#okay i'm probably going to miss some cw tags and i'm sorry for that

[chrissv4mp]

౨ৎ i feel more and more like i was made for you

— word count : 1.3k

★ sum: billie flies across the country just to see you.

☆ pair: billie eilish × fem!reader

★ cws: some language, mentions of a long-distance relationship(?), fluff, a little suggestiveness but no smut.

☆ a/n: horrible at writing fluff, so js bear with me🙏🙏 this is more so a blurb than anything else 🙁

— tags: @livialifesblog @her-favorite @mseilishmwah @mxqdii @sophloveswomen @devynscomet @wiidfi0wer33 @muchloveforhacker @slutforsturniolos @br4ttyeilish @xoluvx

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"Hey, mama," Billie speaks through the phone, her voice raspy from the late hour of night. She stayed up just for this call, the call that you and her had every other day. Her blue eyes stayed focused on your own e/c ones, smiling sweetly as her lips parted again, "How was your day?"

You gave her a shrug of your shoulders before you replied, a sigh falling past your lips, "Ts' fine. Would be better if you were with me, though." You frown, earning a quiet chuckle from her end of the line as she catches onto your mood.

The sound of rustling comes from her end as she switches her position on her bed, the bed that she's told you she would cuddle you in every night if you lived with her. The distance between you two hurt, but it's not like either of you could really move. Billie lived in Los Angeles her whole life, and you lived all the way in New York, so it wasn't particularly the easiest thing to do emotionally or physically.

"I'm always with you, 'member?" She holds her wrist up, a small chain with your initial on the front on display for you to see. You had a matching one, but with her own initial, on the opposite wrist. You remember the day she sent it because that week was probably the worst one you've had, and your girlfriends small gesture had lightened it and made it so much better, "Always, m'kay?"

"I want you in my bed, baby. Need you in my arms." You whine, tossing your head back against the pillows. Billie sighs at your saddened expression, running a hand through her hair as thoughts begin to flood into her mind one by one. Your lips curve into a smile as you watch her eyes drift away from the phone, chuckling as you catch sight of the face that she always made whenever she was deep in thought.

"What're you thinkin' about?" She just hums in response, ocean blue eyes moving back to her phone as she smiles at you. She laughs as you continue to stare, eyes never moving for a second as they stay focused on her beautiful face. Her lips were so pink, so full, and you just wanted to kiss them at all times, "What I'm thinking about is why you're staring at me like you wanna devour me,"

You did. You wanted to devour her every night. If you had the chance, you don't think you'd be able to stop, "Well, maybe I do." Your lip was tugged in between your teeth, your face flushing a light pink as you eyed your girlfriend through the phone. Before her lips could part to speak, Finneas' voice came from her line.

Her head turned to the side, and you almost moaned at just the sight of her neck. It was so clear and empty, and you just wanted to mark it up and let everyone know she was— "Fuck, I have to go. I'm sorry, baby girl, I promise I'll call you later, okay?" A quiet sigh passes through your lips as you nod, giving her a small smile as you both mutter your, "I love you's."

"Fuck," Is the first thing you hear your girlfriend say when you pick up the phone, eyes meeting the view of her hair thrown up into a messy ponytail and her face covered with a disposable mask. When you chuckle, she finally looks at you through the phone, "Baby! Hi, I missed you so fuckin' much,"

Your cheeks flush a pink hue at her confession, a cheesy smile finding its way onto your face as your lips part, "It's only been a night, Bils," You speak, taking your eyes off of her for the first time to look around at her surroundings, she wasn't in any place that you recognized, and—was that a backpack she was wearing? "Where are you?"

Billie tenses at the question, unnoticeable from the bad connection on her part. It was never this bad, so that was another thing that had you wondering, "Nowhere." She says quickly, a mischievous smile on her face as she brings the phone closer to her face, "Stop peeking, you creep." The sound of your laugh makes her own lips part in laughter as she rolls her eyes playfully.

"Just wanted to know why my beautiful girlfriend is all covered up, that's all. Also wondering why I can't see you that well," You whine in faux sadness, and Billie just shakes her head as she giggles. The question still lingers between you two as she makes her way through the unknown place, her eyes only paying attention to you every time she hears you speak, "I still have your location, y'know."

"Nuh-uh," She mutters, fixing her mask as she finally takes a seat at her destination, "You're a little pain, y'know that?" Billie smiles, throwing her hood over head before moving her mask to rest below her chin, "Impatient little thing, you are." She points through the phone, and you just scoff as your eyebrows furrow.

Her line goes quiet before you can protest, and your suspicions about her location only rise. Her line glitches, and then the call disconnects, leaving you with nothing but confusion and worry. Before anything else, you go to your messages and click on her contact, shooting her a quick text, "be safe, u got me on my toes over here"

The doorbell rings, and you tense up in surprise as your head turns to the front door. Your limbs are sprawled out all over the couch as you bite on your fingernail in nervousness, the unsettling feeling from the call with Billie a few hours prior still lingering in the cold air of your house. Your phone hasn't rung since then, and she didn't answer any your texts.

Maybe you were a little paranoid, but this was the first time she'd ever gone ghost on you. As you stand up from the couch and pass by the window, you catch a glimpse of a black backpack strap. When you turn the doorknob and open the door, you swear you almost scream.

Billie stood right on your doorstep, a big smile on her face as she stares over at you, "Is this the right house?" She mutters playfully, and before she can even laugh, you grab her hand and pull her into your embrace. Quiet sobs pass by your lips as you bury your head into her shoulder, holding her tightly as she slowly rocks you side to side.

"Yeah—fuck—It's definitely the right house." You whisper, sniffling before you pull away just enough to be face to face with her. You don't waste another second before your own lips meet hers in a passionate, loving kiss. Neither of you feel the need to pull away, even for air as you feel her hand in your hair pull you impossibly closer, "God, I can't believe you're here, baby."

Billie smiles, pecking your lips once again before moving her backpack off her shoulders and tossing it to the side carefully, "You better believe it," She whispers, eyes moving all around your face as she stares at you in awe, "So pretty. My pretty girl." Her lips don't seem to miss a spot on your face as she showers you in kisses, giggles escaping as you bathe in the affection you craved all the moments before this.

"Now, I remember you saying you wanted me in your bed?" She smiles, eyes darkening as she pulls away to take in the sight of you fully. She practically devours you with her eyes, and you can't even express what you feel before your lips come crashing onto hers again. The door is pushed closed as you push her against it. Tonight was only one of the very few nights that you would finally get to taste her, so why not take every chance you get?

[thisapplepielife]

Written for @steddieholidaydrabbles.

Hell Has Officially Frozen Over

Prompt Day 9: Icy Roads | Word Count: 1000 | Rating: T | CW: Language | Tags: Post S4, Eddie Munson Lives, Future Fic, Reconnecting in Your Hometown, Old Friends, Pre-Steddie

It's bad. It's really, really bad.

Eddie white-knuckles the steering wheel of his pickup truck wondering if he's ever gonna make it to Hawkins as he barely crawls along. Not only is it nearly impossible to see, but the roads are slicker than shit already. It's like this snuck up on them, and the state didn't even have time to salt the roads.

He should have left an hour earlier.

Hell, he should have left a day earlier.

It's heading towards being a whiteout. Which is pretty fucking gorgeous, honestly, but not when he's having to drive in these blizzard-like conditions.

Easing down the highway, not another car in sight, he thinks his eyes are playing tricks on him. A slight glow, off to the left.

As he approaches, he's pretty fucking certain that he's seeing the faint glimmer of taillights off in the ditch. A car probably missed that little curve, and slid off in the ditch.

Fuck.

He should stop. But he isn't exactly sure how or where he might be able to do that safely.

Fuck it.

He hasn't seen anyone else out in miles, so he stops in the middle of the two-lane highway. He'll check real quick, see if there actually is anything, or if it's just his eyes deceiving him after all this white.

He turns on his flashers, but he's not sure that'll help anyone see him in this near zero visibility. 

Eddie pulls out his Maglite, and is thankful Wayne was always so adamant that he carried one.

He's pretty sure there is a car. Something covered in white, and lodged into the snowbank.

"Hey! Anybody in there!" Eddie hollers. 

He stops to listen, and he doesn't hear anything — then. A dull pounding. 

"Goddamnit," Eddie mutters, but slides down the ditch, and once he gets closer, he hears the pounding again. Hand against glass. 

The passenger window is covered in snow, and Eddie starts brushing it away as fast as he can. It's fucking freezing, even through his gloves.

He gets the window cleared, and a face appears.

"Eddie?!"

It's Steve Harrington. 

Shit.

Eddie leans down to get a closer look.

"You okay?" Eddie asks through the window and Steve nods.

"I'm stuck. I can't open either door, or the windows!"

"Want me to break in?" Eddie hollers, and Steve nods. 

Eddie moves to the back window of the car, and yells back, "Cover your eyes!"

Steve leans forward, and Eddie bangs the butt of his metal flashlight against the window. It doesn't give. Fuck. Apparently it's gonna take more power than that. 

He rears back and gives a really good whack this time, then another, harder, near the corner, shattering the glass into the car. 

"Hey! Still okay?" Eddie asks, brushing glass from the window sill with his flashlight. It's safety glass, and not sharp, but he can't imagine crawling out over it would be a whole lot of fun, still.

The soft glow of the lights Eddie could see goes out, and then Steve's head pops back into view as he crawls over the console of the car, and into the backseat.

"I'm good, I think. Just thought I might freeze to death before I was able to get myself out."

Eddie holds out his hands, and offers Steve help as he tries to slide out of the now broken window. It's a tighter fit than seems comfortable with his heavy winter coat on, but together they pull him out. 

"Sorry about the window."

"No, no. Thanks for stopping. I figured I was stuck until INDOT came out tomorrow."

They climb up the ditch and towards Eddie's pickup, to see if they can find something to at least cover the broken window.

After, Eddie can't get the traction to get going again. He looks around. He does have some gifts for Wayne, and unwraps one, dumping the contents in the seat, then with his pocket knife, cuts the box into four pieces, one for each tire.

It's enough. He's able to get them edging forward again.

Five miles to Hawkins.

But it seems like five-hundred at this rate.

"What were you doing out here?" Steve asks.

"I could ask you the same thing, Harrington?" Eddie banters back, and Steve laughs.

"Coming home from the airport-"

"That was a rental? Oh shit."

Steve laughs, but continues, "I promised I'd do Christmas at home this year," Steve admits.

"Oh, so this blizzard is your fault."

"Huh?" Steve questions, confused.

"Hell has officially frozen over," Eddie teases.

And Steve laughs. Eddie has missed him. It's been too long since any of them have gotten together. Once out of Hawkins, it's been really hard to return.

"Something like that," Steve says, but he's smiling at Eddie, "What brings you home?"

"Wayne," Eddie says. Wayne's the only reason he'll step foot into this town these days. 

There are no other cars on the road. They're the only dummies out and about in this shitshow.

When they pull up in front of the Harrington house, Eddie turns to look at him.

"Thanks for rescuing me," Steve says, meeting his eyes in the dark.

"Hey, I definitely owed you one. You rescued me first."

Steve reaches over and squeezes Eddie's hand, "You didn't owe me anything. It's been good to see you, man. You look good."

Eddie flips his hand over so he can squeeze back, "If the parents get too stifling, come to Wayne's," Eddie offers.

"Expect me. How long you here?" Steve asks.

"A week, you?"

"Same."

"Let's definitely catch up," Eddie offers, and Steve's nodding, hard. 

"Yeah, let's do that. You and me."

"The Hideout," Eddie laughs.

Steve grins, "All the shitty beer we can drink."

"Where's Buckley?" Eddie asks.

"She'll be here in two days, weather allowing."

"Let's gather up everyone who's home. Do something together again. We survived Hawkins once."

"Hell yes we did," Steve says, his blinding smile proof they can do it again.

This time, it's only Hawkins for Christmas.

If you want to write your own, or see more entries for this challenge, pop on over to @steddieholidaydrabbles and follow along with the fun!

[steddieas-shegoes]

i'm coming out

for @corrodedcoffinfest prompt 'pride'

rated t | 880 words | no cw | tags: coming out, bisexual king gareth, side steddie

🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈

Gareth hated to admit it, but he was jealous.

He was jealous of Steve still being able to hide under the radar enough that he could go to gay clubs and pride events without anyone batting an eye. He was jealous of Eddie being out publicly, not having to keep any part of his life a secret except for what he truly wanted to. And he was jealous of his own boyfriend, Sam, for not even having to worry about how the public would react if they knew he was gay.

"I just think it sounds like you want to come out," he said over the phone. "If Eddie can, why can't you?"

"It's not that easy!" Gareth argued, though he wasn't really sure how to back that argument up. It was that easy. Nobody in the band would care if he decided to come out, and most of the fans would be fine with it if they went off their reaction to Eddie coming out.

"Why not?" Sam asked, calm in Gareth's chaos.

"Because if people don't like Eddie, it can be for any number of reasons. He's loud, or a nerd, or too hyper. If they don't like me, it's definitely just because I like men." Gareth had never actually acknowledged that thought before, but here he was, saying it out loud on the phone to his boyfriend. "I don't want people to hate me."

"Baby..." Sam started. He sighed. "It's your choice. You know I would never pressure you to do anything you aren't ready for. But it does sound like the only person who is holding you back is you."

Gareth didn't feel like talking about it more, but Sam let him change the subject and the rest of the conversation went fine.

"Think about it, Gare," Sam said as they hung up.

That's all he did for days. He saw countless posts about pride events in the cities they were stopping in on the tour, Eddie even made an appearance at a drag brunch and left VIP tickets for the performers to come to Corroded Coffin's show that night. He thought about being able to be a part of the community in the way he knew he could be.

"Ed?" He asked right before they all went to bed.

"Yeah?" Eddie was typing out a text on his phone, probably some long and romantic and disgusting ode to Steve.

"You're going to the parade in Boston right?"

Eddie looked up from his phone, brows furrowing. "Yeah, why?"

"Mind if I come with you?"

"You're always welcome, you know that." Eddie smiled. "You coming as an ally or as the 'B' in LGBTQIA+?"

"I think I'm gonna come as me."

****

He didn't tell Sam what he was doing, figured he would have time between getting back to the tour bus and when news started hitting.

He forgot that Sam tracked alerts on Twitter for him.

His phone started ringing the moment he hit the end of the parade route.

"Hey, love," Gareth couldn't stop smiling. He'd never felt like he belonged here quite like he did today. "All okay?"

"I'm so fuckin' proud of you." Sam's smile was evident in his voice. "You could've given me a little warning though. Seeing 20 notifications pop up at once is a bit terrifying."

"Sorry. Wanted to surprise you. Did you like my shirt?" Gareth looked down at the shirt he was wearing.

"You mean the "ask me about my boyfriend" with a bi pride flag shirt? Yeah, I'd like a matching one as soon as possible."

"Yeah?"

They both laughed as Gareth found a small corner of the alley they'd stopped in to be alone.

"I can't wait to kiss you. This is the hottest thing you've ever done."

"What about that time I fucked you against my drum set?" Gareth asked with a smirk.

"Okay. The second hottest thing you've ever done. Still don't know how you had the strength to hold most of my weight for that long," Sam sounded like his thoughts were drifting to the memory of that day. "Anyway! I don't wanna keep you from having fun. But call me later."

"Okay, babe. Wish you were here," Gareth said softly. "Miss you."

"Miss you too. But only three weeks until you're home."

"Feels like forever."

"Dramatic." Sam laughed. "I love you, baby."

"I love you, too. If you see me getting drunk in a gay bar later, no you don't."

"I'd buy you a drink if I was there."

"Three weeks."

"21 days."

"You two are disgusting." Eddie yelled from a few feet away.

Sam laughed and said goodbye as Gareth walked over to Eddie.

"Not any more disgusting than you and Steve," he grumbled. "At least Steve comes with you for most of the tour."

"Can you imagine if he didn't? The world would end."

Gareth rolled his eyes. "Uh huh. Drinks?"

"Drinks!" Eddie threw his arms up and started running down the block, ignoring the yells of people recognizing him as he made his way to the bar they'd already chosen.

Gareth followed, unable to wipe the smile from his face. He was out, and maybe he'd have to do it more officially later on, but for now, this was enough.

[j-onedrabbles]

𝒎𝒚 𝒔𝒕𝒓𝒂𝒏𝒈𝒆 𝒂𝒅𝒅𝒊𝒄𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏 𝒄𝒉 𝒔𝒊𝒙: 20 𝒎𝒊𝒏𝒖𝒕𝒆𝒔 cw: cursing wc: 0.8k

Y/n quickly dug through her closet to find something to wear. She didn’t plan on going out so she didn’t bother getting out of her pajamas this morning. Now she was going on a date? Utter panic.

“Pick up your goddamn phone Jisung,” Y/n muttered as she searched through her shirts.

“What do you want?” Jisung finally picked up his phone

“What do I wear?” She asked as she looked over at her phone she had propped up against near her closet while the video call rang.

“Y/n, baby, he’s not gonna care what you wear.”

