#one time he accidentally bridged someone to an island... in the wrong ocean.

[transingthoseformers]

Soundwave has definitely accidentally groundbridged mecha into fucked up places before he got used to Earth. He may be good at it but the sensors weren't adjusted to deal with the conditions.

[delimeful]

(don’t) take this the wrong way (7) (END)

final chapter of dtttww :) i had a lot of fun with this verse so i may take requests set in it in the future, and this might receive some more copy editing later, but for now this is the epilogue!

warnings: mild injury, mild hypnosis, for once no miscommunication :)

-

[Several months later…]

Sunlight trickled down through the water in wavy bands, illuminating the shallows and growing fainter and fainter as the distance from the surface increased.

Virgil didn’t spend much time in the shallows, too wary of being without escape, being made vulnerable to human vessels or poachers. Despite his dark and gloomy aesthetic, he couldn’t go too far into the depths either, simply because his fragile fish bones weren't built for it. His eyes weren’t built for it either, and down there where anything could be lurking, he would need more than speed to avoid danger.

So, on an average, sunny day like this, he could be found miles offshore, in waters that were easily too deep for unsuited humans to reach, but still well-illuminated by the light above.

There were a few old wrecks scattered about the ocean floor here, and though they’d probably been stripped by a pod in the past, he figured he’d go through them and check for anything that was left behind. Things that weren’t useful to a pod could certainly be things that were useful to him, after all.

He’d been poking through the undercarriage of one of the larger ships for an hour or two, relaxed as he ever got. He could take his time. The only creatures around to judge him were the shoals of fish and layers of barnacles built up amidst the metal, wood, and rust.

Actually… Virgil paused in his inspection of an old cutlery set to glance around.

What had happened to the fish?

Through a hole in the ship’s hull, he watched as a broad shadow passed over the ground and ships alike, large enough to belong to a whale.

There hadn’t been a single shred of whalesong above.

Virgil edged further back from the hole, eyeing the outside warily as the shadow receded, leaving behind only wavering sunlight on sand as though it had never been there at all.

There was nothing here that was worth sticking around.

He carefully made his way back to one of the other exits, in the opposite direction of where he’d seen the shadow head, the strokes of his fin cutting through the water with barely a whisper. The porthole was easily wide enough for him, and the ocean stretched out blue and vast before him, a promise of safety if he just moved fast enough.

A moment’s pause, to make sure he didn’t hear or see anything out of place, and then he was out, flitting from rock outcropping to bone reef and scanning the seas above. Not for the first time, he wished his scales were a little less distinctive in the day.

Behind him, an ominous creak.

He froze, and watched with mounting apprehension as a shadow spilled over him, looming closer and darker than before. The silhouette of an arm stretched out, heading towards him…

“Virgil, you must help,” a huge voice pleaded, “I’ve been had.”

He twisted around just in time to see a huge arm flop down onto the floor next to him, kicking up a cloud of sand and panicked burrower fish in the process.

It was wrapped in heavy wire netting from fingertips to forearm, and behind it, a giant mer was pouting at him with the best seal pup eyes he could manage, which, considering who his best friend was, were fairly potent.

Roman was huge, and he was a shark, with teeth and claws designed to shred and tear, and hands that could enclose him entirely-- but his elbows were braced against the ground with delicate balance so he wouldn’t crush anything, and he’d never grabbed for Virgil past that first disastrous encounter, and even now, his brow was furrowing with worry.

“Pufferfish status?” he asked, voice lowered from the dramatic plea of before.

Virgil’s mouth pulled up at the corners without his permission.

Roman was huge, yes, but he was also theatrical and eager and witty, full of sharp return quips for every barb Virgil had to offer.

He could hurt him, but he wouldn’t. Virgil believed that much.

“Prickly for a second, but I’m smooth now,” he answered, shrugging away the last of the tension. “Try not to sneak up on me without a warning click?”

“You have my word,” Roman replied, and if someone had told him months ago that he’d dare to ask anything of a giant mer, he’d have laughed in their faces. Now, Virgil knew that just like all the other requests, Roman would do his best to heed it.

“But really, my fingers are starting to feel numb. Help?” he entreated with a tilt of his head, shifting his net-wrapped hand a little closer.

Virgil rolled his eyes, but his smile didn’t go away, though it tilted more towards amused now. He darted forward, twisting in a spiral around Roman’s hand to try and see the extent of the damage.

“How’d you even manage this? At least I had the excuse of being caught up in a storm,” he snarked, picking at a loose section with his claws. Roman’s fingers twitched a little, and he shot him an apologetic glance.

“I was… perhaps… trying to get a glimpse of those sailors that Logan mentioned patrolled the coast?” Roman offered, more than a little sheepish.

Virgil’s gaze turned sharp in a heartbeat. “Did they spot you?”

Logan had warned both Patton and Roman several times that not many humans would take as kindly to their long-term existence near human settlements as Logan himself had.

“No!” Roman assured, “I was very stealthy, truly, I was just… so focused on being stealthy that I missed the other vessel and the nets it had dragging along behind it. It could have happened to anyone!”

“I seriously doubt that,” Virgil replied dryly. He’d snapped a few of the looser wires with his teeth, but already his jaw was beginning to ache with the strain. “Well, you get to explain this to Specs, ‘cause we’re going to need his expertise in detangling for this one.”

Roman groaned in answer, dropping his head to plonk against the ground.

---

Logan carefully set one foot in front of the other, all of his focus on the thin strip of rock below him.

If he switched his gaze to even a few inches to either side, he’d be faced with the sight of a vertigo-inducing drop to the waves below, one that would have all but the most experienced tightrope walkers dizzy with panic.

His gaze didn’t move, though, unerringly focused on the ground beneath him, and on his own body. There was no need to look at anything but the ledge, a soft presence confirmed in the back of his mind, because he wasn’t going to fall.

Another part of him was skeptical, seeing as he wasn’t known for a lack of clumsiness by most. There was just so much to get distracted by, and it was so easy to look away and miss a curb or accidentally trip over his own feet--

But not now. Now, he was focused on just this one task, a gentle voice dragging his attention back whenever it began to stray. He was hyper aware of where each of his limbs were and where he needed to put them to continue forward, step by careful step.

Only a little farther…

“Logan!”

The harsh call snapped him right out of the trance, and he was abruptly made very aware of both the distance he could fall and the effects that sudden instinctual terror had on his sense of balance.

“Newton’s fucking Cradle,” he swore, and then wobbled again, precariously close to falling over.

There was the sound of water crashing against rock, and in the next moment, two giant hands had curled up on either side of him like the shells of an oyster. They provided him some much needed stability to lean his weight against, and he struggled to steady his breathing as relief swept through him.

“It’s okay, Virgil, I won’t let him fall! No cliffs, ands, or buts about it,” Patton’s voice was muffled, but not enough to miss the pun.

Logan sighed loudly, but he also shifted to let his full weight rest against the curl of Patton’s left palm, tapping twice to let him know it was alright for him to move.

His stomach still swooped slightly as Patton slowly shifted his hands away from the thin rock ledge, but there were some things that one had to adapt to when living with two very affectionate, grabby sea giants, and being toted around was one of those things.

Before long, he was level with the flattest segment of rock that made up their meeting place, which could be called an island if one was feeling gracious, but was really more of a collection of rocky spires and bridges that stuck out of the ocean.

Logan was barely able to sit up before Virgil pulled himself up at the edge of Patton’s palm, expression thunderous but his hands gentle as he carefully checked him over for scrapes or injuries.

“Nearly gave me a heart attack,” he grumbled, a phrase that he used much more frequently around Logan for some reason. Logan had already been reassured that it was an exaggeration and Virgil had no heart problems he knew of, so instead of worrying, he bore his friend’s fussing with good grace. “Did we or did we not agree that you need a spotter if you want to play around with bullshit sirensong magic?”

The mer paused. “No offense, Pat.”

“None taken!” Patton replied from where he had sunk further into the water to put himself closer to eye-level.

“I figured you would be along shortly,” Logan defended, and then perked up at the reminder of his most recent experiment. “Besides, one of the things tested in this trial was if the siren song could overshadow significant fear or even terror, and I wouldn’t have been nearly as afraid if you’d been there with me.”

“Aw,” Roman cooed, curling his tail up and leaning against one of the larger rock outcroppings, his posture slightly off.

Virgil dragged a hand over his face with a sigh, and then flapped a ‘go on’ gesture at Logan, distracting him. “So, what’d you figure out this time?”

Logan needed no further encouragement.

“Even the lightest application of a siren’s song can overwhelm other emotions,” he started, recalling the utter honed focus he had experienced. “While in the past I’ve felt distant or removed from my body while under its effects, this time I had Patton focus on requesting a very specific task, and due to the intense concentration it took, I was very present in the moment while fulfilling that task.”

“You didn’t snap out of it until I called for you,” Virgil interjected, more curious than wary. “Was it harder than normal to use the grounding tactics?”

One of the first things Logan had investigated was what it took for him to resist and even break free from Patton’s song, a task that Virgil had demanded in order to let him run any experiments with the siren’s magic. Back then, Virgil hadn’t expected Patton to agree, and he’d outright sulked for weeks to cover up the nerves he felt whenever the siren thralled Logan.

“It was,” Logan said, his excitement growing as he considered the new information. “Without significant outside stimulus, all of my attention was focused on the task, and so I couldn’t pull away mentally to do my normal grounding techniques!”

“I’ve never heard someone so excited about being hypnotized better,” Roman commented wryly.

“He should get a hypnoprize,” Patton added, and Virgil grinned, because he was a traitor who enabled Patton’s wordplay habits.

“Is there an award for smart people doing dumb things?” Virgil mused teasingly. “Logan could be voted ‘most likely to throw himself into danger in the pursuit of knowledge.’”

“That’s why he has us, Finding Emo,” Roman countered, gesturing extravagantly with one hand. “We would never abandon him to the cruel clutches of his own nerdiness.”

Logan couldn’t help but feel a thrill of pride at the casual way that Virgil ducked beneath one of Roman’s sweeping gestures, no trace of the blatant fear or suspicion that had been present as recently as a month ago.

They’d really come a long way from the misunderstandings of that first encounter, all of them.

A glint of light at the edge of the shark mer’s submerged forearm caught Logan’s eye, and he frowned. “Roman, what’s happened to your arm?”

Roman’s prideful grin dropped into sheepishness immediately. “Well, about that…”

“Princey here was abandoned to the cruel clutches of his own reckless dumbassery,” Virgil informed him, ignoring Roman’s trill of offense to drift back and shove at the hand in question until Roman finally lifted it, displaying the impressive collection of netting that he’d managed to get tangled in.

“Oh, you poor thing,” Patton clucked sympathetically, and Roman soaked in the attention like a very dramatic sponge. Virgil rolled his eyes even as he sawed at a few of the looser wires, and Logan sighed in fond exasperation as he reached for his pocket knife.

Perhaps some things would never change.

[chaoticallysapphic]

Oh my heart

Summary: Lin never expected to have a soulmate, in a world where your mark appears whenever your soulmate is born she grew up completely blank. So when she’s thirty and it finally etches itself around her arm, she vows to never be with the one meant only for her. 

A/N: there is an age gap so if that's not your thing, then please don’t read. This will be a two, maybe three parter and the reader is Korra’s older sister who is also a waterbender, besides that I’ve tried to keep any physical descriptions of her as vague as possible.

Word count: 4k

Lin was terrified. Something she had longed for her entire life had finally appeared but at the worst possible time, those strange words etched onto her forearm stared back at her in a taunting manner, making fun of her new attempt at happiness. You wished for me all your life, aren’t you pleased? The voice in the back of her head taunted, but she wasn’t. A moment meant to be filled with joy was one drenched in dread. Lin had finally accepted her feelings for Tenzin, despite him having had his soulmate mark since he was sixteen. Her glances grew longer, her smile seemed reserved only for him, and she finally felt happy, until now of course. Thirty, that’s how old Lin was, which meant she was thirty years older than her soulmate which seemed wrong, disgusting even, so Lin did what she thought best, she burnt it off. She blamed it on a work-related incident when asked, a pesky firebending criminal got a little to close and she paid the price. No one knew she did it to herself in the darkness of her apartment with tears on her face, a hint of regret gnawing at her heart.

Two months later, Tenzin asked Lin out on a date and despite that nagging feeling that this was so wrong, she accepted. After a few months Tenzin made her forget about the burnt skin on her forearm, the shameful secret she’d take to the grave. She felt happy, so happy, she felt loved and accepted, like maybe she had a shot at a happily ever after despite his mark and her own. Lin knew he’d choose her, knew he loved her, and had nothing to worry about, so she laid her head on his chest as they basked in the sun on Air Temple Island.

