#people are gonna make elections about whatever issue they like the best anyway | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

hanzi83 · 1 year ago

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Read It or Don’t BUT It’s Very Long

I know I have spent a lot of time on this already but when I feel like there is an overall danger being normalized and a lot of shit is being amplified and in the wrong direction, so much so that you will have people who claim to be progressive or gate keep the left, that them starting sensationalist fear mongering under the guise of being “reasonable” while taking the the far right wing side, and just because people don’t admit that they are taking a right wing position, it shows me more that these people who want to sell out for a bigger gig or to make more money, they are not content with just selling out, they are content with making their side seem like the real progressive ones, because they spar with delegation members in the system to hype up a sensationalist issue with trans people in sports, and like I have stated before on here and on my podcast, I don’t really give 2 shits about sports and I am not familiar with the official science in any capacity, I take “experts” word on it because they are around sports and athletes etc, but out of all the issues that is concerning in sports, trans people partaking in them would be on the bottom of my list. You mean to tell me in a world where there are systemic abuses and coverups and problems with the leagues not giving the right information when it comes to concussions, plus if you walk down my path of the conspiratorial thinking, that these people on top literally help organize and initiate people into the system to do the sports entertainment and getting in trouble and scandal because it is a mafia system in my personal opinion, and we have to prop up the entertainment dollar so those issues to me would be more concerning that we think there is integrity in sports in general, like the games are not rigged and organized, like most people are not cheating already, and your main concern is that trans people might want to play sports. The excuse is that it is a losing issue with polling but other people on the left have pointed out that these have been losing issues with people for elections. I am relieved to hear that, but what is so concerning about it, that these shitty sore losers on the right, once they try to normalize and manufacture consent for an overall hatred to marginalized communities, they will not stop until they can force their way and their ideology on the population, but it does make me feel happy that a lot of the population has not gone that super crazy where they think this is the main thing to be scared about because bad faith actors are normalizing Nazi like propaganda. So that is why I don’t give a shit about this argument, but because people consume sports and the news cycle around it, even if you are someone who doesn’t follow politics, the politics will seep into whatever fandom there is now, that is where the cults are going now anyways, so I don’t even know how rare this shit is or how prevalent it is, but people who are not paying attention to other normalized propaganda in the MSM will think the shit they are getting from their fav celebs and alt media outlets, they think they will get 100 percent of the truth. The thing that might help the right, all the boogeymen type of sensationalist shit they will put out, there might be examples of them being right, and I bring it up because they will bring up an organized sensationalist example to make it the be all and end all. I am gonna try and organize my thoughts as best I can, I know the aesthetic of being on Tumblr is already hurting my image, but also I am not buying into the online narratives as 100 percent accurate because they waste too much time on how the MSM is shit as their main personality trait, so they can then propagandize and pretend that people who are trans and are pushing back at the normalized and sophisticated right wing propaganda, as much as you want to disguise it, it is a new form of right wing propaganda, these people who go “This is why I left the left” will act like that is the very radical issue that won’t do any fucking favors while believing the right wing narrative, doing free promo for politicians who happen to be in fighting and listen there are people who are on the left who i will have agreement on with the morally correct position, but one thing I disagree with is that people with platforms and people who are internet personalities will dumb down their villains and buy into the sports entertainment, because I am mentioning that because all the shots Cenk/Ana want to take at other leftists, and you just judged it off those videos without knowing what they did to start a shirt storm and then pretend they don’t like in fighting and focusing on important issues is one of the sickest things they can do, and now it is clear they are doubling down, there is a reason why it is not in their best interest to admit that they are starting a right wing grift, is because they rather do this new form of propaganda under the guise of being progressive and whatever progressives are genuinely left watching their network they will think these people are reasonable, because this is how much even the supposed progressive of all progressives have lied while screaming about MSM being all liars, they have dumbed down their villains, but they will now double down on fighting for marginalized communities even though you are giving carte blanche to right wing framing in an era where they are literally normalizing laws to start fascist shit, and they use the entertainment as a way to manufacture consent, these are important issues and yes we shouldn’t waste our breathe on Ana Kasparian and Cenk but they have an audience and they are looked at as authorities on certain topics, they can pretend they are being peaceful and they are entertaining debate and disagreement, but if you limit disagreement and yell over people when your employees, some of who had to quit because they can see the pivot, that says more about your way of “debating” and you can watch their snide comments and their videos on this matter and if you didn’t know what was going on you would think they are being the reasonable ones, this all started because Ana Kasparian out of nowhere went on an unhinged rant about not wanting to be called a birthing person, and even then people gave her the benefit of the doubt and gave her valid critique and wanted discussion, TYT went as far as to say they don’t want to collaborate with any leftist anymore, and yet you talk about people on the left doing in fighting. And I know it is sucks because you will be making a bunch of money from a brand new audience but deep down they are fucking angry at themselves because they gotta function off a fucking script that they can’t break. They are doing Howard Stern and Vince McMahon level shit of discrediting their employees who left and maybe that is also part of the sports entertainment as well where this heel turn is all planned out, thing is normally people who leave TYT end up becoming worse so as much as I support Bennie, part of me has it in my head, will she turn heel down the line because I support the video she did and she did a good job but it was like it was limited and designed for ammo for people to counter her when she uses a tinder date she matched with as an example of not being in a bubble, and I am sure she could’ve used better examples. But I even notice on the show of TYT, they have been getting into spirited debates lately and since there is an issue with others speaking their mind, I personally believe TYT has been doing that to have evidence on the show of them disagreeing. Truthfully we shouldn’t waste time on this, because people who know better will be like “SO DID CALLING OUT CENK AND ANA SOLVE TRANSPHOBIA OR NO” like no it didn’t but their actions are normalizing more hatred for that community and even this issue being the reason it blew up on them is also designed to have more hatred for the trans community in that other post left types are trying to minimally get in on the action of this controversy but use their right leaning positions of why they were right about TYT and will make fun of the left for being mad about this but not other shit, but people have been pointing out Ana and Cenk’s problematic shit for the last several years now over a fucking bunch of issues, this is not new but this has felt very abrupt and it feels like one of the most forced heel turns in recent fucking time. You can keep denying the pivot all you want, but it is there and because they give you a caricature like image of what the right wing is, you won’t notice the subtle shit that people do that leads into a more far right wing leaning element. Maybe I have been consumed by propaganda most of my life, that I can recognize it and I am getting good at it, not that I can be acknowledged, and this must be getting at people at high levels, because I barely get any reaction or interaction on social media, I am not relevant but when right wingers show up in my mentions to defend TYT, it is like they are organizing that shit against detractors, Ana is such a fucking coward, she doesn’t want debate with the left but she goes on right wing shows to basically expose these audiences to certain names of people who have called her out where now she is kind of in a way directing hatred to someone like Olay or other members of the show the “Leftist mafia” and now the trolls who approached me pretend that they are being reasonable, you can always tell they are working with a script, and they tweet like they are overdosing on fentanyl, you go to their entire timeline, and it is a fucking shrine to right wing politics plus their bios are suspect, they will keep saying my political biases while they only argued with me because it was a call out of a right wing action. I didn’t want to talk about TYT because there are more pressing issues of where the world is going but they are really gonna throw on their NWO shirts. Even now posting a podcast, their trolls who mix with my trolls, will make fun of no one interacting wit my post of putting out my podcast, I just kind of promote it, and I realize not the most people will listen to me or I may not be required to be listened to but I am putting in effort to try and explain my mental process and how irrational shit can affect you and everyone around you, but I have people showing up in my mentions talking about how no one listens, it is crickets, it doesn’t matter because a lot of “important” people behind the scenes have to pay attention to a fat chubby loser like me. Like yeah you can reduce my podcast being “he just yammers into a phone in his mommy’s basement” but you are still paying attention to it, and yeah anyone who looks at it on the surface and can say I just speak into a phone and then just post it, but I put in hours to speak and I like to think I come from a different perspective and angle when going through it, it is not for everyone, and that is fine. I rather do the show I want to do, and I might not be the smartest, but people know I come from a genuine place, people have seen my progress over the last 15 years and there were definitely really dark times, and when I look at the discourse now and how amplified all of this is, it makes me realize that 10-13 years ago diving into these conspiracies online, I would’ve probably been in a bad place if this established shit online was really popular in the MSM and yes the MSM includes all your favorite podcasters and the alt media who give establishment like vibes, while claiming you are anti establishment. TYT knew what they were doing and they will keep doing it. You will put people in danger with your rhetoric and even then you limit narratives, pretending you won’t capitulate to the mob but you are bowing down to the right wing by this issue with trans people in sports by buying into the sensationalism, they will chastise how activists organize but will give the benefit of the doubt for cute little right wingers who go viral when these people are probably funded to be in front of camera, you are taking the extreme position and then comparing people on the left to the right wing, listen are there sports entertainers online on all sides, probably and there are delegation members from different communities who have squabbles behind the scenes and it spills out on social media etc, but that shit would not exist if there weren’t a lot of right wing funded accounts and personas who will constantly lie about shit, like if this were 10-15 years ago and this movie Sound of Freedom came out, I would’ve bought into the online hype about them not wanting you to see this, and if you know right wing fundamentalists are behind it and judge off that narrative, but if the movie itself doesn’t officially have any politics involved with it then people will use that as a way to call anyone who doesn’t like this movie or doesn’t trust who is behind it, a pedo. You are stepping into the convo and keeping politics out of the movie but automatically you will call people pedo for not liking and buying into this astroturf, I would trust the right wing people who say they are concerned about the kids, if they didn’t support 100 other fucking things that harms kids, but if you know that and want to state it, it is like you have to go 10 rounds online with these shit heads who are gonna regurgitate what is being spewed from their side of the road. It is one of the most forced things on the planet. A bunch of smart people on all sides have denied the internet having more to it than they want to admit, we have to pretend everyone online is 100 percent genuine, it is like they are all playing characters and the sad shit is the sports entertainment the right wing are doing is dominating and getting traction.

So when I look at the grand view of the system and how a lot of stuff on the surface is designed to happen the way it happens, because there is now faction warfare and all of this shit about policy, which is really important by the way, can be used as a way to divert attention, like if someone in the alt media space is making a right wing pivot because they fucking talk about how ballsy the MTG’s and the Freedom Caucus are, because the progressives capitulate to the democrats all the fucking time, on the surface there is nothing wrong with pointing it out but here is where my hypothetical comes into play since whatever is happening on the surface is sports entertainment, it is like wrestling when people get tired of the good guys not being able to be good babyfaces, because the Vince McMahon’s of the world are still booking it, and everyone always get into the heels a lot more because they might show more guts than the good guys or talk about some nugget of truth, and it applies to me in this situation where the right wing trajectory system will always book the heels a lot better and also come back a bit more reasonable, and people knowing that and know where the world is going defend it and take advantage of the right wing trajectory, where they can make it seem like there is nothing to look forward to with the Biden types etc, if you judge on the surface, sure there is kayfabed shit that people will point to, but it is like even the democrats know where the world is heading so even if they do good gestures, the people behind the scenes know that it will undone, but in kayfabe it gives ammo for people who want to be anti right wing etc, and the right wing don’t care about the corruption because they support the most corrupt in the fucking world, so even if you point out what is happening under Biden’s watch, you will still advocate for another puppet who will be the face of fascism because if the goal is to go more right, they can take advantage of what is happening currently and that is why I stopped using the talking point of what happened under each president, because my beef would not be with the booked sports entertainers who get to be world champions, it would be the WWE booking committee. We are at a point where people who are democrat who will shame you not for voting for a status quo mother fucker, knowing it will push people another way and the people who think they are morally right to make grand gestures to prove the dems are fucked up don’t seem concerned with the other problematic shit they are normalizing. Again this is how I process it, sure I can go and regurgitate shit and not think for myself and a lot of people do that, but it is too embarrassing for them to admit it, because no one wants to admit they don’t understand shit, this is why people can be swayed into alternate history and science. I say this as someone with experience with consuming problematic shit via entertainment and seeing how you could be manipulated without realizing shit. Like not everyone who had an issue with TYT was an activist, and some of the people they claim are not forgiving etc, could be sensationalist accounts that do exist since people are becoming sports entertainers and social climbers, that shit exists but there are also others with platforms who were trying to tell you why this is not a good idea and were open to having a conversation about it. Being trans is not a political ideology and not all of them are gonna be aligned 100 percent on issues, there are plenty of people from all communities to have self hatred for their own community at large and will proudly be this new token for the system. After TYT profited off those videos featuring different Karens, they have the gall to fucking chastise people using it. Listen I know these kinds of people exist and it is very real but I also have felt that a lot of viral shit that goes on is funded to happen and then you define it by the community or the political shit so people think they are covering something organic, and it feels like it causes more trouble in a sea of problematic shit that already exists, so now I notice it was cool to profit off those videos but then now you are making money walking back the term Karen, it is always white guys in the system who run shit, so they throw white women under the bus, not that these women don’t enable it but it is a lot more complex but pretending like being called Karen is the most racist shit ever is the stupidest argument coming from a cookie cutter personality and listen I don’t want to generalize all white people, like when it comes to the bad faith actors who have to appease their right wing audience by promoting false double standards to make it seem like on a systemic level white people are being maligned and generalized, so anytime people bring up racism existing it now serves to do a pushback, even the people in the system who can talk about race will have to limit what they say so if you are a regular white person and you are not familiar with the systemic shit and you only view racism as tit for tat like if someone of color says anti white shit in an ignorant way you think you can say something horrible back because it is tit for tat and I am talking about regular white people, not bad faith actors funded for their speech, so then if these people hear public figures generalize white people and they don’t know the grander view of what is being talked about, they will think they are getting dumped on as well, and then you have the problematic people lure them in by telling them they will never be accepted by these minorities so they have no choice but to align with people who they think is making sense while they have no idea they are invested into fundamentalism, so if you listen to Ana’s message of her simplifying her message of saying that they shouldn’t generalize all white people, then yeah I will agree, the system is so racist though that when minorities talk about it, they have to generalize it to white people solely and the generalization helps no one and for us minorities, if the system is a right wing trajectory and a white supremacist system, when you see regular white people or other members of marginalized communities buying into the system’s narrative, it is a white washing going on so I don’t think every white person etc who often can be ignorant, I don’t think they are purposefully doing that, society is the one that puts out different art forms and sensationalist figures that help manufacture the consent for that. But Ana didn’t just simply say “ERMA GURD GENERALIZING WHITE PEOPLE BAD” she defended Kyle Rittenhouse, she lied about what she did to start this argument and goes on right wing show where her new audience will target that woman Olay and other people part of the leftist mafia show, she praised an obsessive transphobe, and her catering to the right wing comes off like she is coming to the light, but she did make points about some people who will cater to people who are left and they might not believe in it, so she is putting that out there so they officially go on that side and don’t worry I didn’t forget what Ana etc have said where they never forget when someone goes after them, even if it is under good intention, they are cowards who will hide behind a fucking cult and they have protection to talk all that shit, because they are simply an elitist bunch. She sophisticated her rhetoric to a newer audience to act more reasonable while she is getting fucking boosted up by right wingers and act like this is a room for disagreement, there are a lot of cowards who will talk a big game about not capitulating to the right wing and we shouldn’t give an inch to let fascism rise, but then they take extreme positions and act like people shitting on them are unhinged. They can’t even do a fucking story without flailing their arms in the air and keeping themselves in check, they have turned the world into politics into armchair quarterback shit and mislead their fucking audience with this sports entertainment. Get mad I don’t give a shit, I wish I didn’t have to talk about it but it has been dominating the algorithm and it is important because there are people who genuinely look to them for their opinions if they are not as educated on the issue and guess what all you have is another segment of “MSM IS BAD. WE TELL YOU WHAT THEY DON’T TELL YOU” this isn’t 2010 anymore, everyone is for sale and everyone caters to propaganda on some level. They will claim they are hesitant to believe stories of racism, because it might more nuance to it and this is why I have been pointing out the notion of the viral videos being used for this shit, like they have obvious ones like the Jussie Smolliet shit happening which was staged and that one was supposed to be the “one time” example because everything else has to be genuine, it could not be organized and funded to happen since our world is turning into entertainment with life and death. So the reason why I bring this up, when these viral moments become the go to, there will always be something that will help facilitate the narrative of why the people claiming racism are the ones who lied, so now it is like they are manufacturing consent not to believe when real shit goes down. This is why I keep pointing out when people make their political motives the backdrop because they are always trying to be entertainers non fucking stop. But they will believe right wing narratives, do stories where they have generalized all Trump people and I am not talking about regular people but now they are doing stories where in a time where facism in a very far right wing way, where they present Trump people in a more positive light and if anything negative is talked about on the right wing with something shitty they did, they have to always mention the left does it too, that is boring and predictable and they and others like them are whores for the big payday. And I know people who say they hate them will dumb down that they are not important, but they have enough of an audience that is helping the right wing framing. She even misgendered on purpose while making it look like an accident so if people called her out on that, that she could use that she made a simple mistake and they wanted her canceled. I think they pull Howard Stern tactics with how they discredit their ex employee and by the way when I would see Bennie on the panel, I saw the name Bennie so I was unsure if she was trans and if she was, I thought it was a female transitioning into a male, but I never really investigated further about someone’s gender etc, but I made the mistake accidentally but I don’t work with her and I just found out she was actually trans, Ana has been working with her and she knows better but will probably cry about how people are getting at her for this when it is also other shit she has done and said, but she will cry on the next right wing show she goes on to misrepresent shit, and her and Cenk act like the left can’t have reasonable conversations all because you don’t want to admit you sold your fucking soul and you know that with whatever big payday you are aiming for, you won’t be happy at all, you will feel miserable because even if you partake and enjoy the spoils of the system, you know that in your head you are not giving a genuine take and it is getting less and less everytime. All of this to me has been preemptive for people who want to turn heel. In my opinion the way Cenk and Ana positioned this shit with how Bennie gave into the twitter critics is a very Chappelle like thing to do because Chappelle had a trans woman that he let do standup and she committed suicide and then Chappelle blamed the pro trans people for pushing her into that, not that it wasn’t a bunch of his cultic base that were sending anti trans stuff that gets ingored by the way, and acting like that wasn’t part of the reason it happened, and now doing the same thing by making it seem like Bennie is the wrong one for giving into twitter for having disagreements, if the disagreements involve having to fucking stand by while shithead sellouts normalize far right wing shit then yeah call me a fucking purist. I think the entire controversy though is also part of an overall storyline and a gimmicked way for people to just become the villains. And you can tell by her tweet about the civil rights never having any violence etc, and then she deletes it and then she retweets another guy who advocated for mowing down BLM protestors in 2020, and he claimed there was no violence in the Civil rights movement and if you have stupid takes like that, I am supposed to feel sorry for you because you are saying you don’t want to speak to someone outside her race because she might say the wrong thing which says more about you, yeah I am sure black people are not gonna be happy that some shit head is talking about the civil rights movement as it was some very peaceful march that didn’t see any violence. She will say that shit, she will say she is done with leftists, and then act like no one wants to have an actual debate, and I have seen enough shitty shock jocks in the comedy world use this kind of rhetoric and these 2 and other grifters don’t have the charisma to pull it off. They will claim everyone is focusing on the wrong things but we are dedicating hours upon hours to react to you guys because you want to be sports entertainers so fucking badly. There will probably be a reunion with Jimmy Dore and other shit heads who left there and got worse, if you call it out, you will have trolls showing up who will demand they are owed the convo and they can dictate how you reply, these are the type of people they have got behind this “progressive” news network. It isn’t really fucking news, it is just horrible takes and limited shit, like if I believe public figures especially in media who have dipped their hand in getting people elected and since these younger politicians and a lot other ones in general are booked to do certain shit, all the disappointing shit that they do that makes the left mad, how do I know Cenk hasn’t given incentive for them to do regressive shit, maybe because we are not supposed to go more left, we are supposed to be tired with the democrats and the left so we embrace more right wing shit that will get worse for people, again that is just my theory and I know if you follow the official rules of who has power, it is just the politicians, not that sports entertainers and billionaires are playing in the same fucking script and to me like I have said, it is all filler until we get to the inevitable that will transpire in the future, whether it is a full fascist takeover or people fighting back and there actually being a revolution in this world, either way more and more chaos is there and these people who pretend to tell the truth by the official narratives, and yes even these alternate theories that frequent on alt media or planted online are also part of the official narrative, they just make it look like people are suppressing it. The last decade plus has shown me that none of the rules people advertise just exist for kayfabe purposes and when you have people thinking limited by the “official rules” it won’t allow them to further their think and see a bigger picture, I can look at the overall vibe and patterns seen in our fiction that I can see where they are leading us to think the world is going, they use gimmicks in the movies by creatures etc to put it out there, but the elements of what is being put there could be true, just look at that show the Boys, do I think there are superheroes that exist, but if I exchange different shit to replace it with, that would make me think celebs etc are military tools and they get away with horrible shit and they hold some kind of power in society, I could look at Sopranos and even though not every click is exactly like that, the elements of an institutional boss could be represented with what Tony Soprano is.

But this situation with a lot of the public figures and especially with sports entertainment personalities is that they want the spoils of being a heel but they don’t want to commit to it, so they play the anti hero where they are too cowardly to admit they want to be cheered for being a new piece of shit, they still want to portray themselves as someone who is standing up for the right in this world while not disclosing they are helping other people who are horrible, I get aggressive with this shit because I know that the only way for me to make any real money is to embrace problematic shit and problematic people, I have been out of the loop and in my own world and I don’t know what shady shit people I know have been up to and if I don’t know, is that the system’s way of aligning me with people who are answering to far right wing shit, that is why for me the only solution is not to be here because I really don’t want to become someone who advocates for sophisticated right wing shit. Like it is easy to get on the trend of the system exposing a problem with sexual assault and harassment within the celebrity and political world and make it relate to regular people, when there have been initiations and abuse that has been systemic, some people won’t get vindication and will just be another number and some will be initiated to be one of the people who gets chosen to be the sports entertainer despite suffering real abuse etc, to be judged by people who are now pushing back against any type of fucked up shit going on and because they make it relatable to regular situations, there have been wrongful accusations that regular people have faced, so now you think someone like Jonah Hill is being shit on, and because I don’t think celeb storylines are going the way they say it goes, because it is more mafia and arranged marriage or relationship kind of a thing in that world, I noticed that they have now done more of these stories that play out as sports entertainment where they are making it seem like women being problematic and being shitty are the real enemies and the celebs they are picking on are completely innocent, they are both cogs chosen to play a fucking role and now that it was going in one direction even if it came off gimmicked, and the media is to blame because they will act like “Well they didn’t want to come out with abuse claims because the victim didn’t want to come out” and if I take it at face value, that is understandable, but I sometimes think the media that is complicit in shit, will not report on it until it becomes a convenient story to now cancel Jonah Hill, so now we start the storyline with stuff that happened but I feel organized to happen, where the victim is going to talk about this boundaries list that sounds so fucking whack to everyone who is just a regular citizen, but to me this is exposing what all these people with any kind of power do with their business relationships, like if they are going to be their “relationship partner” they have certain rules that need to be abided by, but they release this to show you what is common in that world, but they are presenting it like Jonah Hill is the only one that has these rules, it was designed to be one of those debatable things where people are advocating for relationships to be more conservative because these women are running wild, even if these ones associated with celebs were, they would be told to go act wild, whatever their on surface character is, that is what is supposed to be seen, so now the online establishment will automatically start siding with the guy because they are viewing it as double standards issue, then they let another storyline come out where Jonah Hill may have sexually assaulted an actress when she was 16 etc, if this turns out not to be true, it will make Jonah look like someone being framed, so he wants to turn heel which is why all of this shit is coming out, and they know when shit is coming out, in my personal opinion, and they know when they gotta turn heel, it is not gonna affect him, people will think this stuff being in the news is gonna affect him, if it does, it is because he is a cog in the system playing a fucking role, but he is gonna still have his career, if the world worked with shit as simple as “Why didn’t you call the police” if the police are given orders not to do shit by billionaires who fund these kind of initiaitons and storylines, they are not gonna fucking touch it, this is why I hate applying regular rules to celeb shit because it won’t make any fucking sense, but between this and the storyline of Usher playing the role of an RNB singer who has sang about taking your girl away, now serenading other celebs in front of their arranged relationship partner to then have this wild break up on social media, why do people who analyze this shit also become marks, we are judging this shit like this is a real thing so you can live vicariously through, don’t you see how dangerous this entertainment dollar shit is, we have to dumb down the convo and basically we are putting “real” analysis for shit that is a sports entertainment storyline. And they are using these celeb storylines for people who are online sports entertainers and social climbers start advocating for more conservative control in a relationship, because being “liberated” is this faux pas, by the way even the showbiz people who act “liberated” that shit is designed for them to be forced to play that role as well because it helps facilitate the notion of a more conservative way to have these relationships, and that is what is being advocated on a sophisticated level. That is why suddenly every bad faith actor is taking the side of the guy because even in this release of the texts, people are focusing on the part where he is saying these are his boundaries, the guy sounds insecure but fine that is what he wants out of a relationship, if this was a real relationship I would be like “it is best for both these people to move on” and just because this woman is also a cog in the system who was told to do this shit, they are putting more heat on her to be this villain because it played out in the court of public opinion, they are gonna keep manifesting this shit until everything being done will be by the court of public opinion while advocating for more conservative fundamentalist thinking. Same thing with Britney Spears, people reflected on how society would treat her and shame the platformed people for how they fucked with her mental ability because she was being propped up and you can only think it was her dad and family who were controlling and not that they were the gimmicked cogs who were the reason this was happening and now you think she got her vindication and she is free, but I believe she has other handlers having her do antics where people then have no choice but to say “You know what Britney, maybe she should be controlled” because we are leaning in an overall way to advocate for the worst shit while making it seem like liberation and freedom has people acting so out of control, even the people who don’t want to have nuance about sex in television shows or movies, some people will be strong in their belief it doesn’t need to be there, but people who strongly advocate for it come off creepy as well, while pretending the other side is creepy and the reason I say this because since the Metoo movement, even though these stories come out and presented in gimmick ways even if the abuse did happen, I figured we were on our way to actually expose how much more controlling it is instead of it being presented like a simple mishap in a workplace that we think is like a mom and pop shop rules, but the reason I kind of question shit is because then years later both men and women talk about how they were kind of forced or pressured into doing scenes and now knowing that, I do tend to think and ask myself if this person wanted to really do it, if they wanted to that is fine, I am fine with sex scenes in movies, I might not get laid often I might as well see some sex in my life, I don’t mind the scenes at all, but the fact that people who just strongly advocate and completely don’t see the nuanced view of it, it makes me think they want to be people who are pressuring women especially to do shit they don’t want to do or they won’t get cosigned by people online and you need people online to prop up your status because people want to be talked about. But you can’t have this nuance with people because they won’t admit that these kinds of things happen, and people who pretended to be feminists in the 2010s already got their rewards for it and now they have probably done some shady shit, who will use their feminist status as credible to now start advocating that puts pressures on other cogs in the system, it is the same coin because the other side of the extremist shit will be shaming these women and giving the powerful men the benefit of the doubt which is hilarious because these guys shame women that do sex work for prostituting their bodies but these people have no problems prostituting their mental state to bow down to their billionaire or celeb hero. Do I want to stick around this planet so I am put in this position to be that kind of cog? But when I see TYT analyze celeb shit, I know I am gonna get shit analysis, and the way they are defending Jonah Hill and doubting the woman’s story is to amplify this fake story to have this vitriol of anyone who is allowed to speak out about shit, because if I were to bet money on it just like Cenk bets money on sports, I would say there is a good chance that they don’t play by regular rules and they are their own institution like a WWE, maybe on a smaller level, but most of these institutions have their own fraternity initiations and abuse that they probably partake in and Cenk looks like he is worried that it could come out about him, again my personal assessment, not saying I am right, but since they are making the right wing pivot, now them covering these celeb stories in favor of shaming the victim in this sports entertainment storyline shows me the trajectory they are going, and even the people calling for Jonah Hill’s blood etc, are not telling you the truth about how this entire operation with celebs is run. You are not gonna get honest takes from anyone who claims to be in the media, especially with stuff that is run by a fucking mafia. Every story that has the right wing in a bad light, TYT will then start going off on the left, like their new masters told them if they are gonna cover right wing shit, they have to shame the left and equate them to radicals on the right wing who are probably funded, the best they can tell you is that these people are mentally unhinged influenced, but they wouldn’t want to tell you that these kinds of unhinged people are funded to be that way, this guy was used as a cog who stalked Obama, now people who hate the powerful are not gonna give a shit about Obama’s house being stalked, but those same shitheads who have become more right and less left, will always talk about if you take away freedom of speech from Trump, then it is dangerous for all of us, but they never think that if this could be funded to happen to Obama, it represents that Trump or his ilk can put addresses of many people out there and put regular people in danger. This isn’t some random shit, this guy was at the Insurrection, the feds knew who this guy is and he would be under watch so he couldn’t do that again, and people think the feds are on the left’s side, just because some people on the left sheepishly pretend Trump is gonna get in trouble and they are just rooting for him to go away but you know that isn’t the case, if maybe some of you got a bit conspiratorial and maybe think that it could make it look like they are going after him but actually letting him still prosper and look like he is dodging the system setting him up, maybe people would see the danger, but anyone who thinks Trump and his motives are a big concern, you will have people think you are sounding like a MSM DEMOCRAT. The MSM and Dems making fun of things or advocating for things is designed for the “genuine online shit heads” who are totally not given incentive online to push back, will push back and we are supposed to think the only narrative that is shit is the democrat MSM bullshit, while they make it seem like the online shit is where it is at, and just look how MSM like the online shit is with this sound of freedom movie which gets the “crowd surfed funded” or whatever they call it but they won’t tell you who is secretly putting money against it. It is one of the biggest ops in the world, and these people and this ilk will pretend they are better than the MSM personalities, and that isn’t saying much and you are not that far off from these personalities, it is actually fucked up that the MSM has probably a better grasp of what the alt media types were gonna be like, and not because they are moral and good people, but they love to self preserve their truths while they also do phony fucking behavior and antics. People who feuded with TYT when they were actually right in the issue that they were feuding with will now come out and chastise people for now calling out TYT so that to me signals there will be a reunion with them and the other contributors who ended up going right wing themselves but they still can’t admit it. I don’t know much but I know that people are not talking about Latin X, when this originally became a discourse topic, it kind of faded away rather quick, but for some reason this has been Cenk’s go to for polling to own people on, and I didn’t realize this was becoming a big deal again, many other educated content creators who pushed back against them even brought up how this is not even an issue, but Cenk needs anything he can to make it seem he is smart. I didn’t see whatever polls Cenk has been using but I did see the polling for him when he ran for office and people decided he was not the guy so what makes him think his opinion should matter the most, it is insecurity because he knows better people are analyzing shit in a less reactionary way and they are nervous because they used to be kind of credible and they are losing it where they want to pivot right wing but they also want the progressive audience, it is fucking calculated and sick and he can deny it all he wants, this is just an opinion thing, but clearly they read my blogs or listen to my podcast, because when I see trolls make their way back to harass me, it is like they have been given incentive to be online mercenaries to throw me off my mental game. Again I am just a mentally ill person with an opinion who is in his mother’s basement at the age of almost being 40, why would anyone think I am anyone to listen to. They seem to be taking a page out of Howard Stern’s book in discrediting people in their own workplace for not liking the direction their place is going but they just kind of express it as “disagreement” and if the disagreement is helping right wing fascists normalize more hatred while they are the ones doing the real shady shit, then sorry it goes beyond disagreement and anyone who wants to be associated with me, realize that as well, that if you cosign horrible shit and you want to present it as a disagreement, because people who want to sell out and advocate for horrible shit know what they are doing is wrong but they think they can present as a disagreement and I don’t view it that, sure with regular people who might not know better or don’t have power, you can disagree with them and maybe have a rational conversation about it because maybe they are buying into the wrong propaganda, but people who are in the system and know better, either tell us what is going on exactly behind the scenes with delegations or you are just helping out the right wing win while pretending to be some fucking progressive. And naming all the trans people and minorities you have had on your network isn’t going to cut it, it is like you are using every right wing trope to make yourself look like a bigger idiot.