“I was dressed damn near like a whore last night. I don’t wanna show up in sweats.”

“He’s already seen you at your sexist. Go with your comfiest. If he doesn’t like it, I’ll fight him.”

“I feel like I was better off calling Jinnie.”

“Rude! Minho’s one of my best friends, I know him best!”

“Then what do I wear?!”

“Something comfy and cute! It’s just coffee!”

“I know but still!”

“Don’t make me go to your place.”

“You don’t want to get out of bed and you know it.”

“You know me so well.”

Y/n grabbed a few items and showed them to her friend. Ultimately it was decided on jeans and an oversized T-shirt and sweater. Y/n slipped on a pair of sneakers as she grabbed her wallet and keys and made her way down the coffee shop, only hanging up with the changling when she got to the door.

Minho was standing in line and turned when he heard the door. He offered her a smile as she walked in and saw him. Y/n joined him in line, offering the same smile.

“Waiting long?” She asked as she stood next to him

“No. Got here a couple of minutes ago,” Minho shrugged, “How’s your morning been?”

“Quiet. Kind of planned to have a lazy day before this so I rushed to get ready,” Y/n laughed

“You're not doing anything over the break?”

“Not really. I have some work for courses I need to do but other than that I don't have much.”

The two followed the line as the next person stepped up to order. “No work?”

“I kinda quit my job so I'm looking for another one. I'm living off my savings at the moment.”

“Can I ask why?”

“After we get our drinks I’ll tell ya,” Y/n said as they stepped up to the register.

The two ordered their drinks before going and getting a seat at a table, “you didn't have to pay for mine,” Y/n commented

“I asked you out, I pay,” Minho replied, “back to what you were saying.”

“What were we talking about before?”

“Why you left your job,” Minho reminded her, thinking it was kind of cute that she had forgotten their previous topic.

“Oh yeah! It was a toxic work environment and I just didn't feel fully comfortable there,” Y/n explained

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“It’s okay. My boss was this older lady who made it worse. It's the small boutique up the street and she never really like me because of me being a Fae and coworkers made it worse.”

“But she knew you were a Fae when she hired you?”

“No. She was out of town when I got hired. Her daughter was super nice to me. When the boss came back the dynamic shifted, so I left.”

“Is it hard finding a job as a siren?”

“Sometimes? It really depends. Small businesses usually will take any employee they can get in my experience so they don't care if you are human or fae. Corporates are a hit or miss.”

“Sounds kinda rough,” Minho sighed as one of the workers brought over their drinks. The two thanked them as they left.

“It's a little stressful. I'm just using this break to relax and hang out with my friends.”

“Are you going to any more parties?”

“Probably, I don't know. I just tag along with the guys. After the last one, I think we're all up in the air about frat parties.”

“Jisung told me about the rumor and why the guys left early.”

“Surprised you are only now hearing it,” Y/n chuckled as she sipped her drink

“I don't pay attention to the gossip. Seungmin likes knowing things so he brought it up.”

“I'm just surprised it made it here.”

“Bin said he wants to be invited next time we drink together. Not at a party.” Minho didn't want to dwell on the subject any longer

“I’ll let the guys know. They’ll be excited to have some more people over,” Y/n smiled

The two sat at the cafe for a bit longer talking and finishing their drinks. Minho offered a walk around the city which Y/n took him up on. The two walked and talked until the sun went down. Minho walked the girl back to her place before saying good night.

“Text me when you get home,” Y/n called before shutting her door. Minho smiled to himself as he made his way back to his own apartment.

←PREV|NEXT→ MASTERLIST | MAIN MASTERLIST

a/n: triple update today I guess 🤭

taglist: @xxoche3erryxxo @iadorethemskz @maeleelee @morningstardada @sungookie @mistlitmoonlight @junebug032 @m111nho

[hellshottestluxury]

Thank you very much for taking a peek at my rules! If you have any questions or need any sort of clarification- please, let me know!

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[fictionkinfessions]

okay, maybe it was a stupid idea to look thru the blog's cw tags out of curiosity. </3

cus now i have more thoughts running thru my head!!!!

and i wish people didn't infantilize me so much. people think i'm some baby who can't make its own decisions. and they deny that i had any feelings for anyone from there. they made assumptions about me in my head and said it's "canon".

but despite all of that, i miss sonic. memories are still very foggy for me, so i don't know if i ever told him how i felt. i don't think i did. i wanna go back. :(

sorry for the sporatic rambles. i'll probably frequent this blog's askbox, since it's a nice place to put my feelings.

-🦊🍨; tails prower

(p.s, pls tag my asks with the kin tags!! i just felt like i should clarify, thank u.)

Anonymous asked:

sorry! i just realized you have to put the hashtag before the signature so that it's added as a tag!! if it's fine, can you add the #🦊🍨 tag to my old confessions??

-#🦊🍨; tails prower!

[babey-lewis]

cw vent? sorta? not really but not a very happy ask + very vague references to bad cg trauma

hi lew um.. not my normal kinda ask but I could use some advice or somethin if you're able, and no worries if you're not

so.. it's been several years since I've had a proper carer, my last one was my ex who I was with for a whole year. I've been having a hard time dealing on my own recently even tho it's been a while. between missing having a carer and intrusive thoughts/flashbacks to the bad ones I had ages ago, it's been hard even when I'm not regressed/trying to regress.

but I'm clueless as to how to go about seeking out a carer. I'm a very socially anxious person and messaging first is super scary. so even tho I'm following multiple cgs who are looking, or even folks who babysit, I'm too shy to make the first move.

I guess what I'm asking is, do you have any advice for someone looking for a carer, or even just supportive friends, with really bad anxiety? even sending in asks gets to me sometimes haha

no pressure to answer, ik this sorta thing is probably hard to give advice for but I'm just a little lost and you're always so nice so I'm not as worried about bothering you

- 🌌

First of all, I'm so sorry it's taken me so long to answer this. I wanted to take my time and really think about how I wanted to answer.

I am so sorry you have trauma involving a past cg, your cg should be the person you can absolutely trust with your life, and it's not fair or right that they hurt you in this way.

As for tips, I think I have a few!

Put up an "Ad"! And say on it that you have anxiety and don't want to be the first one to reach out! Make sure you add lots of tags so that a lot of people can see it!

If you do so happen to find someone you want to be your cg, I suggest sending in an anonymous ask without any tags so that you can get a feel for what this person is like!

I also recommend, just be kind to yourself. You are getting back out there, and that's hard and can bring up so much icky feelings, and that's okay! Just remember, everyone is nervous to some degree, you aren't alone in your anxiety and you aren't alone in your trauma.

I'm sorry that I can't give me tips, but if you ever need more advice, please do come to me! I always want to help my baby bugs :3

[i-cant-stop-fandoming-help]

For the writing requests could you do something about Arturo and his sister? Like him talking about what happened to someone (of your choice)

Or maybe a cute little fantasy au, I wonder what everyone's occupation would be. Maybe Teruko is going around this new town she's in and finding all the bizzare ppl around (aka the rest of the cast) haha

Thanks for the request! This will probably be semi short, as i'm very emotional at the moment, but I do have an idea of what to do with this. Also uh tagging @corzacorpse because i annoyed them to give me a character for arturo to talk to.

Uhhh CW for suicide and hanging and just mental health issues in general. I dont know i've always sucked at knowing what and what not to give a warning for.

Everything was crumpling around him. Arturo had no idea that Felicity would do such a thing if he left. His hands were trembling and his head was spinning. Bile was rising in his throat as he stared on.

Swinging back and forth, a pattern of death. rope pulled at the ceiling. Felicity was completely lifeless. Her eyes bore no light, and her skin was ollve. She looked at peace, but also in pain.

Arturo had to get her down. she had to still be alive.

He grabbed the chair, standing on it to undo the rope. She dropped like a sandbag to the ground.

A finger on her neck revealed that she was completely cold, and her heart had stopped.

All he could do was scream and sob and beg Felicity to wake up. He struggled to call the police. He had no idea how long she had been dead. He had just come to visit for the first time that week.

Their parents said that she had been staying in her room for days. Was it because she was dead?

"Arturo?" A tired voice snapped him out of his thoughts, his misery. "You're standing in front of my room. Can you move?"

It was Rose. She yawned but didn't seem bothered. Arturo wondered, would she listen if he talked to her about what had happened with Felicity?

"Miss Rose, ahem, may we... talk?" Arturo tried to hide the shakiness in his voice, and failed. It was filled with cracks and whines.

He expected to be mocked, to be laughed at and shunned. But Rose just tilted her head. "Okay."

She followed him to the Cafeteria, blinking slowly and slouching at a table.

Arturo didn't mind, at least not much. It would be easier if she was completely awake, that way she could actually comfort him or something, but it also meant she wouldn't be able to pay complete attention and find details that could hurt him.

"So... My sister... She killed herself." A rough way to start, even more obvious by the way Rose's eyes widened and she shot up.

"Are you okay?" She asked. "I'm sorry for your loss. that must've been hard."

Arturo's lower lip trembled. Tears were returning to his eyes, and a rock felt like it was lodging in his throat. "And... And it's my fault. If I hadn't left home, if I stayed there longer-"

Rose put a hand on his back. "I don't think you've processed it completely, Arturo. Grief comes in stages, but I'm unsure which stage you're in... But it isn't your fault. If she... offed herself just because you left, I think it's because your home life was already bad. And... You wanted to get away from that, didn't you?"

Arturo's breath caught in his throat. Rose was smarter than he thought.

"I had friends who had bad parents, which caused a bad home life. None of that is your fault. But also, I'm not sure i'm the best person to talk to about this. I'm falling asleep just talking... Get some sleep, Arturo. Write down your feelings or draw them out or something..." Rose rubbed his back before standing up and rubbing her eyes, waving a good night.

Her words were comforting, but Arturo was still unsure. The way her corpse stared at him... It felt accusing.

But perhaps Rose was right, some sleep would help. If the nightmares decided to spare him of their treachery.

[mustbefated]

Thank you very much for taking a peek at my rules! If you have any questions or need any sort of clarification- please, let me know!

GENERAL RULES

RESPECT MY BLOG, and I'll respect yours. If you've read anyone's rules page you know this one. Respect me, I'll respect you. Don't control my character. Don't metagame. Don't be a dick. Don't use me JUST for a meme source, there are pages for that. I don't currently have a 'don't reblog memes from me' rule. Don't make me set one like I have in the past.

DON'T decide my muses stuff. Some may have history with certain muses. I don't assume how YOURS interacted, don't just shove mine into your idea of how you want my muse to be. My muse is mine. Their actions are theirs. DON'T say "Well this happened to my character, so they don't like yours." Make sure mine did or would at least do that. Please. I've had this issue and it completely killed that muse's inspiration for me.

YOU DON'T NEED TO MATCH LENGTH however, please at least... try? I don't want two lines to my four paragraphs. Please meet me part way. The occasional mismatch is fine, I just mean if I regularly write three to four times more than you... it'll be hard for me to keep interest.

TRIGGERS I don't have any that I require tagging. I will try to tag known triggers, if you need anything specific please feel free to ask and I will try to keep up with it. ( Tags will be set up like this: trigger cw )

SPICY/18+ THREADS will be tagged with nsfh (not safe for heaven) and any additional tags if needed.

I RARELY DROP THREADS so... if I missed it, tumblr probably ate it. I probably didn't mean to, so just shoot me a message. I try to use rpthreadtracker but sometimes I miss adding them or forget to check. I'm also okay with you hitting me up to refresh what we've got going on if it's not sitting well with you.

MY MUSES ARE NOT YOUR PUNCHING BAG and they won't be. Some are powerful, some just aren't interested and will leave. They're not going to have you just verbally or physically berate or injure them. ( Unless we have talked about it and plotted, in which case ignore this. )

FEEL FREE to just drop into my inbox, dms or send a meme. I'm here for a reason and that reason is to RP!

TALK TO ME OOC I really just find those I talk to always work out better plotting and inspiration wise.

BLOG SPECS

MULTIVERSE - Yes! Everyone is in their own verse unless discussed otherwise.

MULTISHIP - Same as above.

POLYAMORY - As long as all parties are fine with it, let's go. Open relationships fall here.

OC FRIENDLY - This feels obvious, but I love OCs. Gimme. Please. <3

NO CROSSOVERS - I'm sorry, I don't really feel like I'm super interested in these. Half the time I don't know the other verse. If you have a hellaverse, sure. If you exist kind of outside of it we might be able to talk. But for the most part I'd prefer to keep it to Hellaverse muses, HB/HH OCs, and characters with a hellaverse variant.

POST QUEUE Sometimes? I don't always use it but if I fall behind or get too many piled in drafts I toss things into a queue to post one or twice a day and work my way through them.

DUPLICATES OKAY! If it's for my muse, that'll be entertaining, if it's for yours I'll always try to set up different dynamics between different muses.

DNI

MINORS, this blog is 18+ only. Mun is 30+ and not interested in interacting with children. This blog will also have mature themes. By nature of the show being full of them, and I will likely write mature themes as well. Please, do not interact if you are under the age of 18.

THE REGULAR DNI Do not interact if you you're homophobic, transphobic, terf, pedo… etc etc. You know the drill. Thanks.

[alattecaffeine]

Thank you very much for taking a peek at my rules! If you have any questions or need any sort of clarification- please, let me know!

GENERAL RULES

RESPECT MY BLOG, and I'll respect yours. If you've read anyone's rules page you know this one. Respect me, I'll respect you. Don't control my character. Don't metagame. Don't be a dick. Don't use me JUST for a meme source, there are pages for that. I don't currently have a 'don't reblog memes from me' rule. Don't make me set one like I have in the past.

DON'T decide my muses stuff. Some may have history with certain muses. I don't assume how YOURS interacted, don't just shove mine into your idea of how you want my muse to be. My muse is mine. Their actions are theirs. DON'T say "Well this happened to my character, so they don't like yours." Make sure mine did or would at least do that. Please. I've had this issue and it completely killed that muse's inspiration for me.

YOU DON'T NEED TO MATCH LENGTH however, please at least... try? I don't want two lines to my four paragraphs. Please meet me part way. The occasional mismatch is fine, I just mean if I regularly write three to four times more than you... it'll be hard for me to keep interest.

TRIGGERS I don't have any that I require tagging. I will try to tag known triggers, if you need anything specific please feel free to ask and I will try to keep up with it. ( Tags will be set up like this: trigger cw )

SPICY/18+ THREADS will be tagged with nsfh (not safe for heaven) and any additional tags if needed.

I RARELY DROP THREADS so... if I missed it, tumblr probably ate it. I probably didn't mean to, so just shoot me a message. I try to use rpthreadtracker but sometimes I miss adding them or forget to check. I'm also okay with you hitting me up to refresh what we've got going on if it's not sitting well with you.

MY MUSES ARE NOT YOUR PUNCHING BAG and they won't be. Some are powerful, some just aren't interested and will leave. They're not going to have you just verbally or physically berate or injure them. ( Unless we have talked about it and plotted, in which case ignore this. )

FEEL FREE to just drop into my inbox, dms or send a meme. I'm here for a reason and that reason is to RP!

TALK TO ME OOC I really just find those I talk to always work out better plotting and inspiration wise.

BLOG SPECS

MULTIVERSE - Yes! Everyone is in their own verse unless discussed otherwise.

MULTISHIP - Same as above.

POLYAMORY - As long as all parties are fine with it, let's go. Open relationships fall here.

OC FRIENDLY - This feels obvious, but I love OCs. Gimme. Please. <3

NO CROSSOVERS - I'm sorry, I don't really feel like I'm super interested in these. Half the time I don't know the other verse. If you have a hellaverse, sure. If you exist kind of outside of it we might be able to talk. But for the most part I'd prefer to keep it to Hellaverse muses, HB/HH OCs, and characters with a hellaverse variant.

POST QUEUE Sometimes? I don't always use it but if I fall behind or get too many piled in drafts I toss things into a queue to post one or twice a day and work my way through them.

DUPLICATES OKAY! If it's for my muse, that'll be entertaining, if it's for yours I'll always try to set up different dynamics between different muses.

DNI

MINORS, this blog is 18+ only. Mun is 30+ and not interested in interacting with children. This blog will also have mature themes. By nature of the show being full of them, and I will likely write mature themes as well. Please, do not interact if you are under the age of 18.

THE REGULAR DNI Do not interact if you you're homophobic, transphobic, terf, pedo… etc etc. You know the drill. Thanks.

[alattesecrets]

Thank you very much for taking a peek at my rules! If you have any questions or need any sort of clarification- please, let me know!

GENERAL RULES

RESPECT MY BLOG, and I'll respect yours. If you've read anyone's rules page you know this one. Respect me, I'll respect you. Don't control my character. Don't metagame. Don't be a dick. Don't use me JUST for a meme source, there are pages for that. I don't currently have a 'don't reblog memes from me' rule. Don't make me set one like I have in the past.

