#pet abandonment or mistreatment makes me really angry

[pfhwrittes]

P!!! I also have a Widget in my Gaz fic! That’s such fun!

She’s a dachshund in a wheelchair.

Also I’m ready to throw hands with Widget’s Mama. Like meet me in the back of the Piggly Wiggly! I’ll fight her!

oh my goodness!!! i love your widget!! what a baby!! and hiiii dipstick, you look so distinguished!!

oh man i know, i also want to fight widget's Mama. (and the person that inspired me to write widget's Mama but that's a different kettle of fish)

[adamwatchesmovies]

White God (2014)

If you’re wondering what the title of this movie means… ask someone else. I have no idea why White God but it doesn’t matter. What we have here is a unique story that's told in an equally distinct way. This is the kind of movie you absolutely must sit down and watch with others so that you can all discuss and decipher everything it has to say.

13-year old Lili (Zsófia Psotta) is staying with her estranged father, Dániel (Sándor Zsótér) for three months. When a neighbour spots Lili's mixed-breed dog Hagen and calls the authorities, Dániel is unwilling to pay the large “mongrel” fee and instead, abandons his daughter's pet. Alone, Hagen is mistreated and abused until a vengeful fire awakens within him.

White God is partially a dramatic tale of a girl’s four-legged friend trying to find its way home. That’s until the second half, when it becomes one of those animals running amok movies, the kind where normally harmless creatures spread terror as they rampage through our streets. I bet you didn't expect that mix. This is one of the choices that makes the film so unique. You see Hagen at his happiest and then subjected to all sorts of cruel punishments. Dog fighting, malnutrition, emotional and physical abuse. It makes you so sad and so angry. You desperately want him and Lili to find each other again. Instead (and you see this from the opening scene), it's as if everything Hagan has gone through - both good and bad - suddenly allows him to become self-aware so he can lead all of Hungary’s dogs into a full-blown rebellion. When it happens, you no longer know how to feel. If Lili’s pet finds its way back to her, who’s to say it won’t tear her throat out?

This is a hugely ambitious film. Most of the time, we are not following an actor who can deliver dialogue, it’s just Hagan or other dogs on-screen. We’re not used to seeing dogs this realistically. The scenes of violence may be too much for squeamish viewers, particularly those who love animals. Eventually, however, that discomfort goes away. This movie is simply too good for what is happening on-screen to be real. It HAD to be done using careful editing and expert animal training. There’s just no way anyone could’ve been lucky enough to capture what we see otherwise. This becomes most obvious when the tone turns from drama, to horror. The enormous pack of dogs running through the streets is the kind of sight that drains the blood from your face. An overpowering feeling of futility consumes you. More than the visuals, it’s the methodical, deliberate and malicious way the dogs get their revenge that makes you so uneasy.

Some aspects of the story are fairly easy to decipher. The relationship between Lili and her father, for example. Others, not so much. What is this movie really about? I’m not sure. For me, it generated the image of a beloved leader forced into exile by a coup. Away from the people who loved them, they suffer one tragedy after another. The abuse makes them grow bitter and resentful until they are consumed by hatred. When they inevitably return home, they've changed so drastically they're no longer the person the crowds wanted to welcome back. In fact, they've become worse than those who ousted them. There’s probably a message about racism somewhere too. The term White God, and the mixed-race dogs seems to point you towards this direction. Ultimately, you’ll have a great time figuring it out, if there is, indeed something to figure out.

White God drips with powerful emotions at both extremes of the spectrum. Superbly directed, it asks you to take a step back and examine what you’re seeing on-screen. This, combined with the subtitles means there are some who simply won’t have the patience for it. For everybody else, it’s an experience you won’t forget. (Original Hungarian with subtitles, August 16, 2019)

[maedarakat]

Markless - Chapter 3

28th Oct: Soulmates AU // “I don’t need this now.”

Summary: A Mark showing up is like a rite of passage for young Vikings of the entire Archipelago. When Tuff gets his, he tells nobody - afraid it means what his Elders have always suspected about him. Likewise, Dagur’s own Mark remains secretive, due to his fear of making him seem weak.

Too bad the Gods never sent down instruction manuals, since they were so keen to pair humans up this way.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

—————-

Three blue lines.

