [email protected]

thanks man, but na

i'm good

#android fiction #androids #android #science fiction #scifi #sci-fi #short fiction #fiction #short stories #short story #robots #robot #cyberpunk #i guess?#jameson grond

1 note · View note

tylerwritez · 3 years ago

Text

Saturday, June 19 2021

I dont know how I feel about the day yet cos right now its only 10:13. I dont post these exactly on the days I write them, but I write them on these exact days nonetheless.

My throat still hurts, my ass hurts, oUch,.... I'm sure you know why. Like, when you suck dick, it takes throat strength to make sure you don't fucking vomit everywhere and like. I OBVIOUSLY dont have that strength since I had to wash vomit outta my hair this morning

Hes so hot tho oh. My god.

Whatever. New day. So we talk about new things.

Star seems kinda sad but I dont really know why? She said on her story that people dont really go outta their way to talk to her... idk. I shot a good morning dm and now I'm here. I made my bed. Packed up my shit. Every time we pack things up my parents rage cos they always find shit they dont want to see: monster cans, evidence of my self harm, etc.

We have 1 more week then school is OVER and I move outta this house cos of the divorce. Jay will be gone too... I still have his insta, but I might ask for his number... just in case. I always get weirdly attached to people I fuck even if there was never any romantic part of the relationship. We are just friends.

Apparently we are going to the pick n pack today with my friend let's call her Zara. It's notfar off from her real name but whatever. Basically pick n pack is where you go to a vegetable garden and pick vegetables

I have a test soon but idk if I'll study for it. I NEVER really put work into studying or pay attention in class and I'm holding an 82 average. I got a 39 once, so once I retake that quiz I might be in the 90s. Sorry Mr. Renal, I simply can't bring myself to care about your class 😢

I LOVE my art class tho. It's just doing ART!!!! ART TIME!!!! Art is the best and I would post some of mine but my irls would proabably find me then. Like my name isnt ACTUALLY Jude Shepard. I'm just using it as a penname and also cos that's what they called me in my dream. But other than that everything I tell y'all is real. I'm making buttered toast rn.

3:38 p.m. sat june 19th

I've decided to include a song recommendation with every entry. Today's recommendation: A Match Into Water by Pierce The Veil

Okay so it turns out we didnt go to pick n pack with Zara. Instead we went to downtown... White Ave. It was sunny n we walked a bit, got lemonades and a bit of candy, went into stores, idk. BUT. The notable part of this is that next to the farmers market there were all the usual activist groups: falun gong, vegan, whatever... but one of them looked like it was a LEFTIST GROUP, possible marxist.

I wanted to talk to them so badly and wanted to see how I could help the cause. See, I'm a communist. AND IM NOT HERE TO DEBATE THAT. I'm here to talk about my days. Anwyays I wanted to talk to them sO BADLY. but my parents wouldn't leave me alone. And like. I hate political discussion with them. They just upset me and they get mad and I CANT AFFORD TO MAKE THEM MAD. I play everything that goes on with me on the Down Low, I dont talk about anything about myself because if I do, I get less freedom in my life. They have control in my life, so I have to appease them. Because of this, I unfortunately did not get to talk to the communists :(

Hopefully they're still there next time... I'm kinda mad >:(

Also Star replied to my good morning text... I told her to have fun shopping since that's what she told me she was gonna do... she just said "thanks" and I was concerned because THATS NOT HOW SHE TYPES? I feel like shes sad over something but i dont know what.

The day me and Jacob did stuff, I was supposed to walk her to her bus stop like I always do. But I didnt (duh) I took Jacob home.

But IT WAS ONE! DAY. And I told her my dad called me over so.... I apologized too and she seemed mad at herself, but in the way that's intended to make you feel bad.

I dont understand her sometimes. I LOVE HER. DON'T GET ME WRONG. I love her so so much shes such a great supportive funny attractive girl! But soemtimes she gets upset and I can never tell why: is it the depression? Is it me? Is it soemthing else entirely? And she'll never tell me.

Whatever, I'll ask her how she is tonight and maybe we can Talk :/

I might never tell her about Jay... :P I might never tell ANYONE about Jay. It's our little secret I guess >:))))))

Man see? I'm no saint. I guess that's what'll make this blog worth reading. I'm a bit conflicted about the whole thing cos I KNOW this is morally not right but. I'm doing it anyways. What can I say? I'm used to lying and hiding things for my benefit. I had to do it to survive and now? Now I do it for funsies.

I'm gonna pack some more stuff, TTYL ♡

UPDATE: we had to go look at houses for the move (since my parents r divorcing) and I didnt get to pack much of anything yet

I'm definently over my cal limit today...

Cold sweet or carbonated drinks help with my throat pain so I'm downing them like they're NOTHING and since we have no zero cal cold drinks I'm DEAD... and no, water does NOTHING.

Jeez, its raining out.

And FUCK JAY cos hes still on my mind.