DON'T decide my muses stuff. Some may have history with certain muses. I don't assume how YOURS interacted, don't just shove mine into your idea of how you want my muse to be. My muse is mine. Their actions are theirs. DON'T say "Well this happened to my character, so they don't like yours." Make sure mine did or would at least do that. Please. I've had this issue and it completely killed that muse's inspiration for me.

YOU DON'T NEED TO MATCH LENGTH however, please at least... try? I don't want two lines to my four paragraphs. Please meet me part way. The occasional mismatch is fine, I just mean if I regularly write three to four times more than you... it'll be hard for me to keep interest.

TRIGGERS I don't have any that I require tagging. I will try to tag known triggers, if you need anything specific please feel free to ask and I will try to keep up with it. ( Tags will be set up like this: trigger cw )

SPICY/18+ THREADS will be tagged with nsfh (not safe for heaven) and any additional tags if needed.

I RARELY DROP THREADS so... if I missed it, tumblr probably ate it. I probably didn't mean to, so just shoot me a message. I try to use rpthreadtracker but sometimes I miss adding them or forget to check. I'm also okay with you hitting me up to refresh what we've got going on if it's not sitting well with you.

MY MUSES ARE NOT YOUR PUNCHING BAG and they won't be. Some are powerful, some just aren't interested and will leave. They're not going to have you just verbally or physically berate or injure them. ( Unless we have talked about it and plotted, in which case ignore this. )

FEEL FREE to just drop into my inbox, dms or send a meme. I'm here for a reason and that reason is to RP!

TALK TO ME OOC I really just find those I talk to always work out better plotting and inspiration wise.

BLOG SPECS

MULTIVERSE - Yes! Everyone is in their own verse unless discussed otherwise.

MULTISHIP - Same as above.

POLYAMORY - As long as all parties are fine with it, let's go. Open relationships fall here.

OC FRIENDLY - This feels obvious, but I love OCs. Gimme. Please. <3

NO CROSSOVERS - I'm sorry, I don't really feel like I'm super interested in these. Half the time I don't know the other verse. If you have a hellaverse, sure. If you exist kind of outside of it we might be able to talk. But for the most part I'd prefer to keep it to Hellaverse muses, HB/HH OCs, and characters with a hellaverse variant.

POST QUEUE Sometimes? I don't always use it but if I fall behind or get too many piled in drafts I toss things into a queue to post one or twice a day and work my way through them.

DUPLICATES OKAY! If it's for my muse, that'll be entertaining, if it's for yours I'll always try to set up different dynamics between different muses.

DNI

MINORS, this blog is 18+ only. Mun is 30+ and not interested in interacting with children. This blog will also have mature themes. By nature of the show being full of them, and I will likely write mature themes as well. Please, do not interact if you are under the age of 18.

THE REGULAR DNI Do not interact if you you're homophobic, transphobic, terf, pedo… etc etc. You know the drill. Thanks.

[thisapplepielife]

Written for @steddie-week.

Can't Miss Us.

Day #5 - Prompt: Reunion/Exes to Lovers | Word Count: 1979 | Rating: T | CW: Language | POV: Steve | Tags: Post S4, Future Fic, Corroded Coffin Eddie, Hawkins Steve, It's Wedding Season, If They Didn't Have Their Besties, They'd Still Be Floundering Alone, Platonic Stobin, Eddie and Gareth are BFFs

He's in his pajamas. 

And they aren't even his good pajamas. They're just a ratty-ass pair of plaid sleep pants that Robin and him fight over ownership of, and a soft, but ragged, t-shirt that the logo wore off long, long ago, with holes all around the neck and under the arms. 

Steve was just running to the store for ice cream before they closed at midnight. He didn't think he'd see anyone, let alone Eddie Munson.

Shit. Shit. Shit. 

Maybe he will go unnoticed. He backs up out of the aisle, and runs his back straight into someone else's chest. He turns to say sorry, and it's Gareth.

"Steve?" Gareth questions, and he sounds just as surprised as Steve feels.

Eddie looks up at hearing Gareth speak. Steve sees the movement out of the corner of his eye, and there'll be no running from this. From them.

From him.

"Hey, I didn't know you guys were in town," Steve says, trying to play it way cooler than he'll ever feel about the situation. 

Eddie left, Steve stayed, and that was that. They don't hate each other or anything, but it has always been far easier for Steve to just keep a healthy amount of distance between them. 

"The wedding, you know," Gareth says, and Steve doesn't know. 

Is Eddie getting married? Is Gareth? 

Steve lives here. Surely he would have known if a big wedding was happening right under his nose. But he's heard nothing, from no one. Surely, Henderson would have let it slip if Eddie was coming home to get married.

"Oh, no, I didn't know," Steve says, "Congrats?" 

That shouldn't sound like a question, and he feels dumb, dumb, dumb. 

"Well don't congratulate me, I'm not getting married," Gareth says, then holds up his hand, "mainly because I already am." 

Steve nods, dumbly, not really listening to Gareth at all. But Eddie hasn't moved an inch to come closer. Apparently he's not going to. He's just standing there holding two tubs of orange sherbet. Eddie as frozen as the sherbet.

Time to get the fuck out of this awkward situation.

"Okay, well. Good to see you," Steve says, and leaves without the ice cream. 

Robin will understand. 

"He was just standing there staring at you like a creep?" 

"Well, it didn't seem creepy, as much as shocked to see that his ex-boyfriend is now apparently homeless. Look at what I'm wearing, Robin! Look!" he shouts, tugging on the collar of his shirt, and it rips a little further. 

Steve's spiraling. 

"Calm down. You look comfortable. It's midnight. Eddie's not dumb. He doesn't think this is your new style. He knows."

And Steve knows that. He does. But it's still terribly embarrassing. You don't want to go years without seeing the guy you'll probably never quite get over, and then be wearing your scrubbiest clothes.

It's tragic.

"He might be getting married," Steve says, dejected. That's the real problem here. Not his clothes. 

"In Hawkins? Get real. Eddie would never. He hates it here." 

He wouldn't. Steve knows that, too. Eddie hardly ever comes back, saying it's not his hometown, not anymore.

Steve understands. Hawkins kind of lost that right when they tried to burn him at the stake for something he didn't do. But Steve likes to think it's changed, at least a little, after the ones that did stay have worked to make changes.

Like Robin, and him. They stayed, and they aren't unhappy about it. 

"I'd say get some ice cream and calm down, but we don't have any," Robin snarks, and it's just what he needed, as he laughs and leans against her shoulder.

The next afternoon, they drive around in Robin's car, Steve slunk low in the passenger seat, checking every possible venue in town, trying to determine where this wedding might be. They check the churches. The best hotel that has a shoddy excuse for a ballroom. 

And in an act of desperation, the school.

Lover's Lake. 

But it's not in town. Can't be. There are no crowds anywhere.

However, out near the country club, they spot balloons stuck to a sign. 

Green/Goodwin Wedding

"See!" Robin crows, "It's Goodie! It's not Eddie. I told you so, dingus. Can we go home now?"

Steve nods. It does make Steve feel a little better, but Eddie still didn't tell him he was coming home. Still didn't want to see him while he was here, obviously. 

Definitely didn't expect Steve to be loitering around the Big Buy at closing time. 

And that kind of stings, just a little.

The whole "we'll still be friends" thing was a load of horseshit. They aren't anything to each other, not now.

"Home, Jeeves," Steve says.

"Ice cream first?" Robin questions.

Steve nods, "Only if you go in. I'm traumatized."

Robin looks over at him, "Well. I'll do it just this once, but don't think this gets you out of ice cream duty, dingus. I can drive. But I still don't want to."

"Deal," he says, because once Eddie's gone back to his life, things can go back to normal.

"Door!" Robin shouts from the bathroom, and Steve looks at his watch. It's after ten. He didn't even hear anyone knocking from his room. And it's a little late for anyone they know, unless Henderson is in town for this wedding, and just said nothing. 

Steve eyes the bat leaning near the hall tree, and then opens the door. 

It's Gareth.

"How'd you know where I lived?" Steve asks, skipping the hello.

"It's Hawkins. I just had to ask the first person I saw. Which was my mom," Gareth says, and Steve looks out beyond him. Checking to see if Eddie is lurking in the bushes. He doesn't seem to be.

Gareth just reaches into his pocket and pulls out a tape, "Here."

Steve takes it because he doesn't know what else to do.

"If you think it's what I think it is, we're at the club all night. We're out back. In a tent. Can't miss us."

"It's a wedding," Steve says, "one I wasn't invit-"

Gareth pulls an envelope out of his jacket pocket, "From Goodie."

Steve doesn't know what to say, but Gareth doesn't make him, because he just turns and leaves.

"What?" Robin asks, coming out, her hair up in a towel.

"It was Gareth. He gave me this," Steve says, holding up the cassette.

"Is it 1986?" Robin asks, and Steve laughs. The stereo still has a tape deck, but a CD would have been more convenient. "What do you think it is?"

Steve shrugs, but he knows. Down deep. He knows.

And he's right. It's a tape of songs that are very clearly about Steve, and by Eddie's voice, and the way it's matured as the tape went on, they've been laid down over many, many years. 

Steve doesn't know what to do with this information.

Eddie didn't give it to him, Eddie didn't come to him. 

Why does Steve have to be the one to stick his neck out?

Because, Eddie won't. Eddie will run for ten, twenty, forty more years. 

And these songs? They say that he regrets it. That he doesn't want to have ever done it in the first place. 

So. Steve pulls a suit out of the closet, and demands that Robin put on a dress, any dress, or slacks, anything she owns other than her yummy sushi pajamas.

She does. They both do. 

And Robin drives.

And Steve frets, worrying the tape case in his hands, the whole way.

Gareth wasn't lying. They couldn't miss the tent. It's a beacon in the night. Edged up to the woods, and it's a testament to what they all did, that that's a safe thing to do, here in Hawkins. Steve just hangs back, and looks. Sees the blur of people moving around, dancing, having fun. 

The music is decidedly wedding reception, and not Corroded Coffin. 

But Steve doesn't see Eddie.

"I don't see him," Steve says, not taking his eyes off the tent to look at Robin. She'll tell him if she sees him first. "Do you think-"

"I'm right here," Eddie says from behind them, and Steve turns. Slowly.

Robin pauses, for just a second, and then bolts for the tent, like a little traitor. Leaving him alone, staring Eddie down in the near dark. 

Steve fishes the tape out of his jacket pocket, and holds it out for Eddie to see. Eddie takes it, but doesn't look shocked, or betrayed, or anything really. Until he cracks a smile.

"Kid's a meddling little shit," Eddie says, meeting Steve's eyes.

"Was he wrong?" Steve asks.

"No," Eddie answers, "but he rarely is. Which is part of the problem. It's annoying."

"Well, I have Robin. So I get it," Steve says, and Eddie smiles.

"You want to go to the tent? I think it's about time for Cotton Eye Joe," Eddie teases.

"Oh, well, in that case…" Steve laughs, because seeing Eddie do that Cotton Eye Joe dance would be worth it.

"Or, we have rooms blocked off in the lodge," Eddie offers.

Steve raises an eyebrow, and Eddie keeps talking, "Meeting rooms. Sitting rooms. Not bedrooms," Eddie rambles, "I mean, we do have those. But I meant the other options."

Steve laughs, because he's still Eddie. He wasn't sure he would be, but yeah, this is Eddie. Just polished up a little, not as rough around all the edges.

Grown up. 

"Okay, Munson. Take me to one of your non-bedroom rooms," Steve teases, and Eddie lights up, offering Steve his elbow. It's goofy, and silly, but Steve slides his arms through the loop of Eddie's elbow, letting himself be led. 

Eddie stops at the open bar, gets them both a drink and a huge tray of the leftover passed appetizers. And they sit in the room that the guys clearly got dressed in. There are garment bags, and street clothes, and stuff on every surface. Eddie scoots a bunch of it down the bar, making room for the two of them.

"Sorry, it's a mess in here," Eddie says, "we weren't expecting company."

"I don't think I count as company," Steve says softly, picking up what looks like a fancy little pig-in-a-blanket and popping it in his mouth. Even cold, it's pretty damn good. 

Maybe he's just hungry.

They make small talk. Catching up, skirting the real reason they are both sitting here, together. The tape. The songs.

They eventually fall into a lull, and Steve doesn't feel like he needs to fill the silence. They can just sit together, that's okay. Eddie still feels comfortable, even after all these years, those miles, this distance.

He's still Eddie. And Steve's still Steve. 

"They are about you, you know?" Eddie asks, and Steve knows. "The songs."

"I know," Steve admits. 

"But they were private, so they didn't make any albums," Eddie says, "not because I didn't want you to hear them. I just didn't want anyone else to hear them."

Steve puts his hand on Eddie's forearm, and squeezes, "I get it."

"I have missed you, you know? Leaving you? The hardest thing I've ever done."

"Harder than fighting off demobats?" Steve teases. They can do that now. Time has passed, and enough of it, that it's in the past. Which is wild. He wasn't sure that'd ever be true.

"Way harder," Eddie says, smiling a shy smile.

"Staying was hard, too," Steve admits, softly.

Eddie nods, leaning his face down, until it rests on Steve's upper arm, Eddie rubbing against him, like a cat. Steve had almost forgotten that was a thing he'd do. 

His chest constricts, squeezing.

He wants Eddie. All of him. Everything he can get, for however long.

"So, about those bedrooms…" Steve trails off, smiling as Eddie meets his eyes, smiling right back.

If you want to write your own, or see more entries for this challenge, pop on over to @steddie-week and follow along with the fun!

[beyourownanchor6]

Lol you are right, we keep coming back!

Oh it definitely got weird. And they tried to integrate it with the cwtv multiverse and it got even weirder because of spoilers but basically in integrating it they contradicted events of the original series

Lmao the ending of arrow was so bad. The ending of Supergirl made it impossible for Superman and Lois to take place in the same universe because she fucked up the bag. Legends got canceled without any ceremony and it ended on a cliffhanger. Black Lightning was great but it also ended too soon. The ending of The Flash was very disappointing. Basically nobody stuck the landing.

Oh god i wish i could forget the school shooting episode. It wasn't even traumatic (and i'm saying this as someone who survived two separate Activr Gunman Situations in junior high and high school), it was just bad. And i never saw that episode of one tree hill (i only watched a handful of episodes, i was firmly a The OC kid), what was that like? And you're right, they probably wanted to steer clear of the controversy.

OMG I FORGOT VENOM WAS MARVEL 😂😂 Yeah, Symbrock is also one of my ships. I don't care for deadpool but i do like spideypool. Also MattFoggy from Daredevil (my absolute favorite marvel hero).

Omg same. My goal is at least 12 books in the year and to cut down half of my Read Later from AO3. I wanna get through the buddie backlog so i can get into BuckTommy, and i do wanna get back into Sterek. Also you definitely got time to read 10 books! Good luck!

Okay, glad i'm not annoying you. I worry about that sometimes. Lol honestly the readmore is a good move, wish i could do it on asks too. I think i'm gonna stick to asks for a bit cause i love that i have a tag on your blog, but in the near future i'll switch to DMs.

it’s a hellsite, but it’s our hellsite? something like that 😅

the cw multiverse sure was…something wasn’t it? they were definitely reaching with a lot of those episodes and storylines.

i’ve erased it from my memory it was so awful 😂 i tried to watch supergirl twice and ending up quitting it both times; thankfully didn’t come back a third. omg legends! that show was sooo good the first couple of seasons, then they got rid of half the main cast and then it became the reject show. they truly had no idea what to do with it. i never watched black lighting; tried to stay clear of more of those shows after all the others lol. i also stopped the flash before the last couple of seasons bc it was becoming like arrow and i wasn’t going through that again lol. they were definitely all—something lol.

oh wow, that’s intense. sorry you had to go through that; that’s so awful. the oth one was definitely intense. i think a big part of it had to do with how it affected the storyline as a whole, but the way they put it together was definitely very haunting. it’s ironically one of the best episodes i do believe. i also love me some oc. i’ve been thinking of rewatching that one lately lol.

venom my most beloved! ngl a lot of that could have to do with tom hardy 🤣 but i do love the character as well! i can’t wait for the new one. i’ve seen a lot of people are into spideypool but it doesn’t speak to me i guess lol. loveeee daredevil. i miss when all the marvel netflix shows were a thing ngl lol

i got my marked for later down to 4 or 5 pages? so ig i have that going for me 😅 my problem right now is that i’m wanting to read for multiple fandoms and my buddie brainrot has kinda disappeared, so now my marked for later is stuck. i did buy 2 new books today, so there’s hope! good luck on both your goals! there’s still lots of time left this year!

no, not at all! if i don’t reply right away its bc i either don’t have beans atm or i just don’t have the attention span, so once the notification disappears (if it even comes) its out of sight out of mind lol. but definitely not annoying me ever! i love giving people their own little tags 😎

[amorremanet]

You reblogged an OC meme! Thank god, tell us about Josie!

oc profiles meme!