                                                            -----

“You can’t force me into wanting kids!” Lin shouted, her hands waving around as she glared at Tenzin, his usual calm demeanor seemed to crack, his voice rising as he shouted back “I’m the last air bender there is! I have to keep the line going, I have to repopulate my kind!”

“I would be a terrible mother, I hate kids and I’d have to leave my job for at least nine months, I just made Chief!” Tenzin pinched the bridge of his nose, his pale complexion turning red with frustration, he loved how dedicated she was to her job, but it seemed to be all she cared about since getting promoted.

“I think we need a break from each other, maybe a week or t-”. Her eyes widened in horror at his words, her hand's grip at her hair in frustration as she cuts him off “fine, but I am coming back in a week and we are working this out for good, I’m tired of this argument.” Without letting him say another word, she stormed out and made her way back to republic city.

As the week dragged on, Lin put her colleagues through hell. Slamming doors so hard the glass on them shattered, an even shorter fuse than normal, she even fired two of her best detectives for trying to ask her what was wrong. Her apartment seemed cold, her nights seemed never-ending and an undeniable sense of dread clawed its way into her heart like she knew he was slipping away. Maybe she could have one kid, to make him happy and keep the air benders going. If it was an earth bender then fine, she’d have another, but she wouldn’t quit her job, wouldn’t loosen up on the hours and Tenzin would understand, right? He’d just be so happy to be a father that he wouldn’t care, he’d always respected her work before, what was to stop him after a kid or two?

She caved, she decided to go back to air temple island on the fifth day, a sense of determination to fix their relationship fueled each step and she tried to dismiss any fear she had of becoming a mother as she made her way up the steps to where she’d known Tenzin would be. In her state, she didn’t notice the pitying looks the acolytes sent her way, all she cared about was finding him. When she found him in the courtyard, she thought nothing of the young woman speaking to Tenzin with a wide grin but when she put her hand on his shoulder mid-laugh, Lin paused. Tenzin noticed her then, a million emotions flashed through his eyes before his shoulders sagged and a sorrowful expression settled on his face, and somehow, she knew.

Who could blame her when she wreaked havoc on a place she once called her sanctuary, when she wished misery on him before leaving her destruction behind, her fists clenched tight as the best thing she ever had slipped through her fingers.

                                                           -----

“Korra!” a feminine voice shouted from behind Tenzin, you pushed past him and ran forward to hug the avatar in the interrogation room, murmuring something to her in a furious tone. Lin rolled her eyes as she looked over at Tenzin who said smoothly “Lin, you are looking radiant as usual.”

“Cut the garbage Tenzin” she replied in an annoyed tone “why is the avatar in republic city? I thought you were supposed to be moving down to the south pole to train her.” you, who came in with Tenzin let go of Korra and walked over to stand by him, your arms crossed over your chest.

“It was too cold for his bald head” you answered right as Tenzin opened his mouth to speak “now why is my sister in so much trou-”. Lin tuned the rest of her words out as shock slammed into her like a rock wall. No. This wasn’t meant to happen, she’d scorched off any chance with her soulmate twenty years ago, or so she thought. But this… this twenty? Yes, a twenty-year-old water tribe girl with brows furrowed, and an expectant look on her face was it. You were what sometimes kept her up at night when she was so lonely it felt like the feeling would surely eat her up as Lin imagined some faceless figure who loved Lin with all their heart, someone who would never leave her.

“Lin?” Tenzin asked, putting his hand on her shoulder which successfully pulled her out of the raging ocean that was her thoughts, no not ocean, definitely nothing water-related. Lin looked into Tenzin's eyes, completely ignoring her one chance at happiness.

“Just get her out of my sight and keep her out of trouble” she practically growled out before storming off. Her heart was racing so fast she’d thought it’d surely give up any second now, maybe she should have known that her hasty decisions from her past would one day come back to sucker punch her in the gut.

“Well that was weird” Lin heard you say behind her as she continued to rush away from you before she accidentally said something. Lin vowed then that she would never say a single word to you. It was better this way anyway, who would want her? Bitter, old, scarred Lin who was practically married to her job and hated all things romantic ever since Tenzin crushed her heart beneath his shoe.

                                                           -----

She learned that your name was y/n a few days later, she heard Korra call out to you at the gala and when Lin followed Korra’s excited figure and her eyes landed on her soulmate, the wind was successfully knocked out of her for the second time since meeting y/n. You were wearing a deep blue satin dress that went down to the floor with a blue sheer shoulder shawl that had silver snowflakes embroidered onto it. Your hair was down instead of up, and you had a small amount of makeup on, just a bit of rouge and red lipstick. Lin thought it was the perfect amount, any more and it might distract someone from your beautiful eyes, or your enchanting smile. Her heart began to pound despite her desperate attempt at keeping her emotions in check. A large part of her hated this, hated you, and what this feeling blooming in her chest meant.

When Bolin came up to you and threw an arm over your shoulder, which caused you to laugh, Lin remembered that it would never happen. She shoved her feelings down and turned away from you as her thoughts went from how beautiful you were to how you would never love her.

Later on in the evening, Tarlock calls Lin over and she sees you peek around Korra to eye her curiously, a look of intrigue settles on your features as Lin pushes down any feelings she has at the fact that you’re looking at her and it feels like her whole body is on fire under your stare. “I believe you and avatar Korra have already met” Tarlock looks over at her with that sly look of his that she’s already determined means he’s up to no good.

“Just because the city is throwing you this big to do, don’t think you’re something special. You’ve done absolutely nothing to deserve this” she says to Korra, leaning down a bit to glare at the young avatar. Your curious gaze turns to one of annoyance as you glare at Lin. “Hey! Who gave you the right to be mean to my little sister,” you step in front of Korra almost protectively, as you stare her down. Don’t speak to her, look away, don’t reply, she tells herself. Lin turns on her feet and walks off, trying to seem as if she doesn’t care about what you said. “Why does she always ignore me?” she hears you say in an exasperated tone before she loses your voice over the loud music playing nearby.

                                                           -----

When Tenzin stands next to Lin at the pro-bending arena with you by his side, she’s not surprised. It seems the universe has decided to continuously throw you in her face, dangling you teasingly despite knowing her decision regarding your bond. You're holding a bag of fire flakes as you eagerly watch your sisters match, but soon your once excited expression turns to annoyance once the game starts. The Wolf Bats tipped the referee off. Lin wants to go beat the referee up until he starts being fair, just to see you smile once more.

“C’mon! This is bullshit” you shout as the Wolf Bats gain another point. Lin can’t help but notice the way your nose scrunches up as you continue to shout at the referee or how your hair which originally was pushed behind your ears has come loose and is framing your face so beautifully. Her left hand unconsciously grazes over her armor where her burn mark is as she watches you, completely tuning the game out. As Tenzin goes to shout something alongside you, his eyes catch Lin staring at you with a look of longing, he takes a step closer to Lin causing her to tear her eyes away from you and back to the match.

“Lin....” Tenzin begins but she clears her throat and mutters out a sharp “drop it.” To which Tenzin does, for now. Later on, as the match intensifies, Lin says “I can’t believe your sweet-tempered father was reincarnated into that girl, she’s tough as nails.” Lin doesn’t see it, but you smile at her words before deciding to tune out the rest of the conversation between the two, too focused on your sister to care.

You're practically seething at the outcome of this botched game, fire flakes are flying out of the bag as you shout in anger, not noticing the figure approaching with sinister intentions. By the time you do, it's because you're in excruciating pain as something electrifies you, your vision blurs and you make out Lin dropping onto the floor. The figure who electrocuted you steps over your body, you reach out to the Airbender, trying to warn him but nothing comes out of your mouth as he falls to the floor beside you. Soon your eyes droop closed due to the pain despite trying your hardest to stay awake.

When Lin awakens her muscles feel like they're about to give out and she lets out a weak groan as she slowly goes to stand up. Her eyes land on you the second her vision is no longer a blur and her heart fills with panic as she sees an equalist take you into their arms. She stumbles forward, not fully awake, and catches the attention of your capture. You let out a pained groan, in your unconscious state, the sound tugs at her heart and she’s suddenly filled with boiling rage. The equalist is shaking as he continues to stumble backward, another appears to help him take you away and without a second thought Lin shoots out her wires and wraps them around both of their ankles, she gives them a harsh yank which causes them to fall to the ground with a loud thud, for good measure she cuffs them to the floor, warping the metal of the floor beneath them around their wrists and ankles. You land on top of your capture, your eyes begin to flutter behind your lids and you finally stir awake. Pain wraps around your muscles, in your head you think maybe it's best to just lay still, momentarily forgetting about your situation.

You let out a whimper, knocking Lin out of her frozen state as she had gazed at you. Lin rushes forward and wraps an arm around your waist as she pulls you up onto your feet, you open your eyes, blinking the blurriness out of your eyesight. Lin takes you over to the railing as Tenzin also begins to regain consciousness and she props you up against the metal railing. You stare up at her in confusion, your mind is buzzing a mile a minute, not only at the situation at hand but at how her arms felt wrapped around you. “Uhm… Thanks for that.”

“Amon probably ordered them to kidnap you to hurt Korra” she replies, not realizing what she’s just done. Your eyes widen in shock at her words but before she can even notice your shocked state an explosion sets off behind you, sheets of metal from the bending platform go flying and she wraps her arms around you, forcing you to duck down so she can shield you with her body. You pull up a wave of water to protect you from oncoming flames. The heat of the steam from the water causes you both to begin sweating before the flames from the explosion recede only seconds later. You let go of the water, suddenly the discovery of Lin’s secret doesn’t seem so important as you think of your sister. When you passed out she was in the water below, surely she’s somewhere safe, right?

As if to answer your question, Korra appears as she hurtles herself up into the air with a large twisting waterspout. As it begins to falter and then completely goes out you let out a shout filled with terror “Korra!” Lin quickly gets up and shoots her metal wire out towards the roof to send her flying across the arena towards the avatar, before Korra can hit the fiery platform below, she shoots out a second wire to her waist and with all her might yanks her up into the air.

You stand beside Tenzin with wide eyes and bated breath, suddenly the two most important women in your life, I mean Lin has been ignoring you and you’ll have to figure out why later but she is your soulmate which does make her incredibly important to you, are out of your sight and dangerously fighting above as you uselessly stand there with your water bending abilities that won’t get you up there to help fight off equalists. Not being able to just stand by you summon water from below and create an ice bridge to the platform, if you can’t fight, you can try to put out the raging fire caused by the explosion.

“Y/n, wait!” Tenzin calls after but you're long gone. If you just stand there you’ll go insane and you have powers that can help, even if you don't get to kick some equalist ass.  Up above Lin finally lands on the glass dome and immediately sets out to take down as many people as she can at once, Korra watches in amazement for a moment as she wraps her wire at some guys foot and slams him into the roof before she gets knocked off the rope and lands onto the dome with a loud thud and the crackling of the glass starting to break below her.

It’s a collision of fire and electricity with metal wires flying towards the men and from below where you are using all your strength to put out the fire, it looks almost beautiful with the sparks of blue and flashes of red if not for the current circumstances. Tenzin has taken to help you with the fire by trying to use air to snuff it out. Suddenly glass from above sprinkles around them and you look up to see your little sister free falling once more.

“Tenzin can you do something with your air?!” You shout and he goes to try and send a force of air to help slow her down but she's going too fast, she’s flailing and if she doesn’t do something soon she’ll most likely die from the impact. As you run to the edge of the platform to try and save her yourself, Lin appears from above Korra and shoots a small wire to her so she can hold onto it like a rope.

Your shoulders sag in relief as you stumble away from the edge and use everything you’ve got to summon a massive wave to once and for all put out the fire. It works and the force of the water has it crashing into the stands taking with it some of the seats and any trash left behind in the frenzy. When you see Lin and Korra land  you race off towards the now soaking wet stands, using the water below as a set of frozen stairs to reach them. When you do, Lin has her hand on Korra’s shoulder and is saying something but you don’t make it out before you crush them both in a hug. Some sort of strangled sound of relief bubbles up through your throat as your hold on them tightens.

Korra wraps her arms around you, softly saying “thank the spirits you're okay” as Lin stays perfectly still. As her adrenaline slowly leaves her body and she realizes you aren’t in danger, she suddenly can’t be touched by you. She remains frozen until you pull away, you know it's not the time to bombard her so instead you offer Lin a thankful smile, too worried about how she’d react if you did anything else.