I disagree with the left on shit, like not on moral issues etc, but like I hate how even they have also bought into sports entertainment with who is the better billionaire, I know it is just fun but these people are involved with doing shady shit that is gonna affect the rest of us, and we are really gonna sit here and analyze a potential dick measuring content between Zuckerberg and fucking Elon Musk, we are entertaining the possibility of these people fighting in a fucking cage. I hate how we just dumb down the villains because everything has to be levitated by comedy and just more WWE level bullshit, that doesn’t mean everyone on the left does it but everyone from all political sides are gonna have to sports entertain regardless and dumb shit down a little bit, it doesn’t mean all sides are fighting for the same thing but the same elements go into everyone who becomes a personality, we apply logic when the logic doesn’t apply, like Rudy G has done horrible shit, he is being investigated yet he somehow is allowed to sports entertain in the media about it and then suddenly after years of this nonsense, the DC Bar disciplinary or whatever want Rudy disbarred, like yeah that isn’t happening because these guys are operating on sports entertainment rules, so giving logical takes for situations that don’t revolve around that is not gonna work. Anytime someone breaks a rule and they are free, they will come up with another shitty excuse for why that shitty person is allowed to do something even though for regular people, they would be fucking locked up in a fucking hearbeat. Nothing on this planet makes any fucking sense, like if this were 10 years ago, I would’ve bought into the obvious conspiracy grift online, like with how the MSM media is advertising for this Sound of Freedom movie, because it seems like they don’t want people to see it even though they are advertising it and when the MSM does shit, where they will denounce this film but give someone like Tom Cruise good feedback on his character in real life, even though he is a Scientologist, so it makes the base advertising for this movie go “SEE MSM WILL GIVE PROPS TO HOLLYWOOD ELITE BUT THEY DON’T WANT YOU TO SEE THIS MOVIE” if they didn’t want you to, they wouldn’t advertise it, the MSM is like the enemy the right wing grifters need because if they are not saying the opposite of what they are saying, they have no Vince McMahon to rebel against, they want to see themselves as Steve Austin or CM Punk. This is why censoring the Q anon shit was bad because now people can’t investigate what their motives are and what they are planning but now they can put out their propaganda and if you say it is Q Anon level shit, they will then deny it because we don’t know what they are up to anyways, it is actually helped guys like Alex Jones and Q Anon etc, because you give people the news of what will be dangerous because Alex and his ilk will probably be round for some fucked up shit, but banning him completely has stopped from investigating some of the movements being made, only time we hear about him is when someone who is famous is on the show saying something crazy. I am all over the map, but I have shit I listed that I wanted to give thoughts on, like white house cocaine shit, people are so stupid to think that we weren’t supposed to know about it, meaning if there was this big cover up about it, don’t you think they would’ve gotten people not to report on it at all, but they have to pretend because maybe the MSM didn’t talk about it first, that they randomly found out, is that crazy to think out of all the years the white house has been around that there hasn’t been coke anywhere near the fucking premises, but in the midst of real shit going down, and other shady shit, they have turned both Trump’s kids and Biden’s kids as these sports entertainment cogs who are probably up to shady shit, but they are playing the role of being drug addicted sports entertainers for the online fodder of it, because the scandals and shadiness might not be enough, so we have to reduce it into some R Rated movie where spies and coked out hooker are involved to be promoted so people pay attention to this and they act like we are not supposed to know about it all, when this shit is playing out in front of us on purpose, nothing is being censored, they might say it is, but we still know about the censorship. And it feels the outcome of where shit is going is gonna go in the same place, but it is like the Biden administration by design are cosigning horrible things or horrible people, so people who want to lean more right can have valid arguments for why it is going to shit on the surface, when that is basically the design, what did they think bringing back an old villain in Elliot Abrams back into the discourse was gonna do, it is like this shit is helping the alt media people who are bad faith actors themselves to then convince their audience nothing's gonna change and this is why you now have to embrace the supposed victims of oppression in MTG or Donald Trump, like they gave people shit for voting for the lesser of 2 evils but now are doing that with the right wing. On the surface AOC advocating for Biden is gonna blow back in her face, but her decisions as a sports entertainer politician is supposed to be designed that way, I don’t know if they are making it seem like they want Biden to run, knowing that maybe he ends up not running because something unplanned happens where the decision is made he won’t run, it is like WWE shit, anything god that might happen has to happen because they didn’t plan it, or does Biden still run and the same shit will happen on the surface? Because what makes people think advocating for a new person to run is gonna do in the sense of that all these people who become world champion are still going to be booked by Vince McMahon when the system itself is moving in a more right wing direction? Like when people use the support of Ukraine as a way to discredit AOC etc, because people who claim they were anti war knew where the world was going and spent 10 years pretending that Putin is innocent in all of this, while just simply pretending you are anti war but not naming the awful shit Putin has done, it makes me question their motives, I don’t view this shit as country vs country because even the people who call out Russia, they will advocate for other problematic shit which makes them suspect, and it just feels the neoliberal/far right wing elements of all countries are organizing their way, and the far right wing people who pose as anti war will seem they are opposing the US imperialism, while siding with far right wing people in the US, so why would I think you are anti war when you are pro war on marginalized communities with sophisticated rhetoric? I can’t explain the day to day shit, but when the rules they advertise are not what applies under the table, how can I really have a full grasp of what is happening when I can barely trust the narratives, the only way for my dumbed down self to be able to see through the online narratives is looking at what people are aligned with, like to amplify your anti vaccine rhetoric, you will spread that a state of emergency has happened in Peru because of sudden cases of GBS, and then not disclose this was the case in 2017 and 2018 as well, I am gonna assume that the volcano shit that happened over there recently may have helped with the respiratory problems with some people, again I am not too smart, but if if I was falling for the same online shit that I was 10 years ago, I would be what it has become today with taking advantage of the MSM lies, and propping up other lies because it is just being talked about online. I would’ve been falling for all these viral videos of passengers freaking out because they think other passengers are not real human beings, I know these ones are staged, but is that symbolism of how we find out there are other people on this planet that are not human, or that people are actually AI, I have believed that a lot of people we have been seeing are AI or clones because I believe our society has been advanced, and since we are manifesting all our entertainment into real life, it is like stuff from the movies is gonna be coming true on some level, but even this craze is kind of staged to happen in my personal opinion. The world is ending and going into a shit place and I am on another social media platform giving billionaires my information, this is not gonna end good for me, I really shouldn’t be alive anymore. I know I will always give into shit eventually and I don’t know how many people are actually on the good side. I will say that I am enjoying threads so far because I am at my most irrelevant and no one on this app has messaged me yet, I mean the only replies I have got from Threads are from 2 beautiful women I know from IG, so if that is all my interactions then I can rest happy on that app, I feel like it is the AEW of social media apps compared to Twitter’s WWE. I have different gimmick names, I am Hanzi and Scott Halal on Twitter but I couldn’t take that name to Threads so I have to go by Dusty Loads and Imran Khan, but it would be like Dolph Ziggler joining AEW in 2023, and you can barely get a Dark or Elevation match, because you’re not important enough to even be an upper midcarder, and like AEW it will all go to shit once CM Punk joins it officially and causes problems. But before I go, if you are reading this and have good intention just remember that these celeb shit that is happening is designed for manufacturing consent, and the system promotes this for other social climbers online to pretend they are concerned when they know these storylines are going down, like anything with the rapper Blueface, it is clear his entire real life social media character is to be in very toxic and problematic relationships and situations and we judge them like this is what their actual regular life is like, so when Blueface and baby mother Jaidyn are having strippers at the house and then calling his son gay for not being into the strippers, so people then react how dangerous and grooming like that is, but to me it is all forced sports entertainment with real effects of mental illness and abuse going on and we will condemn it, but you think anything is happening, it is like they will keep gaslighting your mental with some of these horrible stories happening but nothing really will be done about it, because these people are not operating as just regular people and making that connection with public figures has been one of the more dangerous things on the planet, because it has helped manufacture consent for us to go back into being regressives and if you don’t see that, then I don’t know, maybe a lot of you want to be mentally sucked back into being this regressive conservative edge lord who is pretending to use “logic” with these celeb examples. Engaging this shit like it is a culture war is not gonna get us the answers, but again you guys are smarter than me and I am lowly ex whack packer who somehow hasn’t died just yet, but don’t believe what I say because I am just full of imaginative conspiracy theories, but you hate that you can’t put me into the right wing category which is the easiest thing you can do when someone is a “conspiratorial thinking” type of person, I just use it to weaponize against the propagandists on the far right wing side and those who aspire to be on the side with fascists, but again I can’t prove shit. I am no one special, you guys decided to make that the narrative. No one interacts with my shit, so why would I be worried about blowback from what I am writing since no one officially listens to me or knows I exist right, that is your version of history, not mine.

#Hanzi Howard Stern TYT Cenk Ana Kasparian #Right wing pivot theories not proven mentally ill person hollywood storylines Jonah Hill Keke Palmer relatable logical

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stellocchia · 3 years ago

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Tbh the saddest part about Ctommy is that winning Lmanbergs independence will probably be the biggest achievement he's gonna make and he did that when he was 15 (or 9 if we wanna go for the best option) and in the end it really amounted to nothing because the country is gone and noone but Wilbur "cunt" soot probably appreciates what he did at this point and even that fuck probably doesn't appreciate it for the right reasons.

Like. He did something good that was supposed to outlive him. But because of fucking politics lmanberg is more of a bad memory than a good one for most people now and he's struggling to even keep up with just his personal business. Well. I say personal business despite it being about the GOOD OF THE WORLD? But it's not like anyone else has ever acknowledged that so I'm just gonna go with the flow and pretend that what Tommy is doing is totally just his personal life stuff.

Anyways. Like. I'm not gonna be all "you gotta make something that outlasts you" because that's bullshit and I am incredibly proud of all the shit he's accomplished and done post independence. Because I feel like essentially keeping everything under control during pogtopia, getting himself out of exile, getting himself out of bedrock Bros, trying to heal etcetfetcetcetcetcetc is a lot more demanding than having a bow duel with dream ever was but like. It's not like anyone around him seems to give a shit about that. So Ctommy will see that the only time people seemed to agree that he did something good. That he exceeded the expectations of the people around him in a positive way? That was when he won independence. And it's not like that amounted to anything good in the end.

Like shit. Ever since independence his life has just been going downhil.

Man.

Or hey. Maybe I'm overthinking that. But I just know that I want the people Tommy adores to validate his actions. To appreciate what he does.

Also if any authors are reading this please just write a lmanberg au where the elections never really happens and it's just domestic life in the new country. Please for the love of God I haven't seen a single one. A single fucking one. Pleeeease.

I mean, what he's doing lately isn't really for the Greater Good, he really is just taking care of his personal business. Like renovating his shack and its surroundings, tending to his therapy scam completely legitimate business venture, and casually hanging out with his friends when he can. And that's actually more than fine. Like heck! That's what makes him happy so there's literally nothing better he could be doing right now.

That said yeah, him receiving some validation from time to time would be good? Mostly because he has pretty serious self-esteem issues and it would be great if he could start recognizing his own self-worth instead of simply accepting whatever other people decide for him.

That said I don't think that gaining L'Manburg's independence was his biggest accomplishment. I think finding a way to put Dream behind bars was. Like, sure, Dream still managed to do damage that way, because he's the biggest asshole out there and because the prison system in there is flawed. But that one was still a big ass accomplishment! And, like, sure. It was something that the whole server did together. But Tommy was the one who sort of organized the thing and he was the one that ended up taking 2 of Dream's lives, so I still count it as a big personal achievement as well.

#ladycatland ask #dream smp #tommyinnit #long post #that said like #wilbur is definitely proud of tommy for multiple reasons #but the two of them are simply incapable of communicating #so the last time they actually spoke there was as much 'you changed the world' as there was 'everything he tried to do was a failure'#and we all know which one tommy's gonna take to heart...

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haunthouse · 4 years ago

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5 for the telephone siblings?

things you didn’t say at all / writing prompts. content warnings: strained sibling relationships, death, the identity issues that come with being an alternate. uh. this one got long and it got sad. also on ao3!

“Seb, you’re gonna wanna see this.”

It’s not a sentence that’s ever preceded anything good, in Sebastian’s experience, and there’s a small, petty part of him that wants to turn his back out of spite, say I will not look, walk out of the locker room and go home. His Steaks, the ones he was with three years ago, pointed at the decree results and said the same thing, moments before he was ripped between realities — and now, when these Steaks say Seb, he knows they aren’t talking to him but to the ghost of the Sebastian he replaced.

It gives him a headache if he thinks about it too much, makes something swirling-sick spark up in his gut. If he doesn’t think about it, it’s like he’s forgetting the world he left behind. There’s no good options, no happy medium, just static droning on and on under darkened skies.

August’s still staring at him, so he fights the urge to run away back with a stick and looks where she’s pointing. The TV mounted on the wall. It’s tuned to the splorts network, tuned to —

Canada. Moist Talkers versus Pies; their game of the day offset from the Steaks’, still going on an hour after the Steaks’ game had come to an end. He thinks August’s pulling a prank until the view switches to a shaky-cam close-up on a murder of crows so thick he can’t see past them, until they part, until out from the swarm steps his sister. She limps to the dugout, leaving the peanut shell in pieces on the field behind her — and despite the shakiness of her steps, she grins a movie-star grin directly into the nearest camera.

Sebastian feels sick.

***

It isn’t that he’s not happy for Jessica.

Sebastian imagines it isn’t fun to be trapped in a shell. Sebastian imagines it’s a little like being trapped in a shadow — not the shadows, like Townsend, but constantly ignored in favor of a sister or a god. Same thing, when it comes down to it.

Maybe that’s an unfair thing to think. Maybe comparing Jess to the god that trapped her there is cruel; maybe comparing himself to her is self-serving at best; maybe it doesn’t matter. The Steaks seemed shocked, when he appeared, that he didn’t fawn over his sister’s every move. Jess seemed shocked, too. Sebastian feels a little bad for whatever former version of himself was here — a version who didn’t seem to want anything more than being the second of two, the lesser Telephone twin.

He’s a little jealous, too. From the stories he’s heard, it seems like this version of himself and his sister were much closer; maybe he genuinely hadn’t minded being in her shadow, maybe he’d celebrated her. Maybe they hadn’t traded jabs every time they were on the field together and meant most of the awful things they said about each other. Maybe they’d actually loved each other; didn’t just say they did.

Sebastian — this Sebastian, the only one who’s here, the one who can’t stop thinking about how he’s not the right version of himself and not the right Telephone and his stats might be better than the old one but clearly that doesn’t actually matter to anyone else — hadn’t spoken to his Jessica in years, when he disappeared. When he was replaced with the other one, he can only assume.

He’d always kind of wondered what it would be like to have a sister he was friends with. They’d fought too much for that to ever be more than an idle daydream, one he would shake himself out of quickly — there was no use in it, even if it would be nice.

(Maybe he’s more than a little jealous.)

But — but — but. But here’s it’s in reach. Here Jess smiles at him when they pass each other on the field, even if it is always a little grief-tinged. He hasn’t been rude to her, but he also hasn’t been kind. He doesn’t call.

And when she’d been shelled, the Steaks had given him condolences like he was the Sebastian they used to know, even knowing he wasn’t. He’d been — not sad, not really, but something more complicated than that. The bitter joy of being the only Telephone mixed with the regret — his chance to reach out taken, too late, not enough, gone. She’d tried calling him a few times, back in season five, and he’d stopped answering the phone, let it ring once and hit end call, not even giving the illusion that he’d just missed it and would call back later — and maybe that was cruel, maybe that was just leftover animosity towards his Jessica, maybe he should have been kinder.

He’d assumed she wouldn’t be coming out of the shell, or that she would be someone else, when she did. The gods don’t do anything without consequence attached.

He hadn’t expected to feel grief at the thought.

Now that she’s back — and with a two-run homer on her first at-bat; he tries to steer his reaction more towards good job, Jess, away from showoff — all those swirled-together emotions make a model volcano somewhere in his gut, threatening to blow.

Sebastian fights back the urge to run, sits himself on one of the sofas in the stadium’s den and watches the game play out. The Steaks give him distance. He tugs at a loose thread on his jersey until there’s a hole in it; he’ll have to get Conner to help him sew it back together before the next game, but he keeps worrying at it anyways, because the harm is already done and he might as well. Jess hits a two-run homer and takes the Pies from losing to victory, and smiles even as she looks like she’s about to collapse.

Leach Herman, from the other sofa, as the TV drones on about the birds and the shell and the league’s star: “You gonna call her?”

Sebastian’s still blinking at Jess’ face on the TV. Takes a moment to process Herman’s words, and another to process that they’re said to him. “I don’t know,” he says.

The rest of the Steaks leave quickly. Game’s over; the excitement of an unshelling has calmed; the Garages’ game is over for the day, too, so no risk of beaning-related news filtering in. Home game means they can all go home. Sebastian still doesn’t know how to feel at home here, so he spends most of his time in the stadium; plays games on the den’s TVs when the rest of the team has filtered out, or reads the comics Greenlemon leaves scattered across the common areas.

Leach is an alternate twice-over, so she gets it more than most. Sometimes she sticks around. They tell each other about the places they came from.

(Her home sounds like a nightmare, and as such, she’s adjusted far better than he has to this new world. His wasn’t ideal, but he was happy there. He knew where he stood, there.)

“Far be it from me to tell you what to do,” she says, which means she’s about to tell him what to do. It’s hard to read her expression, but from the tilt of her head, she’s deep in thought for a moment before continuing. “But I saw you when she was shelled. That first moment, realizing what it meant, that she might be gone — I’ve lost a lot of people, Sebastian. You almost lost her, and didn’t realize it would hurt until it was done.”

“Wow,” Sebastian says. “Jesus, Leach. Are you a mind-reader or something?”

“Only sometimes,” she says, which, ominous. “You’re not very subtle, though. Your emotions show on your face.”

“Cool,” Sebastian says, half-sarcastic but too soft for it to come across.

“Think about it,” Leach says, standing up. “Her place on the idolboard has hardly shifted. It’s possible she’ll go back again at the end of this season.”

“I’ll think about it,” Sebastian says, and he means it.

***

The Steaks beat the Garages the next day, and the Pies win their own game in Charleston, and Sebastian hits the call button before he gives himself time to second-guess.

“Seb?”

Jess’ voice sounds the same as he remembers, from both his world and the Jess who’d called him after he’d been swapped. Jess’ voice sounds mostly the same, but it’s hoarse, like she was screaming the whole two months she was trapped. He wonders if anyone outside the shell would’ve heard, if she had been, and feels a pang of awful guilt for the thought.

“Hi, Jess,” he says, and wills his voice to stay steady, and half-succeeds. “I, uh. I saw you were back? And I wanted to say — uh, congratulations, I guess?”

“You called,” she says, slowly.

“Yeah,” he says. “I called.”

“Thank you,” she says, and it’s almost diplomatic, like she’s weighing her words before saying them, which — really, he hasn’t given her much reason not to. Another pang of guilt. “But why? It’s been — it’s been a while.”

(Echoes of that first time she’d called him after he’d been swapped, and had acted as if they talked constantly, had said she was worried when he hadn’t called to fill her in on the election results. He doesn’t remember exactly what he’d said, but it was something like Why are you calling me, Jess, you haven’t called me in five years. He’d hung up on her, then. He wonders what would have changed if he hadn’t.)

“I don’t know, I was just — I was thinking, while you were in there? I didn’t think I’d get another chance to talk to you. And I might not be the Sebastian you grew up with, but — I was never close to the Jess I grew up with, and I thought, it would’ve been nice, if I’d taken the chance to get close to you, when you offered.” He’s rambling. He’s not giving himself enough air between words; he takes a shaky breath, continues. “And now you’re out, and I just… thought I should say hi.”

There’s a moment of silence long enough that he checks to make sure she hasn’t hung up. The background-static of the call still thrums somewhere at the back of his skull, and her name is still written in bold letters on the screen of his phone.

“Sorry, it was — I was in there a while, I don’t know if I remember how to talk to people,” Jess says. “Hi. It’s good to hear your voice, Seb.”

There’s so much warmth to that single sentence that it makes him want to cry.

Instead, he takes a deep breath, sinks further into the couch he’s settled himself on. “We’re playing the Pies next week,” he says. “Can we go for lunch before a game, or something?”

“Yeah,” she says immediately. “Yes, I’d like that.”

“Cool,” Seb says.

“You’re playing the Garages tomorrow,” Jess says. She says it like it means something, and he knows it does — because it’s not just the Garages, they played the Garages today and it was fine; it’s their undead pitcher, it’s the body count attached. “I caught myself up on everything that’s happened. Hotdogfingers. The debts.”

“Yeah, it’s been — it hasn’t been fun. She got Marco and Sam the second week, and — they’re alright, they survived, but a lot of people didn’t.”

“Be careful? Please. I can’t l—” and she cuts off, but he gets the gist. Can’t lose him again. Because it was a loss, for her, when he showed up and replaced the other-him. “Just be careful.”

“Always am,” he says. It’s a lie. A joke. She wonders if he knows enough about him to know that.

“I have to go practice,” she says. He can hear a smile in her voice, and he realizes very quickly that he’s never heard that tone from this Jess before. It’d been years, when he swapped, since he’d heard it from his own Jess. “But I’ll see you next week, alright? Day seventy-three. Just call me when you get to Philly.”

“Looking forward to it,” he says, and it’s the truth. “Bye, Jess.”

“Bye, Seb.”

***

The next day, Jaylen Hotdogfingers aims a fastball directly at Sebastian’s chest, knocks him flat on the ground. He has to take a long moment in the dirt to catch his breath. The umpire looks like they want to incinerate him just for taking that moment, for delaying play at all before he drags himself to the dugout, sits heavily next to Leach.

She does him the courtesy of not asking if he’s alright.

He isn’t. He saw Sam and Marco go through instability and come out unscathed and thought, foolishly, that it would be easy. They hadn’t seemed any different after being hit. They’d looked exactly the same; perhaps a little more wild-eyed, but the game does that to people.

He looks down at his hand and it has smoke coming off of it already. The smoke before the fire. Events in the wrong direction, happening the wrong way.

“Do you see that?” he whispers to Leach. Holds his hand out in front of her.

“Your hand?” She tilts her head in what might be concern. “It’s the same as it was before.”

He yanks it back into his lap as if it’s been scalded by the words. He’s nervous enough without feeling burnt, even metaphorically.

He should call Jess after the game, he thinks. If something happens to him, she deserves to know beforehand. On the other hand — the video of three Steaks being struck by pitches won’t be plastered over every blaseball news website for the next twenty-four hours, and he knows she checks those religiously, has every stat and every schedule memorized. He’s seen her mouthing her opponents’ stats to herself when the Steaks play the Pies; some of them are numbers he’s never heard of in metrics he can’t fathom, even though they must exist applied to him, somewhere.