That was the Mark on Hiccup; Dagur had seen it himself on their last encounter.

Granted, not in the nicest way possible - more like tackling him outright onto the forest floor on one of their many encounters. Dagur had paused to stare at Hiccup’s shoulder for far too long -  enough for Toothless to swat him off his rider and nearly bite his face off in the process.

There had been three blue lines, just like Dagur had tattooed across his eye and arm. Not exactly the same angle or shade of blue, but who cared - it was close enough that it couldn’t just be a coincidence; Hiccup was meant to be his.

The initial plan had been to find the Skrill, tame it, and then ride it in battle against Hiccup and his Night Fury.

He figured the Greek chorus that rode around with him would be distracted defending all of Berk from his Armada, while he flew in and collected his soulmate.

Hiccup would probably thank him later; he was too good, far too clever for living some sad banal existence on Berk. Even his rider friends couldn’t possibly appreciate him as much as he deserved; Dagur had often felt deep pangs of sadness and loneliness whenever he looked at the Mark on his wrist.

Even knowing that, nothing could have prepared him for whatever he'd felt Hiccup experience just three nights ago.

Dagur had woken in a cold aching sweat, heart hammering in fear. His back and hips had been in unbearable pain, for no reason that he or the hastily summoned physician could determine.  

It only confirmed the Berserker’s worst suspicions: his soulmate was being severely mistreated.

For that? Berk was going to pay dearly - just as soon as he captured and trained that Skrill.

Or so had been the plan. There was now just one teeny, tiny annoying little snag.

The Outcasts had found the Skrill first.

Despite the fact Dagur and his clan had ancestral claim to the dragon, Alvin was not interested in handing the Skrill over. The only thing keeping Dagur from annihilating the entire island with his Armada was Alvin’s threat of outright killing the dragon if he tried attacking them.

Well. A dead Skrill was zero use to him.

Put out and without any alternative choice, Dagur grudgingly agreed to work with Alvin - putting his Armada on the table in the quest to attack Berk.

At least they had a common goal, but Dagur was still going to watch for any opportunity to change things around in his favor.

Currently, all Dagur's ships were docked at Outcast Island - which gave the local wild dragons pause in attacking the village. Alvin had moved his people to subterranean caves, which accounted for the pallor and obesity of most of his men; starved for sunlight and vegetables.

They were eating wild dragon meat, cave mushrooms, and the occasional potato - which was why Dagur agreed to Vorg’s suggestion to slaughter a few boar and sheep and share out better provisions. Better food definitely made these talks go smoother, and had raised the morale of the Outcasts greatly.

Huh. By comparison, they didn’t seem too happy with Alvin. That could prove useful later . . .

He nodded to Captain Vorg, who extracted himself from the group of mingling Berserkers and Outcasts, who were playing a game of dice and cups. The man joined him in stride, as together they walked toward the arena where the Skrill was kept.

Alvin didn’t care if he went near the cage, so long as it was under guard. Dagur wanted to take a good look at the Skrill to make sure the Chief hadn’t injured her, or caused her to be unable to fly, though he’d been warned not to get too close. The dragon was angry, and had already electrocuted the wits out of some old man who had made that error.

“Sir,” Vorg inquired, jarring Dagur out of his thoughts.

“What is it?” Dagur snapped, not looking at him.

“When we gain ownership of the Skrill from Alvin, how do you plan to keep it from flying away? Have you figured out yet how Hiccup subjugated his Night Fury?”

Dagur scowled. He hadn’t figured that part out, but how hard could it be? Dragons liked to fly, didn’t they? If the Skrill wanted to fly again, then she’d just have to realize he was the boss and therefore she would fly wherever he wanted her to. Otherwise? She would just have to sit in her cage and think about it.

“If the dragon won’t obey me, there’s always chains to keep her grounded. I have no idea how scrawny little Hiccup managed to chain down his Night Fury - probably had his little friends all helping him,” Dagur snorted.

He wouldn’t need anyone helping him, though. All that dragon hunting, sparring and training had paid off; Dagur was now much stronger and faster than he’d ever been.

It was too bad Oswald had abandoned him - the weak fool might have had a son to feel proud of, had he stuck around.