                                                           -----

A few days later you finally let Korra out of your sight, letting her run off to deal with her boy problems as you head towards the main police station. You tried to casually ask Tenzin what kind of tea Lin liked best, to which he’d furrowed his brows and said “why?” You simply shrugged and repeated your question. Apparently, it was jasmine, which was a favorite of yours as well so you stopped by your favorite tea shop and grabbed two to-go cups. As you enter the station you square your shoulders and give yourself a little pep talk “You can do this, you just need to march in and figure out why, maybe butter her up with the tea first of course, and then ask why, that’s if she lets you into the office…” you trail off once your eyes land on the door of Lin’s office, the words “Chief Beifong” are written in gold on the glass door which has a blind pulled down so you can’t see inside, which your slightly grateful for.

“Chief Beifong doesn’t want anyone to disturb her” one of the cops called out, but you ignore him and open the door, who cares, you deserve answers.

“I said I wanted to be alone, how brain dead are yo-” her words cut off as you walk in, balancing two cups in one hand so you can shut the door. You swallow, suddenly being in front of her has made most of your bravado slip away, along with your original plan, leaving you speechless. She doesn’t say anything, seeming to forget that she already spoke to you in the arena. You set the cups down and lift your shirt, which causes Lin to blush but you don’t stop until she can see her own words.

“I used to hate them… y’know,” you say quietly before dropping your shirt back down, Lin glares at her desk. “I used to be jealous of Korra and all the attention she got, so imagine growing up with her name etched onto your skin.”

She goes to open her mouth to speak, most likely to spew out some lie so you beat her to it. “I don’t know why, exactly, you kept it to yourself, I asked Tenzin the other day and he said you didn’t have a mark which is odd seeing as you are my soulmate." You pause, your voice softening, "you could have just told me straight away that you didn’t want me, didn’t want this instead of ignoring my existence and leaving me to wonder what I'd done to offend you.” Finally, she looks up from the desk and you make eye contact with her. You're trying so hard not to cry as you try to figure out what's going through her head, will she kick you out? Is your soulmate going to reject you?

“I thought…” Lin begins, she looks away from you, not being able to look you in the eyes anymore. “I thought I was doing you a favor, I’m old, and I’m not the most personable or charismatic person, I thought maybe you’d want someone your own age, maybe someone like your sisters' teammates.”

“So someone who is young and a guy? Did you think that maybe you should let me decide what I wanted instead of just assuming?”

“Look I gave up on the idea of having a soulmate years ago!” Lin shouts and you flinch away in surprise, “thirty years is a long time, do you know how I felt when those words suddenly appeared on me at thirty?”

“Oh, so you do have a mark!” You let out a disbelieving, angry laugh. “So you just went around telling everyone you didn’t have one, pretending the idea of me, of us, didn’t exist.” Tears cloud your vision and you let out a frustrated groan as you quickly gaze up at the ceiling in an attempt to keep them from falling. Lin’s gaze softens and she slowly stands from her desk.

“Y/n… I thought about it every day, but… We can’t be together, I’m far too old and I’ll just hold you back.” You scoff and aggressively wipe at the tears falling down your cheeks, your heart feels like it's beginning to crack.

“Your mark?” You croak out and cringe at how you sound. Lin hesitated before using her bending to take off the armor on her right arm. On her arm is a massive burn scar, you keep staring at it, not knowing what to say. Did someone else do that to her? As if she can read your thoughts, Lin says softly “I did it to myself a few days after it appeared.”

Oh. So this is what it's like to have your heart cleaved into two, what you felt just minutes before seems like nothing compared to the pain wrapping so tightly around you that it seems hard to breathe. She hated the idea of you so much she'd rather hurt herself and lie to everyone in her life. Without another word you turn your back on your soulmate, despite the sound of calling out to you, just like she did to you twenty years ago.

[patricianandclerk]

Complete. 6k. Set pre-160, after they're settled into the cottage together.

Jon looks... hungry. Martin can't stand it.

Jon had been skinny when Martin had met him. Well, not— Was skinny the right word? He’d been small, that much was certain, except he was really only small in comparison to Martin and to Tim, because when Martin saw him out in the street, around other people, he did seem a little bigger than the average, but he was skinny. Square and angular, and sort of thin, with the bony bits of him seeming exaggeratedly bony, but not so skinny that you noticed it on the parts of him that were meant to be meaty – his forearms, his legs, his chest.

Meaty.

Bad choice of words. Bad choice of words, now, now that the actual meat on his body was pockmarked over the arms and the hands where the worms had burrowed in, and when the burn covered shiny-slick up his left hand, and there was a ragged cut at his neck, too, one that only showed when he let his shirt get unbuttoned…

Skinny was the wrong word, and little didn’t seem right either, when Martin really looked at him, but when you weren’t looking at Jon, it was easy to think of him as little. He just had that sort of personality, except that maybe it wasn’t his personality, and maybe he’d used to seem bigger, before he started—

That isn’t a helpful train of thought, and it makes Martin feel a bit sick.

He’s watching Jon in the little cottage, his arms crossed tightly over his chest, his knees drawn partly up to his chest, and he’s managed to cram himself onto one of the windowsills like a cat. Folded up like this, he looks like he’d be bigger, once you unfolded him, and Martin again gets the weird, uncanny sensation that Jon should be bigger in his mind than he is, and he doesn’t like it. Doesn’t like the idea that when he isn’t looking, whatever magic there is might make Jon fade away to nothing, might make Martin forget.

The cottage is small. It’s only three rooms – the living room and kitchen, which is sparsely furnished with an electric fireplace, some dressers, and a few bookshelves which are mercifully crammed full of books; the bedroom, which has one queen-sized bed with what feels like a fifty-year-old mattress, and two chests of drawers which had at least been full of blankets; and the bathroom, which has a bath but no shower, and is so small, with a slightly slanted roof, that Martin has to bend his head slightly if he wants to use the sink. The books on the shelves are varied, and Jonathan had wryly commented as they’d started clearing all the dust off everything that she’d just bought some boxes from a car boot sale to fill them, so that they would be harder to move.

There’s ammunition and weapons behind them, the bookshelves, buried in the wall. Jon had known that when they’d come in, and then gone sort of quiet, like he felt guilty, but it wasn’t as though it was his fault, just for knowing.

There are a lot of blankets, at least, although honestly, Martin hadn’t expected the cottage to hold the heat as well as it does, but it really does – the windows are thickly glazed, with that cross-hatching that some windows have (“It means if someone shoots through it, it won’t shatter too explosively.” More guilty silence.), and the walls are tightly insulated, the roof not seeming to let out too much heat. There’s an attic you can get into from the outside, but Jon had put his hand on Martin’s and said quietly that he didn’t want to go up there, and that he didn’t want Martin to go up there either.

Martin had been distracted by how cold Jon’s hand was, and immediately clasped it in his own to try to warm it up. Jon had gone quiet then, too, but he couldn’t really tell at the time if it was guilty or not. He still couldn’t.

Martin has a copy of Ballantyne’s The Coral Island in his lap, but it’s very old and the font is very small, and when he looks at the etchings of the ocean and the boats, he thinks of Peter Lukas, and it makes him feel sad, and lonely, and sort of yearny, in a way he doesn’t really like, and when he feels like that he doesn’t much want to go for a walk around the area.

Jon doesn’t seem that small, when they’re in bed together. He folds out instead of inward, and although he doesn’t sprawl – Martin doesn’t think Jon is capable of sprawling, even if he’s trying to – he sort of spreads out a bit more, a bit longer. Martin can tell he isn’t used to sharing a bed with someone, but that he isn’t self-conscious enough to apologise if he brushes Martin accidentally, and the night before, Martin had woken up with his nose pressed into Jon’s black-and-grey hair, Jon’s stubble scratching at Martin’s neck, and he’d been amazed at how much his head had spun with it, when he was only just awake. He likes… Once they start touching, it’s so easy to touch one another all over, but when the gap between them is like this, it’s hard to bridge it, to start with.

It’s easier to touch Jon than he expected, though. When he fantasied about it, when he first started having a crush, he’d always thought it would be hard to touch him – he used to imagine that Jon would take charge, that he’d maybe tie Martin down and take control, or tell Martin when and where he was allowed to touch.

That was before he knew Jon wasn’t really interested in sex, of course. He wonders if it’s bad to think about having sex with someone you know isn’t interested.

“I’m sorry,” Martin says.

Jon glances at him. He looks tired, and thin – thinner than he used to, definitely, and not just because of the new Archivist thing. Martin is certain of that, certain, because when Jon had sat up this morning it was easy for Martin to see that he was missing two ribs, because he could count them all easily, and no one’s thighs should be as thin as Jon’s are. Jon doesn’t look emaciated, not like Daisy had, does, does, but then she mustn’t look quite the same now, it’s been weeks—

“What?” Jon asks softly.

“I don’t mind getting you cigarettes,” Martin says. “Just— I didn’t mean, I didn’t want to, um, to stop you, just that I don’t like the… but it would be fine if you smoked them outside. I can get you some.”

He’d asked for them. When he’d seen Martin’s face, he’d actually recoiled a little, although Martin wasn’t sure what his face had looked like, although he had said that he wouldn’t let Jon smoke in the house, and he’d been stern, almost, and assertive, and he hadn’t meant to be like that, it wasn’t the sort of person he was – but maybe it was, now, maybe he was assertive, maybe he could be. He was trying to be.

“I don’t mind,” Jon says lowly. “I’ve been smoking too much the past few months anyway. More than I used to.”

“They’re appetite inhibitors,” Martin says. “Like chewing gum.”

“Yes,” Jon says. His tone is a little more tight, and he isn’t looking at Martin, but instead on some fixed point out over the drably green fields outside. Martin wonders what he’s looking at, who he’s looking at, if he’s looking at something other than damp grass and uneven fenceposts and a dank, grey sky. “My grandmother used to tell me that, too.”

“I was going to cook a chicken for dinner,” Martin says. “And potatoes, and carrots, and there’s… I got some, um, gravy. Bisto.”

Jon smiles at him. It’s drawn, and haggard, and it makes one of the scars on his cheek seem longer.

“You’re a good cook, Martin,” he says quietly. “You’ll have to tell me what to do, if you want things chopped a certain way.”

Mum used to tell him he was a good cook. Martin didn’t think that it was true – he just cooked things, and they tasted fine, but he wasn’t a chef or anything, and he wasn’t really that into recipe books, or interesting things. Tim had liked interesting things, Tim had cooked all this creative stuff, and Basira seemed to know how to cook everything, and Sasha had known all kinds of things about cuts of meat and wine and mushrooms and ingredients and… And Martin didn’t know any of all that.

Mum used to tell him he was a good cook because he was the one cooking, and she didn’t like that, but felt that she should say something, he supposed. Jon at least seemed like he meant it.

“Are you hungry now?” Martin asks, and he watches Jon’s face, watches the little twitch of his mouth, the hesitation. Martin is a good liar, because his mum was a good liar too, and he had to get good – Jon isn’t great. He’s fine, he’s decent, but he’s not good, not like Martin is.

The pause before he says, “I could eat,” is revealing in a way a “No” never could be.

“Jon,” Martin says.

“Martin,” Jon replies.

He’s already said thank you. He said thank you a hundred times, in his head, and then once they were alone together in the cottage, he’d actually said it out loud, and when Jon had turned his head away, Martin had grabbed him by both cheeks and made Jon look at him, and Jon hadn’t felt small then – he hadn’t looked small, or felt small, or fragile. He’d felt gigantic, like Martin was holding a star between his palms, and when Jon had reached up to loop his fingers around Martin’s wrist – and those were skinny, Jon’s fingers were long and skinny and scarred, whereas Martin’s fingers were shorter, plumper, and scarred – Martin had felt his stomach drop out of his chest, expecting Jon to push his hand away, but he hadn’t.

He’d just squeezed, gently, and then pressed his cheek more tightly against Martin’s palm, and Martin had been so overwhelmed he’d felt like crying. “Thank you,” he’d said a second time. “For saving me.”

“Martin,” Jon had said, “it was just one favour for… I don’t know, a few hundred others.”

And Martin had laughed, a kind of giggly laugh he didn’t like that he actually did, and he’d made to pull away in case he was making Jon uncomfortable, but Jon had hung onto his wrist and kept his hand on Jon’s cheek as though—

Not as though. Because he wanted Martin to touch him, just like that, and so they’d sat down together on the dusty couch and Martin had just touched his face, just touched it, just traced the scars there and the threat of shadow that hadn’t come true yet, and stroked Jon’s hair and traced his teeth and his bones through the skin, and he hadn’t felt all that skinny, not really—

“Martin?” Jon asks again.

“We had a cat, when I was a little boy,” Martin says. “He never let me touch him, but when he got hit by a car, I went and I picked him up, because I needed to carry him home. He was already d— He was already dead, but he was still warm, and I think it was, um, fast.”