She’ll find out. He’d be surprised if she didn’t know already.

He thinks, in the infield, at the plate, on the bench, about the pros and cons of calling and not calling. Pros: he could talk to her again. The weather forecast is predicting another eclipse in the next few days, and he feels feverish under his skin, like the fire’s just waiting to engulf him. She cares in a way his Jess never did, has replaced all the distance that used to characterize the idea of siblings in his mind with something else, and it’s taken him this long to even start to wrap his head around that.

She doesn’t want to lose him again. She’d been best friends with the other Sebastian.

And that leads him to the cons: it seems unbearably cruel to try to be her friend if he’s only going to die. If they won’t even be able to see each other in Philly, go out for lunch like he promised — the lack of closure might kill her, too. He thinks about the swirling storm of regrets he’d had when she’d been shelled, and thinks about the hopelessness of an incineration. No chance of being pecked free by birds.

He just has to survive the next week. Then he’ll call, and they’ll go out to lunch together. He can apologize for assuming she was the same as the Jess in his world, at first; he can apologize for pushing her away; he can apologize for not calling, as long as he survives.

When Jess calls him after the game, he lets it ring and ring. He does not listen to the voicemail she leaves.

***

Two days later, Sebastian Telephone is incinerated.

#leonstamatis #blaseball #blaseball fic #jessica telephone #sebastian telephone #SO THIS ONE GOT LONG #ty for the prompt i hope you were expecting it to be terribly sad

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queerbutstillhere-writes · 4 years ago

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An Important Coffee Date

I do believe @gothamcoast gave me this prompt on discord.

So maybe, just maybe, flying all the way to Coast City just for a coffee date wasn't particularly the best use of Wayne Enterprises resources.

But it was a very important coffee date.

It was a coffee date with his new boyfriend Hal Jordan, who had just gotten home after a month-long mission in space.

New boyfriend was a loose term, and Bruce only kept it because they had only been dating a week before Hal had been called away. It wasn't that he was particularly attached to Hal already - yes he really liked the man, and was very attracted to him - but he was still very eager to see Hal again.��

So he flew to Coast City at 8am, in the company jet, on the excuse that he had a business meeting. Well that and he was rich enough to do whatever he wants. He got an inconspicuous rental car at the airport, and drove down to Hal's apartment. Hal's apartment definitely wasn't anything fancy, and the one time Bruce had been inside it, he had been fairly disgusted by how . . . Disorganized and messy everything was. But here he was.

He was able to just walk up the stairs to Hal's apartment, no gate or anything, and found the appropriate door, stopping, glancing around to make sure no one had noticed Bruce Wayne walking up to this fairly shoddy apartment. Then he knocked, leaning a shoulder into the door frame. It took a moment and then he heard-

"I'm coming!! Hold on!"

He waited and then heard the clicking of locks unlatching. The door swung open to reveal Hal Jordan, already grinning. His hair was still wet from a shower, he was wearing jeans, and a flannel that looked like he had just thrown it on as he was walking to the door. It wasn't even buttoned, open in the front and showing off his chest and stomach. Bruce's eyes were immediately drawn to the bruises wrapping around his ribs, and the mostly healed gash in his cheek.

"Bruce!"

"Hi, Hal."

Hal reached out and grabbed Bruce's sleeve, tugging him into the apartment.

"I almost finished getting ready, so come on in."

Hal pushed the door shut and then leaned in, quickly kissing Bruce before walking away.

"Are you okay? Your ribs look bad."

"Hmn? Oh, those?" Hal looked down at his stomach. "Yeah, it's okay. It's mostly just the residual bruising, besides the Corps has me on this med cream that makes that whole area kind of numb."

Bruce followed Hal through the messy living room into his bedroom. The apartment wasn't quite a studio apartment, but it was pretty close. His bedroom was even worse than the living room, but Bruce elected to not look at the floor.

"So how have you been?" Hal asked, moving to a closet. "How's the past month been?"

"It's been busy, Tim's back with me now, and he's doing really good with his training. There's been some business things that have happened, but nothing major. How was your mission?"

"It was fine," Hal said with a shrug and a glance at Bruce that indicated he couldn't talk about it.

Hal pulled on a gray t-shirt and then replaced his flannel over it, quickly pulling on and lacing up some combat boots before turning to Bruce.

"Do you accept this?"

"It'll work," Bruce answered with a laugh.

He was wearing rather casual clothes, just some slacks and a sweater, but everyone would recognize him anyway. Hal grinned and walked over to a dresser, grabbing his wallet and keys, and shoving a phone in his pocket as well.

"Shall we go?"

"Come on, flyboy."

Bruce led Hal back out, and down to his rental car.

"I can't believe you flew your company jet all the way to Coast City just for a coffee date. You know I could have come to you, right?"

Bruce grinned at him and started the car. Hal just shook his head and glanced around. They started driving and there was a pause of silence before Hal started talking, not about anything in particular, just rambling about space, vague details about things that happened on his mission, never enough that Bruce was able to get a clue as to what his mission had been.

Contrary to Bruce's original examination of Hal Jordan, he was very smart. He may put off the class clown appearance quite a lot, but Bruce had learned that was fully intentional. He did that so he could be the scapegoat, so he could get blamed for things, to protect other people. He was smart, he was a top ranking Air Force pilot - before he got discharged - he was still a brilliant pilot, he knows how to fix planes as well as fly them, and maybe his teamwork abilities still needed work, but they were so much better than before.

Yes, Hal Jordan was a very clever man, and he knew just how to talk circles around the main issue.

So Bruce didn't press.

"Where are you taking me, by the way?"

"This little coffee shop I found."

"You sure?"

"Harold."

Hal snorted and when Bruce looked over, he was grinning.

"Harold," he said, using a deep voice to mock Bruce. "Harold, behave. Harold, let's go get coffee. Harold, come sleep with me."

"Oh shut up," Bruce huffed out, sending him a glare.

Hal just laughed, and reached over, squeezing Bruce's shoulder, then letting his hand slide up to Bruce's hair, playing with the little ends at the base of his neck. Bruce felt himself smiling and glanced over to see Hal's own fond grin.

"You're pretty handsome, you know that?" Hal told him, tugging on his hair a little harder.

"I've been told a few times."

Hal chuckled and shook his head.

When they got to the coffee shop, Bruce had to park a few blocks away, just to get decent parking, so they got out and started walking. Hal walked beside him, hands in his pockets, looking around.

"I love this end of town."

"So you know where we're going then?"

"I've got a pretty good idea."

Bruce just grinned and kept walking. Currently in society, most people wouldn't see him walking down the street with a man and assume they were a couple. Now the media would undoubtedly start digging up information on Hal and try to find out how they're "friends", but they wouldn't automatically assume they're dating. Especially not with Bruce's playboy persona. But part of the reason Bruce had chosen to come to Coast City is that no one would expect him to be there. In Gotham, everyone is beyond willing and excited to sell photos of Brucie Wayne to the newspapers and bloggers. But in Coast City? Not so much.

Hal jogged ahead and grabbed the door of the coffee shop, pulling it open for Bruce and then grinning at him. Bruce just rolled his eyes and hip bumped Hal as he passed. Hal followed him in, and up to where they could see the order board.

"What are you getting?"

"Just an Americano."

Bruce hummed and walked up, ordering Hal's Americano, and a caramel macchiato with a shot of espresso for him.

"Okay, I'll get those right out to you!" The barista said with a grin.

“A caramel macchiato?” Hal questioned, stepping up next to Bruce at the waiting counter.

“Yes?”

“Huh. I just always saw you as a black coffee type of guy.”

Bruce snorted and rolled his eyes. “Really, Jordan?”

“Really! Are you telling me you don’t like black coffee?”

“It’s certainly not my go to, that’s for sure.”

Hal chuckled and glanced around. “I’ll go get us a table, okay?”

“Okay.”

Bruce watched him walk away, then looked around the coffee shop, scanning to see if anyone had recognized him yet. None of the teens scattered around the coffee shop seemed to be terribly interested, so he decided he was safe for now.

The barista dropped his drinks off, wished him a good day and then whisked off to help the next customer. Bruce just chuckled to himself and turned to find Hal.

“Do you wanna stay here to have our drinks?” Bruce asked, sliding into the booth across from Hal and passing him his americano.

“Why not? Nobody seems to be obsessing over us, it’s a nice place to sit and chat. Besides, then you can’t quiz me about you know what because we’re in public.”

Bruce scoffed, rolling his eyes and looking away, out the window.

“If I’m not allowed to ask about it, just tell me and I won’t.”

“You’re not allowed to ask.”

“Okay.”

Bruce glanced back at Hal, then took off the lid of his coffee cup and sipped at it.

“How’s your coffee?”

“It’s pretty good! Yours? You’re not gonna have a sugar crash on me?”

Bruce snorted. “No, I’m fine. I’m used to drinking this, Hal.”

“Oh, of course you are.”

They sat there and drank their coffee and chatted, grinning at each other the whole time. It was nice, it was sweet, and it was amazing to see Hal again. It was also definitely worth any tabloid rumors. After their coffee, they walked back to Bruce’s car.

“So did you really fly down here for like, an hour to have a coffee date with me, and then immediately turn around and leave again?”

“That depends if you’re kicking me out or not,” Bruce answered.

“Well, I think I’m still off,” Hal said with a shrug, grinning at him over the top of the car. “So feel free to come spend some time with me.”

“Only if you clean up your apartment, Jordan.”

“Fiiiiinneee.”

#batlantern #bruhal #brucehal #brucexhal #bruce wayne #hal jordan #queerbutstillhere writes #queerbutstillhere #writing #writing prompt #prompt

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pansunset · 4 years ago

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okay time for a theatre hot take about historical musicals. im gonna split this into two posts, one about hamilton and one about six. because while the easiest way to put it is “hamilton bad six good”, there’s a bit more nuance to my opinion on them both than that.

First off, all the cast members are insanely talented, especially Leslie Odom Jr, Daveed Diggs, Christopher Jackson, Phillipa Soo, and Reneé Elise Goldberry. Even though the people they played were varying degrees of assholes, they managed to make them feel compelling. Credit where its due.

anyway, lmm is a good songwriter, the issues with hamilton come from the glorification of the historical figures portrayed. if hamilton was more critical of these individuals, it might not have been such a... yeah.

the hardest hitting songs are the songs that delve into the personal lives of the individuals rather than politics. Satisfied, Wait for It, Helpless, Burn, Dear Theodosia, It’s Quiet Uptown... these are all incredibly emotional and raw. Aaron Burr was a fascinating individual and all of his songs reflect this, honestly. IRL, Burr was actually one of the least scummy of the cast, though because he wasn’t very fond of Hamilton, he is villanized. unsexy. Leslie Odom Jr. has such a powerful voice and does an incredible job as Burr.

some of the songs about the war are also decent works. Stay Alive talks about the actual conditions the American militia put themselves through, and The World Turned Upside Down, while it’s a very patriotic (ew) pov, is still a well written victory anthem. the most interesting one is History Has It’s Eyes on You, and having Washington sing it was a great choice. it’s one of the few songs where a founding father is looked at critically for their failings, and said founding father point blank says that those who come next will judge whatever you do. Christopher Jackson is an amazing vocalist and he actually has talked about his struggle to play Washington despite Washington being a dick.

the songs about politics tend to fall flat because they oversimplify the actual views of the main character and paint everyone around him as either a villain or ally based on whether they liked Hamilton. the cabinet battles especially are pretty cringe. there are a couple exceptions that I’ll discuss in a moment, but first, a character analysis tangent.

Thomas Jefferson is... an interesting case. Irl, the man was a disaster of a person. He came down with migraines from talking to women, was generally considered a weirdo, and was the original “rich person who buys expensive versions of the ugliest clothes and acts like he’s presentable”. Yet aside from one line in It Must Be Nice, he’s portrayed as a extravagant, dramatic, yet mildly charming asshole. His costume is bright purple, he carries a fancy cane. Like, ignoring the fact that its inappropriate to ever make Thomas Jefferson seem charming, this isn’t even accurate to who he was as a person. He was less sociable than Isaac Newton for fucks sake. The only accurate thing is being a france weeb and being a worse debater than Hamilton.

Anyway, speaking of It Must Be Nice, its one of the few good political songs. It’s critical of Hamilton and it explains why the Madison and Jefferson hate his guts (though for stupid reasons). Furthermore, it also explains the political climate of the day better than other political songs in the musical. The other two good ones are, of course, The Room Where it Happens and Your Obedient Servant.

The Room Where It Happens is not only an amazing breaking point for Burr to stop waiting around, it’s the one time in the musical where the real Alexander Hamilton is best represented. (Hamilton in yellow, Burr in blue)

“Or did you know even then it doesn't matter where you put the U.S. capital?

Cause we'll have the banks, we're in the same spot

You got more than you gave

And I wanted what I got

When you got skin in the game, you stay in the game

But you don't get a win unless you play in the game

Oh, you get love for it, you get hate for it

But you get nothing if you wait for it

God help and forgive me

I wanna build something that's gonna outlive me.”

This is the real Hamilton. The facade of caring about ideals is gone, and the truth is bared; Alexander Hamilton was a smooth talker who only did things when he saw it could benefit him in some way. The man was obsessed with his legacy, and anything that got in the way of him building one was just collateral. Yes he was crass and loud, but guess what? That usually meant he was heard over everyone else. Burr only just realized that the whole “scrappy underdog” act was just that; an act

Your Obedient Servant is Burr calling out Hamilton for going back on everything he claimed to believe just to keep Burr from the nomination. Fun fact: the 1800 election was not a landslide victory. It was incredibly close. Hamilton’s endorsement was probably what kept it from being a tie.

Hamilton tries to defend himself by projecting his flaws onto Burr. “I am not the reason no one trusts you, no one knows what you believe” isn’t an accurate depiction of Burr in the slightest. Burr actually quite enjoyed politics and debates, and none of his setbacks ever kept him down for long. He cared very little for what his contemporaries thought of him though: He relied on the merits of his points. A lot of his correspondence was left to his daughter, Theodosia, and was lost on the shipwreck that killed her, so theres a lot we don’t know about him. But the musical depiction of him is not really accurate.

The problem with Hamilton isnt that it’s a musical about the founding fathers. Its that it grossly misrepresents those founding fathers. It never considers the thoughts of the slaves of any of the main characters. It never considers the Native American perspective on the Revolutionary War. It mocks John Adams, despite him being one of the few founding fathers who not only didn’t own slaves, but publicly berated his contemporaries for relying on slavery. It does a great deal of injustice to Burr. It woobifies the Schylers. For fucks sake, it forgot Benedict Arnold. Ya know, one of the most famous spies? Who almost cost America the War?

Its impact on modern political discussion and internet culture is also kind of a net negative, save for the production “The Haunting of LMM”. Its status as a fucking joke these days is earned. Though it has some good songs, and the fact that it got an official recording means good things for the future of Broadway accessibility, it’s a hot mess and is an example of how not to do a historical musical.

#musicals #hamilton #broadway #lin manuel miranda #theatre #twi speaks #long post

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tellywoodtrash · 4 years ago

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immj2 02.11.20 lb

this fucking episode my dudes. i just went through it like...

business maharani is doing some more bitchification of bhaabi, ki dekho phir nikal gayi aapke peeche. even used the same lameass mandir excuse, the idiot, instead of coming up with something new.

hubs like riddhima is a major pain in the ass, but she's MY PAIN IN THE ASS, where isss sheeee, why isn't she back yet???????? is she ok????????????

ishani getting a call about someone in the hospital and......

bitch, it's her friend who's in the hospital. why the fuck would anyone call ISHANI of all people if riddhima was in the hospital????

lo aa gayi.

gujarat registration gaadi waale bhaiyya was a careful driver. unlike literally everyone else on tellywood. good for him.

concern!maxxxxxxxxxxx about her haalat.

asks about her bleeding hand and she's like i'll tell you if you tell me about how YOUR hand got hurt. noice.

again, rrahul's not putting on the vansh voice in this scene and it's 300% more watchable. for the love of god stop directing him in a way that impedes his performance!!!!!!! LET THE MAN MOVE HIS FACE AND TALK IN HIS NORMAL VOICE!!!!!!!!!!!

cliche dialogue about “shareer ke ghaav jaldi bhar jaate hain par dil ke ghaav..........”

this asshole is like yeah who would know that better than me???? BITCH WHAT IS THIS, THE TRAUMA OLYMPICS???

she's thinking ki yeah, i'm not gonna fall for your fakeass parwaah anymore. good. i like. she needed this stupidass illusion of her's broken longggggggggg back.

ohohohohoho ib waala mangalsutra breaking and slipping off trope idhar bhi hai.

“tooti hui cheezein kabhi kabhi dobara nahi judti.”

dialogue maarke chali gayi, lol.

but notice she's the one who caught it anyway. which makes me think she's gonna choose him/this relationship YET AGAIN. *deeeeeeeepest sigh in the world that sucks up all the oxygen in the atmosphere*

“jaise mera dil.”

OHOHOHOHOHOHOHOHOH.

“lekin ab waqt aa gaya hai bohut se cheezon ko sahi karne ka.”

again, he looks menacing and all, but is probably just talking about making sure all the paperwork is up to date for upcoming end of year audits. he's a very rich accountant, remember???

ragini's medical reports have come.

lol being married to ishani is taking yearssssssss off angre's lifespan. roz naya tension, naya drama.

also, angre refers to vansh as "vansh bhai" when talking about him to ishani, but calls him "boss" when referring directly. interesting. veryyyyyyyyyyyyyyy interesting. you guys need to sort out that relationship, my dudes. it's the only stable, healthy one in this whole damn show.

ishani is like you're his right hand, what the hell are you doing about riddhima spying on him and getting all up in his business???????? dang, this might be the first conversation they're having about their only common interest: vansh's well being.

also i notice ki shivaay ke saare shirts angre ko diye gaye hain. huh, the shirts must have a kanji eyed wearer clause in their contract.

“mujhe shakti dijiye ke main apne emotions se upar uthke sahi ke saath khadi rahoon.”

damn, first time i've had a lil respect for riddhima. i mean, i know ultimately it's all gonna go to shit, but she's trying.

lmao a dhaarmik aarti version of the title track is playing. a version for every situation!

“main ragini ko bacha ke rahoongi. yeh mera aapse, ragini se, aur apne aap se vaada hai.”

YESSSSSSSSSSS BITCH, SISTERS OVER MURDEROUS MISTERS!!!!!!!!!!!

OMG WHY WON'T Y'ALL JUST DRESS HIM LIKE THIS, LIKE ARNAV, WITH THE SHIRT AND SWEATER COMBOOOOOOOOOOOOO. PLS GODDDDDDDDDDDD STOP DRESSING HIM WITH THAT STUPID SCARF WAALA BLAZERRRRRRRRRRRRR I BEG OF YOUUUUUUUUUU

he's talking to some shadow (def a woman) about how they're his humraaz about the whole ragini issue and nothing is hidden from them and how everything is going as they planned and the story will end soon.

it might be siya but omg i hope to goddddddddddddd it's ishani. i really really reallly want it to be ishani and see the hot demon siblings do some scheming and planning together. the sibs that conspire together, stay together!!!!!!!!!

menacing growling about riddhima and how he needs shadow chick's help in "handling" her, so that she doesn’t leave the house.

“chaahe VR mansion uske liye jail bann jaaye, i don't care.” cool, real healthy. also copied from this week's naagin 5. i'm telling you, these two shows be copying their homework off each other.

vansh leaning real hard on how he trusting shadow chick. hmmmm. reallyyyy hope it's ishani. though can’t say i wouldn’t be delighted if siya also turns out to be just as fucking twisted as him.

ofc ms. snoopy here has come to snoop. SIS TUM THAK NAHI JAATI KYA ISS SAB SE. MUJHE TOH DEKHTE HI THAKAAN HO GAYI HAI AND I NEEDS ME SOME GLUCON D.

“ragini riddhima se jeete-jee milna toh door, usse dekh bhi na sake.”

uh a little too late for that my man, lol. your girls already had a catchup session this afternoon. they're going for brunch and manis next weekend!

oh ho, she knows that angre's gone out. so this is def someone else in the house. DAMN, I'M REALLY INVESTED IN THIS SHADOW NOW.

yaaar, kya haalat bana rakhi hai shivaay ke room ki. best room hota tha iss set ka, aur isko bas ek random space banaa rakha hai.

ASLKFJSLDKJFLSDKJFLDKSF

this fucker crazyyyyy. like fulllll on flipping cray cray!!!!!!!!!!!!!

wow ok he's shaking from rage. more unhinged than i've ever seen him. which is really something. something scary as fuckkkkkkkk.

kudos to riddhima for just being like same old, same old, instead of being scared. i'm really liking i-give-no-fucks-riddhima.

DUDE. THIS FUCKER HAS COMPLETELY LOST IT.

also knife play copied from shivaay. this dude like a much much worse version of shivaay. never thought that would be possible, but never say never with ITV and the year 2020.

ok i don't like this angry version of him that's outta control, all shaking and growling and panting. not only is it really bad acting, it's hard to take seriously as menacing. ppl are always scarier when they're ice fucking cool with their anger.

blah blah blah some more growled warnings and riddhima and i are just here like............. “ok and????”

she's not even allowed to leave the room.

oooooh brave sis questioning him back and provokingggggggggg himmmmmmmmmm. got a death wish, this one, but i like her like this. i was sick of her just collapsing all over the place weeping. thaaaaaank god she found her longlost backbone.

“tum jaise haiwaan ki baat kabhi nahi maanungi.”

sarcastic slow clapping and slightly turned on by this show of dheentness.

“chalo aaj tumhari bahaaduri ko celebrate karte hain.”

uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

“piyo, zeher nahi milaaya hai ismein.”

OK NOW THAT YOU SAID THAT I'M DEFINITELY THINKING THAT YOU HAVE.

omg ridhhimaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa you idiottttttt.

ok he's def put something in it. his face almost looking pitying as he takes the glass back.

“jaao. jahaan jaana hai jaao. nahi rokunga tumhe.”

ohhhhhhhhhh boy.

dslkfjsdlfkjdslkfjdslkjflkd her legs don't work no moreeeeeeeee.

THIS FUCKERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR. JESUS CHRIST THIS CRAZY ASS FUCKING D;SLFKJ;SLDKFJ;LDSKJF;LDKJ

EVEN THE CHANNEL PUTTING BIG BOLD DISCLAIMER OVER THE SCENE LIKE THIS SHIT IS SERIOUSLY UNHINGED AND FICTIONAL THE CHANNEL ABSOLUTELY DOES NOT CONDONE THIS FUCKING MADNESSSSSSSSS

I CANNOT STOP SCREAMING THIS FUCKERRRRRRR IS OH MY FUCKING GOD WHAT THE EVER LOVING FUCK IS THIS THIS SHIT IS MAKING 4 LIONS MEN LOOK LIKE SOFT CUDDLY LIL SOFTBOIS I AM LITERALLY GOING OUTTA MY MIND WITH RAGE AND ANGUISH WHAT THE FUCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK

i need a break. i seriously need a break to go cuddle my cat coz my god this deranged fucking showwwwwwwwwww.

ok cuddle break done. i’m not feeling any better but at least the tears of blood have stopped flowing from my eyes?

all i gots to say at this point is that CHEELANSHU SINGHANIA FROM NAAGIN 5 WOULD NEVER DO THIS. ONCE AGAIN SANKIIII CHEEL BOY >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> HUMAN MEN.

“haiwaan hoon main. rakshas hoon. aur rakshas kuch bhi kar sakta hai.”

electric chair for you, dude. ELECTRIC FUCKING CHAIR, GREEN MILE STYLE.

he literally gave her a paralytic.

“isse ek luxury relaxing spa treatment ki tarah enjoy karna.”

OMG I WISH I HAD SOMEONE MAKE ME SLIP INTO A PARALYTIC COMAAAAAAAAAA WHAT ELSE COULD A GIRL WANT FROM PRINCE CHARMING UWU TRUE WUVVVVVVVVV

omg inn paplu taplu ka chip waala naatak abhi bhi chal raha hai BIGGER THINGS HAVE HAPPENED IN THE HOUSE YOU IDIOTS KEEP THE FUCK UP LITERALLY NO ONE CARES ABOUT YOUR SADAA HUA MEMORY CARD ANYMOREEEEEEEEEE

anyway they decide to put it in the bank locker. omg why though, under the mattress was suchhhhhhh a safe and secure spot!!! badal kyun rahe ho tum log?!?!?!!?!?

“good morning.”

sis, lower half is paralysed. haath abhi bhi kaam kar rahein haina??? PICK UP WHATEVER THE FUCK YOU CAN GET YOUR HANDS ON AND HURL IT AT HIS FUCKING HEADDDDDDDDDDD

“don't worry, bas kuch der ki baat hai. uske baad tum apne pairon pe khadi ho sakti ho. main tumhari help kar deta hoon.”

TELLL HIM SIS. TELL HIM TO STAY THE FUCK AWAY AND NEVER EVER COME WITHIN A 3 DISTRICT RADIUS OF YOU.

“phir se zidd. tumhara naam riddhima nahi, ziddhima hona chahiye tha.”

ok can't deny i lol'd at that.

OK NO BACK TO HATING HIM. PUNS WILL GET YOU NOWHERE WITH ME, YOU BLOODY PSYCHOPATH.

“abhi toh bas ek chota dose diya hai jiska asar sirf 10 ghante rehta hai.”

oh how sweet. such a considerate husband. Star Parivaar Pati of The Year you are. haan behen, aur rakho aise pati ke liye karwachauth.

“agar baat nahi maaani, toh agla dose double hoga.”

seriously though, where can i get one of these? all i want is to be put in a coma so that i don't have to be conscious anymore. esp with the USA election today............ give me a 5x dose, daddy.

YEAH RIGHT LIKE SHE'S EVER GONNA CONSUME ANYTHING YOU OFFER HER EVER AGAIN LOL

“tum chaahe kitni bhi koshish karlo vansh, main tumhe ragini ko nuksaan pohunchaane nahi dungi.”

determination toh behen ka top classssssssssssss hai. where do ppl get such mental will from? i face the slightest inconvenience and i need a 6 hour nap to cope.

LMAO VANSH YOU DUMBASS YOU LEFT HER WITH HER PHONEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE. YOU KNOW SHE'S A SPY AND HAS SOMEONE ON THE OUTSIDE. YOU WANTED HER NOT TO GET TO RAGINI BUT NOW SHE CAN JUST CALL WHOEVER SHE’S WORKING WITH TO GET RAGINI THE HELP. GOD, BEWAKOOFON KI TOLI HAI YEH SHOWWWWWWWW.

ab yaad aayi kabir ki. my god, he seems like such a mellow weirdo now compared to vansh, just into some casual costume-changing and quasi fratricide. almost a tolerable level of deranged compared to this other fucking madman.

sent a voice note to him.

SHE HEARD SOMEONE COMING AND FLUNG THE PHONE ACROSS THE ROOM INTO A PILE OF CLOTHES. OH HO WHYYYYYYYYYYYY, YOU COULD HAVE LITERALLY JUST HID IT BACK UNDER THE PILLOWS WHERE YOU FOUND IT!?!?!??!?!?!?

“hi riddhima! tumhe iss haal mein dekh kar, dil ko bohut sukoon mil raha hai.”

asldkfsjflkjdslfkjdl i honestly love her the most. she's so fucking petty and hilarious.

ishani is like thank god bhai has seen fiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinally seen your real face.