…oh my god, i was so excited to click post and babble about josie at people that i initially forgot to come back and fill in the placeholder with something about how excited i was to talk about josie (—it’s like 4:15 AM where i am, which is probably part of the problem but i digress)

Full Name: Josiah Daniel Quinn — but, please, they explicitly prefer to be called, “Josie,” so unless you’re one of their bosses over at S.T.R.O.M.A*, whom they’re in no position to argue with, call them Josie. If not that, then use their surname. But if you can avoid it, just please do not call them by their full given first name, okay?

Shiny mutant superhero codename: Lyaeus — derived from an aspect of Dionysus who is traditionally invoked as a reliever of pain and a deliverer from anxiety and emotional turmoil and so on, which is one of their preferred uses of their psychic abilities and one of Josie’s larger goals in life (for them, it’s a mix of, “If something bad is going to happen, and you can do something to stop it and choose not to, that’s on you” and, “The world is a mess and largely sucks, but that’s no reason not to do what we can to take care of each other”).

Their codename is doubly special to them because although they were raised loosely Catholic and have a Mormon extended family who mostly doesn’t acknowledge their existence (and hasn’t for their entire life, since their Mom left the Mormon church to marry Josie’s Dad, oops), Josie is a hellenic pagan whose primary relationship is with Dionysus.

They thought for a long time and did a lot of reflection about whether or not it was too presumptuous of them to use one of his aspects as a codename, but eventually, they went with it because they see their codename and its meaning as someone who they’re continually striving to be and a set of values that they’re always trying to bring to bear in the world, and they feel like Dionysus is probably okay with that.

Gender and Sexuality: DMAB Genderfluid. // Bisexual.

This isn’t actually specifically about their gender or sexuality, but I couldn’t think of where else to put it: Josie grew up around all things Rocky Horror. Like, their parents were highly involved in the local community theatre, which did a semi-regular RHPS shadow-cast, and Josie’s parents brought their kid with them often enough that Josie grew up with their blood family and their, “Rocky family.”

Josie would rather deal with their Rocky family than their blood family a lot of the time, because their Rocky family was more immediately there for them during a lot of rough stuff while they were growing up, and their Rocky family handled it better at the various times when they came out, and their Rocky family didn’t say shit like, “Wait, I thought you were gay, why are you going back in the closet” when they came out as bi or ask invasive questions when they came out as genderfluid and was more supportive in general of Josie’s evolving sense of their own identity, and so on.

Pronouns: They/Them/Theirs.

Josie does also answer to He/Him/His pronouns, but that isn’t a choice on their part, so much as it’s an issue of, “Well, I can be out at work and open the door to potential harassment and people who will invalidate my gender identity and likely flat-out refuse to respect my pronouns, which will create more difficulty for myself in a job that’s already difficult because it’s stressful to begin with and I hate working here — or I can suck it up and just be grateful that my friends and parents are all good about this”

Like, one of the things that Seb does when he and Josie first meet that makes Josie go, “I’m still not totally thrilled at being assigned to help out the newbie (especially since I know I’m only getting this assignment because: 1. our bosses are playing a game of, ‘lmao just toss the LGBTQ ones together’ because the newbie’s gay and pretty much everyone here thinks that I am too; and 2. Deputy Director Gray is still cranky with me over that MSNBC round-table that I did last week where Yael kept pushing me to voice my own opinions and not the Bureau’s official line) — but maybe it won’t actually be completely awful and maybe he’s going to be okay as a new partner”?

…is noticing that Josie wears two woven yarn bracelets on one wrist — one of them in the lavender/white/chartreuse colors of the genderqueer flag, and the other in the pink/white/purple/black/blue of the genderfluid flag — and first waiting for them to be alone in Josie’s office, then going, “Oh, so are you genderfluid? What are your pronouns?” and then listening and respecting it when Josie explained that they’d rather Seb just kept using he/him/his at work

Species: Human (mutant with aforementioned mutant psychic powers)

Race/Ethnicity: White, and the only real part of Josie’s ethnic background that’s ever been important in their life was that their late paternal grandmother was very proud of being Irish.

Like, her parents had come to Ellis Island from Ireland — though she was too young to have any actual memories of the passage herself — and she wasn’t so insistent about it that she objected to her son marrying a Mormon girl instead of a Good Irish Catholic Girl, but still, the Irish thing was a big deal for her.

Josie, personally, doesn’t get it beyond, “I’m white and I have a particular aversion to St. Patrick’s Day because first of all, some of my extended family members can turn into a bunch of rowdy, off-putting little shits on St. Patrick’s Day, and I always had to suffer through that because we always had a party for it, first because Grandma wanted one, and then in honor of her memory.

“And secondly, because as soon as anyone hears that I’m partially Irish and/or a Dionysian, it is just assumed that I want to go get wasted on St. Patrick’s Day, which I don’t, but I still end up going out into environments that are absolute Hell for someone who has both telepathy and hyper-empathy, because the spaces are crowded, emotions are running high, and there is basically nowhere to escape to where you can get some peace and quiet and a break from the sensory and emotional overload of being at a rowdy bar on St. Patrick’s Day.

“And I endure all of this with people whom I may not even like that much just so they’ll have a designated driver, because I would feel bad personally if I didn’t go to make sure they all got home okay, and just because they don’t understand my god or might want to get something else out of him than I do, doesn’t mean that I should brush them off and risk them getting hurt while they’re completely shit-faced.

“Which doesn’t make this any less exhausting and awful, but it’s better than taking the chance that they might get hurt, y’know?”

Birthplace and Birthdate: Saratoga Springs, NY. // 22nd February, 1980 — they’re a Pisces (Libra rising, Gemini moon).

Guilty Pleasures: High-quality dark chocolate, high-quality makeup even if they can’t wear most of it as often as they’d like^, the original Vampire Chronicles novels (and though they will sometimes claim that only the original six ones, “count,” Josie owns everything that Anne Rice has published, even the ridiculous Jesus books), binge-watching reruns of Project Runway…

And they don’t feel particularly guilty about it, but one of the simple things that makes Josie happy is playfully teasing their emergency contacts/best friends over how their parents named them after Beatles songs

Jude, naturally, was “Hey Jude” and Rocky got named after, “Rocky Raccoon” because, at the last minute, his and Jude’s parents decided to veto naming him Desmond because he’s a character in “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da” but his name is not in the title, which was apparently a deal-breaker because of reasons

Rocky also sometimes gets playful ribbing about all things Rocky Horror, because he and Josie are ridiculous nerds, and RHPS isn’t their exclusive thing because Josie will share it with anyone who gives them half a chance to do so…… but it is still a thing that is special to Josie and Rocky, so here they are

If you ask them, Josie will tell you that they don’t believe in associating pleasure with guilt, and in their defense, they do believe in encouraging people not to feel guilty for enjoying the things that make them happy or that help them survive, because as long as those things aren’t hurting anyone — yes, that includes you, person Josie is talking to — then you have a right to be happy and a right to take care of yourself

The reality is that Josie says this to people so often because it’s something that they often struggle with themself, and even though they’re better, in some ways, than they have been in the past, there are still a lot of places where they need work

Also, Josie wouldn’t call some of the more poppy music that they like, “guilty pleasures” — especially because, if you ask them, there is no reason to feel guilty about listening to, for example, Beyoncé or Nicki Minaj

—but it is still the case that, if they were going to have a mini-reunion with some of the old goth crew friends from high school whom they don’t keep in touch with that often, Josie probably wouldn’t mention Nicki or Beyoncé, unless it was by accident or until they were sure that the old gang wasn’t going to do the judgmental goth kids thing they used to do of going, “ugh, all pop music is soulless empty bullshit for posers” and so on

Also also, there is almost no chance of them ever admitting this to most people, but…… Josie kinda loves the goth kids from South Park. Like, Josie really kinda loves them.

There’s basically no chance of them ever admitting it to most people because for one thing, it’s embarrassing to them, due to the whole South Park of everything.

For another, they’d feel the need to give someone a lengthy, tedious disclaimer about how they don’t actually watch South Park or enjoy it very much, they just know about the goth kids because one of their best friends went, “Oh my god, Josie, you have to watch this, the new Goth kid characters are so you” way back when, after the first episode with them in it aired and said friend (Rocky) was still taping new eps on VHS to watch after he got home from night classes

And…… well. Josie still wouldn’t give South Park much credit for anything else, but they do really love the goth kids, and they agree with Rocky’s, “omg it you” moment because the South Park goth kids are often eerily similar to shit that they said and did as a weird little goth kid back in high school

At one point, Rocky actually made Josie little plush dolls of the goth kids that he’d designed himself, and they are a big reason why you’re not allowed in Josie’s room until they trust you.

Other reasons include:

Josie doesn’t want most people to touch their makeup or put any of it out of order, and they keep most of it in their bedroom, on their dresser, in front of the vanity mirror that they found someone just throwing out shortly after they moved to Baltimore, even though it’s a perfectly good mirror so wtf;

some of Josie’s favorite and most personally meaningful religious and spiritual paraphernalia is in their bedroom (they keep their actual shrine to Dionysus and their, “worship workspace” in a different room at their place, but some of the more personally significant things are in their room most of the time, and they’d rather you didn’t have a chance to touch them);

Josie just tends to be an incredibly private person who places a lot of value on their personal space and having spaces that are set aside as Theirs. They were like this even before their psychic abilities kicked in and made them value even more their personal space, and ability to have a place that is set apart as Theirs Exclusively where they can go to get some distance from all the mental, emotional, and sensory overload that comes from feeling almost everyone’s feelings and hearing many of their thoughts**, to some extent or another, almost all the time;

and the few albums of old photos and framed old photos, some of which are just garden variety embarrassing like, “yes, my hair is naturally blond, here is photographic evidence from before my parents let me start dyeing it, and oh yeah, that was probably backstage after the community theatre production of Oliver! that I did in eighth grade — oh yeah, definitely that one, there’s my Artful Dodger costume and my glaringly blond hair”

but others of which are, for lack of a better term, fairly emotionally complicated for Josie. There are several different reasons why any of these photos might be kinda complicated — ranging from, “they feature Josie’s one particularly heinous ex-boyfriend who used his wealthy family’s connections to get Josie blacklisted from working in fashion after they graduated from Pratt’s School of Design” to, “they’re from the year in high school that Josie wound up having to do over because they had to spend a few months getting inpatient treatment for their eating disorder”

^: even before getting recruited to S.T.R.O.M.A., Josie got really good at finding a balance between the, “I don’t want to look pretty, I want to look otherworldly and possibly like a vampire fairy from Wonderland” style of makeup that they want to wear, and a “more professional” style that is less likely to make their clients feel uncomfortable or get them harassed — but god, do they wish that they didn’t have to strike said balance.

It wouldn’t actually make their fondness for high-quality and often expensive makeup feel like any less of a guilty pleasure, for several reasons — on one hand, their awareness of how makeup is always politically Complicated, at best; on the other, if they got to wear their makeup exactly how they want it every day, they would end up spending more money on makeup, and it would make them feel guilty because they’d feel like it’s very irresponsible and probably going to screw them over down the line because they bought makeup instead of saving the money or putting it toward something else; and on the tentacle, a whole laundry list of other reasons

—but they would still feel more comfortable with themself and more at ease with everything because they’d be presenting exactly as they want, instead of censoring their own personal gender expressions (which they’re more okay with doing when it comes to their clients because that’s a case of compromising part of their well-being in the name of [probably] helping people who need them and pay them for that help, whereas toning it down at S.T.R.O.M.A. is tedious and Josie would seriously rather not)

(They have more than once said that the degree to which they have to tone things down for S.T.R.O.M.A. makes them feel like Ned “I’m not a Satanic sex god anymore, used to be a super gothed out androgynous rock star, but is now a straitlaced and nerdy substitute teacher” Schneebly from School of Rock.

This is not a good feeling, in Josie Land. They don’t like it and they live for the weekend because, barring any major incidents that get them called in to S.T.R.O.M.A., they get to wear what the fuck they want, forego pants in favor of their favorite skirts, do their gender how the fuck they want, and wear makeup that makes them look like a vampire fairy from Wonderland)

Phobias: Josie’s biggest fear, in the immediate sense, is losing control of their psychic abilities and ending up hurting people and/or destroying themself somehow.

Underlying that, they have a bigger and more further-reaching fear of being out of control of themself and their own actions, in general.

They’re simultaneously afraid of crowds (largely because they can get really overwhelming for Josie, really fast), and afraid of isolation, which ends up making them a lot like the sort of cat who goes all like, “cuddle me cuddle me cuddle me please please please i need love and affection… no wait, fuck you, this is stifling me and i need to get out of here… wait shit i’m lonely someone please love me… no, not you, you fucking suck… why am i so lonely, why won’t anyone pay attention to me… and so and so forth ad nauseam”

That said, when I was doing Pottermore quizzes for my kids because that is the sort of thing I find both fun and useful, Josie’s picked, “Isolation” for the, “Which is your greatest fear” question on the wand quiz

They picked, “An eye at the keyhole of the dark, windowless room in which you are locked” for the, “Which nightmare would frighten you most” question on the Sorting Hat quiz

Other miscellaneous fears and squicks: Worms, eels, and anything like that (but snakes are okay, snakes are great).

The possibility of never finding love (which they know is kind of ridiculous, because they do have a lot of love in their life… but Josie does want to be with someone romantically, and all their miscellaneous issues with their blood family aside, it’s weird and kind of disheartening for them that most of their cousins have gotten married or settled down with someone, so yeah, Josie knows that this fear is based on a lot of ideas that they generally don’t like and don’t want to live by, but still.

They’re 35, their closest friends both have longstanding romantic relationships, they’re one of the few cousins left who doesn’t have a plus-one to bring to the next family wedding, and they want a romantic relationship, so being perpetually reminded that they’re not in one kicks them in the larger fear that there is something about them that is just fundamentally unlovable, so they might end up being forever alone).

What They Would Be Famous For: Realistically? Probably how they’re going to start a new superhero team with Lucy, Pete, and Sebastian — later accumulating others — and how they’re all going to kinda stumble into trying to foil some other mutants who also happen to be neo-fascist supervillains. But had Josie’s one ex, Danny, not effectively gotten them blacklisted from working in fashion, Josie might well have made a pretty big name for themself there.

They used to joke about being famous for going on Project Runway and winning, but… this started after they’d already gotten onto the path that led them to therapeutic practice, and seen that they had the potential to do a lot of good in the world by continuing on that path, so the chances of them actually doing the Project Runway thing were almost nothing

What They Would Get Arrested For: While they haven’t technically been arrested before, Josie could have been arrested for illegally overstepping the bounds of what their particular level of metahuman license allowed them to do, and if they get arrested in the future, it is almost definitely going to be for something like protesting or some trumped up nonsense charges that actually boil down to, “getting on the wrong side of neo-fascist supervillains who have wealth and connections and political power.”

OCs You Ship Them With:

Romantically: Pete is my favorite here, but: 1. I’m also going to make them work for it, because they would be good for each other, but it wouldn’t just happen super-easily for several reasons, both about the two of them individually and about how they get on together;

and 2. I’d also dig shipping Josie with Seb, Stephen, Vince, Sylvia, Izzy, Raphael, and Cynthia — though tbh, I like non-romantic Seb/Josie better than romantic Seb/Josie

Platonically: As mentioned, Jude, Rocky, and Sebastian. Aside from them, Margot, Lucy, and Sara Grace (who are all ruled out as romantic options by the three of them being lesbians), and Josie being genderfluid, yes, but not identifying with womanhood enough for them to consider romantically pursuing someone who identifies as a lesbian. Todd (who I kind of feel bad for, because he’s sort of the loser in love so far, but otoh, that’s partially his own damn fault and he has a lot of growing to do before I’m letting him have a romantic relationship that actually lasts). Yael and Elizabeth. Really, everyone on the romantic list is a good platonic relationship, too.

“this is not a ship that i condone but i find their relationship interesting, and exploring Not Good relationships is Important to me”: Julian, who actually hasn’t met Josie yet, and won’t for a while, and their relationship will be…… tricky, in a lot of ways, many of which have something to do with how Julian is a huge tool who has a charming tendency to take his own self-loathing and insecurity out on everyone else while acting campy and making sarcastic quips as though this makes his behaviors totally okay.

Pretty much everything about Julian makes him someone who would make Josie say, “the Lord is testing me”

(only for someone — probably Lucy — to go, “But you’re not Christian” and get told either, “I was raised as one, maybe Jesus’s Dad is still grumpy that I found someone who’s better for me. Anyway, you know what I meant, right?”

or, “Fine. The Almighty Thundering Zeus, lord of the heavens and king of Olympus and He Who Was Cheating On His Wife With Everyone Ever Before It Was Cool, is testing me. There. Does that version make you happy?”)

But, yeah. Julian would make Josie go, “someone is testing me” because so much of who and what he is makes Josie want to help him, but so much of what he does makes Josie want to punch him

(an impulse that Josie largely won’t be acting on because, unfortunately for them:

1. they did not get any super-strength kinds of mutations and in an RPG, Strength would be one of their lowest stats;

and 2. first, they need to learn how to throw a punch without hurting themself more than the other person.

Punching neo-fascists isn’t their strong suit. They can let Seb and Lucy do the actual punching.