Its 4:11 p.m. now.

Its now 7:56 p.m.

I kinda feel like an edgy main character in an edgy movie rolling up to the park and sitting #alone in the Treez like the emo band music video protagonist I am.

Sometimes its exhausting to talk to people I care about in a serious way or that I talk to in a more sincere manner like Star and Jay and others. Even if they're just friends. If our interactions are serious and not really casual and usually play out like long deep conversation, I feel like to respond to or even read their messages, I need to have like an hour allotted to conversation. Soemtimes I see the messages early and have to pretend I didnt see em cos I dont have internet to respond or time to respond its. Funny. Idk.

Anwyays I'm binging chocolate in a park alone and like. Rotting my fucking teeth OH WELL 🤷🏻‍♂️ whatcha gonna do.

Its 8 now so I should head home. I just biked to the s4ve 0ns to get my dad white choclate but. If I'm going to s4ve 0ns... YOU BET YOUR ASS IM GONNA STE4L SHIT. THAT PLACE IS EASY AS FUCKKK.

Also I'm kinda addicted to sh0pl1fting. The THRILL I get from it is so insane. It's fun! And you get free stuff! I know If i get caught I'm risking a lot. I'm aware. But I dont really care. Every step I take nowadays is risk taking. So why not take more?

I dont care about nonsense therapy. Fuck that.... actually I'll explain why i dont go to therapy for my shit:

1. I cant

2. I don't trust it

Anwyays yeah.

My throat still hurts. Idk, I just like to be in the sun and shit ALONE.

ALONE! It's so funny to me how now I like my time alone but as a kid I'd proabably kill for some positive attention. Well... it's more complex than that, but I wont go into it tonight.

Pls watch me die of diabetes soon from eating all this fucking chocolate.

My parents said to stop drinking monster and I wANT THEM TO TRUST ME so i can go out with my friends... but also I shoulda got monster outta spite. Heart palpitations my ASS.

Tonight I'll be talking to Jay AND Star. At the same time. Which is awkward... Which is MY OWN MESS TO CLEAN UP. I actually accept full responsibility. But also its awkward.

Whatever. I'll sort it out.

My parents arent being as complicated as usual. I guess they're tryna reverse all those years of... emotional neglect i guess? Something.

Something. Which isnt nothing.

But also I think they're guilty over the divorce. Like. Today my dad was like "do u ever feel sad? Blah blah blah... how do u feel rn" and I was like smiling tryna play off his question like it was absurd and I said "uhm idk... *fake laugh* normal?"

THE TRUTH WAS THAT I WAS A BIT CONFUDDLED ABOUT WHAT I WAS GONNA DO REGARDING. LITERALLY CHEATING. ON MY GF. WITH SOME DUDE IN MY ART CLASS. JUST FOR SEX.

But then he was like "this isnt normal." And he looked all sad. But on my way to the park here, I thought about it a bit more. And actually... it IS normal. The divorce rate is smthn like 60 percent in the states and 40 percent in canada... which is where I live.

Yknow... if my irls find this,,, all I have to say is sorry. Be as mean as you want.

I've already accepted my fate as a degenerate scumbag anyways lol.

Actually... how DO I feel? Hmm... laying in this field.

Urgency.

I have a lot of stuff to do.

Physical pain, but that's not. A FEELING.

I guess anticipation to TALK TO PEOPLE.

Regret from my binge... I better get home.

You know what's so funny to me? I cant purge on my own... but dick makes me vomit. Like the one time I DONT want to throw up, I do. Damn okay.

Well its 8:18 so I'm going home maybe. Soon. For now, I think I'll stay a little longer.

Yknow one thing I didn't expect to be sore was my arms... which I used to prop myself up to... yknow, suck Jay...

I still remember he said: "you're trembling." And I was like FUCK because I thought the trembling was HIM... •_• it's okay though I'll learn to do better.

Idk tho... I feel comfortable with him. Even as nervous as I am and embarrassed to be. Naked. In front of soemone else. And such. He makes me feel comfortable. Look, I did my best, DUH of cOURSE I did my best, I'm the type who will work hard at stuff even if they're getting hurt. I didnt mind honeslty. My goal in that part was just to make him feel good. Equal exchange, yknow? He did the same thing to me.

But like, he can tell when I gag and he tells me not to hurt myself and of course I keep going, I'm not about to SToP. But. I dont kNOW. Him talking to me like that makes me feel a lot safer doing stuff like that you know?

I like when he starts kissing me and touching me like he cant contain himself its almost animalistic and VERY FUCKING HOT

I feel like I talk about him too much but you gotta realize that was my FIRST time

1. Sucking dick

2. having MY junk sucked

3. Having anything put. Inside me. (It was just his finger but stILL)

So yeaH. Of course I'm gonna talk about it. A lot.

He said I was adorable. He said he likes how, when he leans over me, I take in a breath... how he could make me flinch.

THATS HOT ISNT IT.