“sirf vansh ne hi nahi, inn sab mein maine bhi vansh ka asli chehra dekh liya hai.”

“kya matlab hai tumhara?!?!!”

ok, i'm thinking ishani is shadow girl. from day 1, she’s wanted riddhima to see vansh in a certain way; as someone dangerous, the way he projects himself. (as opposed to dadi and siya who want her to see his soft side.) this statement from riddhima makes her wary that did she get close to the actual truth. INTERESTING. VERYYYYYYYYY INTERESTINGGGGG.

she's now grumbling about how vansh treats her much better than she actually deserves. I REALLY WANT MORE INSIGHT INTO THIS BROTHER SISTER RELATIONSHIP THEY HAVE IT'S SO INTRIGUINGGGGGGGG

le, kapde chale gaye laundry. phone ke saath.

———————————————————————

precap: kabir listened to the voice note and now him and mummy are in panic about ragini disclosing the truth about 3 years ago. RE DEVAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA. OFC THESE TWO WERE INVOLVED IN THAT KAAND TOO. LITERALLY EVERY ONE IN THIS SHOW IS A DERANGED MENACE TO SOCIETY.

kabir coming to meet riddhima.

but ofc.

ugh she turned back saying “K.........” and he's like there's literally no one in this house whose name starts with K.

*facepalms for allllll eternity till my godforsaken face itself falls off.*

i think i’ll go watch s2 of mirzapur now. i need something ~~~light and fluffffffffffy~~~ to take my mind off whatever the FUCK this was.

#ishq mein marjawan 2 #immj2 #immj2 lbs #episode liveblogs

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oscars-wifeyyy · 4 years ago

Text

Chapter 13 (The Innocent)

It was back to school and Elizabeth’s last doctor’s appointment for her check up. It was a new year and junior year for her so she hoped that it would be one of the best. She found Monse and Cesar holding hands about to go downstairs so she caught up with them and walked next to them while Ruby, Olivia, and Jamal caught up and walked with them as well.

“It’s a new year,” Jamal said.

“And a new day,” Monse said with a smile.

“Finally, we can get back to normal,” Ruby said.

“Turner!” The football coach called out.

Lunch time came around and the crew was walking to find a seat and Jamal was freaking out, “guys! I have eyes on me,”

“Me too. post-shooting lookie-loos are out in full force,” Elizabeth groaned.

“Elizabeth, Ruby!” a girl called out. Elizabeth pulled down her shirt to show the gunshot wound while the girl took a picture, “thanks,”

“I don’t know how long I can take being Bullet Girl and Bullet Boy,” Elizabeth sat down at a lunch table.

“I just wanna get back to normal,” Ruby sighed.

“Normal?” Jasmine appeared, “Baby, you ain’t ever been normal! You got that special sauce flowing through your veins. And probably all over that juicy nalga,” Jasmine laughed while Elizabeth and Olivia tried to hold in their laugh, “Elizabeth said that I can sit with y’all,”

“Shoot, I forgot dessert,” Ruby tried to leave, but Jasmine wasn’t having any of it.

“Oh, you sit. I got you. Sugar free sweets for my super-sweet treat, coming right up!” Jasmine walked away.

“I’m sorry, but ever since my brush with death, I made a bargain with the big man. Or woman. Let’s just say the universe is gender neutral. But that part of the deal was to work on my karmic energy, be a better person so shit don’t go sideways,” Elizabeth explained.

“Couldn’t you choose to save the rain forest instead?” Monse asked.

“See? I knew this would be an issue,” Ruby said.

“Speaking of commitment, we need to make one. What are we gonna do with the cheddar? We need a plan of action ASAP. First thing after school, all-hands meeting. This kind of gouda can get ripe real quick. I’m not sure we can handle it if people start sniffing around,” Jamal said.

“Cheesy, but I like it,” Ruby said.

“Yes!” Jamal and Ruby fistbumped.

“Sorry, y’all keep me updated. I got a shift over at the restaurant today and I need the money,” Elizabeth shrugged.

The group nodded, “right now, the money as is makes us targets. We need to move quickly to wash the cash so we can use the money and help Cesar survive.” Monse added and Cesar agreed.

“Ok. So where are we meeting?”

“My dad’s coming home this afternoon,” Monse said.

“So we can’t do it at Monse’s and my house is pretty tense post big-debacle, and Cesar never hosts. So, Ruby, it’s you.” Jamal reasoned.

“No. Your mom doesn’t want me around,” Cesar said.

“Oh, my mom’s got a job all week, so we’re good. My house after school,” Ruby said.

Everyone agreed, but Elizabeth, “sorry, y’all. I got work after school, but let me know what you decide,”

After school, everyone went their separate ways and Oscar picked Elizabeth up at the next street, driving to the restaurant. The two talked about nothing in particular, just enjoyed the other’s company until they got to the restaurant.

“Thank, baby,” Elizabeth kissed Oscar’s cheek, “you’re probably going to be busy later so I can take the bus or call an uber,”

“Nah, if I am busy, one of your three Santos can pick you up,” Oscar scoffed, “you trippin’, you ain’t gonna use public transportation,”

Elizabeth rolled her eyes, “whatever, estupido. I gotta go, bye,”

Elizabeth got out of the car and ran inside the restaurant, tying her apron strings behind her back, but the manager of the restaurant, Noah, came up to her, “Elizabeth, I need to talk to you in my office,”

“Ok,” Elizabeth hesitated going, but did it anyway, “what happened, sir?”

“It is to my understanding that you have suffered a gunshot wound,” Noah stated.

“Yes, sir,”

“Interesting. Well, seeing from where you are from, I am going to have to release you from this establishment. I don’t want any of your…” Noah grimaced, “gangs to come in here and destroy the reputation of this restaurant,”

Elizabeth was there, speechless, but a fire erupted in her as she started yelling, “are you frickin’ kidding me?! I am the hardest worker here and I do well from ‘where I’m from’. Now I see you for what you are. A typical white racist asshole who doesn’t give a fuck about anything or anyone else but himself, so no, I am not fired. I quit,” Elizabeth threw her apron at Noah and walked out. She saw Oscar still there so she jumped in his car, “let’s go home,”

“Que? Don’t you have work?” Oscar looked at her confused.

“No! I will explain it. Let’s just go!” Elizabeth seethed so as soon as Oscar started driving, she started talking, “Noah, the manager, fired me today because I got shot and he didn’t want any ‘gangs’ to ruin the reputation. That place doesn’t even have five stars on Yelp so reputation my ass,”

“What?” Oscar looked angry, “he fired you because you from Freeridge then?”

“Basically,” Elizabeth groaned, “Now I don’t have a job since Amazon is only a summer job. I have to find some job now,”

“No, you’re not. I got you,”

“No, Oscar. I am an independent woman that can handle her shit. I don’t need your money. Can we get tacos right now? I want to get some carnitas and carne asada tacos,” Elizabeth pulled her hair from the ponytail, “I can probably apply at the taco joint and at Dwayne’s, maybe,”

Oscar grabbed her hand, “bebe, you don’t need two jobs. Let me help you and ma out,”

“No. I got this. I can do this, I mean I’ve done this before. I can work weekends and after school, all nighters aren’t new to me, anyway. Less time with the squad, but that doesn’t matter,” Elizabeth rambled, “no, no. I got this, yeah,”

Oscar scoffed, but didn’t say anything until they got to Tio’s Taqueria. The two walked in and Marc Jimenez, the owner, walked out and greeted the Santos leader, “Hola, Spooky. What can I get for you today?”

“Let me get dos carnitas tacos y dos carne asada tacos,” Oscar nodded.

“Hello, sir. My name is Elizabeth Hernandes and I was wondering if I could maybe get a job here? I can help with anything at minimum wage,” Elizabeth shuffled her feet.

“Si, Elizabeth. My worker got deported not long ago so when can you start?” Marc asked.

“As soon as possible! I can work after school until closing every other day,” Elizabeth smiled.

“Muy bien. Spooky, it’s gonna be $5,” Marc said to Oscar, but Elizabeth jumped in and shoved a five dollar bill in his hand, “gracias, chica,”

“No. Give it back,” Oscar glared at Elizabeth, “I got you, Eli, so take your money and sit down,” Elizabeth stood her ground and glared right back, “fine. Take her money, I’ll make sure to tell a certain someone that you were planning to get two jobs. She won’t like that very much either,”

“Fine,” Elizabeth took back her five dollars and sat down at a table, “stupid boy thinks he can do all that shit,” a plan formulated in her head as she smirked and put the bill in her back pocket. Oscar sat down with her shortly after with the four tacos, “Thank you, Spooky,”

Oscar looked at her suspiciously, “what are you up to?”

Elizabeth looked up at him innocently, “what are you talking about, lovely?” Oscar scoffed, but still held a smile as he shook his head. Finally the two were done and on their way to Elizabeth’s place since Cesar texted her that he wasn’t gonna be in until night. The two settled in the living room, Elizabeth laying on top of Oscar as they lay across the couch, watching whatever was on until Elizabeth’s plan started in motion. Elizabeth looked up and started kissing Oscar enough to get him distracted and slowly put the five dollars in his front pocket.

They heard keys jingle through the front door so they scrambled to look normal, Elizabeth sat next to Oscar with her legs thrown over his as Oscar just sat with his arm around her. The door opened to reveal Leticia coming in with groceries so the two stood up and quickly helped her put them away, grabbing a couple snacks that she brought too.

“What were you guys doing?” Leticia asked the couple.

“Your daughter tried to distract me so she could shove five dollars in my pocket for the tacos I bought her today. Tell her to take it back,” Oscar held up the bill, “nothing gets passed me, amor,”

“Eli, get your money back right now,” Leticia said, “now, how was work?”

“I quit, but I got another one at the taco joint around the corner,” Elizabeth said.

“Why did you quit? I thought you liked working there,” Leticia questioned.

“Oh, nothing,” Elizabeth said as Oscar scoffed, “don’t lie, Elizabeth. She quit because the manager is racist. Talkin’ about bringing in gangs in the establishment or some shit,”

“Oscar!” Elizabeth yelled, “why did you snitch?!”

“Oh, you want me to snitch? Ok. Ma, Eli is going to get-” Oscar started, but Elizabeth covered his mouth, “Eli is going to bring home some tacos and barbeque once her new one job starts,”

Oscar pushed her hand away, “she’s getting two jobs. One at the taco joint y Dwayne’s Barbecue,”

“Elizabeth Hernandes, is that true?!” Leticia yelled.

Elizabeth began slapping Oscar, but Leticia took off her shoe and started hitting Elizabeth, “are you estupido? You are not supposed to be stuck here! You’re supposed to go to UCLA and get out, to get a better life outside of Freeridge! Don’t you dare get two jobs. I said I got the bills and things also stop hitting mi precioso,”

Elizabeth sat down on the couch, “wow, you love Oscar more than me. Ma, please. I want to help and I can stay up or do it during my electives and other classes because we all know I can ace it without even trying,”

Leticia sat down next to her, Oscar sitting on the armrest, “Mija, I am your mother. I am supposed to provide for you, not you provide for us. I will allow you to have these jobs, but I want you to use what you earned and go on a shopping spree or do something for you,”

“Thank you, mama. You do know I am still going to pay for some of the bills, right?” Elizabeth giggled as she hugged her mother.

“Oscar, talk some sense into this puta,” Leticia unwrapped Elizabeth’s arms from around her, “now, I am going to sleep. Buenas noches,”

“Buenas noches,”

#Oscar Diaz #oscar spooky diaz #oscar diaz imagine #oscar diaz x reader #oscar diaz imagines #the innocent oscar diaz fanfiction #spooky diaz #spooky diaz x reader #on my block #omb #netflix on my block #netflix omb #julio macias #julio macias fanfic #julio macias fanfiction

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mwolf0epsilon · 4 years ago

Note

Hey look I love your au and I was wondering if you could do Sammy x Susie or Sammy x Jack up to you and maybe see him get along with Wally and another guestion can you please make Sammy’s different personalities please thanks 😊

I'll be honest, this ask was the equivalent of mental whiplash and it made me blank out for half a day.

I'm assuming you were either requesting art or a written prompt, so I went with the latter due to currently being on a commissions only basis for art requests.

I took the liberty to assume this was for SillyTunes AU, where relationships are currently strained, so it's mostly just Sammy and Jack having a heart to heart about past-relationships and repressed feelings.

---

It's not that Sammy resented his father for giving him not the best of upbringings. He couldn't entirely hate the man who paid for his education and who told him to do good by himself if he ever wanted to be better than the city abercrombies that ran about thinking they were better than southern joes like them. He was grateful, even, that his father had tried to raise him clever instead of letting his mind rot like the other kids back in their home town (the ones that threw rocks at birds, blew up rats with smuggled fireworks, and who broke property to entertain themselves because their parents couldn't be bothered to teach them any better).

What he did resent was the ideals he'd rubbed off on him. The bigoted views, the generational shortcomings of the Lawrence men that had been passed down like tradition. Views that had gotten Sammy black eyes, split lips, and busted noses. Worse yet, he resented how confused they made him.

Samuel Lawrence Sr. had been the kind of man to sneer at people he thought unsavory. Called them by their skin color like they were disease riddled animals, things Sammy slipped up on even after promising to be better. But where his father simply glared and commented offhandedly what he thought of others who did not share his skin tone, nothing could compare to his hatred of homosexuals. If anything, Samuel Sr. took glee from spitting out the most soul crushing things he could muster to anyone who looked at the same sex "funny". He aimed to hurt the "freaks" that went against the Bible.

How ironic that his own son was a closeted bisexual.

"You know, if anything I thought you'd be focused on the whole 'holy shit I'm a talking sheep' thing, not your repressed feelings for Norman..."

Bless Jack Fain for being who he was. Sammy had gotten along well with the slightly older man from the moment they met. A rarity if you really knew Sammy. He wasn't a people person and often had to be encouraged by his little sister to play nice. But Jack? Jack just eases him into being more open, more honest. He was a safe person to be vulnerable around, and one he could entrust with his little secret.

Mostly because Jack had his own secret: The fact that he was a gay man married to his best friend, a lesbian who'd orchestrated quite the grifter act so that both of them could be married and happy. Sammy had never personally met the woman, but he was grateful she'd managed to make it safe for his friend to be able to be spiritually married with the man of his dreams.

"That's not even the issue right now and you know it..." He sighed, covering his face (muzzle) with his gloved hands as he lay in the hammock he'd claimed for himself. The furthest one in the corner of the 'communal room'.

"Well, there's also the awkwardness with Susie..." Jack carefully tuned his fiddle as he talked, not once needing to look at Sammy to read him like an open book. "Between one and the other, you're pretty strung up on this whole mess."

"Jack, Susie and I ended on really bad terms, and falling back into friendly banter and hugs is physically painful when we both remember what happened." He looked at the shorter and rounder cartoon sheep. Jack was looking at him now, frowning slightly.

"And Norman?" The other asked calmly.

"Hates me because I apparently killed him while I was all whacky from drinking Satan's blood in inky form." Sammy stated dryly. "Cultist shit aside, Norman's married and has kids... Or uh, was married. None of us know who's out there waiting for us..."

"Norman's married life is none of my business but I'm pretty sure he was on the same boat as you. I've seen him eat up both broads and blokes with his good eye like you eye up a chocolate cake..." Jack pointed out, raising his gloved hand when Sammy went to cut him off. "I'm not saying he'd cheat on his wife, I'm just saying the man isn't as straight as you think... Now on the subject of you killing him... Err... Yeah that's rough, but not your fault."

"Because I can walk over to him now and say 'hey sorry for ripping out your heart with an axe, I wasn't myself'?" Sammy huffed and curled up into a tight wooly ball. This was hopeless. Between pining over Susie and Norman, and feeling guilty over all the shit Joey Drew and his damn magical Ink had put them through?

He felt like a fuck-up. A very confused fuck up that couldn't even figure out who he wanted in his life. And, to make it worse, in came someone he really didn't want to talk with...

"Hey guys, whatcha up to?" 'Wally' walked in with a wolfish smile and a chipper tone in his voice.

"Hey Wally." Jack greeted him back, while Sammy ignored the imposter. He didn't trust this guy as far as he could throw him, and it still annoyed him that the others ignored his very valid concerns. He was miserable enough as is. "Just resting... Sammy wasn't feeling well."

"It's all them inkwells he's been draining. It don't hurt us no more but it can't be good for ya to booze it up like that." The cartoon wolf chuckled as he went to his own hammock to retrieve something. "My ma used to say visiting the gin mill when you was down was only gonna put ya in an evil mood."

"You don't have a ma..." Sammy grumbled under his breath, getting a sharp look from the wolf.

"What was that?"

"Baa. I said baa. Laugh it up twit..." He lied as he gave up on getting comfortable. Might as well get up and move on with his life. Do something productive while he was in a funk.

"Don't pay him mind Wally, you know Sammy's not the nicest when he's joed and yearning." Jack laughed, getting an annoyed glare from the taller cartoon sheep.

"Jack!"

"Yearning for what exactly?" 'Wally' blinked in confusion. "Another drink? A slice of that delicious all the way from the cafe? Uh... Miss Campbell?"

Sammy took off his bell and chucked it at the wolf. It bounced off his snout harmlessly before it vanished and reappeared around the music director's neck. Damned thing! The wolf grinned.

"Awww you're still dizzy with the dame! That's real cute Sammy!"

"I'm not having this discussion with you!"

"Half a discussion you mean." Jack snorted.

"Silence Judas!" Sammy stamped his foot (hoof) and snorted loudly, electing to ignore the visible cloudy puffs that exited his nostrils. Toon logic was mind-boggling and the particle effects a bit annoying with how much they made it easy to read his moods.

"If it's about how screwy things got, why don't ya sit down and talk about it? Miss Campbell is a sweet dame, she'll listen." Wally suggested. "Think she might need t'talk it out anyways... She's pretty down about it too ya know."

This caught Sammy by surprise.

"What do you mean?" He couldn't help ask out of curiosity.

"Heard her venting to Norman. Was none of my business but hard not to eavesdrop when them walls ain't up to code or whatever Thomas goes on about with regulations and stuff..." The wolf shrugged. "Anywhos, she felt bad that she blew up on you when Joey gave her the slip. She didn't know Drew literally only told you and left ya to tell her she was fired..."

"I... How does she know that...?"

"Norman. Turns out Joey used to ramble to himself in his office when he thought he was on his lonesome... He was gonna try warn ya both that Joey was being shifty, but by then t'was too late and the damage was done. He felt awful that he wasn't too fast, but then again he wasn't really s'pose to know that anyway. I wonder if Joey would'a known he was watching him if ya both didn't blow up at each other like ya did over the whole replacement thing..."

Norman had told Susie that Joey had screwed things up between them on purpose? The guy had avoided him since going through Thomas and Henry's version of the machine! Why would he go though the hassle?

"See? That counts for something Sam." Jack smiled. "If he hated you he wouldn't be defending your honor."

"Norman Polk, hating on Sammy Lawrence? You guys crack me up! Guy don't have no mean bone in his body... He's all bark and little to no bite unless you deserve a beating!" Wally laughed.

"None of us have bones anymore idiot... But..." Sammy sighed. "Thanks... For the advice. And the information."

"..." The wolf sat down. "Well I'll be. I must be dead, cuzz there ain't no way Sammy just thanked little old me."

The bell was thrown once more and Sammy stamped off as the fake Wally cackled. Jack merely shook his head and muttered something along the lines of young love.

"You're only five years older than me!"

"That's five years worth more experience than you Sam!"

"Fuck off Jack!"

#Eps Writes:#bendy and the ink machine #batim #sammy lawrence #jack fain #wally franks #SillyTunes AU

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strayneoculturekids · 5 years ago

Text

Drunk - Chan x Reader

Summary: Chan had to be the sweetest, most talented, composed and mature man you’d ever met. To say you had a crush on him would be an understatement. Though, it’s not until he gets absolutely hammered at a Halloween party that you find out he feels the same way.

Halloween AU, Friends to Lovers AU

Genre: Fluff

Requests by anon: eyo! Could I please request a best friend's brother au with chan? Also, could the best friend be a girl pls? Lol thank you ♡♡♡♡♡

Warnings: mentions of alcohol and almost everyone in the fic gets drunk

A/N: Hannah and Lucas are the names of Chan’s actual siblings, so they’re the names I’m going with for this fic. If you want to, you can just mentally change it.

----

“Oi!” a familiar voice came from behind you “Y/N!”

You swiveled your head around, seeing none other than Hannah (A/N: in case you missed it up the top, Hannah is the name of Chan’s actual sister, but just mentally change it if you want) running up to you at full speed. You barely had time to open your mouth before she tackled you to the ground in a hug.

“Ah!” You screamed, back hitting the concrete “Owww” You sat up, rubbing your back to feel that some of the fabric had been scraped away- along with a bit of your skin

“Oh my God!” She jumped up, pulling you up along with her “Are you okay?! Damn, am I that heavy?!”

You laughed, waving her off with clenched teeth, trying not to show your best friend how much the scrapes actually hurt- and you were wearing a new shirt, too!

“That looked like it hurt” A deeper yet, again, still familiar voice came

You looked up, being met with Bang Chan, in other words, Hannah’s brother.

“N-no, I’m fine!” You blushed, looking over your friend’s shoulder and staring wide-eyed at the beautiful man in front of you

“Are you sure?” He asked suspiciously, taking off his jacket “Your shirt is ripped. Here, take my jacket”

Your blush only deepened as your best friend’s brother draped his jacket over you, and you refused to meet his eyes again, opting for staring at the ground instead. There was a short moment of silence before Chan pulled his sister aside and proceeded to scold her for running up to you so quickly and hurting you. You hardly paid any attention, though, as you were too focused on the pleasant warmth and smell that Chan’s jacket brought; so much so that you had forgotten about your injuries and couldn’t even feel the blood trickling from them- which happened to also be staining Chan’s jacket.

“Whatever, loser” Hannah said jokingly to her brother, pushing him away once he’d finished scolding and turning to talk to you “Wanna go to the Halloween party with me?!”

“The Halloween party?” You questioned, resisting the urge to glance at Chan

“Yeah! I got invited and we can bring a plus one!” She said excitedly “What should we go as?!”

“Woah, woah” You laughed, making hand gestures to try and calm her down “Who’s throwing the party?”

“My brother” She said sweetly

You looked to Chan

“No, idiot” She said, stepping into your line of sight and blocking out her older brother “My other brother”

“Oh” You breathed “Then how come you said you got invited? Isn’t it being held by a family member just an automatic invitation?”

“Pft- I didn’t get invited specifically, I’m just going whether my brother wants me there or not, and you’re dumb, introverted ass is coming with me!”

“Yeah, yeah, fine” You sighed, playfully scrunching your nose

“Let’s go as cats” She said, smiling

“Even as a joke, that’s not funny” you said, face-palming

“You’re right” She sighed overdramatically “Everyone would be so stunned at our combined beauty that they’d drop on the spot”

“Nevermind, I’m not coming” You shook your head

“No!! I was just joking!!” She whined, going to cling to you for the second time “Come onnnnn!”

“I’ll come, geez!” You shook her off, laughing

“Chan is going as a werewolf” She said, standing up straight “he’s lameeeee”

“Please,” He said, smirking “You know I’ll look hot as hell”

“In your dreams” Hannah rolled her eyes at her older brother “anyway, back to the issue, we need matching costumes!”

“Uhhh- I don’t know” You shrugged

“Pffft, you’re just as lame as Chan! We should go as sirens!” She put her hand in the air, seemingly coming to a conclusion

“Sirens?” You pursed your lips, frowning “That’s a bit…”

“Why not?! Scared of showing too much skin?? Come on, you’re like, the most gorgeous person ever so shut the hell up”

“I think you’d look good” Chan intervened, smiling earnestly, a hint of red displayed across his cheeks

You froze up, your own cheeks becoming red as well.

“Uh- I guess we can go like that, then”

“Great!” She said excitedly, jumping onto you again and almost knocking you over

A week passed by in a flash and far sooner than you wanted it to be, it was Halloween- in other words, the day of the party. You let Hannah match up your guys’ costumes, as promised; once you saw the final piece, you realised she really didn’t hold back on the ‘showing skin’ part, despite knowing that you would protest.

“Come on!” She whined, shoving the costume in your face

“Hannah!” You shouted “There’s nothing to put on! What is that?!”

“Relax” She laughed “I’m gonna cover us with makeup so it’ll seem like less skin is showing”

“You’re going to cover our entire bodies with makeup?” you asked dubiously

“Yep!” She yelled cheerfully, whipping out a palette of murky sea greens and blues

You sighed, looking at the costume unenthusiastically before snatching it from her and changing into it.

“Yes queen!” Hannah shouted once the costume was fully on “I can NOT BELIEVE you hide your perfect body all the time! Look at you!”

“Aish, calm down a little. I feel so exposed” You rubbed your arms, trying to pay no notice to the rather cold air around your apartment

“Now, let’s do this!” She said, getting out multiple makeup brushes, applicators, sponges, and much, much more

It must’ve been at least an hour that she worked on you- your stomach, arms, face, solar plexus, anywhere that wasn’t covered by fabric, was covered by makeup. You had to admit, it didn’t look half bad; she used fishnet stockings to make a scale-like effect on some of the parts, and it was rather effective. Afterward, she immediately got to work on herself.

“You know” She said, trying not to move her mouth too much while applying the makeup “Chan helped pick out the outfit”

“He did WHAT?!” You asked, looking down at the skimpy clothing

“I’m kidding!” She laughed “He helped pick out the makeup colours, though. He said he thought this palette would look nice on you.

“hUH” This time, you looked to the makeup covering your skin

It seemed much shorter when Hannah was doing her own makeup, but maybe that’s because your mind was elsewhere. Soon enough, she was finished and it was time to head to the party. She grabbed your arm and led you to her car despite you continuously telling her you wanted a coat to cover yourself up till you arrived at the party.

Once she had managed to shove you into the car, she began to drive back to her own house, which only took a few minutes.

You had arrived being nervous that you were overdressed, but once you actually arrived, your worries were quickly gone. Most people had pretty decent costumes, some had extravagant ones, almost making you jealous.

“Y/N, you’re here” Lucas said, walking up to you and smiling (A/N: Lucas is the name of Chan’s actual brother, in case you missed that too)

“Ew, vampire costume, both you and Chan are so lame” Hannah said, grabbing your hand and leading you away from her brother

There were a few familiar faces, and you greeted them all politely, but most of them were new. It was a while before you saw Chan, but to say you were flustered once you saw him would be a grave understatement. He was shirtless, which is all well and good, except for the fact that Chan had…a rather toned body, to say the very least. Aside from the lack of a shirt, he was wearing neon yellow contacts, fake blood, had prosthetic claw marks across his chest, wolf ears, a tail, and much more. Honestly, he almost looked like a real werewolf.

“Y/N! You’re here!” Chan ran up to you, almost repeating what his brother said before- you almost chuckled at how similar they were

“I like your costume” You smiled

“Same goes” Chan said, looking you up and down before blushing and looking away

“Okay lovebirds, I’m gonna go get some punch so why don’t you just confess already”

“Hannah!” Chan scrunched his nose at his little sister as she shrugged and walked away before looking back to you

You couldn’t help but let your eyes drop down to Chan’s abs, admiring how well they fit him.