And Pete, even though Pete really shouldn’t because Pete also doesn’t know how to throw a punch without hurting himself more than the other person, so Josie is more likely to try and stop him from punching a neo-fascist supervillain in the face.

Not that Josie will always succeed in that, but… well. They and their teammates are all only human.)

Anyway, uh. Josie/Julian isn’t a ship that I’d personally want to see as the endgame of anything, ever, but I find their dynamic and the potential interactions between them interesting, and they’re something I’m looking forward to playing around with more, when it’s their time

OC Most Likely To Murder Them: Conrad will kinda want to, because he finds Josie’s sense of ethics to be, “tedious and outdated,” but ultimately, he wouldn’t go through with it because Josie’s creativity would intrigue him too much.

Senator Huntington would also want Josie to die, but he wouldn’t do any of the actual murdering because he doesn’t do his own dirty work.

All things considered, Edward and Desmond are probably going to end up with the job, “Go kill the weird effete one who looks like some kind of vampire fairy from Wonderland” because everyone else is busy, and they will fail at it, because that’s kind of what they do.

They are Those Two Bad Guys, and they kind of suck at almost everything that they try to do.

Favorite Movie/Book Genre: Fantasy, vampire trash, psychological thrillers, magical girl everything, and horror (pretty much all kinds of horror, though Josie’s most fond of monster horror, anything with revenge-y themes, and religious or cosmic horror. They will probably tell you, “The weirder and more pointlessly, aesthetically symbolic, the better”).

Least Favorite Movie/Book Cliche: Josie would tell you that it’s how much romanticized abuse there is in paranormal romance, and to be fair, they do hate that…… but they still read it or watch it and get invested in these fictional relationships, even without necessarily coming up with a counter-reading of the text’s opinion, beyond, “this relationship is abusive even if the author doesn’t get that”

Which, to be fair, doesn’t mean that they don’t hate the prevalence of romanticized intimate partner abuse, just that it’s an, “I hate this thing” where they still engage with it, and not just because there aren’t always a lot of options without it

(Horror flicks that demonize and stigmatize mental illness are a thing where Josie doesn’t like the thing, but suffers through them because there aren’t a lot of other options otherwise)

But one trope that will make them, “nope” out…… uh.

Josie is really sensitive about The Uncanny Valley, and while they may not fully, “nope” out of things over it, they need to take more time than most people to prep themselves for seeing it and recover after seeing it

Also, not a trope, but Shia LaBeouf will make Josie “nope” out of anything. They have no rational reason for disliking Shia LeBouf, so much as he Just Irrationally Bugs Them, but they will “nope” out of things if he’s involved

Talents and/or Powers: Okay, so, a lot of Josie’s actual superpowers are discussed elsewhere, especially in the footnotes, so let’s talk about their other, non-mutant superpowers. They can sew. Even without having been actively designing anything for a while, they can still pull out a good design and they are capable of following a pattern pretty well. They know their limits fairly well, and better than pretty much everyone in the main team (this doesn’t mean that they always). And it’s almost 4 AM, so this answer is getting cut short by, “I am tired and I want to sleep” (and the next two answers will suck for the same reason)

Why Someone Might Love Them: Josie is creative and curious and once you get them to warm up, calm down, and stop worrying so much about anything, they’re a complete dork who, among other things, gives people, “C’thulhu kisses” (done by sticking your hands in front of your mouth and wiggling your fingers like tentacles, and maybe making a silly noise and saying, “C’thulhu kisses!” like you’re Sailor Moon shouting her transformation phrase). They have a pretty good sense of humor about themself, outside of their precious few no go areas. Josie is compassionate and they do genuinely want the best for most people, even people they don’t personally like very much. They try to be patient with people, even when they really don’t want to be, and even if they don’t always know what the best option is, they still try to actually do things and choose the best option for creating positive change.

Why Someone Might Hate Them: Their cycle of indecisiveness that leads to recklessness that leads to self-punishing thoughts and behaviors that leads to more indecisiveness, and rinse lather repeat. Their tendency to be really judgmental, even while acknowledging that being judgmental is something that, in their experience, causes more harm than good, and that they want to avoid more often. The way that they can lapse into talking like a high school goth kid who’s up-talking the superiority of goth subculture and doesn’t realize that they sound like an elitist, conformist prick, just like the people they’re complaining about allegedly do.

How They Change: Well, for one thing, Josie has some things to learn about how they relate to people and manage their relationships — which doesn’t necessarily make them special because this is just kind of a Thing for most of my main characters in one way or another. Josie’s specific issue wrt relating to other people has to do with their reluctance to trust people and open up and try to build any new relationships, which has often led to them practicing a sort of interpersonal-level isolationism that has hurt them and other people.

They also have something to learn about managing the façade(s) that they present to the world, much like how Seb has to learn something about his habit of acting like everything is okay while he’s suffering and thinking anyone believes him anymore because he doesn’t want to deal with his problems

and like how Pete has to learn about how…… yeah, okay, he is genuinely angry about a lot of things — some of them fair and really more, “righteous indignation” than anything else, and some of them less fair — but a lot of how he acts that anger out in the world is not actually as truthful as Pete feels like it is, but more a way of keeping people at arm’s length, testing them and testing his relationships with them, and trying to push them away before they can get the chance to hurt him

In Josie’s case, their façade(s) are a bit different because most of them came into being less because of an emotional choice on Josie’s part — e.g., Seb doesn’t want to deal with his problems because they’re painful and terrifying and they feel like they’re too big to handle — and more out of pragmatic decisions

……but then Josie came to rely on them in contexts other than the ones in which they were originally created, and balancing that many different versions of yourself is stressful as fuck-all, especially for someone who already has to do a lot of work to keep reminding themself of where their personal boundaries are, and Josie hides in their different façades every bit as much as every other character who has one, and largely only gets away with that because most people in their life don’t know them well enough to notice this, and their façades do still have pragmatic value, so most people who do notice don’t say shit about shit

Then, there’s Josie’s relationship to time, which

I’m going to explain this really badly now, because it’s 3:33 and I’m tired, but basically, I see Seb, Josie, and Lucy as complementing each other in how they relate to and orient themselves in time, and the negative side-effects that they create for themselves because of these behaviors

On one hand, Seb is way too prone to being stuck in the past. He clings to it too much — but also has a selective relationship with it, where people he cares about get forgiven too easily and Seb tries to deny that he still feels upset about anything (even when basically everyone around him knows that he does feel upset and is just trying not to deal with it), while Seb forgives himself for nothing and defines himself so much by all of his past mistakes

—and he goes past the point of, “honoring and respecting history, such as by not ignoring times when he did fuck up (of which there are many)” to, “actively impeding his own progress in life because, for example, he keeps trying the same shit over and over and over again, even though it literally never works, because it’s what he did before.” Plus, some of his ideas about the past are distorted by various factors, or missing entirely (most often due to intoxicated blackouts and/or head trauma that would have had more disastrous effects on him if not for his mutant healing factor), or otherwise unreliable, so that’s a problem.

On the other hand, Lucy is future-oriented and totally jazzed up about trying new things and meeting new challenges head on and doing things!! also STUFF!!!!! there is an entire world full of THINGS AND STUFF AND BY GOD, LUCY IS GOING TO DO ALL OF IT OR AT LEAST AS MUCH OF IT AS SHE POSSIBLY CAN AND THINGS ARE GOING TO GET BETTER SO HELP HER GOD OR JESUS OR SATAN OR WHOEVER EXCELSIOR YAH YAH YAH!!!!

……which is great and all, but she charges headlong into shit without an actual plan (seriously, most of her plans follow the good old, “step one: do this thing / step two: ………… / step three: PROFIT!” formula), and she’s a case of someone who is averse to learning from history at all because she doesn’t want to be shackled to it, but having no sense of history can be just as bad as being overly chained to it like Sebastian, and… well. You can try to outrun the past like she does, but it doesn’t tend to work out very well, and it’s not going to work for Lucy either

On the tentacle, we have Josie, who ostensibly has a balance between the past and the future orientations that we see in Seb and Lucy, because Josie’s primary focus tends to lie on the present, and at most, the very near future or very recent past

—but that’s not actually a balance like Josie wants to believe, because (among other things), it makes it very easy for Josie to ignore past lessons that are older than maybe the past two or three months; and it means that while Josie can see all kinds of potential consequences, their ability to predict what they could be gets a lot less reliable as you go further into the future; and it means that Josie has trouble actually putting together a longer-term plan, which is part of their problem with wanting to create positive change in the world but not knowing how

Josie also has a tougher road (imltho) to go on about finding a new and better balance here, because their focus on the present is something they learned in recovery, as part of learning about mindfulness, and it does help them sometimes — but on that personal level, Josie’s presentist focus can also hurt them because, even when they notice certain behaviors in themself that could get Bad For Them, they can also overlook some of these budding patterns because they’re not Obviously Bad Enough to feel like a major concern, or they look different from other past manifestations of Josie’s behavior patterns so Josie doesn’t think they need to worry about these behaviors, and so on

I’m mean to my characters and I’m going to make them work to be happy, but they will all be happy, eventually

Uh. Barring most of the villains, because letting the neo-fascist assholes win in the end would be a complete downer that would probably end up undermining a lot of the whole, “just because the world is a crapsack hellhole doesn’t mean that it has to stay that way or that we should give up on it” idea

Why You Love Them: Okay, so, this needs a bit of a story.

See, Josie is a retooled character from an old RP that I was in way, way back. I loved them a lot, and they weren’t entirely wrong for the game — they had a good run in their first incarnation — but they also weren’t entirely right for it, and they kind of floundered a bit because I wasn’t entirely sure what to do with them.

A large part of this was due to how Josie was a senior at their school and, because of the year they did over, they were itching to get out and go to college, and the closest they got to an actual arc was how they didn’t want to leave behind their ex-boyfriend turned best friend (who was in the class below them), but did want to go to college already and get to the rest of their life

and how they had some trouble with accepting said best friend’s new boyfriend when Josie really wanted to be compassionate, because New Boyfriend was mentally ill and dealing with some trauma and Josie sympathized and wanted him to be well because why the Hell would you wish for someone to be *UN*well jfc — but also had trouble with that because New Boyfriend was sometimes aware of how some of his actions affected other people, but sometimes not, but sometimes he was and did the stupid things anyway, and even in working on his problems, he made the mistake that a lot of people do where they focus on getting well as defined by and in order to please the people around them, rather than doing it for themselves

—all of which Josie was sympathetic to in a big way, having been in some similar places before themself…… but they had a hard time always being as compassionate as they wanted to be because New Boyfriend’s actions had been hurting Best Friend, and even knowing that this wasn’t entirely something that New Boyfriend could be entirely blamed for (for several reasons), Josie still had a hard time trying to overlook the, “this lovable weirdo is my friend, my best friend, and even though we aren’t together anymore, I love him, and you hurt him, so yeah, I’m kinda mad at you for that” thing

And this all goes back to why I love Josie because one thing that they’ve kept in a big way, in getting retooled and updated and worked into my dumb little stories about neurodivergent and/or mentally ill LGBTQ mutant superheroes (and Pete, who is not actually a mutant but is neurodivergent, gay, an abuse survivor, and a superhero and I will fight anyone who says otherwise)

(I mean, ffs. Batman doesn’t have any mutant superpowers, and Iron Man wouldn’t have any actual superpowers without his ridiculous power-armor and, depending on the continuities, his arc reactors. So, no, I don’t think that Pete needs to have literal superpowers to count as a superhero — but that’s beside the point and to be fair, I will admit to being biased because I love Pete more than George RR Martin loves Jon Snow and Tyrion Lannister)

Anyway. As I was saying.

One thing that Josie has kept in a big way is that ongoing fight with themself over two equally powerful impulses or reactions to things or desires — like their, “I want affections and I want to be around people…… okay no this is overwhelming and I don’t actually like these people fuck this I want to be alone…… oh but being alone sucks and now I’m lonely, I want to be where the people are, let’s go to the movies…… oh my god why did we go see the new Star Wars while it’s still a relatively recent release, I barely remember anything about the actual movie, I was too overwhelmed by the feelings of everyone else in that completely packed theatre… and so on” relationship with other people and being around them or not

Or like their big struggle in the first book of wanting to help people and create positive change in the world, but not being able to do too terribly much on their own for a lot of reasons (some of which are about Josie personally, and some of which are about the whole Lone Superhero thing be a lot of hot fucking nonsense that is fundamentally unsustainable), but not having an official team to belong to because although they work for S.T.R.O.M.A., they don’t like S.T.R.O.M.A., and while they are part of the extended Wardens family, they’re not a fully-fledged Warden and so much of the Wardens’ everything is based around Yael and Elizabeth’s school, so being one and not being up in Poughkeepsie would be weird and mean you end up missing out on a lot and, in Josie’s case, end up feeling like an outsider even when you’re surrounded by people who, for the most part, love you and accept you exactly as you are, but also not entirely doing everything they can to find a team because, in fairness, it can be really difficult to do that even if you don’t work for the U.S. government……

Basically, I love Josie because I love making my characters deal with internal conflict, and while all of them have a lot of it, I’m really fond of Josie’s particular brand of, “self-reflective, doing things but not things that add up to bigger things in the ways that Josie wants, trying to remedy that but it’s hard, not sure what to do or if going after these new possibilities and new ideas will make things worse, getting fed up with themself and needing to try something, but but but five million different elements all converging on each other but but but” internal conflict

And I’m really fond of it in Josie’s case because Josie is savvy enough to know that they can’t fall into the same, “do fuck-all nothing about anything until the last possible minute” trap, but their frustration is less about, “I can’t do anything” and more about, “but what do the things that I do actually mean, who am I helping, am I actually helping them or not, how can I do things that create more significant positive changes or is there a way to do that at all”

And, well. There is, Josie, but it requires you to trust some new people, bond with some new people, build relationships with them and work on maintaining said relationships, find strength in numbers, and learn more about loving and letting people love you back because one of your biggest problems in your previous relationships has been that you don’t open up — not, “you open up slowly” but, “you don’t open up with most people, period, despite knowing that this is not a sustainable way of doing things” — so yeah I’d say you need to learn about that, and learn to stop being such a lone wolf because do you know what generally happens to lone wolves? Either they find a pack somehow, or they die (without making any kind of positive changes in the world around them, relative to the size and interests of, y’know, wolves).

……Because I’m a lonely and bitter and it makes my half-dead little heart happy to make my characters find more strength together than they do apart and learn to love and be loved in return without it coming off as one-sided, like it can do in a lot of takes on that trope that are aimed at children, because…… uh, last I checked, the whole point of a relationship is that it is not exclusively about one person’s needs or desires???

Also, Josie is a compassionate but grumpy grown up goth kid who is trying to be a good person, and doing a better job than a lot of other characters, but definitely has a problem with their judgmental tendencies and how they sometimes externalize them and get super-judgmental of others, because on some level, their mind is like, “fuck, can i get a break from always punishing myself over here, jfc” and I don’t know, it’s almost 4AM and I have lost track of how long I’ve been writing this

Josie’s a nerd and a cat who can’t make up their mind about whether they want to be outside chasing butterflies or inside sitting on your keyboard so that you have to pay attention to them and not your computer and idk, I love them, the end

(except for the footnotes oops)

*: Special Taskforce for the Regulation and Oversight of Metahuman Affairs — or in plain-speak, the FBI’s wing of people who get involved in all of the shiny, extralegal superpowered mutant hijinks.

They have a pretty good working relationship with their counterparts at the Department of Health and Human Services (who actually end up handling most mutant affairs, because this world treats the question of super-powered mutant licensing as more equivalent to getting a driver’s license, and frankly, most mutants in the U.S. just want to go about their lives in peace — like, go to college, get a job, go on dates, come home and watch the Daily Show, and not be bothered about or make trouble for anyone else with the weird superpowers that most of them did not want or ask for — so there’s rarely any actual reason for the FBI to go stick their noses into anything, and there are plenty of cases where they get called in, only to find that they aren’t actually needed after all), but… yeah.

S.T.R.O.M.A. is a faction of people who exist. Josie works for them, for all they would really rather not. Unfortunately for Josie, particularly powerful metahumans tend to wind up on a lot of S.T.R.O.M.A. watch-lists, and they are more likely to do so when they have powers that the people at the FBI consider particularly useful or desirable — for example, telepathy and hyper-empathy, in Josie’s case. For the most part, these watch-lists don’t actually amount to anything because they don’t end up being relevant to most of the cases that S.T.R.O.M.A. has to deal with.

—but then you can have situations like Josie’s, where they were one of many mutants who got in a brief spot of trouble over genuine confusion surrounding a new bill that had just gone through Congress and revised some of the definitions of and privileges associated with/afforded to people at the different levels of metahuman licenses. (Since this is still America and we’re still talking about the FBI, there are also plenty of even worse potential outcomes for people who end up on their miscellaneous mutant watchlists — which is one of the big points that gets brought up by people who either want to reform or do away with the whole metahuman licensing thing — but in fairness to most people, they don’t know the full specifics.)