“Spock,” Jon says. “It was fast. The wheel snapped his spine, so he didn’t really feel it.”

Martin swallows, and he watches the guilt on Jon’s face as he turns his face away. “Yeah,” Martin says. They’ve been trying to keep things light, trying not to talk about hard things, but it’s hard, he thinks, because Jon is such a hard person, and Martin isn’t as soft as he used to be, as he used to want to be. “I didn’t realize how skinny he was until after I touched him. He was an old cat. They get skinny.”

Jon seems to understand where this is going, and he presses his lips together, but then tries a weak smile, tries to joke. “I’m not that old, Martin. You can touch me whenever you want.”

They’ve been trying to keep things light.

“Just— Basira will send the statements soon. As soon as the Archive isn’t a crime scene anymore, really.”

“I’m fine,” Jon says, and he smiles in a way that Martin supposes is supposed to be comforting. “Really.”

“Is it—” Martin starts, leaning forward, setting The Coral Island aside, and then he stops, because he feels guilty, and weird, and… “Is it hard?” He asks anyway, because he’s meant to be not quite so soft, he’s meant to be harder, and that means being more assertive, and not just rolling over on anything, everything, that means…

“Is what hard, Martin?” Jon asks in a low voice.

“You’re hungry,” Martin says. “You look hungry. You look thin – not as thin as Daisy, maybe, but thin, like you’re not eating properly. You tell me everything I cook here tastes good but I don’t really know if you even taste it.”

“I do,” Jon says. “Your cooking’s nice, Martin. When I have the statements, I’ll be—”

“But the statements aren’t the same, are they?” Martin asks, demands, which is too hard, too assertive, but he can’t stop, the words flow out of him like they’re rushing to get off his tongue. “It’s more like the ghost of a meal, isn’t it? Or a snack, like it’s not something with enough substance? And two weeks have gone by and you haven’t even had that.”

There’s a long silence. This one is very guilty, Martin thinks, and Jon looks small in a way that has nothing to do with being the Archivist, or being skinny.

“Maybe we should go for a walk,” Martin suggests, trying to soften his voice.

“I don’t want to come across anyone by accident,” Jon murmurs.

“Because you’re hungry,” Martin says.

“Martin, I’m always hungry,” Jon says exhaustedly, and then winces, like he’s just heard what he’s said and hates himself for it, and he stands to his feet. “I’m going to… I’m going to take a nap, I think. I’m… sorry. I know this is difficult for you, I don’t mean to—”

Martin doesn’t mean to lunge, per se. He isn’t really the sort of man that does lunging, he’s not really big in an athletic sense, and his mum used to describe him as lumbering, he’s not that fast, but he does lunge, now, and he shoves Jon up against one of the walls, covered over as it is with a blue wallpaper that must have been here before Daisy bought the place.

Jon’s head tips back against the wall, his jaw set, and he doesn’t even look surprised – had he seen it coming? Did he know it was coming, like Elias, like Magnus, always did?

“I’m sorry,” he says again. “I know this probably isn’t what you wanted.”

Martin stares at him. “What? You think that I didn’t, that I didn’t want for you to become the Archivist and have to be hungry all the time because you can’t— because you have to read statements, because taking them from real people is too traumatic for them, because— you think that’s what I don’t want?”

“I can’t imagine you wrote it down in your wish list, no,” Jon says. “But I just mean… Martin, I’m not very… Even before all this, people used to think that they wanted me, sometimes. And I’m not…”

“What, you think I’m disappointed?” Martin asks, surprised by how hard it hits him, like a punch to the gut. “I knew what you were like. You’re not disappointing. And I don’t mind that you don’t like se— that you don’t want… I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but out of the two of us, I’m not exactly the hot one.”

Jon’s head tilts, just slightly. “Aren’t you?” he asks.

It hurts, actually, because it feels like he’s making fun, except that Jon isn’t a good liar and he isn’t good at making fun either, so Martin knows that he isn’t, knows how genuine it is, but then that just hurts more, compounds the hurt and spreads in a layer of guilt like it’s jam between slices of bread.

“I could give you a statement,” Martin says.

“What?” Jon asks. “Don’t be ridiculous.” It’s the first time he actually starts to pull away from Martin’s grip, tries to struggle out from between his hands, but Martin holds him fast in place, and the Eye doesn’t exactly give its people super strength, does it? “Martin, even if I wanted to do that, even if I wanted to hurt you like that, I already know—”

“Only stuff that happened to me after I joined the Archive,” Martin says. “Not from before.”

There’s a sort of sheen that appears in Jon’s eyes that makes a shiver run down Martin’s spine, but it’s only there for a second before he shakes his head, turning his face away and trying not to look at him.

“No,” Jon says. “No, I don’t… I already— I’ve taken far too much from you, Martin, do you really think—”

“What have you taken off me?”

“What have I…?” Jon laughs, a sort of indignant, huffy sound, gasping.

“What, I’m such a stupid child now I can’t even decide who I like and who I want without you deciding—”

“That isn’t true! That isn’t what I’m saying at all, Martin, you’re being—”

“Oh, harmless Martin, he’s got this big crush, can’t possibly be because he can actually decide who and what he likes, obviously he’s just an idiot who—”

“I didn’t say you were an idiot! I just—”

“— must have been tricked into liking me, and is only staying out of guilt or something—”

“Well, are you? Because, Martin, I know I’m not exactly a catch, and—”

“Jon, you’re so arrogant, usually, and when you come across as all self-deprecating to someone who’s really self-deprecating, it sort of feels like you’re trying to steal my act. So. Stop.”

Jon stares at him, his mouth ajar. It’s not exactly keeping things light, but it’s closer, and Martin gives him a small, shyer smile than he means to. Jon laughs, in a small way, a tiny way, a breathless way.

“You don’t want to take live statements from strangers because it’s awful to just go up to somebody and rip things out of their head,” Martin says. “I get that. But I’m not some stranger, and I know what it’s like. You’re not ripping anything out, I just… I’m, you know. Feeding you.”

“Like your dead cat,” Jon says.

“Well, I haven’t fed Spock in decades, Jon. Frankly, it’d be weird if I did,” Martin says, and Jon actually laughs, properly, a little chuckle instead of a nose exhale and a huff, and this time his head falls forward so that his forehead touches Martin’s plushly cushioned sternum, his fingers brushing the side of Martin’s waist. “I don’t get why you think you’re so hideous. I mean. Not because of the monster thing, I get that, but that doesn’t bother me, I just mean, you know, you, as a person. You’re not that bad.”

“Martin, everyone we know thinks I’m a prick.”

“Well, yeah, you are a prick,” Martin says. “But people marry pricks all the time.” That’s a bit weird to say, isn’t it? That’s very forward. He’s made it awkward, talking about marriage, and he tries to make it less so by adding, “And date them, and kiss them, and find them attractive,” but he thinks he just makes it worse.

“I don’t like sex,” Jon says to Martin’s chest.

“I like to wank,” Martin says in the same tone, and then feels himself blush, as if someone’s just lit two matches in his cheeks. Jon slowly leans back, looking up at Martin with his eyebrows raised as highly as they’ll go, and Martin coughs. “I mean, that is, er, that is to say, that I like to— to… What I mean is…”

“Yes?” Jon asks, looking as though he’s trying not to laugh. Martin’s pretty sure his cheeks are glowing right now.

“It doesn’t bother me,” Martin says more seriously, trying to come off as genuine. “It’s not like I haven’t… You know, I’ve had sex. But wanking is… It’s fine. I’d rather have you and not have sex then go have sex and leave you all alone.” Jon’s face shifts, and Martin says, “No, no, it isn’t just that. It’s not obligation. I… like you. I want you. For some reason, Jon, I actually enjoy your company.”

“Really, why?” Jon says. “I don’t.”

“I know,” Martin murmurs. “But you’re… You’re funny, and I know that you’re acerbic, and sharp, but you do actually care underneath all that, way more than you like to admit. And I’ve always had a weakness for prematurely grey hair.”

Jon’s fingers spread over Martin’s chest, gently pressing on the flesh there. “I don’t deserve… you.”

“What do I do?” Martin asks. “It was when I was… when I was nineteen, I think. With the Hunt.”

The glint comes back into Jon’s eyes, but Martin can see him trying to hold it back, trying to keep himself reined in. He shakes his head, but Martin inhales slowly, keeps Jon framed in between his hands, and says, “I think it was the Hunt, anyway. I knew it wasn’t, um, that it wasn’t normal… I was working in Kwik Save at the time, back when there was still Kwik Saves about, and I’d been working there a year, got invited to a party. A lot of them were uni students, and I wanted to be impressive, you know, show them—”

“Martin,” Jon says, urgently, and Martin pulls him slowly back toward the sofa, trying to move slowly and deliberately. He all but drags Jon into his lap, and he can feel the warmth that radiates from him, can feel the way Jon stiffens slightly, looks at him. He doesn’t know why it’s so easy to touch Jon, but it’s easier than talking, somehow. “You hate— You don’t like it when I…”

“I don’t like hearing you read statements,” Martin says. “But because you get so… You get so into them. The whole empathy thing. You don’t just read them, you experience them.”

“So why—”

“Jon,” Martin says. “Let me make a statement.”

He doesn’t know where the tape recorder comes from. It’s just there, whirring away on the coffee table and Jon says, lowly, “Statement of Martin Blackwood, regarding an encounter with a believed agent of the Hunt on the night of the 19th of July, 2010. Statement recorded the 13th of October, 2018.”

Jon licks his lips. Martin’s throat feels thick and full, a sort of nausea stirring in his gut – he doesn’t know why he’d never committed this one to tape. Because he wasn’t the real victim, he supposes, because he was just at the edge of it, but also because it always seemed… unrealistic.

“I’d been working at Kwik Save for nearly six months,” Martin says, and it feels different, somehow, the way that the words come out of his mouth, perhaps because of how intently Jon is focused on him, how unblinking his eyes are, all of a sudden. Elias used to look at Martin like that, sometimes, but that doesn’t matter now. “And I wanted… I wasn’t very popular at school, and it wasn’t that I was unpopular at work, I just knew that I wasn’t… You know, people didn’t really want to hang out with me. I didn’t really have friends. I’ve never had friends.”

It’s too honest, but it flows out of him so easily – and it isn’t comfortable, exactly. It reminds him of being a kid, when he’d messed up trying to tie a piece of thread around a loose tooth and had swallowed a little ball of it, had had to pull it out of his throat bit by bit. It feels inevitable to tell him this, sort of a relief, but not comfortable, not natural.

“So when Jonathan Radley, this guy who was working part-time, he was a student, invited me to a house party, I jumped at the chance. I knew it was just because he was inviting everyone else, that he probably didn’t care all that much about me particularly, but it was a party, and I’d never been to a party before, not… not since I was a kid, and back then, people would only invite me because their parents made them invite everyone. But it was like… I don’t know, people were nice. They weren’t cruel or anything, I wasn’t even bullied that much at school, really – I was too big for that, I think. People didn’t want to say anything too bad because I was big enough to be bad back, even if I chose not to.

“It was busy. There was loud music playing, but I ended up in the kitchen, and this girl, her name was Anna, and her boyfriend had walked out on her. She sort of, um, I don’t know, adopted me? She kept grabbing me by the hand and leading me around, introducing me to people.  I don’t know what it was she saw in me specifically, I think she just wanted someone to look after, and because I’m so broad and tall, if anyone came over, I could just stand in the way. We looked after each other.

“That was why I got as drunk as I was, I think. I didn’t mean to drink that much, because my mum was at home with my grandmother, and I was only going to be out for the night, but I didn’t want to be too hungover because I knew my mum would… She hated it when I got drunk. I think she was bitter about it.

“We did shots. I drank a lot of vodka, a lot more than I’d ever drunk before – I usually got drunk off, you know, cider and sours and cocktails that were more mixer than anything else, not spirits.

“And then this guy came in. He was… He was my height. Which is tall, right? That’s tall. He was tall, with really broad shoulders, muscular arms. A bit like Tim – he was a… He was a bodybuilder, I think. Handsome, too. He had dark hair, and this jaw that was, you know, when people say chiselled I don’t always see it, but it did look chiselled, like someone’d made him out of marble and then painted him, and there was this cleft in his chin. He was… He was hot. Handsome, but handsome like a model, handsome like an actor. It was unreal, overexaggerated, like he couldn’t really be real – and I thought at the time it was just because I was drunk.