“My eyes are up here, Y/N” Chan laughed, smirking when he caught you staring

“Wh-what?! I wasn’t- I-” You looked up to Chan’s eyes, only to immediately avert your gaze to behind him afterward, your entire face turning red

“Geez Y/N, could you get any redder right now?” Hannah said, coming into view once again, handing you a cup of obviously alcoholic punch “If I didn’t know better I’d say you’re already drunk”

“Hannah, I already told you I don’t want to get drunk tonight,” Chan said as his younger sister handed him the drink she was carrying

“Don’t be such a buzz kill! You’re just scared you’ll get too drunk and accidentally confess to Y/N”

At that, Chan’s face turned almost as red as yours, and he immediately downed almost the entire cup in a few gulps, glaring slightly at his sister. You chose to ignore your best friend’s comment, electing to instead take small sips of your drink. It would’ve been an awkward silence, but as soon as it started turning into one, childish Halloween music suddenly began blasting through the house. It earned a couple of chuckles from some of the older guests that seemed over 30, but everyone else cheered and started dancing with their friends.

“This is my kind of party” You laughed as Hannah grabbed you and pulled you into the crowd of people dancing immaturely

----

The party must have gone on for a couple hours, and by the time most people had left, it was past midnight, and everyone who had stayed to help clean up or because they lived there was either completely sober or horribly drunk. Fortunately for you, you were one of the few that didn’t drink much, unfortunately for you, however, everyone surrounding you was drunk and it was now your official duty as the sober friend to take care of them.

“Y/N I’m gonna throw up” Hannah slurred, staggering up to you and heavily draping herself in your arms

You sighed and dragged her to the closest bathroom, quickly tying her hair up in a ponytail and leaving her to puke her guts out (once you’d gotten her into a position that wouldn’t allow her to fall into the toilet) and take care of the others

“Y/N!” Seungmin, one of Chan’s close friends called, running up to you, looking quite composed in the minimal-effort dog costume he was wearing that consisted of headband ears, a tail attachment and normal clothing “Thank god! I’ve found another sober person”

“Seungmin! Oh my god, you’re my savior” You smiled widely in relief “Where’s everyone else?”

“Lucas is passed out, Minho is in the upstairs bathroom throwing up, Woojin is trying to get Jisung to drink a glass of water and failing miserably, Felix and Hyunjin are harassing Jeongin and Changbin is hunting me down because he wants to cuddle” Seungmin said, looking around warily at the last line

“So you, Woojin, Jeongin and I are the only sober ones here? What about Chan?”

“Oh right! That’s why I wanted to find you- Chan is in his room sobbing over the fact that you don’t like him back so I’m gonna need you to go comfort him because I need to stop Felix and Hyunjin from bringing Jeongin to tears while also running from Changbin”

“Seungminnieeee!” Changbin’s voice came- but he was speaking in the kind of high-pitched voice you use to talk to your pets

“OH SHIT- GOTTA GO” Seungmin yelled, taking off back the way he came, quickly followed by a drunk Changbin

You stood in confused silence for a short while before processing what had just happened.

“Chan- Chan’s room- where’s Chan’s room?” You asked yourself, slowly heading upstairs

You passed the bathroom first, in which you heard the horrible sounds of Minho puking, then Hannah’s room, then a room which you could only assume to be Chan’s, considering there was deep, obviously drunken, sobbing coming from inside.

“Chan…?” You slowly crept open the door

“Y/N- oh- oh my god whyyyyy-” Chan sobbed, barely getting out the words, his face was stained with tears and he looked absolutely distraught, the sight would be sad if it wasn’t so comical

“Chan why are you crying?” You asked going inside and smiling sweetly

“Don’t talk to me!” He pouted in a choked, whiny voice while crossing his arms, sounding and looking almost exactly like a little kid

“Channie, don’t be like that” You walked up to him, trying not to laugh at how ridiculous he was when drunk “Why don’t you just tell me why you were crying”

Chan hesitated for a bit, sniffling silently before breaking down and bursting into tears again.

“B-because you don’t like me!” He whined, throwing himself into your arms

Finally, you couldn’t hold it in anymore and burst out laughing, clutching on tightly to the heavy boy in your arms.

“See!! You’re laughing at me now” He bawled

“I’m only laughing because you’re so cute, Channie”

“You’re just saying that” He further pouted

“No, I like you too!” You said brightly, stroking Chan’s hair

“You do?!”

“Yep! Now let’s go get you cleaned up, okay?”

Eventually, Chan’s crying began to subside, and he followed your instructions and where you led him. The first place was the bathroom, where you took off the makeup he was wearing and washed the tears and drool off his face, which proved to be more embarrassing for you then it was for him, though you were sure that wouldn’t have been the case had he been sober. After a much longer time in the bathroom then you would’ve liked, you had Chan get changed out of the uncomfortable Halloween costume and into his pajamas, a plain white tee and black sweatpants- clothing in which he looked unfairly handsome. Finally, you took him down to the kitchen, finding Woojin, Seungmin and Jeongin sitting tiredly on the couch, looking like absolute messes in their torn and broken costumes, though, not nearly as much of a mess as the six boys and one girl surrounding them, (including Lucas and Hannah, that is) all passed out on the floor.

“Y/N, we barely got out of that alive” Woojin said as soon as he saw you coming in “Jisung full out attacked me”

“I can still smell Changbin’s alcohol breath on me” Seungmin said, obviously exasperated

“I think I’ve been scarred” Jeongin chimed, though his voice was less than enthusiastic

“Chan is acting like a two-year-old” You chuckled sourly, thankful that the boy you were still holding didn’t seem to process your words

“Yeah, he gets like that” Woojin sighed “And then he spends the next week or so apologising for his behavior constantly”

“I see” You groaned as you dragged Chan to the kitchen and made him drink a glass of water

“Fuck” Chan swore once he had drunk the whole cup, clutching his head

“Come on, Chan” you slowly pulled him to the living room, finally feeling exhaustion creeping up on you “I’m not going back upstairs, sleep on the floor with the rest of the drunks. Seungmin, Woojin, Jeongin, scooch over”

The three did as told and let you half-sit half-lie on the couch with them while Chan sat down on the floor in front of you, leaning back into your legs and immediately falling asleep. It wasn’t long before sleep managed to claim you as well, and everything went dark after the long, long night.

You groaned and woke up to far-too-bright sunlight blaring through the open windows. Looking next to you, you saw Seungmin and Jeongin asleep, and looking down, everyone who passed out on the floor was still in their original place.

“You’re awake” Woojin’s voice came

You turned around, seeing the eldest boy carrying a tray of water and two full packets of Panadol.

“Last night…was tiring” You muttered, carefully lifting Chan’s head off of your lap and laying it back down on the couch

“You can say that again. I barely drunk a thing and I’ve got a headache”

You got up and took the tray from Woojin, setting it down on the coffee table. Just as you did, the ten people surrounding it began to slowly wake up one by one.

“Holy shit” Felix spoke in his deep voice, clutching his head painfully

“I have every regret” Hannah said, looking at you “Y/N! Why didn’t you stop me?”

“Fuckkkkk” Hyunjin groaned, grabbing a glass of water, two tablets and downing them as quickly as possible

Eventually, after everyone else had awoken, Chan stirred, waking up and clutching his head.

“What happened last night?” He looked at Seungmin before copying everyone else and grabbing pills and a cup of water

“I dunno” Seungmin shrugged “Ask Y/N. She’s the one who took care of you”

“Fuck” He muttered, looking to you, fear in his eyes

“Don’t worry yet Chan” You waved him off, yawning, still not awake enough to process everything “Wait until your memories come back”

“...okay…” he said unsurely, downing the pills

A couple minutes later, while everyone was lying on the couch or floor, Chan abruptly sat up, worsening his headache in the process, but he didn’t care much.

“Y/N! Fuck! Shit! Oh god oh god oh god oh god!” He looked to you, face completely red

“Did you remember what happened?” You asked

Pursing his lips, Chan grabbed your hand and led you to another room, shutting the door behind the two of you quickly.

“I-” He breathed in, cutting himself off before looking at you in the eyes “Sorry about…that”

“Chan, it’s fine, you were drunk”

“I hate getting drunk! I can’t believe I let Hannah make me drink like that- I-” He slowed down “I don’t remember everything. Did I say anything…weird?”

“You said you liked me…that’s basically it…”

“I knew this would happen!” He looked angry with himself “Y/N- I’m so sorry- I wasn’t- I didn’t-”

“I wanted to ask if you meant it” You interrupted his stuttering “Or if you were just saying it because you were drunk”

“I- if I meant it?” He blushed

“…Yeah” you refused to meet his eyes, blushing on your own as well

“I…I did mean it…”

There was a pause as you processed the information. Then, finally, you jumped on Chan, wrapping your arms around him excitedly.

“Y/N!” He groaned in pain, scrunching his eyes shit but, nonetheless, wrapping his arms around you in return “Please, I don’t need surprise movement like that”

“I’m sorry” You said bashfully, bowing slightly

“That’s okay” He said “I couldn’t be mad at you”

You were about to say something, but before you could Chan pulled you closer to him and kissed the top of your head, leaving the room before you could say anything else- or before you could see just how much he was blushing.

#bang chan #chan #chris bang #christopher bang #stray kids #stray kids chan #stray kids bang chan #stray kids imagines #stray kids fluff #stray kids scenarios #chan imagines #chan fluff #chan scenarios #bang chan fluff #bang chan scenarios #bgn chan imagines

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saiilorstars · 5 years ago

Text

Dare To Forget Me

Ch. 11: Rivalries

/ Story Masterlist /

Fandom: Law & Order SVU

Pairing: Rafael Barba x Original female character

Warnings: Due to the nature of the series’ plots, I do have to rate this as ‘mature’ for constant mentions of rape.

~ 0 ~ 0 ~ 0 ~ 0 ` 0 ~ 0 ~ 0 ~

Chapter Summary: Montserrat's and Rafael's childhoods come for them both in different ways.

'With only 12 days left until New York's mayoral election, the latest polls show state senator Alejandro Munoz still holding on to his lead. The time has come to fix our broken schools. The time has come to provide affordable housing for the hard-working people of the city. The time has come!'

"Ouch - Kara that hurt!" Montserrat scrunched her face after one particular strong hair pull from Kara's hands. "Are you even paying attention to what you're doing to my hair or are you watching TV?"

Kara pulled her hands from Montserrat's fiery orange hair and cheekily smiled behind Montserrat's chair. The two were in Kara's salon, before opening, and while Kara was attempting to try a new hair style using Montserrat, a lot of her attention seemed to be going towards the television up on the wall.

"I swear to God," Montserrat muttered as she decided to end this impromptu hair modeling gig by pulling out the bobby pins in her hair.

"Sorry, it's just elections are coming up and I wanna stay informed," the blonde hair stylist replied with, not even bothering to help Montserrat undo a knot on her hair. "My vote's going to Muñoz for sure. What about you?"

"Don't know, don't - OW!" Montserrat angrily glared at her reflection after feeling like she'd pulled skin off during the unknotting process.

Kara remained unfazed. "You don't know who you want for mayor?"

"Hasn't been on my radar yet but I've heard things about all parties. Can I go now?" Montserrat dropped the last bobby pin onto the salon table and turned to find Kara engulfed in her cellphone. "Nice to see the attention you give me."

Kara sarcastically rolled her eyes. "It's Damian. We were gonna get lunch but he's at your cousin's right now."

"What? Casey?"

"With Gael too," Kara put her phone in her back pocket. "Something about a client gone wrong? Issue? Not sure."

"Hm, I guess they're still having trouble. Maybe I can stop by," Montserrat said as she got up from her chair.

"What are you going to do? You're a cop not a lawyer!"

"Thanks, really. I haven't talked to Gael in weeks and I was meant to babysit his girls last week but he cancelled in a very short text," Montserrat turned to the mirror to fix her hair as best as possible. "I'll say hi to Damian for you."

"And while you're at it, remind him that he owes his little sister $20," Kara pointed in a serious, mocking, manner.

Montserrat playfully rolled her eyes. "Hair model is gone!" she announced as she swiped her purse off the table.

"But coming back!" Kara reminded because she certainly had more styles to try out and as it turned out, Montserrat had very smooth hair.

~0~

On her way towards the D.A's office, Montserrat heard the distinct voice of her partner calling her name. Montserrat paused and looked back to see Sonny speeding to catch up with her, with, due to his long legs, was done in a quick stride.

"Hey, what are you doing here?" Montserrat asked him.

"Warrant," Sonny said the magic word that could answer almost everything.

"Case of Jamil?"

"We got him this time," Sonny promised then motioned Montserrat to walk ahead.

"I sure hope so cos I'd love to see the smirk get wiped off his face already," Montserrat thanked him for opening the door for her but as she was about to step in, she bumped into a man. "Sorry," she apologized dutifully.

"Oh don't worry about it, bonita," a familiar man responded with.

Montserrat stepped back, accidentally bumping into Sonny at the same time. "I know you," the redhead said within the second. "My roommate was talking about you earlier. Alex Muñoz, you want to be our mayor."

The man in question smiled the same charming smile Montserrat saw on the television. "Sounds like I got her vote. What about you?"

"I... don't know yet," Montserrat shrugged then looked up at Sonny behind her.

"Don't know either," he admitted.

"Psh, you'll vote for whoever Kara will," Montserrat waved him off, missing Sonny's face of offence when she looked back to Alex. "But I have to say I'm surprised a candidate for mayor is here…?"

"Just visiting an old friend," Alex left it brief.

"K, well, promise I'll do my research," Montserrat politely reached for the door again.

"If you need any help deciding, you can always call me," and the man surprised her with a small card. "Always happy to help a citizen, especially cuando toca ser una linda mujer."

Montserrat slowly took the card from him, eyes glued to Alex's returning smile. It was cocky no doubt even when he walked off.

"Okay, I skipped Spanish class a lot in highschool but I'm not that bad to miss the fact he just made a pass at me," Montserrat turned to face Sonny with a wide grin, close to laughing.

"You're so not voting for him," Sonny ushered her inside, instigating her full laughter.

"What? Why not? You're not actually thinking that being overprotective of your crush's roommate will score you some good grade points?" Montserrat leveled an amused glance his way, one that made him roll his eyes.

"I'm gonna go get that warrant," Sonny decided to avoid another teasing round which, thanks to Montserrat, the squad now partook in.

"Sure, sure," Montserrat waved him off and headed for Casey's office. She was only a couple feet away when the office door opened. Damian was the first to emerge, letting Montserrat notice his face expression. Whatever problem they were having didn't seem to be getting any better.

"Hey," Montserrat walked towards them, but the closer she got the better she could see Gael's grim face. "Woah, what problem have you two got?"

"None of your business," Gael snapped at the same time Damian had answered "It's just business".

Montserrat raised her eyebrows in confusion. "What the hell's your problem, Gael?"

"Seriously?" the older brother snapped again which only confused Montserrat even more. "You're asking me what's my problem after what you said about Dad?"

"Wait, you're actually mad about that?" Montserrat didn't know whether to laugh or not. It was plainly absurd. Though now she supposed it made sense why Gael cancelled her babysitting day.

"You said Dad was a bad parent-"

"-I did not say that!" Montserrat couldn't believe they were actually going to have this argument.

"Yes, you did!"

"No, I didn't!"

Damian looked back and forth between the siblings as their argument got louder and louder. He tried to cut in but it didn't work. It rarely did. And it just seemed to attract more people out from the offices.

"How could you be so insensitive towards Dad!?"

"How could you be so stupid!?" Montserrat mimicked her brother's tone without a care in the world. "This is why you didn't let me babysit the girls last week?"

"I was afraid you'd call me a bad father too," Gael promptly said, and it honestly became hard for Montserrat not to smack him right there.

"Would you quit being such a baby!? I didn't say anything about our father that wasn't true! But that doesn't mean I said he was a bad father!"

Casey flung open her office door and fixated an incredulous glare on her two cousins. "Would you two quiet it down?" her input only seemed to make things worse.

"No, I will not 'quiet it down'-" Gael mimicking Casey as well earned himself another glare from the woman, "-when my sister is being so ungrateful to our father!"

"I'M NOT!" Montserrat outright shouted, which then called forth her partner.

"Montse, what's going on?" Sonny emerged from Rafael's office, along with the ADA himself.

"The entire building can hear you," Rafael added.

Montserrat, frustrated, motioned them all to be quiet. "I'm not doing anything except defending myself from ridiculous accusations by my dear big brother!"

"You got a lot of nerve, Montserrat," Gael got face to face with his younger sister. "You want to call our father a bad parent when he worked his ass off to get both of us through? While Regina was out probably partying, he was there reading you stories and helping me with my homework-"

"-but I never said anything! And you know damn well that I know what Regina did."

"Well it doesn't seem like it-"

"-Gael-" Casey once again stepped in but the man went over her words anyways.

"-but of course you'd never understand. You're still thinking Mommy is coming back. You always thought that-"

"-screw you, Gael," Montserrat felt there was nothing left to say.

"Montserrat!" Casey hissed.

"Montse, why don't we head back to the station together?" Sonny made his own attempt as well.

"Yeah, go back to work and act like you didn't insult our father," Gael spat and finally moved around Montserrat to head for the exit.

"I'm so sorry," Damian felt like he needed to apologize to Casey at least for the siblings' brawl but it wasn't like Casey was new to it.

"We're good, go," Casey gave him the nod that it was alright for him to leave.

"No, we are not good!" Montserrat turned with the intention of catching up with her brother. "If he wants to talk about Regina then let's have it!" But of course she was stopped by both Sonny and Rafael. She fought the two for a bit before she finally backed off. "Taking his side?" she snapped at both of them.

"Easy there, Novak," Rafael pointed a finger at her to keep her from trying again. "You've got the whole building watching you."

"I don't care," she snapped. "If he wants to talk about Regina then I can do it."

"At another time," he snapped this time. "I'll find her myself if that'll shut both of you up."

That seemed to trigger her. "You know what, if you think you can find Regina Ramos then be my frikin guest because I haven't been able to find her in 25 years!" This particular spat startled Rafael due to the ferocity lacing her words. Even her expression had gone ballistic and he'd seen quite a lot of things in his line of work.

"Montserrat," Casey once again attempted to calm her cousin but Montserrat waved Casey off and took off in a storm.

"What the hell was that?" Sonny jerked a thumb over his shoulder, completely lost on the show they'd seen.

"What do you think? Another sister-brother brawl," Casey sighed. "How many siblings do you have again?"

Sonny playfully rolled his eyes. "My sisters and I have never argued like that."

"Who the hell is this Regina and why is she making such trouble?" asked Rafael. He'd certainly like to know why he'd garnered such a snap from Montserrat.

Casey knew what he was thinking and decided to answer only to clarify what Montserrat was dealing with. "Regina is Montserrat's and Gael's mother. She...sort of walked out on them when they were just kids." Casey sighed when she saw the sorrowful expressions on the men's faces. "And that's why Montse doesn't talk about that because she hated the pity faces she would get afterwards. She doesn't like talking about it, period. I mean, you guys got a firsthand look at what happens, and you-" she gestured at Rafael, "-got a firsthand taste."

"Wouldn't be the first time I accidentally probed where I shouldn't have," the ADA shrugged, though inside he was feeling a tad remorseful (which he didn't like one bit).

"I would just tread lightly," Casey parted with that warning and returned to her office.

"How the hell do we 'tread lightly' after that?" Rafael was left with an unanswered question.

"We take slow steps," Sonny decided it was as close to a proper answer as they could get to.

~0~

Montserrat practically stalked into her apartment that evening with a white paper bag in one hand, and a half eaten brownie in the other. Kara looked up from her dinner plate with a mouth full of spaghetti, one noodle in particular dangling below her chin.

"What's...wrong with...you?" Kara said while she swallowed the whole food in her mouth.

"My brother's an idiot," Montserrat spat and trudged into the living room to take her coat and shoes off. She stuffed her mouth with the remainder of her brownie. Kara watched her ginger roommate chuck the paper bag (aggressively one should add) to the couch before plonking down to take off her boots.

"Uh, my brother's an idiot too. All big brothers are. Didn't you get the memo?" Kara's light joke was met with a cold deadpanning look. "Okay. Um, I know I'm going to regret asking but shouldn't you be at work?"

"I asked Liv for a personal day. She's very understanding," Montserrat threw her boot across the living room, missing how Kara winced when the hell of one boot hit the television furniture piece. She then pulled her phone out of her back pocket and let it drop (not so gently) against the glass coffee table.

Kara feared for her furniture's safety. "Um, okay, so...would you like dinner…? I made spaghetti," she motioned to her plate which was half empty already.

"Since when?" Montserrat unceremoniously snorted. "You always complain how you never got that one."

"Sonny gave me a recipe," the blonde shrugged.

Montserrat shot her roommate a look. "You're trading recipes now?" but she decided in that second that she didn't even want to get into that potential romance that was sure to make her gag. "Never mind. No, I don't want dinner."

"Right, cos stuffing your face with brownies is the better way to go," Kara's sarcasm was once again responded with a cold glare. "What's going on, Montse?"

"You mean Damian didn't call? Not even Sonny?" Montserrat grabbed her paper bag and reached for another brownie.

"No...should I call one of them…?"

"Oh, right, like you need another reason to call Sonny - stop with that!" Montserrat pretended to shiver, making Kara roll her eyes, and took a bit of her new brownie. "Gael's still mad at me for what I said about our Dad leaving us alone sometimes. He thinks I actually called my father a bad parent."

"But I'm sure you didn't mean it like that-"

"-yeah, I know," Montserrat's sudden cut in sounded rude but Kara knew Montserrat needed to vent right now and this was how she did it. "He even went ahead and brought in Regina, like I don't know what she did to us."

Kara wouldn't even try to say anything about Regina Ramos. That topic had always been a delicate one that usually resulted in arguments between Gael and Montserrat. Their mother abandoning them as kids had left raw pain that hadn't really see any healing.

"Gael is an idiot. And more than that, he's…" Montserrat couldn't even finish without getting furious all over again. "We argued outside Casey's office and...we got loud."

"...how loud?" Kara raised an eyebrow, knowing well where this was headed.

"Pretty loud."

"Were there people?"

"...when we were finished…"

"Oh, Montse. How mad was Casey?"

"I don't know. I didn't ask her when I stormed out of there after threatening Sonny and Rafael."

"Oh Montse," Kara shook her head disapprovingly.

"Gael made me so mad!"

"That's not an excuse, that's just a sister-brother relationship," Kara dug her fork into her spaghetti. "Only now you're actually held responsible for your actions."

Montserrat hated when Kara was right. She just hated it. Thankfully, someone knocked on their door, preventing Kara from continuing with her lecture.

"It's probably the Andersons downstairs complaining about your stomping," Kara warned as Montserrat went up to answer the door.

"I've still got some colorful words left if you're interested," Montserrat said before opening the door. "Great, what are you doing here?" her initial whine made Kara lean to the side to try and see who was at the door. If it was Gael, she'd take cover for sure.

"Seriously, I don't get paid enough to be your partner," Sonny said with a straight face.

Montserrat deadpanned him but took his sarcasm to heart. He probably came around trying to see if she was okay, not for Kara nor for the sake of their work... but to be a friend. Those thoughts softened her expression and made her remember some politeness. "Come on in, Sonny."

"Careful, she bites when she's angry," Kara said while Montserrat shut the door.

"I come bearing gifts," Sonny raised his hand that held a white plastic bag.

"You didn't have to," Montserrat was now feeling exceptionally guilty for her behavior earlier in the day.

"After that kind of fight, yeah, I had to," Sonny held the bag for her to take.

"I heard plural which just makes me feel awful," Montserrat admitted as she rummaged through the bag. A smile came to her face when she caught whiff of the familiar peanut butter cannolis inside one box. "And I guess Kara gets to enjoy my guilty moment."

"Why?" asked the blonde in question. She scarfed down her spaghetti and looked in their direction.

"Peanut butter cannolis," was all Montserrat had to say for Kara to jump out of her seat.

"Sonny, you didn't!?" she zipped towards them and practically yanked the bag out of Montserrat's hands to see for herself. She squeaked when she confirmed the cannolis and suddenly planted a kiss on Sonny's cheek.

Montserrat nearly laughed when she saw how red Sonny had become in less than a minute. She honestly didn't think Kara even realized what she'd done.

"You better apologize to him right now," Kara wagged a finger at Montserrat.

Montserrat rolled her eyes but did know when it was time to give in. "I am sorry, Sonny. I got carried away and I...it was not the place."

"Look, I get it, siblings can be…" Sonny wouldn't even finish that sentence because they all knew what he meant. "I just hope you're feeling better about things. Casey told us about...your mom? She said few things-" he said quickly before Montserrat assumed the worst, "-and I want you to know that Barba and I understand you were in a...special type of moment."

"Very special moment…" Kara muttered under her breath.

"Shut up," Montserrat warned her. "Go eat your spaghetti already."

"You made spaghetti?" Sonny's attention was momentarily driven towards Kara. "Did you use the recipe I left you?"

"Of course," Kara smiled. "And it really was better than that frozen crap Montse buys."

"Hey," went the ginger with offence. Now it was Kara who motioned for silence. "I'm going to my room," Montserrat announced and snatched the cannolis from Kara's hands. "Thanks Sonny. And just so we're clear, Kara's not getting any."

"Rude," Kara frowned and watched her roommate go off into the hallway.

Sonny chuckled and offered to buy more another day. That perked Kara right up. Montserrat's phone started buzzing against the glass coffee table, cutting short Kara's beam.

"I really hope it's not Gael trying to continue the fight," Kara mumbled as she went to get the phone.

"Maybe he's calling to apologize?" Sonny offered another alternative but Kara shook her head.

"Looks like we're both wrong," she grabbed the phone off the table and waved the phone at Sonny, letting him see the caller ID on the screen. "Your friend's calling to check up on Montse, maybe?"

Sonny made a face that Kara found difficult not to laugh at. "Barba would never call to 'check up' on anyone."

"You came to check up on Montse, why can't Rafael do the same?"

"Because he just doesn't."

Kara's face clearly said that wasn't an answer.

"He doesn't do that sort of stuff, trust me," and that left Sonny wondering why Rafael would choose to do start doing it now.

"Hm, then Montse must be special enough to catch his attention," Kara made way for the hallway but the phone stopped buzzing. "But apparently I'm slow to help." She turned back with a disappointed expression.

"You might be right about the first thing," Sonny conceded as he thought back to the various moments of strange behaviors between Montserrat and Rafael. "But that could also be because she nearly had a kid in his courtroom."

Kara laughed. "One of Montse's finest moments. Whatever, if he meant to check up, he'll call again and this time I'll be ready." She bit her lip and looked back to the kitchen where her lonesome plate remained on the table. "I've made enough for two but it looks like Montserrat's already got dinner so...you want to stick around? Give me some feedback on the spaghetti."

"Okay," Sonny nodded. "But I doubt you got anything wrong. You're a good cook."

Kara chuckled. "I like to think that I am. C'mon, I'll get you a plate." She walked past Sonny and tucked Montserrat's phone in her back pocket to be on red alert in case Rafael were to call again. She probably should have given the phone to Montserrat but, truth be told, she was curious herself about her roommate and the ADA.

To her surprise (and Sonny's), Rafael did call again that night.

~ 0 ~

Montserrat gripped her coffee cup all the way to her desk. She saw Olivia and Nick heading out, probably to continue questioning their latest victim. She plonked down at her desk and went back to her paperwork which seemed to get bigger every time she paused to look.

"You sure you don't want to take a break?" Amanda stopped by her desk with Fin beside her. "Our comfy Chinese place is always open for a third guest."

Montserrat smiled at the two. "No, I'm good. I'll get lunch later."

"And I'll make sure she actually does," Sonny reassured since they learned fast that Montserrat tended to skip meals when she felt swamped by work.