Anyway, Josie got in trouble because they are an actual therapist and, although they prefer not to use their powers with clients and extensively brief anyone who asks about trying that approach (about the potential benefits vs. potential risks, all the drawbacks, all the potential unintended consequences, etc.) while offering them plenty of chances to change their mind and go, “okay, let’s not do this,” they do still let their clients know that they’re a telepath/empath and that they can use their powers in a therapeutic context but it’s not the best thing to try as a first approach

Which is all great, except that Josie had been assured that they wouldn’t need to get a different kind of license to continue doing this, after that bill passed… except that they did. And this probably would’ve continued with no actual interference from anybody because Josie is hyper-responsible about using their powers with clients, about keeping up on all of the latest research and debates about therapeutic uses for psychic abilities and the ethical issues surrounding this, and so on…… except that one of their clients was a teenager who needed parental consent to go through with this, and one of their parents worked for S.T.R.O.M.A.

Relevant piece of context: Josie was absolutely not the only mutant who’d had some confusion over the revised licensing scheme. Josie wasn’t even the only mutant in the greater Baltimore area who had similar confusion on this issue.

But Josie was one of the only ones who was already on S.T.R.O.M.A.’s radar when they got in trouble, partly by virtue of being a “telempath,” partly by virtue of having trained with Dr. Elizabeth Woodham (who is: one of the most powerful telepaths in the entire world; a respected professor, activist, and philanthropist; one of the first mutants in the States to register for one of the early, “superhero licenses” [not their official name, but that’s the gist of what they are]; and with her wife, Dr. Yael Lehrer, one of the co-founders of the Wardens and co-headmistresses of one of the most respected schools for mutants in North America), and partly by virtue of having a lot of (mostly untapped) potential power.

And, see, one of S.T.R.O.M.A.’s problems is that it is perpetually under-staffed, in all areas but especially in terms of mutants who work for them, and moreover, mutants who will actually do fieldwork (like, Pete’s cousin Emerson is a mutant and he does work for S.T.R.O.M.A., but he’s lower on the powers scale than most of their employees who do active fieldwork, and he has no desire to do fieldwork when he could do lab-work instead). There are a lot of reasons for this problem of staffing, but one of the more noticeable end-results is that S.T.R.O.M.A. can be somewhat unethical in some of their recruitment bids. Like, yes, sometimes, you just get a visit from Some Guy Who Is Totally Not Nick Fury, who offers you a chance to be a part of something bigger than yourself and to use your abilities to help people

Other times, you get treated to a few hours of what S.T.R.O.M.A. sees and treats as the interview portion of applying for a Very Important Position somewhere, except that they don’t tell you that this is what they’re doing and they use “interview” (read: interrogation) techniques that people in law enforcement usually save for wrangling confessions out of suspects.

It will not look like it, but they are actually trying to figure out some specific things about you, including but not limited to: how you handle high-stress and high-pressure situations (like, for example, being accused of using your powers for any extralegal vigilantism, and maybe knowing things about [the biggest mutant-related news of the day] that they don’t; being threatened with a trip to one of the U.S. prisons designed to hold mutants; etc.); various details about your backstory and who you are as a person and what your biggest Deals are (i.e., getting you to help them run a damn background check on yourself); and how in control of your powers you are (since they trust the DHHS evaluations, but prefer to supplement them with firsthand evidence).

Then, once they’ve figured out what they want to know, you might very well be offered something to the tune of, “Alright, this is your first offense, and based on your dossier and this interview, we think that you could be an asset to S.T.R.O.M.A., if you wanted. If you like the sound of working for us, at least as an analyst or consultant if not a fully-fledged special agent, then we can make all of this legal trouble just go away. If you don’t like the sound of that, then……… well… *deliberately trails off to let you draw your own conclusions while still staying within the letter of the law, because hey, they didn’t actually tell you that you’d for sure end up getting prosecuted and going to prison*”

So…… yeah. S.T.R.O.M.A. and Ethics are not always on speaking terms.

Add this recruitment story to Josie’s frustrations with how metahuman employees at S.T.R.O.M.A. tend to get treated — e.g., they, themself, are often trotted out to go liaise with different media outlets as a public face of Mutants Who Work Here, Look We’re Trying Our Best So You Should All Just Totally Cooperate With Us, but they’re discouraged from voicing any of their own opinions and advised to just stick to these Bureau-approved talking points — and at having to be closeted and fairly masc-presenting at work because S.T.R.O.M.A. thinks they’re a cis man, and…… yeah, uh.

“Josie would really, really rather not work here” is an understatement af… but they continue working here anyway because: 1. as a consultant, they can still usually balance things enough to keep working as a therapist;

and 2. Josie wants so badly to help people, and for all S.T.R.O.M.A. is highly unethical (sometimes) and part of the goddamn FBI, most of the people who work there also want to help people and use their work to create positive changes in the world — and it’s not an unfair observation that, on their own, there really isn’t much that Josie can do (because the idea of the solo superhero who works alone… isn’t sustainable, like??

Aside from the political and ideological issues with that whole aspect of superhero mythology, it’s not actually feasible for one person, working on their own, to create any positive change. It would be massively unhealthy for them, there’s only so much they can do as one person, there are no actual safeguards in place if they ever get corrupted, and as multiple deconstructions of the genre have shown, it’s really easy for a classic lone vigilante model superhero to slide into a mindset like Rorschach’s — which is full of hypocrisy, double standards, misogyny and homophobia and ableism, and total moral absolutism that simultaneously allows no room for compassion and keeps Rorschach from being able to appreciate the big picture outside of his little myopic Objectivst bubble — or Frank Miller!Batman, who is often only a step or two off from actual fascism, but we probably won’t call it that because he’s wearing the Batman suit).

At this point, Josie has even had it all but confirmed that the agents who came to recruit them definitely “avoided certain truths to manipulate them” on purpose, so they’re reasonably certain that they could probably leave S.T.R.O.M.A without having their previous step out of bounds dredged up and handed to a D.A. who’d be pressured to prosecute them for it…… but they want to help people, and S.T.R.O.M.A. is one of the only options that they can currently see where they get to help anyone.

So, here they are. Working in a position that they’re not a fan of, looking at the motivational posters of gothed out kittens that one of their best friends drew for them, and trying to take, “hang in there!” kitty’s advice and tough it out at S.T.R.O.M.A. for the sake of doing some good in the world.

**: This mostly happens if Josie doesn’t have the energy enough or keep focus enough to keep their mental walls up — which they are usually very diligent about because on one hand, hearing other people’s thoughts kind of sucks actually (Josie would definitely agree with the sentiment that, a lot of the time, being a telepath is like having a youtube comments section screaming at you in your head)

—and on the other, um, hello, telepathy can, in the wrong hands, become a walking violation of civil liberties. Like, if you ask Josie, telepathy has a lot in common with wiretapping, though they consider it potentially even more dangerous than that, because it’s harder to prove that telepathy has been involved in something, since:

1. yes, the traces of telepathy can show up on a CAT scan or an MRI of the brain, but you’d need a neurologist who is well-trained, very attentive, and up to date on as much of the current research into telepathy as possible — or hey, a team of neurologists might not be a bad idea, if you can get them all, because one neurologist might miss something

—but otoh, the traces of telepathy can sometimes also be mistaken as signs of something else, especially if someone is neurodivergent and/or mentally ill, has suffered any serious and/or recent head injuries, has a history of substance abuse, is sleep-deprived at the time of the tests, may actually have something else going on in their brain in addition to the traces of telepathy

Seriously, just about anything that affects the brain can make it harder to tell whether or not someone’s been hit with telepathy

Plus: telepathic abilities are sort of mid-level common among mutants, and some mutants use them without even realizing it because their powers haven’t manifested in ways that are for sure Outside Three Standard Deviations From The Non-Mutant Human Mean, so some minor telepathic scarring is common, even in people who haven’t been hit by something as awful as, say, memory modification, or having someone go in and pick around in their brain like they’re flipping through an issue of Us Weekly

—and without a keen, well-trained eye, it can be really hard to tell those types of telepathic scarring apart

2. some of the traces of telepathy are more subjective, and while they might show up on a brain scan, the best evidence of them will come from the people who’ve been hit with the telepathic whatever

—but that’s going to be a problem because, in a lot of cases, they won’t have any memory of it, or they’ll have a false memory of it, and there’s no guarantee that further telepathic probing will be able to help here, and it could just make things worse. Plus, there’s no guarantee that the people who’ve been hit will actually be aware that what they’re experiencing is related to telepathy.

This is especially true with experienced, exceptionally powerful, and/or highly meticulous telepaths, because some of them can dick around in people’s heads and leave barely any trace that they were there

Like, for an example of what a more subjective trace might look like: Conrad is a telepath, and unlike Josie, he doesn’t really care about ethics or the rights of most other people. About ten years before the story actually starts, he took an interest in his new brother-in-law’s youngest brother (Sebastian), because he could sense something in Seb — he didn’t know what it was, exactly, but it was definitely a something — that made him go, “huh, maybe this emotionally troubled nearly twenty-year-old boy is also a mutant”

(I mean, he’s not wrong. And the something that he got a sense of back then is the part of Seb that he’s eventually going to call, “La Bête,” because if he’s going to go for the superhero thing and need a codename, then, “Gévaudan” makes sense to him because his family is insistently French [despite not having lived in France since about 1781, apart from one ancestral namesake of Seb’s who stayed in Paris for their Revolution (and Severin Sebastien Moncrieff was a confirmed bachelor, so he left behind a partner but no heirs), well before La Bête du Gévaudan was a Thing, and despite not being from the region of France where that happened] and hey, he can apparently turn into a giant wolf-man, now

—and if he’s calling himself, “Gévaudan,” then, “La Bête” is just thematically consistent. But that’s beside the point.)

Anyway: Conrad wasn’t new to his powers ten years ago, but he was much more reckless with them — especially when he believed that he was absolutely right and would stop at nothing to prove it — and he had less finesse in using them.

So, he left behind plenty of traces when he decided to use his little sister’s wedding reception as a chance to go telepathically play around with Seb, trying to either figure out if his new brother-in-law’s little brother actually was a mutant, or maybe triggering his powers into fully manifesting (plus plying him with alcohol and adding rohypnol to the mix based on the notion that either it wouldn’t affect Seb because he’s a mutant, or if not that, then it’d trigger his abilities into manifesting).

The underlying logic of the rohypnol idea was actually not wrong, because toxin filtering is one of the more common mutant abilities you find in the States (and it happens to be one that Seb has), and some mutants have had their powers manifest in response to poisoning, drugging, exposure to carbon monoxide or other toxic fumes, and even being given antibiotics or certain medications

The idea was still morally wrong and ethically skeevy, but the mutant-related logic actually did work. Where Conrad went wrong on that count was that he overly simplified the situation, only looked for two potential reactions, and didn’t know what to make of how Seb was affected by the rohypnol but not nearly as badly as he should’ve been, so he went, “Was he affected or not?? I don’t know????”

[Here is where I cut a whole big tangent explaining that whole story, but it got way, way off the point, so.]

Anyway, the gist of the story is that Conrad is the only person who consciously remembers everything that happened, since most of the people who cared about it were not present for the encounter itself, and Conrad screwed around with Seb’s memories, both telepathically and not.

Like, Seb has more memories of it than he would if he weren’t a mutant, considering that he got dosed with rohypnol, but he also has false memories about some of what happened, and Conrad repressed Seb’s memories of certain events (like how many times he tried to break away from Conrad, or turn down the offer of another drink, because he’d promised his big brother that he wouldn’t get drunk and make a scene at Max’s wedding or the reception, and it was important to him to honor that promise)

Fortunately for Conrad, Seb is not one of the mutants who has an increased resistance to psychic attacks — largely because, contrary to what Conrad thought until about two years before the story starts, someone’s ability to resist to psychic attacks has nothing to do with whether or not they’re a mutant (aside from some special cases where someone has a resistance to any psychic attacks that falls outside three standard deviations of the non-mutant human mean)

—so, despite the feelings he sometimes gets that something about those memories might be wrong, Seb totally believes that they’re real and he doesn’t notice any of the incongruities unless someone points them out, which almost no one has any reason to do because there isn’t usually a reason for Seb to talk at length about the details of this particular incident that happened almost ten years ago

(there would be, if he ever brought it up in therapy or at AA and/or NA, or dwelled on it when he did, but that has yet to actually happen)

Unfortunately for Conrad, he did a sloppy job of this, and while it would be hard for a neurologist to tell the physical signs of his telepathic probing apart from the other brain damage that Seb’s accrued, the hardest thing for most other telepaths would be trying to find the right memories. The crap-shoot nature of telepathically digging through someone else’s mind is one of the many reasons why Josie doesn’t like using their powers as a first approach in therapy, because you can never guarantee with any reliable certainty that you’ll get at the parts of someone’s mind that you want

—but if someone did get to Seb’s memories of this incident, it would be really obvious to them that they’ve been modified. Like, images might be blurred around the edges, it might glitch like a video or audio track that’s skipping, the voices might get distorted, the colors might look wonky, and so on. Prodding a bit more would also be able to undo Conrad’s memory-blocks without doing too much damage to Seb’s brain (not so much on an emotional and psychological level, but the damage there would be more like the painful truth that hurts now but leads to something better)

Anyway, it’s much harder to get proof of this nature when you’re dealing with more skillful, more attentive, more powerful, etc. telepaths, because they aren’t as messy as Conrad was with Seb

and 3. Wiretapping operations usually involve more people, which doesn’t make them ethical or necessarily justified, but it does mean that they’re easier to find evidence of because there are more folks who can spill the beans and point you to it. Telepathy only needs two people to happen, and one may not even be aware of what’s going on, depending on how sensitive they are and whether or not they’re dealing with an ethical telepath

For example: while not metahuman levels of resistant to psychic attacks, Pete is exceptionally sensitive to them and he’s naturally better at resisting them than some people, so if someone wanted to paw through his mind, he has a better chance of recognizing that he’s being telepathically invaded and getting them out

Sebastian, on the other hand, is Bad at recognizing and resisting psychic probing. Unethical telepaths have an easier time of getting through him because at his best, if he isn’t told in advance, then he feels ill at ease, inexplicably anxious (not that it means much, because he tends to attribute that to his shitty mental health), kind of nauseated, and maybe like he’s being spied on. At worst, he doesn’t even notice.

So, basically, Josie considers it a moral and ethical responsibility on their part to do everything they can to not inadvertently spy on people, because there is already so much about telepathy that can go really bad and poses a lot of ethical problems — but they are only human, and there are a lot of ways for someone’s mental walls to come down or reasons why they would.

Letting their empathic walls down usually makes it easier for Josie to focus on keeping up the telepathic walls, since the empathic ones are a lot harder for them to keep up, but it’s only a temporary thing because if Josie takes those walls down, they open themself up to a looooooot of potential overwhelm from outside influence, and there’s always the option to find a balance between the empathic walls and telepathic ones, but sometimes, it’s easier said than done.

Josie is usually too hard on themself for it when any slip-ups on their part happen, even knowing that every other telepath and every other empath has moments like this and even if they got too overwhelmed to actually remember anything and/or heard nothing.

It’s such a big deal to them because the potential for psychic abilities to violate other people — and especially the potential to manipulate people and compromise or outright remove their agency — is something that Josie never wanted. They went into counseling as a profession, after their original plan of going into fashion went up in smoke, but part of it, for them, has always been about trying to help people get their lives back, or manage them better, and so on. Granted, they knew about their telepathic and empathic abilities before they officially went into therapeutic practice, but that, for Josie, was part of how they developed their approach to being a therapist.

Furthermore, on a more personal and less professional note, Josie never wanted mutant superpowers to begin with. After having their telepathy and empathy first manifest in full, they might’ve done plenty of things that they normally wouldn’t even consider, if they thought it could take their powers away.

Partly, that was because their powers manifested toward the end of a really bad mental health downswing that ended in Josie going back to an inpatient treatment center for their eating disorder. Any of these elements on their own would’ve been bad enough, but having them all come down on them at once was Hell for Josie, and worse, trying to get well while you are in an inpatient center and can feel everyone else’s feelings, hear a lot of their thoughts, and are currently having trouble sorting out which parts are your own feelings, which parts are coming from your eating disorder, and which parts are coming from everyone else (not least because you don’t have any proof that you are feeling things or hearing thoughts that are coming from other people).

Josie eventually got help for that part because one of the therapists at the center was a metahuman and had gone to the Woodham and Lehrer School before deciding that she didn’t particularly want to be a superhero in the traditional sense. She reached out to her old teachers, and Josie got help for that while doing more intensive outpatient treatment until they got better at tuning out other people’s thoughts and feelings.

But there’s a lingering problem here that goes back to the feelings that underlie Josie’s ED. When they are at their absolute worst, Josie can be an absolute control freak, and they tend to turn it inward more than outward because they realize that taking it out on other people isn’t fair and they don’t feel good about it. Additionally, feeling other people’s feelings as intensely as they do gives Josie an additional incentive not to take their issues with control out on other people (and did even before their powers fully manifested, because they’ve always been pretty sensitive). On some level, Josie realizes that they can’t control things like how people react to them, whether or not bad things happen to good people, and so on, but that doesn’t always help because it can lead to them feeling even more of a need to crack down on controlling themself.