“He started talking to me. I was sat down, and he came in and I still remember the way his fingers felt when he touched my neck – he traced up from my throat up to my chin, and it was as though he… I don’t think I’d ever been as suddenly desperate for a man’s attention. It just felt so good, to have him look at me – not even touch me, just look at me, just be in the spotlight. When he smiled, I felt like the world could end and I wouldn’t even notice.

“It was ridiculous! Stupid! As soon as I got home, later, it faded right out, I couldn’t understand why I’d been so into him. It was like he stopped being so intoxicating, when I wasn’t in his presence anymore. Pheromones, maybe.

“He started talking about… I don’t even know. I wasn’t really drunk anymore, all of a sudden, but he was still stroking my chin like I was a dog in his lap, like he didn’t… I remember he was talking about exercise. He was asking me what sort of exercise I did – he said I looked like a strong guy, asked if I’d done any sport, and I said that I had, that I’d played rugby at school, but that I didn’t like how rough it was. That I liked to walk in the countryside, that I liked to ride my bike, sometimes. He asked me how much I could carry, and it was…

“It was a bit like you, or Eli… Like Magnus. It didn’t feel like he was compelling me, exactly, just that before I even realised what I was doing, I was telling him that I could lift my mother up and carry her up and down the stairs, how much she weighed. He asked me how fast I could run. I told him I didn’t know, that I was more of a slower and steadier guy than a sprinter, you know?

“He asked me… He asked me what I’d scored on my last beep test, at school, and I told him I couldn’t remember, but that I’d been in the third to last level. He sort of… I remember the look he gave me. He kind of pouted, you know? Actually stuck out his lips and pouted a bit, and patted my chest as if he was consoling me.

“He said, “I suppose you’ll do,” he said. “Maybe you’ll surprise me.”  But then Anna came over, and she was a track runner. She jogged 5k every day. You know, he went through the same interrogation with her, and the whole time he kept just… just stroking my chin, and I let him, it was… It felt normal.

“I fell asleep. I remember that, that I fell asleep, and when I woke up the party was still going, but I was nearly completely sober, or I felt it, anyway. I got a lift home with someone who was going the same way, but Anna, she was… She was gone.

“It was in the paper. It was in one of those freak stories, that she’d gone for her jog in the morning, but that she’d sprinted, that she’d… They found her out on the moor. She’d had a heart attack. Her clothes weren’t torn or anything, but she’d just run herself so fast, for so long, that her heart gave out.

“I remember his eyes. I used to dream about them, sometimes – they weren’t yellow or green or anything bright. They were a silvery blue, like shallow water in sunlight. I thought back on how it felt, once I started at the Archive. I didn’t remember it being frightening. It didn’t feel like he was going to do anything dreadful, or even… It didn’t even feel sexual, at the time. I didn’t even think about having sex with him – I just wanted to be close to him, and I wanted him to like me. To pick me.”

He looks at Jon’s face for the first time since he’d started, and he looks…

The bags have faded a little from under Jon’s eyes. His skin doesn’t look so pallid and chalky as it had before, and there’s a brighter light in his eyes, and even his lips seem less chapped. He looks… healthier. Not as thin.

Martin’s done this.

Martin’s made him… better. Healthier. He’s nurtured him, and he looks…

This shouldn’t be quite as sexy as it is. It shouldn’t turn him on, he shouldn’t feel…

“End statement,” Jon says hoarsely.

Martin waits for the tape recorder to click off, and then hauls him closer by the front of his shirt, crushing their mouths together. Jon lets out a low noise, but when a sudden wave of guilt makes itself known, Jon opens his mouth wider and kisses Martin back. He’s a good kisser, better than Martin – he kisses like he doesn’t like being in charge of them, but like he enjoys them, and when they kiss, Martin is aware of how loud the noise is, the wet smack of their mouths—

When Jon pulls back, his eyes are heavily lidded, and h looks blissful – Martin’s done that, too, Martin’s made Jon feel like this, Martin’s taken care of him…

“Do you feel better?” Martin asks.

“Yes,” Jon says. “I didn’t… Why did you kiss me?”

“You look good,” Martin says. “Better.”

“Oh,” Jon says, looking relieved, and Martin drags him closer, bundling his legs up against Martin’s chest, so that he can hold all of Jon’s body in his arms at once. “I feel… I feel better. I should feel guilty, I suppose, but—"

“You need to eat,” Martin says.

“But you don’t have to be the one feeding me,” Jon says. “Except that you… I’m not imagining it, am I? You liked it.”

“I like taking care of people,” Martin says. “I like taking care of you.”

“This is a bit more direct than handfeeding me dog treats at the dinner table.”

“God, how did you know I wanted to do that too?” Martin asks, and Jon laughs, breathlessly. Martin puts his fingers up and into Jon’s hair, running it through his fingers again. Jon’s hands come over Martin’s own, loosely gripping his wrists, guiding them up higher, to touch his scalp. “I like touching you. You… You come off as someone who isn’t used to being touched. I like being the one to touch you.”

“You can do whatever you want to me,” Jon says. “I trust you.”

It’s a hundred thousand miles away from the fantasies of Jon telling him he couldn’t touch, of being all stern and in command – it’s everything Martin never realised was impossible, back in the beginning, and yet somehow… “I— Are you trying to make me hard?”

Jon grins at him, shows his teeth, tips his head back slightly, looks for a moment like he’s completely energised, and Martin laughs. He knows it won’t last. He knows he couldn’t see Jon like this all the time – he knows that it comes with nastiness, and horror, knows that most of the statements are horrible, traumatic, much worse than this one. He knows that would be the payment, for Jon to be like this.

But—

 “Yeah,” Jon says, tone teasing. “Maybe a bit. What, got a problem?”

“Pretty big problem, actually.”

“Oh, is it big?” Jon furrows his brow down low, twisting his lips – it’s more Carry On than seductive.

Martin laughs. “As if you’d know. As if you’d even have a frame of reference.”

“I’ve had sex! I’ve seen penises! Tell you what, Martin,” Jon adds, and he lowers his voice, “I’ve even got one.”

“Is it in your desk drawer, next to your rib?”

“Yeah. Different box, though.” Martin’s never seen Jon smile so much – it’s still a tired smile, but he looks… sated. It’s nice. Martin likes it.

“I used to think you didn’t have a sense of humour.”

“That’s in the third box. Rib, sense of humour, penis. Ranked in order of importance.” Jon’s fingers trace down the inside of Martin’s wrists, and the sensation is ticklish, but not unpleasant. “I never used to have friends either.”

“I don’t want to make you uncomfortable,” Martin says. “With… Sex.”

“I’m not uncomfortable. I don’t mind that people have it, that they want it. I just don’t really like the idea of participating, but I don’t mind… I don’t mind teasing. If it doesn’t bother you.”

“It doesn’t bother me,” Martin murmurs, feeling his cheeks burn with a slight blush. “Sort of the opposite, actually. Do you still want to nap?”

“We could take that walk, if you want,” Jon says. “I feel a bit more up for it.”

“Yeah,” Martin says. “Me too, funny enough.”

Jon smiles, and he hesitates, but then turns his head, slowly, and presses his mouth to the inside of one of Martin’s wrists. His lips are surprisingly soft where they press against the pulse point there, and Martin’s mouth feels dry.

“Let’s take that walk,” Martin says, and Jon nods.

They hold hands. Martin’s never walked with someone and held hands with them before. He’s never even fantasied about it, never even dreamed of…

It’s nice.

It’s really nice.

My Ask | My Ko-Fi | My Ao3 | Requests always welcome!

[writingonthemoon]

Old Clothes Part 1

Word Count: ≈1913

Warnings: Mentions of Death

Back of Book: Odette had few constants in her ever-changing life.  One was The Burn.  She had learned it from her mother Lilijah when she was only four.  It was a way to escape all past mistakes and start anew.  It also came at a cost.  After one Burn, they need for more grows stronger.  Every time there was a possibility of someone recognizing one person in the family, matches were thrown to the ground and everything with them.  After, they would move hundreds of kilometres away and build a life again, only for it to be burned once again.  Then they would find old clothes and start thrice.

    At the age of seventeen, Odette got lost during a move.  Alone, she scoured the forest for her mother, father, and siblings.  As the sun set, she came across the Tuck family while searching for her own people.  They welcomed her to their campsite and offered to help her in the morning.  Grateful for their kindness, she thanked them and drank from a nearby spring before resting.  In the morning the group of five searched for the runaways, but to no avail.  The Tucks made a proposition to Odette.  She could become a part of their family.  And so she did.  She travelled with the youngest son, Jesse, for years unknown, never once ageing and always in old clothes.

     Alone again, Odette travels back to New York after spending decades out of the country.  There, she expects to visit old and new landmarks before making her way to the west.  Instead, she comes face-to-face with victims of The Burns she held over her many years.  The embers are still hot and may reignite, burning Odette and her old clothes with her.

Author’s Note: It’s here, people!  My spur of the moment story after I watched Tuck Everlasting had now become a semi-published story.  I know, like, three people will probably end up reading this, but I don’t care much about that.  And if you think this is a good part one, share it on your blogs so I get my butt in gear and finish the second part!  Thank you for reading and enjoy!

P.S. I’m using this for Day: 11 of Tuck Month since it’s a free day and it works with yesterday’s post if anyone’s wondering.

Old clothes.  It’s always old clothes for a new beginning.  It’s easiest to create a new identity with someone else’s.  Fabricating a single history that intertwines many from all over is simpler than pulling a single story from a single source.  If there’s no traceable trail of your lie, nobody can prove anything right or wrong.  It’s always wrong, though.  It’s wrong until the next new life.  And the next and the next.  Every new beginning brings an unfinished and unsatisfied end.  My mother never taught me that last part.

     It had been years, many years since I had last seen her.  My father, brother, and sister too.  I didn’t know where they were, I just knew they were no longer alive.  How could they be?  It had been ages since the last time I saw them.  Our lack of visitations was not my fault.  They lost me in that wood, not the other way around.  Things just kept happening after that took me farther and farther away from them.  When I met the Tucks in that clearing after hours of panicked wandering, I was desperate for warmth and food.  They let me camp with them unit the morning, so we could have the sun on our side while we searched.  The water from the spring… I had no idea.  None of us had a clue and now we’re all stuck like we were that day.  I’m stuck, never being me again, but always being seventeen.

     That was, oh, 91 years ago.  Now, it’s 1899 and I’ve left New Hampshire and gone everywhere.  Jesse and I travelled together when we figured out our… predicament.  We were in love and were going to get married and have a family, even with my internal inhibitions.  Then Miles had a son, Thomas.  Then Thomas and his mother left, fearing the unknown.  Jesse and I had become split on the plan. I still loved him and anyone could tell just by the look in my eyes whenever I was with him.  I took in everything about him, from the small creases between his eyebrows in the sunshine to the way his fingers always intertwined with mine at all hours of the day.  I wanted to be his partner in crime forever, just not with kids.  After we discussed it, Jesse… Jesse seemed to start feeling the opposite way.  The soft looks we used to give each other while we were waiting in train stations slowly started to disappear and the nights we used to spend talking ‘til all hours of the morning became rare.  He started getting more restless, more agitated with everything I did.  I would squeeze his hand too hard before we jumped down from trees or me getting excited about our next trip would make him dread the entire thing.  After one of our few screaming matches, I discovered out he had been—according to him—falling out of love with me since he found out I didn’t want kids.  So we parted in tears, one of us heading to the mountains in the west and the other to the ocean in the east.  The storm clouds in the north kept us apart and I never saw him again.  Every day, a pang of guilt and loss made my chest ache.  It was as if he had died.  The fact he never would die was almost worse.

     Back to 1899, though.  New York City.  I had just arrived off a ship from England, wanting to revisit the Brooklyn Bridge after years.  Even with amazing emotions being turned sour as I travelled through my past, I still loved revisiting the places the best memories came from.  After I found a low profile hotel to stay in for a few days, I wandered the streets to reminisce.  I had seen the rest of the world while I was gone, but it seemed like New York had the rest of the world there.  Even if the culture had changed exponentially, the city’s energy still contained the same buzz I had grown to adore back when I still aged.  Now the city was so much bigger!  It included Brooklyn, Queens, The Bronx, and Staten Island.  The most notable difference was the surplus of children on the streets, hollering headlines and scurrying from shadow to shadow.

     My stomach clenched for the dirty boys and overworked girls that crossed my path.  They should’ve all been in school, learning about the world they would discover as they got older.  Their futures couldn’t be made by the spare change they called a living.  What about their parents?  They should be the ones working to support the family they made.  The ethics of the new world sickened me.  As I turned every corner to the new, glittering buildings, I couldn’t stop myself from hoping it was just a dream.  To my despair, it was a horrifying reality.