"Your call," Fin nodded to Amanda towards the hallway.

"You are getting lunch, right?" Sonny asked after the other two were gone.

"Yes, at some point," Montserrat dug her nose into a particular file.

Sonny rolled his eyes and went back to work at his end. He paused, though, when he noticed Montserrat picking at her hair every minute or so. "What are you doing?"

Montserrat put her pen down and groaned. "Kara keeps using me as her hair model and today was apparently a big ole crown braid." Her ginger hair was picked up with a large-sized crown braid adorning her her head from ear to ear.

"It looks nice," Sonny's compliment was met with a loud scoff.

"You're only saying that because Kara made it."

"You know, not everything I do is dependent on Kara."

"Sure."

Sonny decided to just keep quiet from now on.

Fifteen minutes passed and Montserrat finished her coffee - or drowned it - so she got up for a refill.

"Sonny, you want one?"

"Nah, let's head out for lunch already," his suggestion flew over Montserrat's head as the ginger went to get more coffee.

Montserrat returned two minutes later, surprised that Sonny hadn't continued calling her name out. Of course when she saw him talking to Rafael she understood why.

"They went to go talk to her, I promise," Sonny insisted yet Rafael still looked rather doubtful. "We're doing what you asked, alright? You can call Liv right now to confirm if you want."

Montserrat awkwardly cleared her throat as she neared her desk, gaining both men's attention. "Are we finished…?"

"You're one to talk," Rafael scoffed, but Montserrat took that with a nod. She deserved it.

"C'mon councilor," Sonny gave a disapproving tilt of his head towards Rafael.

"No, it's totally fine, Sonny," Montserrat shrugged her shoulders, though her casualness seemed to end at her fingertips since she was once again gripping her coffee cup. "I was rude, so...you two get a free pass."

"It shouldn't be like that," Rafael was the one to say as he considered once more the circumstances of her outburst.

"I wasn't professional and I accept that," Montserrat nodded. "You were the one to tell me, after all. Leave my problems at home and any other thing related to my personal life. Work is a place for work only."

And as she said all that, Rafael felt that twinge of guilt knowing he was virtually doing the exact opposite of his words right now. Because of that, he felt obligated to let her episode go. More than that, it was the right thing to do.

"Montserrat it's fine." The usage of her first name made Montserrat smile - it was a sure sign he forgave her completely.

"Thanks," she whispered.

Rafael nodded at her in return. His eyes gazed at the pretty empty bullpen and figured no one would be returning anytime soon despite the cases going on. He watched as Montserrat pull her desk chair to sit back down. Even as she tried to get back to work, it was easy to tell the problems with her brother weren't letting her focus.

He honestly felt that.

And maybe it was because he felt they were in a similar place at the moment, or...maybe for another reason he didn't know of, but he spoke up with a request. "Montserrat do you want to get something to eat?"

Montserrat paused and looked up, momentarily surprised since they hadn't had a meal together in a while now. The fact Sonny's eyes were flickering from her to Rafael - not so discreetly - made it all a little more on the spot.

Was her face warm?

"I would…" Montserrat was in the middle of making her answer when she recalled Sonny's insistence to get lunch together already. She quickly looked at the lanky detective with wide eyes. "But I told you I'd get lunch with y-"

Sonny raised his hands to show it was fine. "No, no, I've still got work to do." A lie. He was starving. "You go ahead."

"O-okay," Montserrat reached for her bag tucked in one of her drawers then looked to Rafael with a growing smile. "My turn to pay?"

"No, it's on me," he smiled right back at her. He felt awkward with the staring eyes of Sonny so he hoped Montserrat would get a move on already.

"I'll see you later," Montserrat told Sonny as she got up to leave.

"Hey, when is Kara's lunch hour?" Sonny's question earned him a deadpanning look from the ginger woman. "Hey, if you get to go on a date, then I get to go on a date."

"It's not a date," went Montserrat and Rafael simultaneously, quickly exchanging glances with each other to make sure the other knew they didn't think it was a date.

"Fine," Sonny picked his battles carefully and decided Kara would probably have a much better idea on how to go about this. "But seriously, when is her lunch hour?"

"Carisi, leave her alone," Rafael motioned Montserrat to walk ahead, and the look he gave Sonny just made things even more suspicious for Sonny.

Oh, Kara was definitely going to have something to say about this.

~ 0 ~

Steak. Steak was unofficially declared as the favorite meal.

"How could you get barbecue on that?" Rafael crinkled his nose when Montserrat practically savored her barbecued drenched steak.

"The real question is how could you not put barbecue on it," Montserrat smiled widely after swallowing.

"Some of us have taste," Rafael's straight answer made her laugh.

"And some of us are just plain rude. Guess who's who?"

Rafael took that as a tie between them and took more of his plate. It was refreshing to have someone who could keep up with his 'sharp mouth' as Olivia often said he had. As he ate, he watched her cautiously like he was waiting for something. And it seemed like Montserrat knew just what he was waiting for.

"I'm not gonna shout at you again. Gael's not here," she reminded him and reached for her glass.

"But are you...are you doing better now?" he asked slowly, now fully taking Casey's warning to tread lightly on the subject.

Montserrat appreciated his concern. "I'm...better in that I don't feel like shouting at anyone. But Gael's still not speaking to me." And even as she tried to smile a little, it was easy to see how big of a struggle it was.

There were probably plenty ways to start, but for some reason Rafael couldn't think of the right way. "About...about your...your…"

"This is the first time I've seen you speechless, councilor," Montserrat's smile widened, becoming a genuine smile in the process. "Have to say, I like it. But don't do that in court."

Rafael rolled his eyes at her, though her small-time humor did make things easier sometimes for them. "I meant about...Regina?" he watched the sarcasm fade from her face all too fast.

"I have nothing to say about that woman," Montserrat grabbed her glass again, drinking as a form of retreat. It pretty much said the opposite of her words.

"Except it looks like you do." And that was the thing about Rafael, he was trained to be observant. "And the things Gael said…"

"Look," Montserrat tinkered with her glass on the table, "Gael hates our mother. He despises her because she walked out on us when we were kids. Now, h remembers more since he was older, so naturally he has more reason to hate her. He remembers the love and warmth Regina deprived him of...I don't." Her attempt at a careless shrug failed. "I was four. I can't remember her that well except she knitted me this little pink sweater that I used to wear everywhere. And I mean, mothers don't make things like that if they didn't love you, right?"

She knew it was an unfair question to make, putting Rafael on the spot like that (not that he wasn't used to it) but it was something that always nagged at her mind. If her mother went through the trouble of knitting that sweater then it had to mean she did it because she wanted to, because she loved her daughter. It was right... right?

"I shouldn't have asked that," she said once she'd gone through her thoughts twice and realized how out of line it was.

"Yeah, maybe you shouldn't have," Rafael's agreement elicited quite a look from Montserrat. "I mean, it's not like my answer is going to make a difference." He smirked when Montserrat understood his point. "Is it?"

"Sometimes I actually hate you," she muttered though he laughed it off.

"And yet you're still here. How's your lunch by the way?" His not-so-subtle reminder that he was paying for their lunch wasn't made for bad intentions but if not to remind her in general of their little agreements.

You didn't go out for meals with someone you actually hated.

"It's actually very good, thanks…" Montserrat debated whether or not to be very specific about what she was thanking him for since it borderlined a different line of their friendship. "Thank you," she ended up saying anyways, nervously fidgeting in her chair afterwards.

Rafael completely understood her and nodded. "Anytime."

Montserrat found herself smiling more than she should have and quickly looked to her half-eaten food on her plate. "Okay, we're done with the unprofessionalism for now I promise."

"Novak, you don't have to keep worrying about that. Trust me, I finally understand it's not that easy being so detached."

Now that pulled Montserrat's gaze off her food in a millisecond. "I'm sorry, are you saying you were wrong?"

Rafael deadpanned her but even that didn't stop her from looking so wide-eyed. "Don't act like you don't know what I'm talking about," he warned.

"But I'm not acting…"

Rafael searched her face for any indication that she knew of their recent case's problem, but there was nothing. "H-how...you do know about our case at the moment, right?"

"With the shoe model? Yeah, I've been following it like everyone else. Why?"

"Novak you're not kidding me, are you?"

"No, I am not. What did I miss?"

Rafael wondered how out of it Montserrat had to have been for her not to know what their case was doing to him and the squad. So, he began to tell her just how close he was to the suspect in their custody at the moment.

"Wait a minute, so you're friends with our mayor-to-be Alex Muñoz?" Montserrat chuckled at the irony. "Kara loves him. She has me and Sonny already lining up to vote for him."

"Well, Alex is a pretty good candidate," Rafael said as impartially as possible.

"Yeah, and a flirt," Montserrat's statement did not pass well with him.

"Excuse me?"

"I met him outside the DAs building just before meeting with Gael. I only talked to him for like two minutes and it was enough to confirm he is a flirt." Montserrat reached for her glass on the table. "He gave me his number and everything."

"He's married," Rafael said with a deep frown on his face, though the fact Montserrat nearly choked on her drink made him believe she didn't know that detail.

"What?" the poor woman reached for a napkin to dry her mouth. Her big wide eyes looked at him for some explanation.

"He's married and has three daughters. How did you not know that?"

"Because I work a ten hour shift?" Montserrat snapped and cleared her throat. "Hey, I did not flirt with him. You can ask Sonny - he was there. I didn't do anything."

"Maybe you misunderstood Alex's intentions," Rafael said alternatively, though there was something in the pit of his stomach that told him something else that was wrong was already brewing.

Montserrat would have argued that she most certainly did not misread his intentions but he already looked so...conflicted about the case. She didn't want to make things worse. "So, you grew up with these guys?"

Rafael slowly nodded his head. "Yeah…" but even then he still wasn't shifting away from the other topic.

Montserrat tried again and hoped for some luck. "Were you really close? Or was it like a hello-bye basis thing?"

"N-no, um…" Rafael shook his head and got back into the topic at hand. "We grew up together. The three of us. Los tres mosqueteros de Jerome Avenue. The three musketeers of Jerome Avenue."

Montserrat laughed. "Like the three musketeers, that's adorable. And I will be sure to remind you of that whenever you need it. Or when I feel like it."

A smile came to Rafael's face whether he had wanted it or not. "The joy."

"So you guys were like a close a team, then?"

"Mhm. Alex had the heart. I had the mouth, of course-"

"Of course," Montserrat smiled so widely it might have cracked her face in two.

"Eddie had the muscle to protect us when we got into trouble."

"And what kind of trouble did our young ADA get into?"

"Stop it."

"Impossible." Montserrat leveled his look until her lips curled into a smile, which was done in a pretty impressive time. Anyone else would have looked away out of sheer uncomfortableness. Eventually, she gave in but only because she wanted to get to something really important. "I hate to bring it up but please tell me you're not actually wanting us to...look the other way in this case because you happen to know the perp?"

The sheer 'perp' mention made Rafael uncomfortable. He never wanted to believe any of his friends could be capable of some atrocity. "I would never do that. I am only asking that you all get the facts before taking any action."

"...fair enough," Montserrat conceded with a small nod of her head. "But can I ask you something now?"

"Of course."

"How did you know the perp was a friend of yours? My understanding is you don't get involved until we call you and...I distinctly remember you being there when we first brought Eddie in."

"Alex came to talk to me," Rafael said, shrugging his shoulders and missing Montserrat's moment of pause.

"So...our mayor-to-be had time to do all this when he's near the elections?"

Rafael was about to take a drink but paused midway to give Montserrat a look. "What do you mean by that?"

"I'm sorry to say but people in Alex's situation don't really have time to look for anyone's back but their own," Montserrat expected some type of reprimand for her words judging by the look on Rafael's face.

"Eddie's been volunteering for him. He's been driving him around during the campaign and since - like I said before - we are all childhood friends, it's natural we try to help each other out."

"Right," Montserrat was smart enough to know it was time to keep her mouth shut. She didn't know who these men were so she should probably leave that up to Rafael for when the case gets further made. Still, now that she knew more details about the case there were some conflicts she could see coming into play very soon.

Just as they were finishing up their lunch, Rafael heard his phone go off. Soon as he fished it out of his pocket, he saw Olivia's name on the screen. "It's Liv." His tone of voice radiated anxiety so Montserrat assured him she was all done with lunch.

The two returned to the precinct quickly and listened - just like the others - as Olivia and Nick relayed their latest visit to Lindsey. Apparently, she was taking everything back and even adding new details...ones that didn't fit really well.

"Lindsay told you Eddie came into the store with his wife?" Rafael raised an eyebrow at Nick. "No chance. He hasn't seen her in three years. She's partying in Miami…"

"Are you sure?" Nick had still decent suspicion towards their perp and wasn't going to be letting it go just because said perp happened to know their ADA. "Cause he still wears his ring."

"I'm sure. Eddie's... eh, he's just catolico, loyal."

"So Lindsay saw the ring, tried to make up a story," Olivia was on the boat of keeping peace amongst them. "Yeah, then she says that she'd be more comfortable just talking to Nick."

"Because she thinks she has a better chance of working the male partner," Amanda made a face of disapproval, shared by the rest.

"So she's lied to you, tried to manipulate you…" Rafael almost started listing off with his fingers when Nick cut in.

"So did Eddie."

"I know Eddie's story," Rafael said all too quick, warning a mini-glare from Nick. "What's hers? Find out. Now." He gave all of them a sharp look before heading out.

"Great going, I had him relaxed twenty minutes ago," Montserrat made it as a joke but some of them took it to heart.

"Yeah, we heard about your impromptu date from Sonny," Fin said with a tiny of a smirk on his lips.

"It was not a - wait, where's Sonny?" Montserrat looked around for the lanky detective.

"He's with that roommate of yours," Amanda answered her and almost laughed at the wide-eyed look Montserrat did.

"I'll kill him." She huffed and went for her desk to get started on their work.

"Not until after 10 you won't," Olivia said a she passed Montserrat. "I need everyone working on this right now."

Montserrat huffed but obeyed. Of course it didn't help one bit when Sonny returned fifteen minutes later wearing a big smile on his face. Clearly he had a good time. And when she got home that night, Kara would be up and ready to tell Montserrat how much of a good time she had too.

"He just, like... surprised me! He finally brought me to that place he goes to when he brings cannolis! Let me just tell you that they are better fresh at the store - Montse?" Kara paused when she saw the ginger rubbing her temples. Montserrat had a laptop set in front of her but it appeared whatever she'd been looking at was no longer her interest.

"Kara, this is not a good idea," Montserrat dropped her hands to the kitchen table.

"What isn't?"

"You, Sonny...whatever that even is - it's not a good idea."

Kara's eyebrows knitted together. "Why not?"

"Because of it doesn't work out, guess who's gonna be the one that'll be stuck in the middle?" Montserrat swirled her index finger before pointing at herself with it. "Me."

"That's kind of selfish, don't you think?" Kara plopped down at chair next to her.

"No, just being mindful of a potential future."

Kara playfully rolled her eyes. "Well, thank you for your concern but as far as I'm concerned, things are going just fine. It is, after all, my life." Montserrat sighed not so quietly but did concede with Kara on that point. "Besides, if anyone should be mindful of who they go out with, it should be you."

It was Montserrat's turn to be thoroughly confused. "Me? What for?"

A smirk tugged at Kara's lips as she answered the question. "Sonny mentioned that you basically dumped him at lunch today for the ADA."

"I'm seriously going to kill him," Montserrat shook her head. "We won't have to worry about things not working out because he'll be found dead tomorrow morning."

Kara laughed at her roommate's dramatics. "Oh c'mon, he did you a solid. Anyone else would've been on your ass for leaving them right before lunch."

Knowing exactly where Kara was headed at, Montserrat decided to beat her to it and explain the famous lunch she has today. "I still needed to apologize and Rafael suggested we go to lunch-"

"-suggested or asked because Sonny mentioned it was more of an ask-"

"-stop! I'll kill him!"

Kara laughed again. Montserrat slammed her laptop lid shut and moved to get up, prompting Kara to sober quickly. "Okay, okay, I'll stop!" she put one hand over Montserrat's arm. "I honestly thought it was kind of sweet he asked you, even when you've been avoiding him for days. Anyone else would've...well...avoided you too."

Montserrat sighed realizing Kara was right. She let herself fall back into her chair. "Yeah, it was. Rafael has his moments."

"A lot with you," Kara muttered not so quietly. Montserrat practically growled and got up from her chair. She made a beeline for her room. "I'm sorry!" Kara laughing didn't exactly help Montserrat believe her.

"You're a child!" Montserrat shouted before slamming her bedroom door shut.

#rafael barba #svu #rafael barba imagines #ocapp #ocappreciation #svu imagines #rafael barba x oc #svu fanfics #Law & Order SVU #law and order imagine #law & order svu fanfic #oc: Montserrat Novak #oc: Kara Mackie #fic: dare to forget me #Olivia Benson #Sonny Carisi #amanda rollins #fin tutuola

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keelywolfe · 5 years ago

Text

FIC: Playing Games (baon)

Summary: In the aftermath of Internal Disputes, Sans wasn't alone, not when his own thoughts could be haunting him.This wasn't how things were supposed to work, none of it, and there was nothing he would do but wait.

Tags: Kustard, Spicyhoney, Established Relationships, Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Terrorism, Major Character Injury, Hospitals, References to Collaring

Notes: Now, I want you to know that I say this with the greatest sincerity possible, but all you people that got me shipping kustard? I hate you all.

Part of the ‘by any other name’ series.

~~*~~

Read it on AO3

Read it here!

~~*~~

The hospital chairs weren’t bad when it came to comfort, especially if you ran a little shorter in the pants than average. Not that it would’ve mattered much if they weren’t, Sans was well-trained in how to get to sleep in any and all places, knew exactly how to curl up in a folding chair for maximum comfort, no matter how hot or cold the climate got around him.

Tonight, he was only too tired to sleep. That didn’t matter either, he’d been worse off plenty of times before. Only thing that mattered was that Paps was the one sleeping, and that was enough of a topsy-turvy to make Sans want to check they hadn’t missed an exit and were still in the right universe.

Probably were; from what Stretch said, when you first took a sideways step into another world, you could feel the wrongness of it in your bones. His bones felt shaky and sore, a fine litter of bruises all along his side where he’d hit the asphalt, but none of them were sending out Morse code squawking that the sky was falling, so they were all right there. Chicken Little would have to wait for another day, though maybe he’d check in with Stretch’s little flock, see how their bones were feeling--

Sans ran a weary hand down his face, smelling the lingering smoky char. Fuck, he was tired.

In the hospital bed surrounded by machines and IV’s, Papyrus was lying perfectly still, and it was so fucking wrong to see. Even when he was sleeping Paps usually twisted and turned like he was training for the next Olympics. That little quirk cost Sans plenty of his own sleep when they were kids, nights huddled together for warmth beneath a threadbare blanket and all the while his baby bones bro tried to sleepwalk a watusi up his spine.

Sometimes Sans missed that little kid.

The fancy suit Papyrus always wore when he was playing ambassador was gone, replaced by a hospital issue gown that would give a peepshow of his pelvis when he stood. His old clothes were past the dry cleaning stage, scorched all the way up his spine and yeah, that sight was gonna haunt Sans’s dreams a coupla times in the near future, as was the bitter taste of his own soul in his throat when he crawled over to him, all the dazed moans and screams around them as he clung to his brother, frantically checking him over.

Yeah, let’s close that scene and set the memory box aside for those upcoming dreams to rifle through. No need to re-live the nightmare during the daytime, too.

Sans shifted in the chair, pulling his bare, bony feet up onto the cushion. He hadn’t changed his own clothes yet; about all he’d managed was kicking off his shoes, his filthy socks draped over them like the peels of the world’s most disgusting fruit. His travel outfit was a lil’ different than his bros, a hoodie and shorts were about as fancy as he cared to get, maybe a pair of sunglasses if he was feeling particularly feisty about it.

That getup was fine for someone on security team, something Papyrus very much was not, and Sans was planning to have a nice, long chat about that with him whenever his brother finally woke up.

He was gonna wake up and Sans was gonna be here waiting when he did, thanks.

As if magnetically drawn, a compass endlessly searching for north, Sans’s eye lights slid back to the bed towards his sleeping brother. His skull was still abnormally pale against the pillowcase, a revealing sign of magic drain despite the IV steadily dripping at his bedside. So very pale, except for the fine line of a fresh crack running down the side of his skull. Barely visible, really, someone who didn’t know any better might mistake it for a cranial suture.

Sans knew better.

It’d been a lot worse before Tori started in on it, crawling over to them through the rubble on the tarmac, ignoring shouts to stay down and her normally pristine white fur had been filthy, hands already caked with crimson marrow even as she reached out to Papyrus. The ugly wound Sans could barely stand to look at vanished beneath a thick green glow and that little crack was all that was left, a souvenir of Papyrus’s first trip to California. His brother had slumped to the ground after, those thready, pained moans fading. He’d been unconscious ever since.

He was gonna be fine; both Tori and Blue told Sans’s that over and over on the plane ride home, gonna be just fine. He was out cold was all, used up his magic down to the last dregs generating enough of a shield to cover himself and two other people besides. Right now it was nothing but a waiting game, Sans moving his pawn across the board until he landed on the ‘good morning, sunshine’ spot.

Just fine, sure, and Sans believed them. But he really wished he could roll doubles right now and speed up the process.

Most of his thoughts were either being firmly suppressed or focused the still figure laying on the bed, but Sans did manage to spare one or two leftover balls from the ones he was mentally juggling to wondered tiredly how Stretch was holding up. He’d been eating shit sandwiches himself this weekend, and now honey boy was topping it off with big ol’ slice of disaster pie. At least Sans had the luxury of being with his bro from the get-go. Trying to picture how he’d feel knowing only the bare details of what’d happened sent a cold frisson through his soul. That was enough for him to offer sending Edge out in the first ambulance; at least he was with his brother, Edge and Blue were both stuck in limbo all the way home.

Besides, he’d gotten to see plenty of the show on the flight home in the moments when Edge wavered into brief wakefulness. No wonder he never wanted to smoke weed or even drink much. They’d doped him to the gills without mercy, and now Sans was gonna have to live with an eternity of regret that the loss of his phone meant he didn’t get a chance to record Edge massacring a heartfeltly sung rendition of ‘I Want It That Way’.

Since Tori and Blue were no fun at all and refused to do it either, seemed the best option was to send Edge out and hope Stretch got a front row seat to the second act.

That show had been a helluva lot better than the inflight movie Edge’d given them on the way out. Stoic and distant since the second he’d gotten on the plane, a fuckton more so than usual. Wasn’t until Blue snuck in a whisper to Sans what was up that he got it. Anniversary tomorrow, yeah, husband back home while he got stuck playing lead babysitter with Sans as backup ‘cause Red was off saving the world or catching an early bird sale, some bullshit, anyway.

(not thinking about red, better not to, better to not)

Stretch probably pitched a bitchfit about Edge tagging along without him and Sans hadn’t registered to vote in this election, but he was gonna go with Stretch as his candidate. There was no good reason he could think of to make Stretch stay home past paperwork and pissiness, and the fact that Blue thought his Papy staying home was the better choice told him all he needed to about that.

They’d been Aboveground for a few years now and Stretch was nowhere near as bad off as he’d been back when they’d first shown up on the doorstep back in Snowdin. He’d gone the good boy route, got himself a therapist and everything. He was happy, anyone could see that, and HP issues aside, it was ‘bout time to cut the apron strings let Stretch mess up his own cooking.

Edge was better about it than Blue, but looked like he was still trying to play sous chef ‘cause Stretch wasn’t on the plane. Their fearless leader had put up a good front, but any moron could see he was upset, and Sans wasn’t just any idiot on the street. Whatever his reasoning, Edge obviously wasn’t happy about leaving his honey behind.

Welp, Sans had a feeling Edge wasn’t super eager to add Stretch to the roster now. Not after spending some quality time laying on the crumbled tarmac waiting for a stretcher, banged up and bandaged the best they could manage on the fly while the Human side of the contingency ran around squawking out orders, getting everything on lockdown. Trying to keep everything on the down-low until they could get a proper press release in order, yeah, that was the right procedure.

Sans still didn’t have a single qualm about slipping Edge that phone so he could let Stretch know he was okay. ‘Course he’d probably scared him shitless the way he started rambling on like it was his deathbed confession hour instead of just saying ‘alive and kicking’, oops, but eh, couldn’t win ‘em all.

Sans wasn’t winning a lot of ‘em lately.

The stack of blankets were tucked around Papyrus with generous care, but Sans got up and went over to him, anyway, smoothing the imaginary wrinkles in covers. His hands were beneath the blanket, the better to keep them toasty warm. Probably for the best, it was bad enough having to look at his skull, that single ragged crack. If he had to keep looking at his bro’s bruised, battered knuckles, Sans might go nuts.

It wasn’t supposed to be this way. It was his duty to play big bro, his, he’d taken that on years ago while he was still in his own striped shirt, his very first job. He was the one in Security, he was the one who was supposed to fucking protect, and even if Sans thought maybe he’d fucked that up a time or two before, suspected that there was a memory he didn’t possess, a

(reset)

past that wasn’t theirs. But he’d been keeping up their end of the bargain since his bro decided to be an Ambassador and Paps wasn’t supposed to break it, he fucking wasn’t—

The door creaking made Sans jerk, heat rushing to his fingertips in a heady blurt of magic for an attack that stopped forming the moment he saw who it was. He took a long, slow breath, shaking away his exhausted agitation the best he could, cause he was going to need every wit that hadn’t been blown away in the explosion to deal with this.

Red was standing in the doorway, his hands in his pockets. The light pouring in behind him cast him in shadow except for the smoldering glow of his eye lights burning out from his sockets.

Sans only ignored his awful horror movie impression and wandered back to his chair, crawling up to settle on the cushion with a weary sigh.

"you done with skulking around trying not to talk to me?" Sans asked. He didn't mean to sound as pissy as he did, but did Red really think he wouldn't notice? On the plane, outside the ambulance, even here, Red'd been all over, watching but not getting close.

No answer came, no sardonic comeback, no angry snarl. Red stepped into the room and closed the door behind him with disturbing care. Probably only playing at kindness for Papyrus’s sake, but something about his expression was unnerving, the lines of his face laid out in a way that Sans didn’t know.

He came close to the chair without reaching, only stood there, hands visibly fisted in his pockets. Crimson eye lights resting on Sans, but more like Red was looking through, like Sans wasn’t even there and Red’s gaze was laser-focused on the wall behind him.

“came to tell you i’m taking off for a while,” Red said, every word filled with deliberate indifference, “dunno how long.”

Sans only nodded. “yeah. thought you might.”

“wanted to see if you’d keep an eye on that fucking cat of mine.” Again, nothing but cool detachment, Red speaking to the wall and expecting answers.

He made no mention of asking Edge and Sans didn’t either. “sure, why not, i could use a few more scrapes for my collection. maybe i can trip over him on the stairs, add a few broken bones to the tab.”

There, a veritable hit; Red winced visibly, the distance in his gaze wavering. It was almost fascinating, really, watching with his own detached interest as Red tried to force it back. Must be a sign of his own shaken control, all of it unraveling, snapping into its proper place as he actually looked at Sans.

Sans had a pretty good idea what Red was seeing. The force of the explosion had thrown them all to the ground in spite of any shields, leaving behind a nice collection of mottled bruises and bloody scrapes to share around. His own pain had been secondary, unnoticed until they’d been shoved back on the plane for a ride straight back home. He’d been sitting next to Paps when Tori came over, watching the metronome precision of the rise and fall of his rib cage like only the force of his will was keeping his brother breathing.