Having psychic powers becomes problematic for them in two big ways, here:

1. It’s unfortunately very easy for Josie to slip into overly self-punishing thought patterns if they feel like they aren’t as in control of their abilities as they, “should” be — which happens very easily because Josie’s standards for themself aren’t always realistic, and they usually aren’t the best judge of whether or not they’re being fair to themself.

It’s even more noticeable, for them, when they try to do more complex and demanding things with their powers.

This was one of the big reasons why they’ve stayed on good terms with their friends and mentors at the Lehrer and Woodham School, and among Yael and Elizabeth’s Wardens, but consistently rejected any invites to become a Warden (and then regretted that when S.T.R.O.M.A. got them instead, since Josie would much rather be one of the Wardens than working for the FBI).

Basically, Josie trusted Elizabeth’s guidance, and they really, really wanted to trust Elizabeth’s faith in them to handle their full power responsibly…… but it was hard to believe that when they already didn’t feel like they controlled their powers as much as they, “should” have been doing, and Elizabeth wanted to push them further.

For Josie, it felt like the choice came down to, “be a superhero and do more cool superhero things, at the expense of my own well-being, which means I eventually won’t be able to help anyone and could hurt more people than I help”

or, “quietly go back to training for an entirely different career than I expected, keep in touch with Elizabeth and work on honing my abilities, and maybe not get to help people in as big a way as members of the Wardens get to do, but at least, as a therapist, I will still have the ability to help people and will probably be less likely to screw that up by virtue of losing my control over my powers”

(To her credit, Elizabeth was disheartened by this, because she believes in all of her students and wants them to believe in themselves, and really wanted Josie on her team — but she’s learned that the superhero life isn’t for everybody, and that it’s not her job, as a teacher and mentor, to tell people what they should do; it’s her job to show them new approaches, teach them how to learn, help them find what paths and methods work best for them, etc.

So, disheartening as it was, she’s been nothing but supportive about Josie’s choice not to be a Warden, and compassionate about how much Josie doesn’t like working for the FBI — and without trying to turn it into some kind of, “this could be super-beneficial for us, if Josie wanted to give us any advance warning about S.T.R.O.M.A. business that might negatively affect us here” thing like Yael)

(To her credit, Yael really does believe that she’s helping when she says things like that, because she is so fundamentally a doer, rather than a thinker, feeler, planner, or anything else. She is absolutely capable of all of those things, but she has an approach to life and problems that goes, “Okay, this is a Thing and it’s a setback, but what can we do about it, how can we use this to build something even better”

—so her idea of how to help one of her and Elizabeth’s students and comrades with an unexpected and unwanted “recruitment” to S.T.R.O.M.A.… is going, “But look, see, we can still potentially make something good out of this, and just because a government agency snatched you up doesn’t mean that you have to forget your own values or let them control you, this can be a good thing if you take advantage of the right pieces and opportunities”

—for a moment of MBTI nerdery: Yael is an ENTJ (***) vs. Josie’s INFJ (***), so while she has Extroverted Thinking (Te) for a dominant cognitive function and primarily approaches the world based on how to get results, Josie’s dominant function is Introverted iNtuition (Ni), and while they have an orientation toward the future that appreciates where Yael is coming from with her drive to get results, Josie’s primary approach to the world looks less at objective things and objective results, more at patterns and theories and trying to find the, “higher purpose” or, “deeper reason” behind how stuff happens

Which, oddly enough, is part of why Josie and Yael get on so well. They can butt heads with each other, sometimes, but at the end of the day, they complement each other really well because both of them have vision and the drive to act on it, but Yael is better at actually getting shit done, and Josie is better at checking things through the processes of making them happen, finding potential problems that Yael may not have seen coming and trying to work addressing them into the fabric of her plans.

Their Feeling functions also complement each other really well: Josie is a high Feeler, with Extroverted Feeling (Fe) as their auxiliary function, which keeps them more attuned to the state of the group and all the people in it, while Yael has a very good relationship with her inferior Fi (Introverted Feeling), which enables her to better evaluate how their actions and plans are helping or hurting their causes, where their ideals fit into everything, and so on.

So, basically, Yael is better at making sure that they all remember who they are and what they stand for, both individually and as parts of the whole, while Josie is better at attending to people’s emotional needs and keeping the whole intact by caring for the individual members of it.

And because they both respect and admire each other, neither of them devalues the other’s contributions to anything — and it doesn’t matter to Yael that Josie has a badge and would have an easier time getting a gun if they weren’t really uneasy about guns; Josie’s a mutant, they’ve been one of her students, and they care about helping other mutants, so officially being part of S.T.R.O.M.A. doesn’t mean that they aren’t part of Yael’s (larger, mutant) family

—which all means a lot to Josie because, in a lot of ways, they still haven’t entirely outgrown their early experiences of being one of the weird art freaks at school (which, even for someone who wound up being part of a subculture/clique that’s all about going, “fuck you, I’m gonna do my thing and you can love it or shove it,” gave Josie some trouble because, goth of not, they’re sensitive), and they have a huge tendency to be overly harsh with themself and don’t always love themself very much, so this whole unconditional acceptance thing is a Big Deal to them

But I digress.

2. Having psychic powers also gets Problematic for Josie because, in their mind, they’ve spent so much of their life fighting their eating disorder and their overall mental health to keep control of their life, and it’s difficult, periodically degrading, often horrific, and something that they wouldn’t wish on anybody, period…… so having the power to take away someone’s ability to control their own mind? Having the power to violate someone’s agency, potentially with more or less complete impunity? That’s horrifying, and Josie doesn’t want it

One of the easiest ways to make Josie go off the handle at you is to dismiss how hard it is for them to maintain any sense of composure. Like, okay, they can handle people teasing them about some of their self-care habits because humor is how a lot of people come to be comfortable with and accept things they don’t understand at first, and how a lot of people show that they’re comfortable with you and like you.

But if you act like Josie doesn’t have to work, impossibly hard and daily, on their own well-being, because if they don’t, then they could lose control of psychic abilities and this would be Really Fucking Terrible for everyone? ……Uh.

Just don’t do that. It’s not pretty, it’s not fun, it’s mean and please, just don’t do it.

An even easier way to make Josie snap at you is to play what they call, “the Aslan card” — which means telling them that the proof that they can handle the responsibility of psychic powers, is their own fear that maybe they can’t, their awareness of and attentiveness to the ethical and moral problems attached to them having psychic powers, the fact that they’d rather not have psychic powers in the first place because it can — and often does — feel like these powers and their attendant responsibilities are too big and too potentially Terrible Forever, For Everyone

Which Josie calls, “the Aslan card” because, uh. The first time they heard it was from Elizabeth (whose heart was in the right place in saying this, but she didn’t think about how it might end up sounding to Josie), and the first thing Josie was reminded of was Aslan telling Prince Caspian that he’s ready to become the King because he doesn’t think he’s ready

It’s just…… Josie understands where this idea is coming from, and they appreciate the underlying sentiment

But, to them, it always sounds more like, “why are you upset about how hard this is for you, at least it’s happening to you and not someone who doesn’t give a fuck about ethics or how they treat other people, quit whinging and cheer the fuck up”

Which…… yes, Josie knows that this isn’t what most people mean, but it’s still pretty upsetting for them to hear because of how much it reminds them of things that they’ve told themself so many times, when they’ve been at their worst, in terms of their mental health and emotional well-being — especially the things like, “My eating disorder isn’t bad because it’s only hurting me, not anyone else, and it’s only hurting me because I’m weak”

—and yeah, okay, Josie appreciates that you’re trying to help, but they already have enough work to do on keeping themself from slipping back into the comfort of those thought patterns, so if it’s all the same, can you maybe find a different way of trying to comfort them or praise them or whatever? Please?

Thank you, they’d like that

[xiaotopia]

Longing For You

Pairing: Fem reader x Aether

Words: 10k+ I lost count

Genre: one-shot, platonic relationship, fuff, angst, slight crack if you squint

Cw // mentions of character death, blood

Hi! It's my first time writing on here and I just write what's on my mind I'm sorry if this is bad since english is not my first language ㅠㅠ I promise I will get better with my writing! Enjoy ^^

Lonely.

That's what you are feeling. It's been 3 days you got stuck in this unknown land. You thought it was beautiful, it really was. But will you be ready to face what's in front of you?

You manage to survive with fruits like apples and cashews, at least that's what you thought the name was, because in your world they called it cashews. Even though it doesn't really give you enough nutritions, as long as you get to live you're okay with it. Heck there were almost nothing here. You wanted to explore the place more but there are monsters everywhere, and you- with no weapon, could only run and hide in hopes of not getting spotted by them. Will you ever survive?

Sighing, "just another day like this I guess"

you said before drifting to dreamland under a tree in a secluded area of the unknown land.

----

"She's still breathing"

"Paimon! What are you doing?!"

You could hear someone whispering- half screaming to be exact, at someone but you are more bothered at someone poking your arm with a stick. Groaning, you woke up and realized someone invaded your place. Ready to fight whoever that was, your actions suddenly come to a halt when you meet a pair of golden eyes and his tiny little companion. They were as shocked as you, well... I guess you are more shocked to see a floating kid beside the blonde boy.

Quickly, you hide behind a tree. Since you don't have any weapon to defend yourself what else can defend you other than a tree?

"w-who are you?! And why you can float?!"

you shrieked, the little floating kid crossed her arms and scoffed at your question. Why would she scoffed at you?

"excuse me young lady but we're the one who should ask you that!".

You just meet her now but god knows how much her high-pitched voice started to annoy you. The blonde boy beside her started to speak up before his companion could even say a word,

"I'm sorry she bothered you. I'm Aether, and this is my travel companion, Paimon. We found a group of hilichurls around here and we already fight them off before it could reach your campsite. May we know what is your name?" he asks as his pair golden orbs stares straight into you.

"Uh.. My name is y/n..."

He smiles, assuring you that they're safe and can be trusted, you slowly got out behind the tree when he stretches out his hand for a handshake. You grab his hand, reciprocating his action. "it's nice to meet you y/n".

----

"No"

"Aether c'mon please?"

"ugh fine"

It's been a month you had stayed in Monstadt, The Land of Freedom, and a month since your encounter with Aether and Paimon. She still annoys you though, but you're really grateful that she can keep the conversation going because it always turns awkward whenever you tried to initiate a conversation with people. You learned that Aether didn't come from this world too, separated from his sister by the unknown god and now is looking for her in Teyvat. Hopefully, you can go back home too.

You missed your family of course but you're also happy that there are people who willing to take care of you, especially Barbara. She treated you like her own sister, beside Jean. You learned everything here from Lisa and learned how to fight from the cavalry captain Knights of the Favonious, Kaeya. And Diluc? He's hot, but cold as ice at the same time and you went to the Tavern once, only to see him talking to a bard named Venti, about how the bard needs to stop drinking all of his dandelion wine before he runs out of it because of him.

Now, Aether is in front of you as you manage to persuade him to bring you to one of his adventures. He never let you tag along because he told you it's dangerous outside. Both of you are no vision holders, but he has the power of Anemo. It's still a mystery to you but he's an outlander so it would probably make sense why he can have such powers even without a vision blessed by the Archons.

"But! You only have to fight the hilichurls only while I take down those mitachurls, got it?" he says. Nodding your head aggressively, you started your journey with him as an adventurer.

"Let's go to Liyue!" Paimon says excitedly.

---

"That was close, thank you y/n"

Aether pants heavily, letting out a sigh of relief as you kick off the last hilichurl with your sword. Turning around to face him, you tell him it's nothing.

You three bumped into a hilichurl camp in the middle of the road of Bishui Plans. Unfortunately, those group of monsters noticed you before you three could even hide.

You were about to follow Paimon but Aether called you, you look at him as his face expressed shocked. You asked him what's wrong only him to point at your hips. You were confused so you look down where he's pointing at. Well now you're equally as shocked as him, if not because of the shining crystal blue orb hanging on your belt.

"What... I-I swear it wasn't there before?"

You whispered, questioning yourself because how did it get there? How did you even got a vision? What did you do? You know it's a vision because Lisa has taught you at the library back in Mondstadt. How? That was all in your mind.

You hear Paimon gasped, putting her hands on her mouth, "you got a vision! Let me see!". She flew to look at your vision before touching it to get a better look. "You got a cryo vision!" she exclaimed.

"Cryo? You mean I get the power of ice?" You question her. She nodded her, "Yes! Now you can help Aether to fight enemies!". Looking down at your feet, sighing. Aether asked you what's wrong and you simply said you don't know how to fight. Like actually fighting enemies with your own power, how to use it and how to handle it. What if you unintentionally hurt people around you? Aether chuckled at your response. You look up at him, tilting your head in confusion.

"Don't worry, I'll teach you"

----

"I wish kaeya was here"

"You don't like it when I teach you?!"

Chuckling at your friend, you said it's not that you don't like it when he teaches you. It's because "it would be easier if a cryo vision holder teaches me how to control the element", you says.

He let out a puff, while you were stroking Paimon's hair on your lap. She snores softly and you swear you could hear her mumbling sticky honey roast in her sleep. Giggling at her, you wonder how can she be cute and annoying at the same time. It's unfair you think. You turned your head to look at Aether and he was zoned out, as always.

"Mind telling me what's in your mind?"

You picked up his habits quite quickly, since you both attached to the hips all the time. You would notice he always does this when he's deep in thought. The same goes for him. You both can read each other like an open book.

He looks at you, smiling. Shaking his head and tells you he always thinks the same, about his sister. You smiled back at him, you assured him that you will meet her soon. And now, you both enjoy the calm breeze as you both watched the sun set over the blue horizon at the nearby cliff in Liyue.

"S-sticky honey roast... "

----

Annoyed.

That's how you feel right now.

This guy just keeps pestering you for 20 minutes now. You got separated with Aether as he got something to do with Zhongli, the Wangsheng Parlor Funeral Consultant. Aether wanted to let Paimon stay with you but you said you're fine on your own and you would enjoy alone time in the time being while waiting for them.

But you didn't expect this.

"Can you stop following me now?"

"Why would I?"

Rolling your eyes, you bump into his shoulder, or Childe as he call himself.

"Oh don't be like that girlie-" " I have a name shut up" you sigh for the nth time. You need to avoid this man, because he's one of the Fatui, you don't want to involve yourself and Aether with them. That's why you've been running and avoiding him at all cost.

"Well you never tell me your name girlie-"

"It's y/n okay? Now go you're getting on my nerve..."

you mumbled the last sentence. He only chuckles at your reaction as he enjoys it. You were buying some street food from the food stall and before you could give your mora to the seller, someone beats you to pay for the food. You were not complaining though, you didn't thank him either.

"Okay then but can I ask you one last question, y/n?" he smiles widely while you only look at him, chewing your spicy fish cake, unamused. His question however, almost send you to you death as you were choking on your food.

"W-what did you say?!" "I want to get to know about you"

Aether is not going to like this...

----

As expected, he was mad. No, he was furious.

"Why did you talk to him?!"

"I tried not to talk to him Aether, he kept following me when I tried to avoid him! To the point he creeps me out..."

Aether sighs, rubbing his forehead as Paimon watched you two arguing. Was this the only time Paimon shuts her mouth? Excluding the time she's asleep. She knows when to silent herself because this time, Aether is different in Paimon's eyes.

"So.. Did you agree?" he questioned, not giving you a glance. You shake your head, "No, of course I didn't. He's dangerous and he could hurt us if he has the opportunity..." Which is true. Childe is a harbinger, and you, just a mortal from another world who just got dumped to Teyvat out of nowhere.

Aether engulfs you in a hug, which surprised you. You could feel your cheeks burning from the physical contact. His arm wraps around your shoulder while the other strokes your hair, calming you.

"I won't let that happen to you, Paimon and me. I won't let him hurt us, I will promise you that I will protect you both from any danger. I don't want to lose another friend..." he says and the last sentence sounds more like a whisper to you but you understand him.

You also promised to yourself that you will protect paimon and him. Because you love them.

----

"Well traveller, you're quite stronger than I thought"

"Stay away from him!"

You yelled at the harbinger, keeping yourself from falling as you struggled to stand up. Paimon tried her best to keep Aether awake while you were guarding them, ready to attack him anytime.

Childe let out a loud laugh, as if he was mocking you and your companion. Shaking his head, he came closer to you.

"You know what, you're lucky that you didn't fall for my tricks" he chuckles. You were getting antsy everytime he take a step closer to you, "no one is fool enough to fall for a harbinger, Tartaglia" you sneered.

He was about to attack you with his hydro sword but you managed to dodged it with your power and turning it into an ice. You both fight for a while and fortunately, Aether came to help you.

After hours of fighting, that's what you think, you feel drained out. Slumping on the floor, you take a glance at Aether he was panting hard, Paimon at his side to support him. And Childe, he looks better than both you and Aether combined but he's still in a good shape.