     “Hi there, miss.” My heart thudded against my ribcage when I heard a voice just off to my side.  No, no, no, no, no.  It couldn’t be.  “Care to buy a pape?” I turned and looked, the hairs on the back of my neck standing on end.

     I lost my breath at the sight of the familiar face.  I hadn’t realized how much I missed him until his shining eyes were in my life again.  Everything was the same, but I don’t know why I thought it wouldn’t be. Perhaps I thought he would’ve changed himself to leave the past behind him.  He was never one for looking back.  I could still see over his head, but I could see more than before. I realized he had a crutch under his arm.  Must’ve been one of the lies I taught him.  His blond hair was hidden under a backwards cap.  I wondered if it was still soft like when we were 63 before we got caught in that storm while travelling back from the Old World to visit his family.  His face still held all the things I fell in love with, but it seemed slightly different.  The dimples I enjoyed poking seemed shallower and his eyes didn’t seem as old.  Perhaps my imagination was toying with me.

     “Jesse.” I breathed out, trying to keep my emotions from going with the word.  I couldn’t let him think I was terrible without him because I was thriving without him holding me back.  The unfamiliar blue fabric of the dress I had found was held tight in my fist as I studied every last inch of his face.  The toe of the worn boot I came to acquire—along with its match—tapped on the ground as I waited for his response.  Could he possibly recognize me?  I couldn’t age, no, but I could change.  My hair got a pair of scissors to in somewhere in Europe and had accidentally darkened my skin while out touring Asia.  Would he even want to recognize me?  It seemed he wanted to go to the other side of the world to get away from my red hair.  That was in Cairo, though.  Things can always change.

     “Uh, my name is Charlie, but a lady as pretty as you can call me Crutchie.” He lifted his crutch for a moment and made my heart drop.  Not him.  Is that good?  I couldn’t tell at this point, with my emotions rising and falling like the waves of a storming sea.

     “Oh, my bad.  You just look like a friend I once had.” I glanced down to the ground and back up at the boy, whose face had turned down for me.  It wasn’t the boy I loved all those years ago.  After a beat, I solved what I felt was wrong.  This boy in front of me had seen things different from Jesse.  Jesse had seen wonders people could only dream of.  Charlie—Crutchie—had seen horrors nobody could imagine.  I shoved my hand in my pocket and grabbed a penny.  I handed it to the boy with a smile, “I’ll take one newspaper, please.”

     The rough paper hit my calloused palm, a part of me I could never hide behind a new identity, “Here you are.  Might I know the name of the sight in front a me?“  His eyebrow lifted in such a familiar way, it sent a shiver down my spine.

     The test I came across every time my life was compromised.  Make a story in an instant with what I have, “Odette Tuck.” Damn, he got stuck in my head and made me think of the future we were going to have.  I shook Charlie’s hand firmly, trying to make more of a life for my character.  My parents were a fan of the ballet, that’s where my first name comes from.  The callouses are from a childhood in small towns where I climbed trees.  A dark tone from a recent family visit.

     “Nice to meet you, Odette.  How old are ya?”

     The second part: create a personality.  Happy in the way that can make anyone happy.  Funny in a playful and flirty way.  Smart like no one knows it.  Mature enough to hold a conversation with adults, but not enough to stop making practical jokes. “Now, Charlie, didn’t your mother ever teach you not to ask a lady that question?”

     He got quiet almost immediately and I knew I struck a nerve.  Before I could rush to fix my mistake, he responded, “Nah, I, uh, never really had one.” It was like he flipped a switch and turned his grin back on, “Doesn’t matter much, though.  I got plenty a friends.  Theys my family.”

     “That’s good.” I nodded slightly, trying to remember what it was like to have a family.  Laughter around the table.  Warm hugs after a long day.  Going to the fair for one night only and winning as many prizes as you could for the others.  Making jam and pie with your mother and sister while your father and brother were out finding enough patience to fish.  Bickering and the occasional biting when you were younger.  Unconditional, unwavering, and neverending love.

     Finally, my mind and lips seemed to catch up with the original question that was posed only a few moments before, “I’m seventeen, by the way.” It had been an automatic answer since the Tucks and I had figured out what was going on.  It would be the same answer forever too.  There was nothing behind it anymore.  No excitement like someone who had just had their birthday and their whole life ahead of them.  No regret like one who was ageing out of their childhood and would soon have to face the anxieties of adulthood.  Nothing.

     “Huh.  I’m only fifteen.” As my expression changed, he quickly went to correct himself, “Well, I’m turnin’ sixteen soon.  Real soon.“  Charlie nodded a dozen times too many as he confirmed his age.

     I smirked, “I see you enjoy flirting with older women.” Older by a lot.

     “You ain’t that much older.” Oh, you poor boy.  You have no idea.

     "I am still older.“ I made my point by poking him in the chest slightly.

     He rolled his eyes and chuckled, “Yeah, alright.” I laughed along with him for a moment before stopping as he did, “Well, I’ll let ya get on with your day, Odette.”

     I nodded in response, “Thank you.  I’ll see you again, Charlie.” I backed away from him for a few steps, getting one last look at the past and a future put together.  Maybe these old clothes were finally going to be right.  Just like my first clothes had been.

[flowercuco]

Fiasco! - Transatlantic.

This weekend me and some friends played Fiasco, specifcally the Transatlantic playset by E. Tage Larsen.

The premise is that we’re on the Leviathan a boat that’s speeding across the sea to secretly win the Blue Riband, the award for crossing the Atlantic the fastest. Nothing could possibly go wrong as a result of the captains desire to win the award and there’s no way that anyone on the boat opposes him. (Note: this is a joke)

Our star studded cast are myself and @jacquerel cheating, allowing six players in this game, via playing a pair of identical non-binary fancy lad children, Barry and Berry Knight, mischievous fourteen year olds with a variety of skills they shouldn’t have.

We have @mimicdog​ as Belén Santiago Durand, a sweet cook, soft spoken and low key he/him lesbian who definitely isn’t stressed and definitely isn’t afraid of the water.

Seedy presented us with Clothilde Devereaux, a former battlefield nurse from the Great War with ulterior motives and plenty of tea.

@augmentalize​ gave us Vasily Dmitriovich (he/they), who swam to western Europe from Russia and is probably some kind of fish man.

And finally, rounding our our cast is @foursight​‘s William "Billie" Blackwell, a trans man aristocrat who just wants to settle in a new life in America, and hopefully get laid at some point before then.

The web of relationships we weave have the twins being mischievous friends with Belen, and paint Billie as an eccentric uncle, as well as establishing Belen’s fear of water and an interesting trunk, delivered to the wrong address.

Clothilde and Belen share a mutual suspicion of their respective false faces, while the nurse and Vasily are cultists trying to stop the Deep God from rising, with a sacrifice of course.

Finally, Billie is of course, a Confirmed Bachelor and Vasily is his bachelor companion. Wink.

We start off with a scene in which the twins are in their cabin, inspecting a mysterious suitcase that is similar to theirs, but not theirs, while we do not see the contents of the case, it is enough to make Billie want to take charge of it, despite initially trying to push it on as something they can do to build character. As Billie leaves the scene with the case, the twins look to each other and reveal a wicked, seashell knife, a prize looted from the box prior to their calling of their guardian. 

Belen’s first scene is one in which he meets Clothilde and Vasily, having a moment in which we establish Vasily’s wet feet and need of... hydration, as the two discuss their plans to delay the ship, catching the ear of Belen at a less than critical moment. The cook comes over and while the two manage to ease his suspicions, the nervous cook takes to them, believing them to be... friends. 

Clothilde’s scene involves her, Billie, and the captain of the boat playing bridge, a card game almost none of us are familiar with, passing cards around or whatever and establishing the captain’s odd dreams. He has never dreamed dreams like these before, shocking Belen, the fourth player of the game, as he has never dreamed anything real, but this feels more than his dreams have been. Clothilde tries to ease his worries, implying that she might help later...

Vasily is in the lower decks, in somewhat of a disguise, when he stumbles upon the twins, toying with something shiny, hearing them comment on how it looks like the ocean on there. When he makes his presence known to them, they deflect, saying that its a pocket watch, which very much does not reflect the ocean. Vasily tells the twins of a tale involving a child who fell into a train furnace, which excites them, asking Vasily what that would be like. Vasily offers to tell them if they go find the furnace, but they do not manage to find it, as the twins get lost.

Billie’s first scene involves him inviting Vasily to a party the next night, which the captain insists on throwing. Vasily comments on the scandalous nature of it, but ultimately accepts the invitation. Additionally, Billie comments on the chest the twins found, and Vasily claims it belongs to a friend, after observing it, he realizes that something is missing. Billie promises to get the twins to give it back to him.

The twins go bother Belen the next day, wanting to trade the knife for a cool skull ornament thing that he... acquired... Belen asks about the knife and the twins comment on its similarity to the ocean. Belen begins to get a little scary, and asks for the knife. The twins give him the knife, hoping that the chef thinks about giving them their desirable skull in return. Belen uses the knife and gets cut by it, accidentally, leading the cook to go to Clothilde for help, saying that he has been... cut. Clothilde is obviously suspicious, but tries to calm Belen down, saying that its fine, and not to worry. Later, the nurse speaks with Vasily about what’s going on with Belen, and that they need to recover the knife and possibly prevent the party. Clothilde lends Vasily her parrot to aid him in recovering the knife.

Vasily once again finds the twins, bird in tow, threatening them lightly in that adult way, and asking them where the knife is. Though the twins consider Belen their friend, they are more concerned with the bird and offer to assist in retrieving the knife. The final scene of act one involves Billie and Clothilde speaking about the party and the captain, with Billie asking her to help the captain, as the ships doctor seems to not have done that great of a job. After becoming a bit suspicious, Billie goes to the captains quarters and sees something which causes him to faint. When he wakes up, Clothilde is pouring him some brandy.

The tilt, chosen by seb and seedy, consists of Tragedy, someone’s life is changed forever, in a bad way, and Failure, a tiny mistake leads to ruin. 

Act two begins with Barry and Berry once again near the engine room of the ship, finding a wrench in a pivotal place and pulling it out, undoing one of the cultist’s sabotage. Vasily calls upon them now to distract Belen, and they succeed, distracting the cook while Vasily sneaks around, eventually getting the knife from under his nose. Belen notices the knife being missing, and finds the twins in their room, asking for where the knife is. The twins think about whether or not to sell Vasily out before just agreeing to. Belen insists on having them help him get the knife back despite them asking and begging him to take a nap or something, only for Vasily to come on in and knock Belen out, and then lock the twins in their room, for their own safety at this point.

Billie wakes up and Clothilde tells him he had a fall, and to not worry and have some brandy. Billie takes some but then starts to remember, saying that theres problems, that they need to do something. Clothilde tries and fails to convince Billie to step down, eventually feeling the need to act, getting out a syringe and stabbing Billie, who faints. Vasily brings Belen in a potato sack to Clothilde, hopefully solving their sacrifice problem as she reveals an unconscious BIllie. The two converse and decide to trade captives, having a bit of a spat but deciding that stopping the deep one is more important. When he comes to, Billie questions Vasily about the cult and the other things going on in the ship, Vasily admits to it, saying that he was going to tell him when they got to shore, shocking Billie, as it meant someone would have been sacrificed and he would have been none the wiser. He needs some space and he leaves Vasily for now, needing to think on the events of the night.

The Knight twins escape their room and find themselves in the captains quarters, concerned and dismayed at the unseen horrors inside, getting the sense that it is as if it is getting filled with water, and the two deciding they need to get Belen, their friend, and an adult. Belen is taken to the captains quarters, now increasingly more... fish like, and obsessed. Belen goes to the captains quarters and the resulting event makes the twins run away. Clothilde takes to drastic measures to sabotage the ship, breaking into the boiler room and rigging it to explode. Vasily chases Belen into the captain quarters, and the two fight over the knife, Belen desperately needing it while Vasily tries to finish the ritual to stop the deep one from rising. In the conflict, Belen is stabbed, bleeding a far more viscous ichor and unknowingly ending the ritual. Billie finds the twins as people are evacuating the boat, he tells them to go to the liferaft despite the two of them asking where he is going. Billie leaves them after ensuring their safety and takes out his gun from its locked box. Billie goes out and finds Vasily still struggling with Belen, sharing a tense conversation before Billie puts the gun down and lets Vasily go, swimming down with the ship as Billie turns away, leaving with the other evacuating people.

In the epilogue, here is the state of the game.  

William "Billie" Blackwell, ends with White 10, not too shabby, having a comfortable life for a time, but constantly drawn to the events that occurred on the ship. He does more and more research before eventually turning into a supernatural investigator.