The cold wetness against his skull had stung and it was only then that he noticed his own hurts. He’d sat there and concentrated on keeping Papyrus breathing, let Tori gently clean him up the best that she could.

So he didn’t have any illusions about what kind of eye candy he was right now. Another note of interest that Red didn’t seem to be able to look away, the minute flicker of his eye lights moving as they traced over those bruises and scrapes.

“i need to go,” Red repeated, but that indifference was wavering, seeping away, leaving behind something that was almost pleading. Huh. How about that. “i gotta. this is my fault. i’ve gotta—"

“listen to the ego on you,” Sans snorted. “even you can't know everything.”

“no, you don't fucking get it.” Shattered desperation, like nothing Red ever showed. Seemed like those walls Red kept up weren’t quite as impervious as Sans always thought; words were spilling out of him, vomited out in pained rush. “i didn't have shit going on here. i didn't come along on this trip because i knew you'd go without me and i…i wanted you away. for a couple days. wanted some time to get my head on straight and i didn’t give a shit who i pissed off to get it, i—"

Yeah, Sans could believe that. Fucked over his own brother and Stretch, and why not? It was only to get out of a Security detail that would’ve left him sharing a hotel room with Sans, left them out in the open in front of everyone. Made them obvious in a way that somehow Red didn’t think they’d been before, fooling no one but himself, but it was a lie Red somehow needed.

Knowing that was a different sort of bruise, on his soul instead of his bones, and every word out of Red was giving it a rough press. It was satisfying in a strange way, to know Red was panicking over him, made him want to feel it again.

"all right,” Sans said calmly.

"no, it ain't all right!" Red snarled, his voice cracking, breaking, breathing too heavily. "if I hadn't've fucked off--"

"then you would've been there instead of edge and it would all have happened the same way." He felt oddly serene, floating in his own peculiar calm. "you're one person. even you can't be everywhere and know everything. ‘sides, if that’s your fault, this is mine.” He flung his hand out like an attack at the hospital room, towards his brother lying unconscious in front of him. “’m getting sloppy, should’ve reacted faster.”

Red twitched, stepping closer, grasping that line of thought with eager gratitude, “reacted to what? how did my brother know? toriel ain’t sure and neither was blue—"

“intent.” Sans shivered, remembering the prickle of it washing over him, virulent hate that came a bare second too late for him to react. The memory of it made him remember something else, a delirious question forgotten in the aftermath, “didn’t think edge could beat me when it came to sensing intent.”

Red waved that off. “he’s been practicing ever since andy got turned into a pincushion outside that chinese place. what else?”

Of course he was, Edge probably spent his lunch hour wandering the streets to see how much hate he could pick up, that was a filling meal. “it was coming from the driver. edge was a lot closer to the car, he must’ve felt it before i did. he yelled for everyone to get down but by then, paps already had me face first on the asphalt.” He shrugged, trying not to think too deeply of the wash of vicious heat, the sound of it, the screams, fuck, all the screams— “after that, it gets a little explody. i can still hear it a little, it’s like listening to a seashell lodged in my head. doc said it might take a day or two for the echo to fade out.”

“that it?” Red’s gaze bore into him.

“that’s all i’ve got,” Sans drawled sourly. He turned in the seat, lounging with deliberate casualness, his legs hanging over the arm. “that’s the shit, the whole shit, and nothing but the shit. so that happened and our bros got hurt, yeah, but they’re gonna be fine. so, now, you wanna take off and go headhunting? you go on ahead. play your little game, start following your clues. just remember after paps wakes up and i can see he’s okay? i’m coming to find you.”

Red had been nodding along and Sans could see the moment realization bled through, the indignant rasp as he snapped out, “the fuck you are!”

“the fuck i’m not,” Sans countered, tauntingly. He ran his tongue over his teeth, tasting his own sweat, the bitterness of smoky residue as he goaded, “how are you gonna stop me? ask edge to chase me down while he plays hop along cassidy on some crutches?” Fury was sparking in Red’s eye lights like a firecracker as Sans went on with fractured glee, “he’ll be a coupla weeks recovering, you know. even you harping on him to get up and play protector ain’t gonna change that. gonna tattle on me to asgore, gonna lock me up? tie me to your bed?” Sans tapped a finger against his cheek bone pensively, a mockery of thinking, “or maybe i won’t go after you at all. maybe i’ll see about playing a little on my own.”

Ah, that, that right there. Sans could feel the impotent fury rolling off of Red, about the only time he couldn’t get it up, hands flexing as if he wished there was something in them and for a distant moment, he thought Red might actually attack him and wouldn’t that make for an interesting problem to explain.

Then it was gone, all that anger and frustration swallowed into nothingness. Interesting how Red managed to break without so much as changing expression. Must be a gift.

“you win,” Red said abruptly.

“we playin’ something?” Sans asked lightly,

“only with our lives. ain’t like anything important.” There was a sharp prick of frustrated anger in that, wasn’t all gone, then, only banked. A point Red proved by stalking forward to take Sans’s chin in two sharp fingers, yanked it up. Crimson eye lights searched Sans’s face and he couldn’t begin to wonder what they hoped to find. “you even know what you’re getting into here?”

“i’ve been fucking you for over a year.”

“i ain’t talking about fucking.” Those searing eye lights pierced deeply into him, crawling over the depths of his soul. “do you know?”

Deliberately, Sans lifted his chin more, exposing the bones of his cervical vertebrae. Red’s gaze dropped, lingered over them with hypnotic weight, and his fingers followed, coiling around Sans’s throat like a metaphor.

“if you like it, then you shoulda put a collar on it,” Sans said, soft and singsong. “i’ve been fucking you for over a year, fucking around three times that, you think i don’t know? collar me, claim me. may as well, i ain’t going anywhere, anyways.”

Red shuddered, lurching forward another step and his fingers tightening convulsively, not quite painlessly. “collar you? like you’d be fucking obedient.”

“from what i saw of you wearing one, i always figured the obedience part was an optional add-on. besides, at least i’m housebroken.”

The thin fingers around his throat tightened again, so very close to choking and Sans only shivered, yearning into that grip even as Red whispered with low, virulent intensity, “should’ve known i couldn’t keep dodging you forever.”

Red leaned in, but not for a kiss. His mouth was suddenly hot on Sans’s collarbone, dragging over I, uncaring of the sweat and filth coating him. Sharp teeth nicked tantalizingly against bone and Sans couldn’t hold back a cry, edged with a near sob because he wasn’t supposed to get this, he wasn’t, wasn’t supposed to have this suddenly thrust into his lap like a gift. His magic gave stirring an unfortunate try, but he was thankfully too tired to demo how much his psyche was absolutely going for the sweet threat in that touch.

"i wanna to keep you," Red muttered, mostly to himself, something like desperation curling around every word. Sans answered anyway, mumbling mindlessly.

"okay. okay, yeah."

"wanna keep anyone else from touching you,” whispered against him, a promise, a threat, Sans didn’t know. Red’s tongue was winding around his clavicles, sharp fingertips tearing Sans’s t-shirt, exposing more. “wanna put my collar you, warn the whole world that you're mine."

"yeah," Sans breathed brokenly. His hands move of their own accord, not bothering to ask for permission as they clutch at Red’s shoulders, blunt fingertips digging into the leather of his coat with creaking force.

"That sounds very romantic and potentially disturbing, but may I ask if you could do that in your bedroom and not here in front of me?"

Sans came pretty fucking close to kicking Red to the floor as he jerked up to see his brother’s sockets open, blinking at them owlishly. It wasn’t even a thought to scramble down and go to him; reaching for Papyrus was as automatic as drawing a breath. His brother reached back and if his hands were shaking a little, if there was something tremulous and almost fragile in that touch, Sans didn’t care.

His brother was awake and reaching for him, pulling him up on the bed and into his arms.

“Hush, there’s no need to cry,” Papyrus scolded gently, but he held on to Sans with enough force to get his bruises singing out an Ava Maria. “I’m perfectly all right and even if I’m not, you are, so that’s fine.”

“that is so not fine, paps, it is completely the opposite of fine,” Sans wiped away embarrassing flood of tears, sniveling humiliatingly into his sleeve even as Papyrus flailed and tried to reach for the box of Kleenex on the bedside table. “me and red are the ones working in the security department, we—”

He turned back to the chair, trailing off when he found it empty.

Well, shit.

“know something, bro?” Sans sighed out, even as he settled into his brother’s arms. “that whole vanishing thing is fucking annoying when i’m not the one doing it.”

Papyrus smoothed a hand down his spine, more gentle than not, and if he had an inkling of what he just interrupted, he was kind enough not to ask. “Never fear, brother, you are always fucking annoying whether you’re trying or not.”

Probably true. Hearing his brother swear was always enough to give his soul a seizure, even if he knew Papyrus only did it to get a rise out of him. He needed to go find one of the docs, let him know Paps was awake and there were probably tests that needed to be run, x-rays maybe, who the fuck knew.

It could wait a minute. Right now, the only place his soul wanted to be was right here.

But later, he thought maybe he had some dice to roll. Some asshole in a stupid hat once said the game was afoot and now that he knew there was a chance?

Sans was playing to win.

-finis-

#kustard #spicyhoney #papcest #keelywolfe #underfell #underswap #underfell papyrus #underswap papyrus #by any other name

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ladylynse · 5 years ago

Text

Part IX of The Trouble with Ghosts [FF | AO3] for @queenofhearts7378! Sorry this took me forever.

Lancer hadn’t realized how closely young Mr. Fenton’s school troubles–and the secrets he surely wasn’t telling his parents–were tied to ghosts until after that encounter with Phantom.

<< < Part IX >

-|-

Lancer still expected a denial, even as Phantom shrunk into himself and hung his head.

It never came.

He’d thought it would. Somehow, after all of this, he’d thought it would. That was…easier than this, really. He’d rather think Phantom had enlisted Danny Fenton’s help and taught him how to fight. He’d rather their wounds were simply similar, left from having the same holes in their defenses. He wished the injuries weren’t identical, that they weren’t the same injuries. It would be so much easier if they weren’t.

He still didn’t understand.

Not really.

But whether it was some sort of strong connection or if the worst had really happened, if the accident Phantom had mentioned had led to poor Mr. Fenton’s death….

“Danny.” Lancer didn’t know who he meant anymore. Fenton or Phantom. One or both. It didn’t matter. “You can’t avoid this forever.”

“But I’m not ready.” The words were whispered. “I don’t want forever. I know that probably won’t happen. I just want not now. Some other time.”

Lancer sighed. “Running and hiding won’t solve your problems.”

“No.” The admission was barely audible. “It’ll buy me time, though.”

But at what cost?

“Jazz will come up with something else,” he insisted. “They’re not…. They can’t be the priority right now. I’m more worried about Vlad, about…this.” He straightened up again. “You don’t get it, Mr. Lancer. You can’t just ignore Vlad’s power.”

He very clearly didn’t get much of this situation, but at least the issue with the mayor was on more familiar ground.

“I don’t intend to ignore it. Ignoring one’s problems does not make them go away. But neither does avoiding them.”

Phantom—Danny—blew out a breath. “Okay, okay. I know. I’ll come up with something to tell them if Jazz doesn’t. But seriously. Vlad. I don’t know how strong my ecto-signature is when I’m like this. I don’t know if it’s suppressed at all, like everything else, but even if it is, the Red Huntress will be able to find me with her ghost tracker if she gets close enough. And she might try to confirm that I’m here when she’s not suited up, which is why you can’t tell anyone.”

Lancer raised an eyebrow. “Or you could tell me who she is so I won’t make any mistakes.”

Danny shook his head. “No. That’s her secret, not mine. No matter how many times you ask, I’m not going to tell you.”

“Then do you have a solution to propose that doesn’t involve me turning you out?”

Danny groaned. “C’mon, it can’t be that hard for you to trust me now that you know, right? I’ve dealt with this kind of thing before. Vlad’s hit me with this kind of thing before—”

“That is not the impression you gave me earlier.”

“It wasn’t as long lasting, but it still did this, whatever this is. And I’m feeling a lot better than I was yesterday. I don’t think anyone besides Vlad’s gonna come after me like this—even Skulker isn’t big on easy prey when he’s not the reason behind it—so I can just give him and the Red Huntress the slip—”

“Either you are staying right where you are or I am going with you.”

“But Vlad—”

“I’ve taken the mandatory ghost-hunting courses.”

Danny snorted. “Dad taught those courses.” It was still jarring to hear him say it, to have it confirmed yet again, but he was continuing on before Lancer had a chance to say something. “He couldn’t teach anyone to aim properly, even if he could explain what you need to do. And even if he could, that wouldn’t help you with Vlad.”

“I’m not planning to go head-to-head with the mayor,” Lancer said dryly, “but I do think I could hold my own against some of his hired help if it comes to it.”

Danny did not bother to hide the blatant doubt on his face, but he didn’t push it. Instead, he said, “Vlad wants me because of who I am and what I am. And he probably understands what I am better than I do. But my parents don’t know that. They think he gave up everything to do with ghosts back in their university days. Moved on to greener pastures. But he didn’t. He just got better at hiding his tracks.”

“You’ve alluded to as much before.”

“Yeah, but I don’t know if it’s really sunk in for you. Mr. Lancer, he’s fooled so many people. And if something comes up that makes him look bad, he’ll find a way to turn it back on whoever it was. If he finds out you’re helping me, he can probably get you fired. For ‘colluding with ghosts’ or something like that. He’s gotta have some pull with the school board; all he’d need to do is threaten to withhold some promised donation money or something like that.”

Lancer sincerely doubted Danny was aware of how much Mr. Masters’s donations helped with the cleanup and repair costs from all the ghost fights, but he supposed it wasn’t difficult to deduce.

“Are you really willing to risk your job, your life, on this?”

Lancer let out a slow breath. “I’m sorry you think so little of me,” he said quietly, “that you do not think I am willing to practice what I preach. I want the best for my students, and yes, even though we are no longer in a school setting, I will risk my life to protect you. This is not simply lip service for me. I have many colleagues across the country who take similar risks, and we do not take our responsibilities lightly.”

Danny stared at him, and Lancer had the feeling he still wasn’t entirely believed.

“It takes a village, remember?” he prodded gently. “Not everything must be done on your own. So, please, for your sake if no one else’s, tell me what I need to know to help you.”

Danny bit his lip. Then, finally, “Vlad’s…obsessed.”

Lancer fought the urge to roll his eyes. “You have been implying that,” he said, allowing a bit of testiness to leak into his tone. There was only so much he could do, so many ways he could break it down. If Danny still refused to tell him everything, well, then Lancer would just have to face whatever the danger was with blinders on and hope for the best.

“No, I mean, I think he’s actually obsessed. And…. I don’t know if he realizes that. If he can realize that. I don’t…. I’ve never asked if you can recognize it in yourself, or if it’s just so much a part of who you are that you can’t see it.”

This time, Lancer waited instead of prompting Danny further.

He wasn’t entirely sure he understood enough to properly prompt him, anyway.

“Something happened to him. Back in his college days, I mean. And he basically cut all ties with my parents until that reunion he hosted last year. But ever since he reconnected with them, ever since he found out about me, he’s just gotten so much worse. Like he can’t stop himself. He’s…. It’s bad, Mr. Lancer.”

“He is as intent on hunting you down as your parents, then?” Lancer asked cautiously. “Simply with more skill and knowledge of the whole story on his side?”

“No, I mean, I said before, he doesn’t want to kill me. At least, I don’t think he does. He just…. He’s tried to clone me. And it’s gone wrong, really wrong, but he keeps trying. He does some accelerated growth thing and…. I dunno. I don’t understand it. But he seems to have gotten the idea in his head that if he can’t have me, some lookalike is the next best thing. Except he still wants me me. To be his son.” Perhaps catching the expression on Lancer’s face, Danny nodded. “Yeah, he’s some seriously crazed up fruit loop.”

Lancer thought over Danny’s words and chose his next ones carefully. “You don’t believe he realizes how far he’s gone? How many lines he’s crossed?”

Danny shook his head. “And the Red Huntress doesn’t know what I am. She just thinks I’m the ghost that ruined her life. She won’t figure out the truth until it’s too late. And the ghosts like Skulker, well, I’m just kinda in their way. Most of them won’t care if I’m gone.”

“Maybe you should tell her.”

“What?”

“The Red Huntress. Maybe you should tell her. If you can’t bring yourself to tell your parents yet, start with her. You’ve worked together in the past. She’ll listen. I can back you up.”

“Uh….”

“Or would you rather I call the emergency hotline your parents set up and give them the information about their son that they’re so desperately looking for?”

“Isn’t that blackmail?”

“Isn’t it in your best interest?”

“Not really. The truth isn’t exactly great for either of us. The current dynamic is better. She’s, um, not going to be as hurt this way as she would be if she knew the truth.”

Danny genuinely seemed to believe his words, if the quiet acceptance in his tone was anything to go by. Frankly, Lancer found it rather astounding. He couldn’t seem to see the parallels, perhaps didn’t want to see them, and had managed to convince himself that keeping himself in danger—Lancer would call it mortal peril if anyone else were involved—was better for everyone, himself included.

He didn’t want to be a bother.

Didn’t want to rock the boat.

Truly believed keeping all of this to himself protected others.

“You do realize,” Lancer said, “that the Red Huntress—and your parents—would be hurt far more if they realized the truth only once it was too late?”

Danny didn’t meet his eye. Lancer was prepared to keep pressing this point—he was determined to keep bringing it up until he made some progress on that front—but then the doorbell rang, and he wasn’t prepared to leave someone standing on his doorstep. After all, it was just as likely to be Mr. and Mrs. Fenton trying a new tactic to find their son as it was some door-to-door salesman or a volunteer knocking on doors to see if he would support Mr. Masters in the next municipal election.

Who he found, however, was one of his students.

Valerie Gray.

She looked as surprised to see him as he was to see her.

“Miss Gray,” he said, “aren’t you supposed to be in school?”

“It’s lunch,” she said, and he wondered how he could have forgotten that when he’d used it as an excuse to visit Phantom. Danny. “I’m selling chocolate covered almonds on my break to raise money for my dojo. Three dollars a box if you’re interested.” She held one up and shook it for emphasis.

“I…yes. I’ll take a box.” Where had he left his wallet? It wasn’t in his pocket, and he didn’t have any spare change on him. He couldn’t just leave her standing on the stoop like this. “Come in for a moment, Miss Gray. I believe I have some change on the counter.”

She slipped inside without further prompting. “I’ll put your almonds on the table,” she said, and he nodded in acknowledgement even as he began to search for the coins he could’ve sworn had been there last week. “Do you mind if I use your washroom? I’ll be quick.”

“Down the hall to your right,” he answered. He was trying to remember what martial arts training she had; hadn’t she done an assignment on that earlier in the year? He remembered that she was skilled at it, whatever it was. Tetslaff praised Valerie’s skill in gym more often than not, though she always made a point of it whenever one of the others expressed concern about Valerie stretching herself too thin.

They all saw the strain she was under, of course. Being teachers did not make them blind to the social whiplash she must have faced with her fall from grace. It was no secret that Paulina no longer considered her a friend, now that Valerie was among the working class, just as it was no secret that Valerie had had to pick up a job in the hopes of paying for college. They were doing what they could for her, just as they were for all their students—offering make up exams and extensions when circumstances demanded it and letting their students know about scholarship opportunities and the like—but he hadn’t realized she’d been able to keep up her martial arts training. Did Elmerton have a volunteer group at its community centre? Perhaps Valerie taught in her spare time, trying to cash in on how good such a thing would look on university and scholarship applications….

“Danny? What are you doing here?”

Lancer’s heart jumped into his throat even as his fingers finally closed upon the stash of quarters that had somehow made their way behind his coffee pot.

Valerie had turned left, not right.

“Your parents are looking for you everywhere!” Valerie exclaimed as Lancer headed down the hallway, desperate to make the best of the situation.

He hadn’t entirely expected to walk into the spare bedroom and find Danny Fenton staring back at him with pleading eyes.

Danny Fenton.

With, as before, the very same injuries as Phantom.

He’d been such a fool.

Lancer cleared his throat. “As you can see, Mr. Fenton is a little worse for the wear. He, ah, tried to help me during a ghost attack.” It wasn’t a lie. He still wasn’t entirely sure how, but it wasn’t a lie. “That did not work out for him. I thought it best that he rest before heading home.”

Valerie narrowed her eyes. “Why not just take him to the hospital? Or at least call Mr. and Mrs. Fenton?”

“I’m afraid I wasn’t aware that they were searching for him.” She didn’t believe him; he could read that much on her face. He doubted anyone in Amity Park was unaware that Mr. and Mrs. Fenton were missing their son. “Rest assured, I will correct this oversight as soon as possible.”

It wasn’t a good excuse, even in Amity Park, and they all knew it.

She could get him fired for this if she tried. It wouldn’t be difficult for her to spin it just the wrong way if she so desired. He didn’t think she would—at least, he hoped she wouldn’t—but he wasn’t exactly everyone’s favourite teacher, either.

“It’s not his fault,” Danny whispered, drawing their attention. “I asked him not to tell Mom and Dad. Or to take me to the hospital.”

Valerie did not bother to hide the incredulous look on her face.

“I got hurt in a ghost fight, Val,” Danny said. “How do you think my parents would take that?”

He wasn’t lying. He was managing to tell her the truth while making it seem something it wasn’t, and he was doing it with terrifying ease. Lancer was, of course, very familiar with Danny Fenton’s outright lies. They were awful. These…weren’t.

These selected truths made it painfully clear how he could have been mistaken.

Valerie made a face. “They’d probably try to send you to school with weapons that you’d then get confiscated.”

“Only if I’m lucky enough that they didn’t quarantine me at home for a week first to make sure I didn’t get contaminated or something because I wasn’t wearing a HAZMAT suit.”

A HAZMAT suit. Like Phantom wore. Like Jack and Maddie Fenton wore.

He really had been a fool.

“A week wouldn’t be bad if it meant avoiding that in the future,” Valerie said, looking him up and down.

Danny’s mouth twisted into something that wasn’t quite a smile, even by Lancer’s low standards. “Trust me, whatever they did to me, it wouldn’t avoid stuff like this. That possibility’s always going to be in my future. I’m a Fenton, after all.”

And a phantom. Another similarity he hadn’t put together. He wondered if anyone had. Jazz, perhaps, if Danny hadn’t simply told her and his friends, and he supposed that would’ve been the only way for Vlad Masters to know about him. Danny certainly wouldn’t have volunteered information like that to someone who had practically been a stranger.

Especially not when he was so reluctant to tell the truth to those he was close to when it would help him.

“You really think the ghosts are going to target you for that? I’ve never seen them do that in the past.”

Maybe she hadn’t, but she—like the rest of them—clearly hadn’t seen a lot of things that had happened in the past.

“Really?” Danny asked, raising an eyebrow. “Aren’t you forgetting the last time my parents went all over town looking for me?”

Valerie winced. “Okay, fine, but I’ve been keeping an eye on you and Jazz, and you guys don’t seem to get it worse than anyone else. Everyone got that weird ghost flu. Except for, like, you and Tucker. How did you guys get around that, anyway?”

Why was she keeping such a close eye out that she’d know that?

Danny shrugged, not finding anything odd about Valerie’s words. Lancer wondered if there was something else he was missing or if this was simply how teenagers—friends—talked these days. Given that this was Amity Park, it very well might be standard practice to watch each other’s backs. More so than anywhere else, at least.

“Probably some combination of luck and Tuck’s fear of doctor’s offices and everything else. Anyway, what are you doing here? You don’t have any reason to be hiding out.”

“My dojo’s having a fundraiser.”

“You’re still doing that?” Danny asked. “You’ve got, like, a ninth-degree black belt. How many are there?”

Lancer blinked. He hadn’t remembered that Miss Gray was quite so adept at martial arts.

Valerie crossed her arms. “Ten.”

“Is that even attainable?”

Valerie smirked. “Not for someone who doesn’t work their butt off for years and years.”

Lancer hadn’t even realized it was possible to attain a black belt by high school, let alone anything past the first degree.

“I mean, it’s not something I’ll get for a long time, but I definitely won’t get it if I don’t do stuff like this. Three bucks a box for chocolate covered almonds. You in?”

“You know me, Val. I’m broke. I’m lucky I can scrape together enough to grab something at the Nasty Burger. Sorry. You’ll have to hit up Jazz when you get back to school, though. She’s got a sweet tooth and always carries cash.”

Lancer thought this as good a time as any to break back into the conversation, so he cleared his throat and held out the change to Valerie. “I hope you don’t mind that it’s in quarters.”

“I can keep track of it,” she said, pocketing the money. “Thanks.”

She lingered, eyes darting around the room even though Danny’s never left her face.

She was looking for something.

He was waiting to see what she would do.

“Is there something else I can help you with, Miss Gray?”

She seemed to have forgotten her earlier request for the washroom because she shook her head. “No, sorry, Mr. Lancer. I’ll go. I’ll, um, see you soon. Get better, Danny, okay?”

“Quick as I can,” he promised, and Valerie slipped past him, still looking around as she headed back to the front door.

He knew he should follow behind her and lock it after she’d gone, but he was starting to realize that wouldn’t help him in the slightest.

She’d come here looking for something, and even if Danny believed her story about fundraising, believed she could have a ninth-degree black belt at her age, Lancer was beginning to see that not everything added up.

He didn’t doubt that Valerie had been trained in the martial arts. Even if it weren’t for Tetslaff’s praise of her in the staff room, her overall fitness made that clear enough. And he knew of her grit, her determination, her sheer strength of will; even in English class, that came through.

But she hadn’t come here to sell him chocolates.

She hadn’t come here to recruit his help to look for her missing classmate.

She hadn’t asked to use the washroom because she’d needed it, nor because she was just idly curious and wanted to poke around his house now that she was here.

Like Danny, Valerie’s grades had also slipped. Not as much, not so drastically, and he’d always attributed it to the turmoil that had befallen her and her father in their personal lives. He didn’t need to know the whole story to see its effects. She wasn’t getting as much sleep. She was tired, worn out, even considering how busy she was kept at her job at the Nasty Burger; she certainly wasn’t the first student to take on a job like that in high school to begin saving for college.

Except it was more than that.

There were her vehement essays—when he gave the class the freedom to choose their topics, within reason—on the trouble with ghosts. The insistence that Phantom, considered by many a hero, was anything but. The biased view (despite presenting sources) that was clearly tainted by her own life experiences and the rhetoric spouted by the Fentons.

The Red Huntress will be able to find me with her ghost tracker if she gets close enough.

The fact that she had come here looking for something and not found it.

Something that had led her straight to Danny.

To Phantom.

She might try to confirm that I’m here when she’s not suited up.

And the fact that, now that he thought about it, Valerie disappeared nearly as often as Danny these days.

And if Danny wasn’t hiding anywhere except plain sight….

“Danny.” Would he even get the truth if he asked? “Do we need to be worried?”

Surprise froze on Danny’s face. He was too slow to rearrange his features into mild confusion. “What?”

“Do we need to be worried?” He wasn’t going to say I or you, not after his insistence that they were in this together, whether Danny liked it or not.

“What are you talking about?”

Oh, for The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, he knew exactly what Lancer was talking about.

“About Miss Gray,” he ground out, his understanding that Danny simply wanted to protect someone else’s secret not outweighing the fact that Valerie was also one of his teenaged students who was routinely risking her life. “About her benefactor. About the fact that she must be suspicious about something, even if she isn’t sure what’s wrong. About the fact that she might not be the last person to visit right now.”