As you were trying to stand up, you saw a glimpse of a woman at the corner of your eye. You widen your eyes and tried to push Aether away as you saw the woman was about to attack him with her sharp ice.

Signora.

You made a wall of ice to protect Aether and Paimon from her attacks. However, you didn't do it for you. You didn't protect yourself and got hit by the ice. The ice wall from you melts, so does Aether's world when he saw you, bleeding from your own element.

Childe was as shocked too, he thought you were a genuine person, he really do. Is this what it feels when you know someone personally got hurt? He can't imagine what Aether feels now.

You fell, you felt dizzy as you hit your head on the solid ground.

"Y/n!" Aether and Paimon yelled your name, but why do they sound like they're miles away?

"Y/n! Keep your eyes open! Don't you very dare to close your eyes!" Your friend screamed. Paimon is holding your hand while sobbing on you. "Y/n you can't leave us! Paimon still want to have fun with you!"

All you can do is cry. You don't want to leave them. You still haven't find your way back home, you can't. But you were losing so much blood and all you could do is remembering your moments with your friends.

Aether and Paimon.

Aether holds you on his lap, you could feel his tears falling on your cheek. He cups your cheek as he stares into your (e/c) orbs. To him, it resembles the stars on the night sky. He wish he could look at them like this before.

Not when you're dying.

He put his forehead on yours as he keeps repeating "please don't leave" to you. You promised him that you will protect him, but not stay with him. Did you regret it? Yes. You wish you could stay but you knew at the end, both of you will leave eventually.

But you didn't expect that you would leave them like this.

With all your might, you hover your hand over his that was on your cheek, rubbing it softly. "Promise me, we will meet someday, wether it be in our next life or in different universe, promise me we will meet again" you said, voice getting hoarse and staring to his golden eyes. You want to remember his eyes, his nose, his lips, his everything.

"Paimon doesn't want you to leave!" your little friend cried, you let out a loud sob as you pull her to your chest, soaking your bloody shirt with her tears. You three tried to cherish your last moment together, even though it was a tragic one, like now.

Aether tighten his hold on you, Paimon cries harder when she saw the colour of your vision starting to fade, knowing you couldn't make it.

"Paimon loves you, y/n", all you can do is cry, before your last breathe you hear Aether says "I promise you, we will meet again.. I love you"

Your vision faded, you fall into a deep sleep and everything turns dark.

----

"She's awake!"

"Call the doctor!"

You slowly opened your eyes, the bright light hurting your eyes, still adjusting to the surrounding. You could feel your tears were falling. Why did you cry? Then it hit you.

You were in the hospital.

You remember what happened, was that all just a dream? It feels real, way too real for your liking.

"Thank god, you're finally awake!" your mom sobs. Wait, your mom is here? You're finally back? You were supposed to be happy but why did you feel sad?

"H-how long did I... Sleep?" you asked, voice raspy as your throat lacks of hydration. Your mom gave you a glass of water and you gladly drink it, your throat still hurt.

"2 months now, you got hit by a car and the guy felt bad. He even insisted to pay for your bills", your mom says as she hold your hand. It's been a few minutes but you missed them. Aether and your little friend Paimon.

"Oh.." that's all you can say. You really don't know what to respond. You were happy that you're finally awake but you also missed people you met in Teyvat. Are they real or just your imagination?

"I forgot to tell you, the person who pays for your hospital bill will visit you. He always visits you when me and your dad is busy with work", you nodded your head, didn't have the energy to reply your mom back.

Suddenly, the door opens, revealing a tall man. You face him, only to widen your eyes as you were shocked to see the person in your dream.

"Childe?"

----

It's been a month since you got discharged from the hospital and been recovering well. You still struggle to walk on your own though, but nothing serious. Ever since you met childe, you both got along very well, not like the one in your dream.

"So... What I dreamed of during my coma was real?" You asked him, walking through the flowery path as the cherry blossom falls on the ground beside him arms clinging to his.

"Yeah. In fact, I'm still the same Childe in your dream!"

"Yeah as you wish. The only same thing is you keep paying things for me.. And being annoying"

You remarked. He only laughs and told you the reason why he keeps doing that is that it's the only kind action he could do, even now. But in reality, he felt guilty. He

"By the way, I want you to meet an old friend of mine. You won't mind right?"

"What's the point of asking me if you're going to introduce your friend to me now?"

"Geez woman, you're still the same"

you could only laugh at him. To you, he's a good friend but no one could replace Aether. If you met Childe, there's a possibility of you to meet Aether and Paimon right?

"Oi blondie! We're here!" Childe yelled, getting you out from your deep thoughts. You look up only to meet a pair of golden eyes that you've missed so much.

It feels like the time has stopped. He walked towards you and slowly, engulfed you in a hug. You were stunned, you meet him. You both found each other. You hugged him back, tightly. You let out tears of joy, he was relieved he found you that he also cried.

"You didn't forget me don't you?" You hear a feminine voice behind Aether, only to find Paimon crossing her arms, just like when you meet her for the first time. But what amazes you that she's in a different form. She looks... Like you. A woman.

Your eyes got teary again and went straight to her, giving her a big hug which she reciprocated. "I miss you so much Paimon" you burried your head into her neck. Paimon was happy she could meet her.

Childe and Aether could only look both of you with adoration. Aether cleared his throat, without looking at the man beside him, eyes still on you. "Thank you, if it wasn't for you, we wouldn't find her"

The red haired man could only smile, "it's no problem. I couldn't face anyone after what happened in Teyvat. Think of this as my way to apologize". Aether couldn't answer, he only nodded his head to let him know he's listening.

You went to him only get a hug from you. You missed him so much. And you noticed Aether doesn't have his long braided hair anymore, which saddens you because you always play and braid his hair.

"I noticed that you finally got rid of your annoyingly long hair", you teased him. You hear him chuckled as he tightened his grip around you. "Can't let the annoyingly long hair distract people sweetie. People found it weird here"

"But I like it though..." you blushed at the pet name he gave you. You both just couldn't let go of each other now. He strokes your hair, enjoying each others presence. "I'm so glad that I found you", "me too, I'm glad you're here".

The other two friend only watched you two reunited again, hugging each other and won't let each other go because you missed each other so much that you both are afraid one of you vanished anytime. But it's real.

"Childe can we get some sticky honey roast?"

"Good grief, paimon.."

[ohhicas]

I've only been into comics for a few years, but I've read enough of the old Flash stuff where I adore the classic incarnations of the Rogues. Honestly curious here: what's it like to be a fan of James Jesse back when he was retgonned around 10 years ago and see him brought back but now all mwahaha crazy evil? I'm way more used to Axel (and all that off-panel character development in Nu52, thanks DC) but even I find this kinda weird. Was James ever crazy evil in any arc?

^- me 90% of the time someone says James is coming back to recent media & it’s not a direct continuation of the comics prior to 2004

[ Warning: this is gonna get long and be full of a lot of assumptions. I can never form solid statements and things will get jumbled, because I suck at presenting things ]

[ this is my can of worms hill and you opened it so I’m dYING HERE ]

I mean, back in the earliest ages, no Rogue had a real personality to speak of? They were just “1960s Bad Guy in a different outfit” at the very start, with quirks! Like James having a thing for toys and nuclear powered flying tricycles. It wasn’t until that era ended that they started getting real distinct and into what a lot of ‘classic’ James fans loved and appreciated? 

(I think at least, I’m just One Person here pretending like I even understand HALF of what the ‘classic’ fandom enjoyed. I’m wildly speculating just going off what fanworks I’ve seen produced.)

(I don’t have all my scans anymore but I’ll toss in scans when I have them)

But that’s when we started getting things like James actually having specified friendships with certain people

or clear distaste towards others, and when you could tell he was more of a wild card than the others. Or when he decided to fuck off and hang out in Hollywood with Blue Devil for a bit, even siding with Kid Devil to deck out Captain Boomerang. 

Or when he decided to fuck off to Gotham, to mess with Catwoman by pretending he didn’t know who she was, but absolutely knew who she was because of how she walked and carried herself, but James being James was like “mmmmm long con, nope”

hey lil Cold, gimme all ur guns and don’t question why I’m in drag xoxo

Even then, he wasn’t shown to be vicious yet! He’d hopped around various places, was still considered A Rogue, A Criminal, and as far as any comic reader could tell by trying to count up how many civilians may have been crossfired at, he had no On Purpose deaths racked? Like, the only thing you could really argue was he may have made someone drive their car off a cliff once, but I’m like 98% sure they’re fine. He’s not a murderer, he’s just here for a laugh and a long-con for funsies because he know he can get away with it!

AND THEN WE GET A LITTLE OLDER, LITTLE DARKER

[ I’M PUTTING A CUT HERE CAUSE AFTER I THREW IT INTO DRAFTS, I REALIZED I GOT REALLY LONG, I’M SORRY IF MY LAYOUT SUCKS ASS FOR THIS. ]

little more 90s Hair. Little more 90s stereotypical “But what if EVERYONE WENT TO HELL” demon plots against Satanic Hockey Hair Neron. And James? still wasn’t evil? He was a little dismissive when everyone ELSE died sure but he still in the end turned around like “nghgng I’m THE ONLY ONE”, purposely got his ass down there, regretted it, and then beat Neron at his own game to save the entire fucking world. Because! He could! And he did it so well. STILL NOT EVIL, even when he had a chance right then and there to take over everything alongside Neron should he so desire. Like, two words, maybe some under the table BJs depending on how you feel about that pairing (I don’t), and bam. He would’ve bested nearly any other villain in the DCU save like, Satan himself. Or i guess one of those world destroyers. But we’ll get back around to those BOY HOWDY WE WILL GET AROUND TO THOSE. 

So James! Saves! The world! Sorta! Later they fight Neron again and his kid he somehow had somewhere down the road (it sounds like I’m complaining, i’m not, I love Billy and Mindy both I just wish they showed up like… ever again?) and he sTILL SAVES EVERYONE. 

Piper helps by their 90s ponytails combined. 

Somewhere around here, because dates and timing aren’t my strong suit, he also goes and messes with Bart for a bit. It’s pretty much a Spy Vs Spy episode, but with less bloodshed. 

ANYWAY IT’S AFTER THIS POINT THAT THINGS GET… where I think the majority of “James is a Low Rate Joker” comes from? 

For some unknown goddamn reason, in between issues (James wasn’t a Super Frequent Rogue? He’d show up, sure, but in the huge run of the series he’d just kind of vanish for 20 issues at a time and you’d go “welp, guess he’s still alive”) James went super-cop? like, the FBI? For some reason? Hired James “I am a probably still wanted felon, a man who has escaped jail numerous times, probably never served a full sentence, known Trickster and liar” Jesse. to the FBI. And for so many issues it’s like he legit just. Did this. He threatens to shoot Piper who he was up until this very moment, considerably very close friends with (as far as comics would show Rogue/Rogue friendships), unwilling to help his friend clearly framed for murder of his parents and losing his mind by the day. Despite James talking Hart down a little on the whole ‘THE MAYOR IS ROSCOE ADN NOBODY BELIEVES MEEEEEEEE” thing. 

Also he steals Digger’s dead ass corpse? 

FBI James is a fucking enigma. Here he is standing up for Gay Rights even though Piper is like “mm maybe I should forgive my abuser??”

BUT. AFTER THIS? WE GET COUNTDOWN WHICH IS JUST. Countdown is. IT’s a problem. James’s personality is IMMEDIATELY HORRIBLY u-turned into “well we need SOMEONE to be the Bad Guy to Piper’s Good!” DESPITE. ALL THESE YEARS OF COMICS.This is the shit you’ll see people who don’t know better or just want a reason to hate the Trickster (despite being 100% okay for them to just say he’s annoying/they don’t like his tights/acrobats are stupid) reference. James is, suddenly, very abruptly, a homophobe. Like an “ew don’t touch me” level homophobe because I’m pretty sure DC snorts cocaine and threw a dart at a board for “how could they make these two fight” and landed on GAY RIGHTS IS TRENDING. 

BUTSTILL IN THE FUCKING END OF ALL OF THIS?After so many issues of James being a complete fuckass prick? 

springboards himself from his current job of being railroad face putty to catching bullets to make sure Piper wasn’t gonna die. Without knowing the proceedings of this entire plotline, James out of nowhere after so much gaybashing, still finds it in him to leap into the path of multiple bullets and save Piper. Because, yknow, he’s evil!

Later it’s shown he’s been working to take everyone down (y’know, like when he was in the FBI) and left Piper specific helpful notes to do it himself. Because Evil Bad Guy! Helping his gone-good friend! Take down bad guys! 

DC I STILL HAVE SO MANY GODDMAN QUESTOINgsd

But yeah that’s. That’s where we last saw James. in 2007, dead, after saving Piper when he could have easily pulled a Joker and ripped HIM down to take hte bullets and etcetc, y’know. Something a Very Bad Person would’ve done, like the characterization we’ve seen now. 

His ghost (easily argued as Piper’s own mental construction of James sassing him) sasses Hartley to even, in his mental state, saw off James’s hand so Piper doesn’t have to lug his weight around and has a fighting chance at living. And in the end, when Piper’s fighting the thing that can destroy the fucking world, it’s shown only Piper was the one who could save them? Because his flute, and his musical ability, and [enter DC comic science here]. You could argue this was James, once again, somehow knowing the long-con at play here, getting screwed over at EVERY turn, and sacrificing himself so they ‘good’ team had a fighting chance.You could also argue this is me losing my mind trying to make sense of the things they made James do. (my running argument is he was purposely a prick to push Piper away, so he could keep him safe) 

Also Piper plays James a Swan Song of Queen as the final boss explodes and he’s fully prepared to die. So like. There’s that. 

AND THATS BASICALLY THE COMICS? The main, ‘canon timeline’ comics. I’m missing a LOT of little things here and there, but I’m not missing anything like body counts, or murder attempts, beyond the old Silver Age “Bad guy of the week” things like trying to make Flash’s head explode, or you know. Other “nobody really has a personality, we just have quirks”. 

MY NUMBER ONE GUESS TO WHERE THIS NEW PERSONALITY TREND COMES FROM?

Mark Hamil|’s OG run as him in the old live action show. That characterization was fun, for the time, and I even enjoyed it cause it was just that off the wall and you could tell it was what they used to decide he should be the Joker for the BATS Joker. Consider it a prototype (combined with all the previous comic jokers but that’s not for this long ass post) 

And if it’d stayed there, that’d be it! That’s it! But then JLU came along, and they referenced the old show for their version of James with a sprinkling of early-era comics, and a lot of people loved and watched that show. That was their version of the Trickster, because it was their first meeting with him! And I can’t fault that! But that guy was clearly off his rocker and I’m sure if the JLU allowed a higher rating, it would’ve been even closer to the old TV show. 

And both of THOSE were heavily, heavily referenced for the CW version, which as I’m at this point now means I need to slap my usual anti-CW tag onto things. I hate the CW James. There is so little comic in him it’s almost disgusting, and they ramped up so much of the Joker side of JLU & OGTV he might as well just be the Joker. It’s not a good representation of him at all. I have, also, only seen his first appearance episode, so maybe I’m wrong? But when you fuck up hard on the first run, why would I return for round 2? 

So with ALL THIS– 

REBOOT TIME. Whatever the newnew remake is calling itself. 

At first! With how James was! In the first panel flash of him clearly behind the scenes tugging so many wires and lines, watching everything with a bucket of popcorn while pulling others to his side, sitting pretty in an old museum? warehouse? highlighted in purples and vintage toys, I was like “holy shit this it. This is My Boy, back from the goddamn limbo-dead. It’s him.” But then“taking over the city entirely” to do? What? Turn it into the world’s biggest Trickster themepark? Make everyone wear striped leggings and combat boots? Martial Law of murder if you don’t carry rubber chickens? This is already veering from anything major James has ever done. As it stands I can’t see the gag here. Its’ weirdly dark and edgy, and way too close to something we saw the 90s TV show Trickster do, in the episode where he basically took over the place. The previews show him being what I’m assuming a Judge, Jury, & Executioner joke– and unless this spins into a Clopin song and dance number and his little hand puppet crops up to slam the button on the guillotine, I’m not having it, DC. 

They’re trying to tie him back into the CW, despite the writer saying he really enjoyed the Neron-era things with James (if I’m remembering the interview correctly). And it’s also why you may see me constantly saying “Well I sure as fuck hope Neron shows up” at anything new that’s released, to explain away all of… this.

This isn’t him. If they wanted a murderous Trickster, they should’ve just used Axel. The kid, canonly, tied explosives to stray dogs and homeless people. AXEL is the not-good Trickster, the murderous Trickster, the one you aren’t suppose to feel sorry for beyond being in way over his head due to his young age. 

i think I somehow didn’t answer your question

TL;DR

it sucks? it’s also great because there’s a .5% chance that maybe they’ll do it right and won’t reference the fucking 90s noncomic media. But then they do. And all I can do is laugh and shrug like ‘welp I expected nothing’. But when they get it RIGHT it’s like christmas came early.