I feel like I'm getting lost in his charm when I shoULD be tryna fix shit with my girlfriend. She seems sad and I'm worried.

But there isnt much more to say until I DM her tonight...

I really fucked up, didn't I? I totally fucked up and now my brain is all confused. But I have to remember that Jay is only about sex. He would be nice to cuddle, since hes fucking HUGE and I'm kinda on the short side, but he doesnt talk to me out of love. He does it out of lust. And yeah... I really only want sex from him too. But like. Star and I are COMMITTED. We got our feelings wrapped up together. Emotionally and romantically.

So. I should proabably like... stop fucking with Jay. Tell Star what I did. And hope she forgives me. That's the morally correct thing to do.

But like... do I EVER make the morally correct decision? No. Not really. I'm a piece of shit. Whatever. Its highschool anwyays we arent mating for life. IM NOT SAYING WHAT I DID WASNT BAD. IT WAS. VERY BAD.

but I'm gonna keep making bad decisions.

I DO FEEL BAD.... but look. If we're being logical about this and tryna maximize my benefit here,, I should keep Star as my girlfriend and TREAT HER WELL... but with Jay as a fuckbuddy on the side. Hes leaving the school soon anwyays so then we'll hang out less...

That's my plan, anyways.

I KNOW I'm a bad person. I'm aware. But it's just a fact of life.

I'm cheating with my cards here in so many places: stealing, lying, cheating, disobeying my parents, not paying attention in class.. IM KIND OF AN ASSHOLE KID. Idk. It's kinda whatever to me. I'm fucking harry Houdini, okay? I can get out of anyhting. This isnt me being cocky... I have historically gotten out of MANY tight situations, even some that risked my life, and I'm still here. I think I'm a walking lucky charm or SOEMTHING

Welp, we know if gods real I'm going to hell.

I dont really care. Idk. I guess I'm just at that risk taking phase in.my life. That doesnt justify anything... but it explains it. And it's possible to explain without justifying.

Man,,, I guarantee whoever reads this blog is gonna hate my guts.

Whatever. It's my fucking journal/diary lol.

I can sorta say whatever I'd like.

It's funny because I always thought I was trustworthy and had no commitment issues BUT HEY I GUESS NOT.

I keep telling myself, cut him off, YOU AVE A GIRLFRIEND, FESS UP AND APOLOGIZE... but then I picture his STUPID smirking face and I CANT.

Maybe I am in love double.

Doesnt matter if I am... i still did a bad thing.

DAMN.

Well... I'm headed back home now. 8:41. I'm gonna pack my shit, change, watch youtube,,,, I guess I should check my google classroom and like. do my fucking homework... cos I haven't done it yet.

Then I'll update yall.

11:51 p.m.

Hey guys I'm back with an update.

I talked with both of then... star doesnt seem interested in having an actual conversation,,, shes just talking about random bs. Which is fine but I dont rly get what shes saying half the time COS SHES NOT BLUNT ENOUGH. and then the other half shes going on about how much she hates life. Like.

I do love her. We've bonded. I AM concerned about her. But sometimes I feel like she doesn't really try. Like I can talk her down from suicide all I want but everything I say is wrong and cliched and based off my own experience with suicidal thoughts and like... my mentality has always been sorta toxicly masculine. Push through, and push through alone. I CANT ALWAYS HELP! And it makes me feel shitty. Idk. She'll be okay, I know so cos of her story posts and drawings.

I feel bad but I know I can't help much. We talked a little. Idk, we didnt get anywhere. I love her but shes acting in a way that tells me soemthing is wrong but I CANT FIX THAT THING. SO. yeah, theres not much to say. I wish I could take away all her pain but I can't.

I talked to Jay as well... I DONT KNOW WHATS HAPPENING BECAUSE I LIKE HIM SO SO MUCH. SO MUCH. HES LITERALLY PERFECT. sexy, kind and super considerate, he always makes sure I'm comfortable... I dont KNOW,,, hes sweet.

Hes not romantically interested in me. Which is a bit sad. Sometimes I want to tell him "I love you!!!" But then I remember that we are, in his words, friends with benefits. Fuck buddies. Two horny teenage boys who just wanna fuck... and be friends. That's all. That's us. We aren't romantically involved nor will we ever be. I hate how my brain gets so attached to anyone I fuck... especially since I kinda see Jay as an "older brother" figure, which makes no sense until you actually meet him and vibe with him... and like,,, I've always wanted that?

Tommorow I'm gonna ask for him to come over to watch a movie... but idk if I should actually ask because my parents kinda hate me now for fucking up so much. I'll do my homework and clean my room first... which will take up all my time proabably :( it's okay. Maybe some other time :(

I dont want him to lose interest in me though.

.... its 1:56 a.m.

Okay. Okay. I'll say it. I love him.

Goodnight, tumblr.

-Jude

#JudeJournals #jude shepard #tumblr diary #journal

1 note · View note