“Uh….”

“Please do not try to deny it, Mr. Fenton.” It was still Mr. Fenton. Even…even if he was also Phantom. Somehow. Lancer pinched the bridge of his nose. “You’ve as good as laid the facts out in front of me. I can only be blind to so much.” It would be easier to be blind to it all, but he’d never signed up for easier. “It’s not as hard to see now that I know…more.”

Danny said nothing.

Once again, the lack of a denial spoke for him.

“I even might have been able to piece it together if we were still calling her the Hunter, or the Red Hunter, or whatever it began as. Something a good sight better than Inviso-Bill, I imagine.”

“Vlad’s puns are terrible,” Danny muttered.

But he still didn’t deny it.

Crime and Punishment, but Lancer wished he would have denied it.

How had two of his students become entangled in such serious matters? Worse still, the mayor—the mayor—was perpetuating the problem by hunting down one, treating him as a science experiment, and purposefully misguiding the other to the point where she would…could….

She’d done this to him, Lancer realized.

She’d caused the very wounds about which she was so worried.

She had to show me some of her new weapons.

Vlad Masters was giving weapons to a student, fully aware that she was using them against another student. Encouraging it, even.

She had a few I wasn’t expecting.

He was even inventing weaponry Jack and Maddie Fenton hadn’t dreamed up. Using his knowledge of Danny’s secret to better design them. Using his position of power to put more pressure on Phantom, on Danny. Lancer hadn’t forgotten that million dollar reward.

He doesn’t want to kill me.

He just wanted something so much worse.

The Red Huntress doesn’t know what I am. She won’t figure out the truth until it’s too late.

Danny had said as much earlier, just before the Huntress herself had come knocking. And he had lied to her face, albeit mostly half truths and lies of omission and not correcting her assumptions, and Lancer knew Danny was right. She wouldn’t figure it out until it was too late. And if things continued the way they were, it would be. Valerie was too fixated on her beliefs to do anything but dismiss evidence that dared contradict them.

At least….

At least, she would be if Danny was not forthright.

“This cannot continue.”

“What?”

Lancer looked down at Danny, still sitting in bed. He was too young to have all of this on his shoulders. He still didn’t understand. He still didn’t realize that refusing to share this burden wouldn’t lighten the load of anyone else but merely weigh them down with different troubles.

He meant well, but he was wrong.

“This cannot continue,” Lancer repeated.

Fear, in every line of Danny’s suddenly tense body. “No, you can’t tell them. You promised!”

“I never promised that,” Lancer said quietly, “and I certainly never promised you a rose garden.”

A brief flicker of confusion as the reference went over Danny’s head—Lancer supposed he couldn’t blame him; it had just been one of the book options which his students could choose to read and write about, and Danny hadn’t picked that book, let alone pretended to read it—and then the fear was back. “No, please, Mr. Lancer, you still don’t know everything, and—”

“Then for The Life of Pi, tell me the rest of it!” He hadn’t meant to snap, but he was at his wit’s end. Danny was still keeping secrets, dangerous ones, and—

“Vlad’s like me!”

-|-

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#danny phantom #danny fenton #mr lancer #valerie grey #phanfiction #dp fanfiction #fanfiction #my writing #ladylynse #snippets #and here is the last part of your three part prize!#which looks bad on my part but in my defense you didn't decide until spring #it's almost autumn now but still #*grins*#I hope you like it!

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smile-files · 4 years ago

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heya folks

gonna write a long post about the nicest person i know who i’ll probably never see again :’[

it’s an interesting story, but i wouldn’t blame you for not wanting to take the time to read it. do what you’d like!

it was after 7th grade just ended; i wasn’t in the best place emotionally, things kinda sucked. i was excited for camp, however, something i always looked forward to. i got placed in a bunk and stuff, of which there were 4; i was happy with the counselors, too (their names were ariel and jared). i was kinda bummed that one of my favorite counselors, named eli, wasn’t working there as a counselor anymore - he still worked at the camp, but whatever position he had i didn’t see him around as much.

at camp i would carry around a drawing notebook and a fanny pack, in which i had pens, pencils, the like. i soon noticed that another counselor, named shai, had a fanny pack; no, we didn’t ‘bond’ over it or whatever, but that’s one thing that made him grab my attention.

my camp is a ramah camp, which is a jewish camp; one of the activities that we’d have were a kind of elective we’d sign up for, called ‘shiur’ (literally means work), which integrated jewish learning with some activity - sometimes it’d be calligraphy, or pokemon, or super heroes. during first session i chose the pokemon shiur. normally, during the shiur period, counselors would go off and have a meeting. but, for some reason, shai would always hang out near where we’d have our pokemon shiur. i knew, of course, that this was because of julian.

i don’t know a specific reason why, but camp ramah tends to have a good number of autistic kids going there; some of them have a specific ‘caretaker’ of sorts who are with them to make sure they’re okay. my sister had one, my friend abby, and julian - shai tended to be with him and made sure he was okay. (something i find fascinating about julian was how he loved drawing road maps and signage)

it just so happened that julian picked the same shiur as me both sessions -pokemon in first and super heroes in second - so shai tended to be around. in this way i got to get to know him.

he noted my art on several occasions - he said that i’d be good at doing henna considering how frequently i’d draw on the back of my hand; when making the banners for color war, he said he’d abduct me so i could do the banner for his team (no abducting ever occurred, lol)

shai is a very funny person - i don’t know his mbti type, but i’m dead set on him being an nf. he was nice to be around, and i keep describing him as ‘supportive’; no wonder why, considering the circumstances of most of second session.

near the end of each session, we would have an overnight trip we’d go on (for two nights, three days). on the first trip, shai unfortunately wasn’t able to come for whatever reason. it was still a fun trip, but i still missed him.

come second session, however, and things would be different - shai was able to come with us on our trip to baltimore! i ended up sitting in the back of the coach bus, and shai was sitting across from me. something i noted is that he’s one to ask ‘you okay?’ a lot. and i mean a lot.

on the first day of the trip, we went to the national aquarium, got caught in a downpour, and watched an orioles vs yankees baseball game in the rain. we arrived at the synagogue we were staying in and went to bed; i got my typical 7 hours of sleep.

the next day we went to six flags! i chose the slow group because i’m a wimp. i had been wearing my galaxy hoodie at the time; when we stopped to have lunch, shai seemed concerned about me. woop

we went back into six flags after lunch; at one point we went on some raft ride type thing, and we were sitting on a bench in the sun to dry off (we’d gotten drenched). i was still wearing my hoodie (which, i may note, is rather thick). eventually shai’s group came around and they sat next to us on the bench.

shai checked the temperature on his phone, which was 90 degrees farenheit, so he said that i should probably take off my hoodie; i was only convinced after the “do it for me” thing that people do that just sells it. note: after his group left i put the hoodie back on lmao, now that’s a story i tell a lot (along with the story of eli having gone illegally ziplining with jesus)

that night, for whatever reason, i slept terribly. i fell asleep at 10:40 and woke up 48 minutes later, at 11:28. i was left sitting in the dark, super bored; i watched counselors walk in and out of the room, i counted to 1000, i went to the bathroom to sing to myself, i looked out the window. either way i had to wait 8 hours for everyone else to get up.

by this time this was the last day on the trip, and we were going to go to an elderly home. we packed up our stuff, something i did quickly. i then kind of wandered aimlessly around the room, waiting for everyone else to finish. this prompted another ‘you okay?’ from the shaister.

i managed to nap on the bus, but only for half an hour. we eventually got to the place; we were going to talk to them, give them ceramic gifts that people had apparently made, and that one kid who can play any song on the piano by ear just went off.

you may know that i’m a rather shy person; this, for whatever reason, felt like any party i’d ever been to - isolated and very anxious. there were a number of girls who said they were scared, but they weren’t shy - they were just scared of old people or something. shai convinced them that old people are not scary, then came to console me; he noted that people used the pun of “shy” and “shai” sounding similar on him a lot, but now he could actually use that himself. he didn’t pressure me to do anything i didn’t want to, and even suggested going outside if i really felt uncomfortable. i probably should’ve gone outside, but i didn’t. eventually we all went outside anyway to have rita’s ices, but i didn’t want any.

i’m pretty sure that’s all the trip stuff, but there’s more afterward. there are some stupid inconsequential things that i just find kind of amusing, to say the least. for one thing, there were these tacky plastic champagne glasses that the counselors had for whatever reason; there was this show going on, and everyone was bored out of their minds. shai just gave me one of these stupid glasses with no context, for the lulz or whatever. my response was to draw a smiley face on it with sharpie and give it back. he found this rather amusing.

one day i brought this shark plushie to camp, whom i called ‘smore’ because he looked like a marshmallow. shai insisted it was a piranha just to annoy the heck out of us, an argument that lasted two days.

another thing, one of the counselors was going to be leaving for israel before camp ended, so we had this whole thing where basically you could give a shoutout to anybody and thank them; i decided to thank the counselors in general, as most teenagers wouldn’t tolerate leading around a bunch of loud middle schoolers; shai knew i was a rather shy person, so he said that it was a very good thing of mine to do.

my age group was actually an amalgamation of several age groups - rising 6th graders, rising 7th graders, and rising 8th graders. being in the latter group, i was going to take part in some stupid graduation. and, you see, we all had to write speeches for it.

i wrote a speech, whatever, which mostly consisted of thanking counselors (in general i get along better with figures of authority, eg. counselors or teachers or whatever rather than fellow kids). i was very worried about the whole ordeal, but i did it; afterwards shai said he was proud of me for giving my speech despite how anxious i was about it.

and note how i never outright told the guy how anxious i was about any of these things - he’s just the type of person who knows; i always value people like that, given how i never tell anyone anything :’]

when it came to the last day of camp, i wanted to make sure shai knew how thankful i was for everything he did for me. i didn’t know a single other person who was half as validating and supportive of me as he was. but, being me, i couldn’t just tell him. no, i had to make a hand out of pipe cleaners, write a card, fold it up and make it look like an ice cream cone, put the folded card into the hand, and then awkwardly give it to him.

he initially said he’d read it later; but soon enough he read it and then i got a shai hug. yea!

welp everything after camp sucked! before school started i was so worried how i’d cope with my dumb issues without shai being there; i came to miss him a ton. like really, a ton.

before that summer, i had camp dreams like, heck, maybe once or twice a year?

but since that summer of 2019, i’ve had ~15+ camp dreams. i really missed him. i longed for the support he’d give me when i was anxious, for the knowledge that somebody understood me. i eventually started having headaches a lot, so i came to ‘think’, “oh! he’s trying to telepathically talk to me!”

i never did believe that to be the case, but imagining that i could talk to shai was comforting. every day i’d talk into my hand, telling him how my day went, asking him about his, and sometimes singing him a song or something. this came to be a normal thing i did routinely. i would get worried when i didn’t get headaches for a while, as i perceived those as him ‘responding’, so i would think i did something wrong.

i would frequently worry about if i’d ever see him again - i had no way of knowing if he’d be a counselor at camp this year. then covid-19 came and i knew he couldn’t. at some points it really bothered me how much my mental health revolved around this person who i knew for around 2 months and who i’ll probably never see again.

as of now, i still do miss him. i still had camp dreams. i literally had one last night, where i saw shai and was trying to call out to him, but he didn’t hear me. i still do ‘talk’ to him, but it’s not like i think i’m actually speaking to him. but heck, if it’s comforting to me, there’s no reason not to.

but really, shai seems more like a figment of my imagination now. it’s been a year since i’ve last seen him. was he ever real?

i would draw him sometimes, imagine what it’d be like to talk to him again. how i wish i could talk to him again.

there are so many silly little things i remember about shai - his poofy hair, his aviator sunglasses, how his fanny pack had writing on it in red sharpie and had multiple sunscreens in it, how he almost got hit by a cookie...

shai is the nicest person i’ve ever known, and it’s a shame that i’ll probably never see him again. he’s the kind of person i want to be - i want to be able to understand people and cheer them up when they’re upset. i want to have poofy hair and call people ‘bud’ unironically...

oh to be you, shai...

(oh wait, i know he exists because apparently you can find his channel on youtube and his pfp is his face... the only thing on it is one comment saying “thanks for subscribing” lmao :’])

if any of you know who i’m talking about, or think you do, please tell me!! :’0

thanks broskis *sob*

#ramble #long post #shai bocarsly if you're out there i miss you so hecking much aaaaaa #wait i already had that tag?#oh #when the heck did i use it before?#:']

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tisthenightofthewitch · 5 years ago

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GHOST – “I would say by early 2021, you can expect the next chapter of the Ghost story.” TOBIAS FORGE

From the underground to a bonafide global take-over, GHOST are fast becoming the most-talked about band in Metal music today, with legions of fans dedicating their total and utter commitment to the bands every move. Overdrive sat down with one Tobias Forge to discuss the bands success and that all important new album…

The spectacular rise of GHOST is a success story that nobody could have predicted. From their captivating live show’s, to a rich discography that continues to win over armies of fans the world over, GHOST are fast becoming one of the biggest bands in today’s current global Metal/Rock scene.

From the projects birth back in 2006 to conquering American arenas, winning a Grammy for ‘Best Metal Performance‘ (2016), headlining their first UK festival at Bloodstock Open Air (2017), selling out the iconic Royal Albert Hall (2018) and now, floating around Europe as very special guests with the biggest metal band the world has ever seen, Metallica.

One could say that that the Cardinal and his Ghouls are in a rather good place right now.

Prior to taking the stage for their Irish debut before 75 thousand fans (no pressure), Ghostmastermind, Tobias Forge is calmly hanging out in the enormous the backstage compound with his band members and crew, happily sipping on a hot coffee and eager to talk about his excitement in playing the impressive Slane Castle venue.

OD – Firstly, let me congratulate you on the continuous success of GHOST. From the outside, it’s been an incredible few years for the band. My question is how has it been for you personally, from the success of the album (s), playing to stadiums in the US, and now this tour with Metallica?

TOBIAS – Absolutely! I have moments where I have to step back and take it all in. You see, I’m not a very ‘in the moment‘ type of person. In fact, I’ve always been very distant and I guess a ‘dreamy‘ sort of person. If I look back on my life so far and I think about how I spent my childhood, I guess this comes with age and it comes from the fact of also being a parent because when you’re a parent, you can’t help to look at your kids from an upbringing point of view where you have to think about our progress.

I found myself asking the question;”Well, how did we do when we were younger?” [Laughing]. I guess there is a certain amount of reflection you have to do as an adult and now, for me, especially being an artist, I tend to have to think about my life and the journey I’ve had growing up and I’ve come to realise that very little has changed. I have spent my whole life drawing, writing and dreaming about doing all of these things that I’m now getting the opportunity to do.

So, at some point, that dreamy, adolescent looser just like, transgressed into this person who could go back into childhood again. The backside of that is sometimes, I have to remind myself that I’ve gone past the point of wishing to get here, and understand the realisation that this is actually happening. Like today for instance, getting to play this infamous venue, (Slane Castle) is huge for me. I’ve known about this place since the ’80’s.

I have a bit of a ‘now‘ moment with this today, but what often happens is that I play a certain venue, or meet a particular person and it’s like that moment just happens and I’m looking in from the outside, but afterwards I’m like; “WOW!” [Laughing]

OD – You recently did your first unmasked television interview, considering the history and the mystic of Papa Emeritus / Cardinal Copia was this a difficult decision for you to make and why did you feel that this was the time to do it?

TOBIAS – I think I thought and pondered for many, many years and at a certain point, in fact on that very day, it was one of those kind of ‘rip the bandaid off‘ kind of moments. Let’s just get it over with, no drumroll, no fanfare, let’s just move on. I try to be super transparent with this, but my choice of trying to be anonymous or should I say “masked” because anonymous is when no-one knows who you are. That choice was purely an aesthetic choice based on how I wanted this project, this band, this concept to become.

It was not my personal choice, because I don’t want to be famous, or a well known rock musician. So, fast forward to right now and when I look back, I have been involved with some very well-known bands and I’ve had my own share of recognition, so really, I don’t have a desire to become more famous. Bearing that in mind, I was noticing over the years that trying to maintain that vague order was causing a few problems and issues with the whole thing.

There was definitely moments when there was discussions and demands and enquiries about what can we do in order to enhance things. So, I figured well, at some point when I feel that the concept, or the band, or the name and it’s visual aspects are big and strong enough to stand on its own, I can do a thing like that unmasked interview, and hopefully whatever we are doing aesthetically and what we choose to present to the world, that will still be more interesting and better than anything I have to do on the side to appease journalists.

OD – What do you think of the critics who don’t look to favourably on what you do?

TOBIAS – Well, traditionally I’ve noticed that the critics that are critical of the band have been so since day one. Often a lot of the times the shit that people click on is criticism that is not really meant to be positive or productive anyway. I’ve been very vocal towards those people and have to remind them that what I set this project/band out to be, happened to get very popular to an extent that I didn’t foresee.

There are people who say: “Ghost was way better back in 2010” and as a rock fan myself, we can start where my collection begins from ‘A’ and I too will have some critical things to say about each album/artists. That’s just the way things go. You can’t please everybody all the time.

OD – There has been reports of entering the studio for 2020, is this still something that is very likely and is the intention to release the album next year or 2021 or is it too early to think about that right now?

TOBIAS – I think about it all the time. But, let me be very transparent here. I am indeed going into the studio where I will be beginning the work in January. We’re doing another American tour in September/October and then we’re gonna come back to Europe and that is gonna take us right up until Christmas basically.

So, after New Year’s we are gonna have maybe one or two small things at the beginning of the year and then it’s gonna be all about the new album.

People need to understand that I spend about 5 to 6 months in the studio. That’s not with red lights going or anything [Laughing]. But it’s just being in that creative environment you know? I also try to work ‘normal’ hours because I have a family also so, I try to work traditional hours, you know. I like to come in on Monday morning at about 9 am/10 am and then I do normal stuff like have lunch and think about what’s going on, and then I wrap up for the day and head home and see my family.

In order to make that record, it’s gonna take me about 6 months and then that’s gonna take me to the Summer, which we’ve already decided we’re gonna take a break a let the dust settle, and then hopefully by the end of the summer the record will be finished.

Unfortunately or fortunately, depends on how you see it, the US elections are happening, so bearing that in mind, it’s not the best time to release new material when peoples minds are focused on other things. I just want to make sure that when we release this new album, we have peoples attention.

OD – So, you’re hoping that the album is going to be ready by late Summer then?

TOBIAS – Well, that’s the plan but in the event that it’s not finished, it’s gonna be okay. I don’t want to stress the situation. Every record I’ve done has been under some type of time restraint, even ‘Opus Eponymous‘ (2010), that album was on a very tight schedule. It was definitely last minute [Laughing]. I just want to make sure that I have enough time to release the album that I’m thoroughly happy with.

When strategising about where Ghost is right now and where we want to go moving forward, we have to be aware of all the possibilities regarding the best time to release the new album.

OD – I’m sure you have big ambitions for the production of the new album also?

TOBIAS – Yes, totally. We now have the pleasure of playing in much bigger venues all over the world and with that comes the fact that there are a lot of tickets to sell. I hate to talk about it in this way, but it’s a huge part of this business. We have to take great care in everything we do now. Like the best time to announce a tour, a new album, as well as the best time of the year to release the new album. There’s loads of things to take into consideration.

OD – Do you think that some of the previous album releases were not timed well?

TOBIAS – Yes, some of our previous releases were not released at a time that was in our favour. In fact, I have memories of things being very stressful at times. At this point in the bands legacy, it’s far too important to just release the next album with no plan or strategy put in place first. Also, it’s very important that we give the production of the album a few weeks of rehearsal. Basically, we have to plan it like a rocket launch [Laughing].

OD – So, when do you see this album finally being released?

TOBIAS – I would say by early 2021, you can expect the next chapter of the Ghost story.

OD – With regards to each character, do you have an overall plan of what will be happening or is it something that are inspired about with the writing of each album. Does the writing of the album determine the character we will see when it’s eventually released?

TOBIAS – Well, at first there was no masterplan, but now there is one. A lot of the things that have been communicated over the last few years will be fined tuned and explained in the coming years.

OD – Can you give me an example?

TOBIAS – Well, there will be a number of non-album things that are going to happen. This will all happen in tandem with the overall story. These things might be happening next year also.

Even in the void of 2020 not really being an active year for us in terms of live performances, there will be other things that we will be doing in the interim where there’s going to be an album made.

OD – So, would you say that things are more conceptional now than ever?

TOBIAS – Yes, totally. In the beginning there is was lucid, but things have changed in a huge way.

OD – Have you ever considered making a documentary or perhaps releasing a book about your life?

TOBIAS – Well this can tie in with a previous answer that we have already spoken about. At some point or another, during the high points of Ghost, I’m sure there are people that would be interested in reading about my thoughts and my background. But I feel like I’m not really there yet, if you know what I mean.

I feel that I have a lot more to do, before I can think about something like that. Right now if feels like thinks are ever progressing and it just doesn’t feel like the moment where I need to document everything to date. I mean, who knows what’s gonna happen but for all I know, all of this could go tits-up in four years from now. If that happens then I can look back and reminisce when it’s all over.

I just don’t feel like I’m anywhere near the end. I’m gonna be 4o years-old in 2 years time and i’ve got a lot more to do even before I hit that age.

OD – Do you worry about getting old?

TOBIAS – Not really. In fact here’s a little life hack about feeling better about your age. I have a lot of friends who are much older than me. Not only is that very interesting socially, but if I have any issues with the concept of ageing, sometimes it’s great to have older friends whom you can use as a sort of barometer.

I have a lot of respect for my older friends. I think to myself; “If I was half as cool as my friends, I would be very happy with that“. The concept of ageing is definitely hated by a lot of people. At the end of the day, regardless of all of this, my plan is to become a really cool 50-year-old [Laughing].

OD – Do you think it’s important to have role models that are older?

TOBIAS – Yes, very much so. You can not stare yourself blind at the idea of youth being the only state worthy of being because that will greatly disappoint you.

OD – So far, what has been your biggest personal achievement?

TOBIAS – Hmmmm, there are many to choose from. [Thinking..] I think the biggest achievement for me and what I really feel blessed about is..there’s not really a word that can encapsulate what I’m thinking here. Let me try to explain.

From a family point of view, knowing where we were and what our options and possibilities were 1o years ago when our kids were born to present day. I am extremely proud and happy and thankful that I managed to steer things around to something very different. I’m not saying that everything would be crap had all of this not worked out as we were still very happy back then.

I’m very happy that it turned out this way because I got to be one of the few that got to live out a childhood dream. Music really is the only thing that I can do intuitively. I’m quite able to do this and I get better at it with age [Laughs]. But, there is a lot of things that I can’t do, and I don’t exactly know if it’s because I didn’t do that certain exam or for another reason.

I have a hard time concentrating when I’m faced with doing things I don’t really like doing.

OD – How did you back in school?

TOBIAS – I actually wasn’t really good in school [Laughing]. I have no scholastic background, so basically the outlook 10 years ago, had this not happened, did not look that good.

OD – There are few (if no other) bands that have managed to achieve the success that GHOST is currently experiencing, although it’s an exciting and wonderful thing, surely that, in its own right, is a huge achievement for you?

TOBIAS – Up until I was 29 years old, I was on the outside looking into the music industry, trying to figure out a way in [Laughing] and during this time, this industry was not interested in having me as part of it.

Since I was a ‘late bloomer‘ in this business and I got this very coveted opportunity, I feel that my biggest achievement is doing the right things at the right time. This is a highly strange situation for me at times. For instance we are a crew of 25 people here today. I’m not setting up the stage, tuning the guitars etc… I’m expected to put my shit on and get up on that stage, do a little dance and sing my songs in the somewhat correct key [Laughing]

If I have to talk about someone else that made all of this happen, it’s my wife, who gave me the freedom and the pass to continue to chase my dreams when things were just starting to happen.

I remember her saying; “Why don’t you quit your job and just go for it?”

OD – At what point in time did this happen?

TOBIAS – Only a couple of months after Opus Eponymous came out. I was in a critical moment in time. I was employed in a position at a company doing a job that I was not really good at, and I didn’t really enjoy nor felt any value in doing.

She then said to me one day; “It seems like some good things are happening with your ‘rock dreams’, so why don’t you just quit your job and try that? It’s not like your job is worth anything to you. So, you can just do that and if it doesn’t work out, then at least you’ve tried it”.

When I look back on that and realise what she helped me do, most people don’t get that break. Most people who are in a relationship and are grown up, with children, just don’t get a pass like that.

Of course, my Mother also was a huge support for me. When I was in school, she was very saddened that I was such a poor performer and we went to many of the school teacher meetings where there were saying things like; “What can we do to aid you?” [Laughing] and my Mom was like [crying sound] “I don’t know what you want to do with your life“.

Meanwhile I’m over there in the corner being obnoxious, telling teachers to “go fuck themselves“. My Mom had to deal with a lot of worrying and hoping that life will fall in place for me. And by 2010 she was finally beginning to think; ‘Maybe this ‘rock’ thing is actually gonna work out!“, because I finally had a job and with two kids etc..

OD – As Mother’s do, she stood by you all the way.

TOBIAS – Yes, she believed in me.

OD – She’s been to the shows I’m assuming. She know’s all about the ‘Cardinal’ then?

TOBIAS – [Laughing] Yes, she’s been there and loves it. She is not an authoritarian. My Mom was born in the ’40’s and is very “arty“. She was very much a part of the ’60’s generation. In fact, a little bit of side information for you. My Mom bought my first and my second guitar.

OD – What kind of guitar was it and do you still have it?

TOBIAS – Unfortunately, I don’t have that guitar. Ironically, since we’re here with Metallica today, the first guitar that I had was a black Fernandes Strat, just like the one that Kirk (Hammet, Metallica) had on the cover of the original “Garage Days‘ ’87 release.

That was my first guitar and I was so proud that I had the same guitar that Kirk Hammet had and here I am today, sitting backstage on tour with Metallica. Talk about full circle in life. It’s mind-blowing for me, it really is.

OD – I guess there was no hesitation when the Metallica offer came in then?

TOBIAS – I believe the term used was; “A stone-cold no-brainer‘ [Laughing]. It really felt like it was the right time to do this much more than say, if we were given this tour six or seven years ago.

OD – I remember the first time I ever saw Ghost live was back at the 2011 UK Download Festivaland you were on the Pepsi-Max tent, during Soundgarden’s performance on the main stage. There was only a couple of hundred people in that tent but that show was fantastic.

TOBIAS – I remember that show. Phil Anselmo and the guys from Anthrax were standing on the side of the stage watching. That was a really big show for us as we almost cancelled because we did a show in Sweden the night before and we just about didn’t make the journey. It happened because it was very much based on my will to play Donington Park.

Not only were we seen by a lot of cool people, but also that was when our now manager saw us perform for the very first time. I didn’t know that she would end up managing us at the time but it was because of that performance that things took a huge turn for us.

Ghost is very much a collective effort in many ways, from the people that work with us, our crew, techs, management, band members etc, they are all responsible for making this happen. That show was very much a landmark gig that changed the course of the bands destiny.

So, the message here kids is don’t cancel shows, you just don’t know what might happen. [Laughing] Just be cool to everyone because you just don’t know who you’re dealing with. One day a stage hand, or lighting tech, could very well become the next big label, booking agent etc. Just be cool to everyone all the time.

Catch GHOST on tour with Metallica NOW. US dates have also just been announced. Check out the full listing above. For more information, please click here.

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