Vasily Dmitriovich ends with a White 6, a weak ending, going in and out of cults over the years, trying to do what he can before eventually being found by some sort of suit clad cult group and shoved into a car for unknown purposes...

Clothilde Devereaux ends with a Black 14, awesome, an ending that is better than anyone else’s. She changes her name, gets a new life, starts to work in a hospital and eventually has an entire hospital as well as another wing named after her. She is last scene retiring with a beautiful wife driving a convertible.

Belén Santiago Durand ends with a Zero, a fate worse than death, and finds himself on an island with various fish people and normal people, having fully been converted into some sort of jellyfish person and trying to adjust. After some time, having, some friendship? or something to the effect, he changes back, leaving the cultists and fish people and staring down at himself, saying that he can never go back. He can never go back. He doesn’t know if he can go back.

Barry and Berry Knight end with White 7, a second weak ending, they land with the others, finding it a bit more difficult to speak with each other and with Billie, watching the boat sink along with their stuff. As their life goes on, they are reprimanded for their behaviour and eventually forced into a boarding school for troubled children, where one night, after curfew, they find a dead body, the start of another mysterious event.

Fiasco’s great!

[wheregayeldhidsthewips]

You Can’t Stop Yourself From Falling

Dude, I don’t even remember writing this.  I also don’t remember why I stopped, because I made a point of getting these SPN Summer Gen stories finished.

WIP, like everything else here.

Title: You Can’t Stop Yourself From Falling 

Author: Wouldn’t you like to know <ljuser=”gayeld”> 

Recipient: <ljuser=”kaethe”> 

Prompt: A case involving a literary or mythological character. 

Disclaimer: Mine. No, seriously, mine. Prove otherwise. Unless you’re Eric Kripke or, you know, the CW, Warner Bros, then, uh, my bad. 

Summary:  <--Oops?

   “Dean! Come on, Dean, please, I just need you to step back a little, okay. Just a couple steps… Please. NO!” 

 --- 

 Sam stood in the dusty junkyard, listening more to the sounds that weren’t there than the ones that were. No music, none of the rhythmic tapping that normally accompanied Dean at work.  No whisper of the stupid, loving pet names his brother usual lavished on the car. Just the muted sounds of tools on metal. 

 Jesus, he didn’t know what to do. Dean was scaring the shit out of him and everything he’d done to try and help just seem to push his brother further away from him, closer to the edge he’d been dancing around ever since dad had died.  

 Maybe bringing him another hunt so soon after the last was a mistake. All the hunt for the Rakshasa had done was widen the rift between them and leave Dean more worn around the edges than before.  

 He could call the Roadhouse. Ask Ellen if she could pass this hunt on to someone else.  

 “What do you want, Sam?” 

 Dean looked drawn and tired, the circles under his eyes deeper than they’d been at dinner last night and Sam had to bite his lower lip to keep the words from slipping out. I want you to be all right. I want us to be all right. I want you to let me help you with this. 

 “There’s been another one.” 

 “Same as the others?” Dean wiped his hands on a dusty rag and shoved it in his back pocket before reaching for the stack of printouts in Sam’s hand. 

 “Looks like it.” Sam bumped his shoulder against Dean’s and was grateful when his brother didn’t pull away. “Coroner’s office ruled it death by misadventure, accidental drowning.” 

 “And the body was near the river?” Dean flipped quickly through the pages, stopping at a picture of a smiling couple. 

 “A place called Cat Island. It’s in the middle of the river, between Arkansas and Mississippi.” He took the papers back, shifted through them until he found the one he wanted. “Coroner’s report says the bones had evidence of bite marks but they were unable to match them to any known species.” 

 “Yeah, sounds like our kind of thing.” Dean sighed and rubbed a weary hand across the back of his neck. “But I am not taking that freakin’ minivan. I will walk to Arkansas first.” 

 “It wasn’t that bad,” Sam couldn’t help laughing at the sour look on Dean’s face. 

 “Dude, I would rather drive a Gremlin,” Dean replied, disgust evident in his voice. 

 “A Gremlin? Man, I had no idea you swung that way.” Sam danced away from the fist Dean aimed at his shoulder and started back toward the house, feeling lighter than he had in days. 

 --- 

 “I hate you.” 

 Sam bit back his laughter and followed his brother through the parking lot. “There’s nothing wrong with it.” 

 “It’s a Volvo, Sam.” The horror on Dean’s face made every penny Joseph Perry had spent on the rental worth it. 

 “They’re very safe cars.” 

 “They’re pieces of crap. Ugly pieces of crap.” Dean scowled as he opened the door to the police station and ushered his brother in. “And they faked all those crash test results. So, really, they’re ugly, unsafe pieces of crap.” 

 “Dude, you used to love that one Bobby had in his yard.” Sam reminded him with a grin. 

 “I did not. Besides, Bobby’s was a classic. A 1962 P1800, not—” Dean hooked his thumb back over his shoulder as he strode past Sam. “—a piece of crap.” 

 “Whatever, dude, you know you loved that car.” 

 Sam couldn’t help smirking as Dean glared at him before stopping in front of a battered desk, manned by matronly looking woman in a police uniform. 

 “Can I help you boys?” she asked, eyeing them warily. 

 “I certainly hope so, ma’am,” Dean replied, turning on the charm. “I’m Warden Tyler, this is Warden Kramer, I spoke to an Officer Kramer on the phone earlier and—” 

 “Oh, you’re the Fish and Game boys, the ones looking for the swamp monster.”     

“I don’t know that I’d put it quite like—” 

 “Files are over there.” She pointed to a beat-up box sitting on the counter behind her desk. “One of you’s gonna need to sign a receipt for them.”  

 Sam leaned over the desk and signed “Warden J. Kramer” as illegibly as possible while Dean grabbed the box of files. “Can you point us in the direction of the Coroner’s Officer?” 

  --- 

  “Man, I hate the Coroner’s office.” Dean shed his jacket and tie, tossing them carelessly in the direction of the nearest chair before belly-flopping onto his bed. “It’s gonna be a week before I get rid of that smell.” 

 “The body or the Coroner’s assistant?” Sam dropped a stack of folders on the small table next to the door and plopped down on the second bed, kicking his shoes off and breathing a sigh of relief. “What the hell was that cologne he was wearing?” 

 “Ode to dead skunk,” Dean mumbled into his pillow before turning over. “You catch those mark on the bones?” 

 “Yeah.” 

 “Look like any animal you ever seen?” 

 “No.” Sam scooted up on the bed and jammed a pillow under his head before turning to look at Dean. “They looked more like human teeth marks.” 

 “Only pointier.” Dean flashed him a half-hearted smile, all teeth and no humor. 

 “So, something humanoid? Another Wendigo, you think?” 

 “Nah.”  

 “Too far South?” 

 “Too much meat left on the bones.” 

 Sam groaned and rolled over to plant his face in the pillow. “Too much information, man.” 

 Dean sniggered and Sam could hear him getting up and moving around the room followed by the sound of the shower coming on, the familiar sounds lulling him to sleep. 

 “Sam. Sammy, wake up. Pizza’s here.”  

 Sam wasn’t sure how much time had passed, only that it was fully dark outside the windows as he rose and crossed over to where Dean had balanced the pizza box across the folders spread out over the table. “You get any sleep?” 

 Dean ignored the question, which Sam took to be a no, and gestured toward the map in front of him. “Looks like whatever it is it’s moving steadily down river.” 

 “You think it’s headed toward the ocean or just trying to spread out its kills to keep the cops from picking up a pattern?” Sam dropped into the second chair and pulled out a piece of pizza.  

 “It’s hard to tell without knowing what it is.” Dean shrugged and leaned back in his chair. “I figured tomorrow you can hit the library and see if you can find any local legends.” 

 “Uh huh. And what’ll you being doing while I’m doing all the research?” Sam asked, a note of challenge in his voice. 

 “I thought I’d go down to the river and see what—” 

 “What? No way, Dean.” 

 “No way what?” Dean looked up at him, confused. 

 “You’re going down to that river alone.”  

 “I—Why the hell not?”  

 “Why the hell not? Dean, people are being eaten!” Sam threw his hands up in frustration and stared at his brother. Jesus, what was so hard to understand about that. 

 “I know how to take care of myself, Sam!” 

 “I didn’t say you couldn’t, but—” 

 “But what, Sam?” Several files slid off the table, scattering their contents as Dean jumped to his feet.  

 “But that’s no reason to take stupid chances.” 

 “Are you calling me stupid?” 

 “Damn it, Dean, stop putting words in my mouth!” Sam returned his brother’s scowl, with interest. “You know that’s not what I’m saying.” Long seconds past as they stared angrily at one another. “Fine, you think it’s so safe to go out there alone, you go to the library and I’ll go out to the—” 

 “The hell you will!”  

 “Why not, Dean? Huh?” Sam asked, stepping up to his brother. “Why is it all right for you to go, but not me?” 

 “I didn’t say—That’s not—Whatever.” Dean turned away and started gathering the fallen pages. “Fine, we’ll both go to the library, Nancy Drew.” 

 “Fine.” Sam dropped back into the chair and stared disinterestedly at his pizza, picking aimlessly at the toppings until he realized that Dean had frozen over something out of the spilled files. “Dean? What is it?” 

 “I—Nothing.” Dean shoved what Sam could now tell was a photograph back into the folder and slammed it shut.  

 “Dean.” Sam leaned forward and pulled the folder out of his brother’s hand and flipped it open. On top lay a picture of a car smashed beyond recognition.  

 “One of the victims was in a car accident a couple months before he was killed and—” Dean gestured awkwardly at the file. “The police station must have gotten that file mixed in with the rest.” 

 “Yeah, I guess.” Sam closed the folder and set it carefully back on the table, an uncomfortable silence settling between them. 

 ---   

Sam held back a sigh as he pulled his boot out the thick mud with a sickening squelch. The library had proved useless, too many tall-tales and legends built up around the river to be any help, at least until they had more information. 

 Which left them slogging through the mud and debris along the river, the air between them still thick and silent in the wake of last night’s argument. 

 “Sam.” Something yellow fluttered on the breeze, flickering in and out of sight between the trees, and Sam followed with a quick nod. 

 Police tape, one end left tied to a tree, marking the site where the last body had been found. 

 Sam ducked beneath a branch and crouched next to where Dean was examining marks in the soft soil. “What are those?” 

 “They look like bird tracks, only bigger.” Dean outlined the print. “Where wasn’t anything about a killer emu in those legends, was there?” 

 “Dude, how do you even know what an emu is?” Sam snorted and bent closer to the tracks. Dean was right, they looked like they’d been made a bird, a really big one. “Thunderbird?” 

 “Nah.” Dean gestured at the thick, intertwined braches over their heads. “No way one would fit in here.” 

 “Then what?” 

 “I don’t know.” He rubbed the bridge of his nose and cocked his head to the side. 

 “What?” Sam looked around the clearing and tried to listen for whatever had caught Dean’s attention. 

 “You hear that?” Dean rose slowly, stepping out the clearing and toward the river. 

 “No, man, what?” Sam caught up to him, cocking his own head and listening intently, but only heard the rush of the river. 

 “I—Nothing, I guess. It was just—” Dean shook his head and gazed blankly at Sam for a long moment. “Nothing. We should get back to the room, see if we can find out what Big Bird is up to these days. Big yellow bastard always did creep me out.” 

 ---   

“Anything?” 

 Sam sighed and closed the laptop. “No. There are plenty of legends around here and things that prey on humans, but no birds that I can come up with.” 

 “Something imported?” Dean slid the last piece into the gun he’s been cleaning and looks over to toward the window, frowning. 

 “Maybe, but that leaves the field wide open.” Sam watched his brother for a long moment and tries to put his finger on why the picture in front of him seems wrong, off. There’s an air of distraction around Dean, something other than the pain and grief that’s been clinging to him since the accident. But instead of bringing relief, Sam feels something clench tight and worrisome low in his gut. “Dean, what is it?” 

 “Huh?” Dean turned back to him, the same blank look that he gave Sam down at the river, before shaking his head and smiling. “Just tired, I guess.” 

 “You sure?” 

 Dean shrugged and looked out the window. “Go to bed, Sam.” 

 ---     

A soft rustling brought Sam instantly awake and he rolled quietly to his side, checking the bed next to his for his brother.  

 Empty. 

 He scanned the rest of the room, almost missing the silent figure at the window. “Dean?” 

 Dean turned away from the window and Sam felt his breath catch in his throat at the depth of sorrow reflected back it him before Dean seemed to shake himself out of it. “What’s wrong?” 

 “Nothing, Sammy. Go back to sleep.” 

 “Don’t tell me nothing, man.” Sam rolled out of the bed and crossed to stand next to his brother. “You’ve been acting weird ever since we got back from the river this afternoon. What’s going on?” 

 “I told you, Sam, it’s nothing. I just—” Dean shrugged and looked out the window again. “Let it go, Sam. It’s not important.” 

 “If it’s keeping you up at night, then, yes, it is.” Sam leaned into the window and tilted his head, trying to meet Dean’s eyes. “Dean, what did you hear down at the river?” 

 He shrugged again, still gazing into the night. “Nothing.” 

 “Dean!” 

 “Sam, please, just go back to sleep.” His voice was soft, imploring, and Sam was torn between giving his brother the space he was asking for and the worrying knot in his gut. “I swear, Sam, it’s nothing. Just a weird dream.”  

 “Was it about Dad?” 

 Dean’s head drops forward and Sam holds his breath, silently begging his brother to trust him with this. 

 “No, it was—“ Dean rubs a hand across his face and sighs. “It was Mom, she was singing, but I couldn’t understand what she was saying and—“ He shrugs and looks back out the window. “I woke up.” 

 “Oh.” Sam didn’t have an answer for this, didn’t even know where to start. Mom, her loss, had always been a touchy subject, an unspoken pain shared between Dean and Dad that Sam had never felt the way they had. 

 “Let’s get some sleep.” Dean dropped onto the edge of his bed and rolled away from Sam, burying his face in the pillow. 

 Sam stood, a moment longer, and watched, wondered how you could know someone your entire life and still not know what to say to them. 

 --- 

 Alkonost – Russian/harmless? 

Bennu – Eygptian/benevolent 

Camulatz – Mayan, ate heads 

Harpies – Greek, various myths, angel of death, bringer of death 

Quetzalcoatl – Aztec/too big 

Raven – Native American/Trickster? 

Roc – carried off and ate elephants?? 

Sachamo – Chinese, feeds on bears?/too big 

Simurgh – Persian/benevolent 

Sirin/Siren – Russian/Greek, lure sailors to their deaths with song? 

Swan Maiden – shapershifter/skinwalker? victim in mythology 

Thunderbird – Native American/too big 

Ziz – Talmudic/too big 

 Sam ignored the cramp in his hand and scanned the list of creatures once more. So much for getting more information. It may have narrowed the field some, but not enough to be of any real use. 

 “Find anything?” Dean sat heavily in the chair across from him and closed his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose. 

 “Lots of things.” Sam closed the book on Asian mythology and leaned back in his chair. “Too many. Most of them are too big, too small, not known for eating people, not—” 

 “Yeah, yeah, I get the picture.” Dean waved a hand at him, leaning further back in the chair. “We need to talk to the families, see if they can tell us what the victims were doing down at the river in the first place.” 

 “You sure you’re up to this?” Sam already knows what Dean’s answer will be, but he can see the bags under his brother’s eyes, the tired slouch of his body. 

 “I’m fine, Sam. Let it go.” 

 “Right.” Sam shifts through his pile of notes until he finds the list of victims. “You want to start with the most recent ones?” 

 “I already called the mother of the last victim, Katie Tyler.” Dean stood slowly and paused, tilting his head to the right. 

 “And?” 

 “What?” Dean startled, looking at Sam as though he’d forgotten about him. 

 “You called the last victim’s mother?” Sam prompted, gathering his notes and stuffing them in his backpack. 

 “She said it was no problem if we came by.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out his keys, eyes drifting toward the nearest window.  

 “Are you sure you’re all right?” That knot Sam had been trying to ignore since he’d woken, to find Dean once more standing at the window gazing out, tightens even more. 

   --- 

 “Is he all right?” 

 Sam looked over his shoulder to where Dean was standing on the sidewalk, a distracted frown on his face, his head once again tilted to the side as if he were listening to something. “I don’t—Why do you ask?” 

 “He just—something about him makes me think of Katie in the days before…” her voice trailed off as they both watched Dean for a moment longer. “It’s probably just my imagination.” 

 Sam nodded   

  Will 

Brenna 

Jennie 

Lucy 

[annamcnuff]

The 50th State: Hawaii

Ah Hawaii. Islands of the sea. Land of the Hukilau cafe. Home to Polynesian princess’, pineapples and palm trees. And more importantly, the 50th state… A BUMPY START Finally sat on a plane at Dallas Fort Worth airport, I was overcome with relief, and also rather aware that we’d been stationary at the gate for quite some time. The pilot aka ‘DJ Wings McGee’ came on the tannoy. His soothing words were to the effect of 'A part of a plane isn’t working. In fact, we’re concerned it’s missing entirely. We just need to make sure everything’s 'OK’ before taking you up to 30,000ft and letting you plunge to your death.“ I couldn’t help but marvel at such a flawless execution of customer care - DJ McGee clearly missed the training memo about ignorance being bliss. To cut a long story short, I disembarked. The flight was cancelled and I was moved to another. The only casualty of the debacle being… Boudica. As I waited for her beautifully decorated pink gaffa taped cardboard box to appear in the oversized section at Honolulu, it dawned - she was AWOL. Amidst the kerfuffle in Dallas, someone had left her behind (so much for my detailed marker pen box instructions to 'treat her like a lady’). Of course, I was never too worried, you’ve gotta keep the faith after all, and within two days she was safely back in my possession. I don’t need Ms Morisette to tell me how losing Boudica en route the 50th state would have been mildly ironic. "It’s like cycliiiinngggg, 49-states-and-losing-your-bike-on-the-plane…” Boudica, with high hopes of not getting left behind at Dallas, and instructions to treat her like a lady MOUNT HALEAKALA Way back in the heat of the Reno desert, when Hawaii was just a distant dream, a wise man named JP foretold of a mystical volcano on the Island of Maui, called Mount Haleakala. It was also foretold-er-ed that it was the longest, steepest paved road ascent in the world. Considering I was on the hunt for a special little sumthin-sumthin to round off the trip, that sounded perfect. So I floated the idea to my travel agent (AKA - Mum), and the plan was set - we’d nip to the island of Maui, and take on Haleakala. Seeing as though my Dad was a) Going to be in Hawaii too and b) Loves destroying mind and body as much as I do, it was only fair that he join me on the climb. And, seeing as though he wasn’t going to be bringing his very own Pink ten-ton beast to the pedal party, I opted to leave Boudica behind on Oahu, and hire a little carbon number instead. She was Blue. She was beautiful. And I named her Wanda. I’ll level with you, frightening as it sounds to ride from sea level to 10,023 ft in one go, Haleakala isn’t the hardest climb I’ve ever done. Far from it. The gradient is steady, the road is smooth, there are switchbacks to break up the slog and when you have a support car, you don’t even need to carry the many layers of kit required. But I’ll be darned if it’s not spectacularly unique. For a start, the climb takes you through 4 micro climates. And because the gradient is so steady, rather than splitting time equally between staring at the front wheel and trying to relocate your weaker lung, you actually get a rare chance to take it all in. Usually when making the dizzy heights of 10,000 ft you’re surrounded by other mountains. So whilst the vista is a guaranteed spectacular, it’s largely comprised of neighbouring peaks. From the top of Haleakala all you can see is Maui. The whole of it. From one end to the other, and all the way across. Your eye line is spattered with views of the cinder desert landscape, the reef below, the offshore Molokini crater, lush green fields and endless delicate whisps of cloud - suspended as if someone hurridly dismantled an oversized candy floss and just… left it there. Reaching the top of Haleakala is pretty much the closest you’ll ever get to flying (well, aside from jumping off of the sofa, holding a Tesco bag above your head when you were seven. Just me? Oh, right, I see.) I’m not a huge fan of descending. In fact, my level of fanship for the descent is on a par with my level of fanship for Justin Bieber. Suffice it to say, I would gladly never cycle down another hill in my entire life. But apparently old Isie Newton screwed me over way back when, and what goes up must come down. So down I went. Now I know the textbook du cycling says that you’re not supposed to brake whilst descending, but whatevs, I’m a braker. My Name’s Anna McNuff, and I’m addicted to braking. My Dad’s a braker too, I come from a family of brakers. It’s not my fault. And when you’re a braker, 90 minutes of downhill can take it’s toll. Halfway down, my forearms began to look like Popeye’s, my teeth had just about ground down to the gums and and both hands were stuck firmly in 'the claw’ position. By the bottom I had no forearms. Nor gums. Nor hands. THE DRIVE OF DEATH Having seen Maui from on high, it was decided that we should do a little ground level exploring the following day. Within 30 minutes of setting off on a 'short drive’, we were accidentally taking the scenic route to a town called Hana. That is, 30 miles of winding cliff top highway, with a speed limit of 10mph. Granted, it was incredibly beautiful - jutting in and out of tropical forests, past waterfalls, over tiny bridges and with ample opportunity to stop at ocean lookouts. Following a stop for a hike up to a waterfall, the options to get home were either a 3 hour drive back the way we came, or via a more direct 'category B’ road. Considering I was feeling rather car sick by this point, and firmly parked at chunder-junction, I requested that we take the direct route. After all, how B road, can a B road be? On Maui the answer is beyond B. So B-esc that I wouldn’t wish this road on anyone other than Indiana Jones. And possibly James Bond. After a few miles of tarmac, it turned to single track gravel. If you’d be so kind as to lend me a moment, I’d like to place you in the back seat of that car: Jostling around from side to side as if in a Star Tours simulator, with Mummy McNuff (who has a fear of heights) at the wheel. Driving an automatic, oversized SUV, on the wrong side of the road (yes this still matters in a single track). Round sharply banked corners, a sheer drop to the ocean on one side, and rough falling rocks on the other. Watching Dad in the passenger seat grip the door handle and utter soothing comments to an almost silent and shaking Mother Bear, as you try not to vomit for a further 2 hours. It was so frightening, that at one point I opened the window - thinking 'Well if we plunge off the edge here, at least I have a way out’. Then I started wondering how I’d get Mum and Dad out too … Credit where credit’s due. Rally driver Snr Sue McNuff did well. And we actually make it home in one piece, just as the sun went down. A 'relaxing drive’ my eye… THE DOLE PINEAPPLE PLANTATION There are many great unanswered questions in this world. Like, have you ever seen a baby pigeon? What happened to the cheerleading twins from Fun House and why is Floo powder not yet viable method of transportation? Yet, until now there was one huge philosophical consideration that had escaped the wanderings of my mind - how do Pineapples grow? Stop. Let it wash over you… There we go. You’ll now have found yourself in one of three camps: Camp A) “Err duh. (rolls eyes). In the ground, of course” Camp B) “Psssshh don’t be so silly, they grow on trees.” Camp C) You know the truth. Which is of course that they grow in a bush. Sort of like a Fruit-Fugees, hiding from the outside world, nestled between leafy splays of gigantic grass. And, I don’t want to blow your mind too much, but there’s more than one type. I tell you this from a throne of authority, having visited an enormous pineapple plantation on Northern Oahu. I’d love to relay how I spent hours learning about the humble pineapple. That it was my sole motive to go there and fill my brain with fruity facts. Alas - I heard that they had the best Pinapple ice cream in all of Earth-land. So I simply went to fill my belly, and learn a little bit on the side. The DoleWhip pinapple cone was more than worth the trip. The Pineapple revelation, a bonus. WAIKIKI BEACH The hard work (and a final ride on Boudica) done, I spent the rest of my time in Hawaii relaxing. I went snorkelling, which reminded me how much I missed swimming. I lay on a beach, which reminded me how much I missed sitting still (not much). And I drunk cocktails, which reminded me how much alcohol I’d consumed in the past 7 months (again, not much). Waikiki itself is a tourist trap, there’s no denying it - but I loved it. Unlike many busy tourists strips around the globe, at Waikiki there were a distinct lack of Pikies (American readers, you might have to urban dictionary that one). There were no lobster sunburnt, beer swilling, projectile vomiting, fishbowl fuelled louts with made in England tattoos across their shoulders and gold caps on their teeth. There were simply contented individuals, enjoying 24 hour paradise, a warm sea and a civilised Mai Tai or two at sunset. If I’m not allowed to be a snob in my last week, when am I. THE FINAL COUNTDOWN I can’t believe we’ve made it to this point, Five-O gang. If you’ll stick with me for one last week, as I squirm my way through jet lag and the return to normality, I’d like to write you all a final post. A comment on the trip as a whole - what I’ve learnt (about me and about others), the highs, the lows, and where I go from here. I promise not to get heavy on your asses, but I do promise to be honest. And who knows, I might even be humorous. This week"s pictures are up on Flickr here Until then, 50 high fives to you all for each and every state, Anna :)