Oh well, all the more reason to let people believe he’d ended his father’s life. It was rather amusing, really - and it garnered him both respect and fear.

Vorg was talking now, going on pointlessly about some kind of repair work on one of the ships, and Dagur tuned him out, approaching the Outcast who was on guard duty.

Instead of the usual slouching idiot, this one was already standing to full attention and straightened further upon Dagur’s approach.

“Sir! Your man has already begun his preliminary inspection of the Skrill cage ahead of you. I hope you find his results satisfactory.”  

“My what has done what now?” Dagur asked after a confused pause. He didn’t bother to wait for an answer, stepping past the guard and storming into the arena.

There was a thin blond boy sitting on the ground before the Skrill cage.

He was cooing at the dragon within, who looked decidedly less grumpy. She trilled back at him, blinking her eyes like an overgrown house cat.

Dagur scowled and stomped towards them both, dead set on hauling this intruder out of here and tossing him into the nearest Whispering Death hole. The Skrill hissed at him, retreating further into her cage, but the boy jumped to his feet and grinned at Dagur, running to meet him.

“Chief Dagur!” the blond shouted joyfully, and then hugged him - of all things.

As the young man’s arms encircled him, Dagur made as if to grab his elbows and shove him away. Upon skin contact, he froze - a plethora of emotions nearly crumpling him.

Relief, joy, anxiety - all crashed against his brain, leaving his thoughts a confused and tangled mess. Dagur stood still and stared at the intruder mutely, unable to help but listen to his strange babbling.

“The Skrill is doing just fine - she’s a bit under the weather, but if you feed her roasted hagfish with some onions and garlic, it’ll probably do wonders for her. Also, there’s a few patches of broken scales that need attention - I have some salve that should help.  It’s got comfrey in it, which Mom says is great for healing wounds and skin irritations. It will help you bond with her if you put it on her yourself.”

Dagur shook his head, trying to clear it. “Who are you?” he demanded, trying to sound both scornful and imposing. It was not very effective, given that the boy was still holding onto him, and Dagur had yet to enforce some distance between them.

Captain Vorg stepped in, yanking the boy away and shoving him a couple of feet back. “Answer him! What is your name and why are you here?”

“Tuffnut,” the young man answered, not appearing bothered in the least. “I’m here to help Dagur train his dragon.”

“. . . Who sent you?”

“Uh, myself? Duh. I sent me.” Tuffnut shook his head, as though Vorg had asked a stupid question. To be fair, Vorg did that sometimes. “Chief Dagur, when’s the last time she got fed or pet?”

“Pet? He’s mad! She’ll have your arm off as a chew toy if you try to pet her!” Vorg scoffed to Dagur, shaking his head. He reached for his sword to chase Tuff off, but Dagur stopped him with a gesture.

“If you want to help me train my dragon, prove to me that you can.”

“Okay,” Tuff agreed, grinning. He walked over to the bars, and the Skrill perked up, sniffing at him as he put his hand in.

She licked her nose and stood up, stretching as best as she was able. It was a tiny cell, not nearly big enough for her to unfurl her wings.

“Aw, poor baby girl,” Tuffnut murmured soothingly as she got her head under his touch, moving around so his scratching fingers got all the best spots. “We’ll get you feeling better soon and out of this tiny little kennel, I promise.”

She purred loudly under his ministrations and eventually flopped onto her side so Tuff could get under her chin.

Dagur tilted his head, more than impressed. “Okay. So she won’t attack you - that’s a good start. How long until you can get her to let me ride her?”

“That depends on you,” Tuff grinned. “You have to bond with her even better than I do. Come here, give me your hand.” He reached out to Dagur, unflinchingly.

Dagur was unaccustomed to be reached out for; by now even his most trusted men had learned to keep a careful and respectful distance. Even Captain Vorg was wincing in anticipation that the boy was going to lose his hand after all - which honestly rankled Dagur. 

Vorg didn’t know him.

Drawing himself up, Dagur put his slightly larger hand in Tuffnut’s and allowed the scrawny Viking to direct it - palm outward - to the Skrill. The dragon regarded him with an odd purring growl, but she didn’t snap at him.

Tuff sweet talked her into drawing nearer to the bars, where she sniffed suspiciously at Dagur’s fingers. Eventually, she nuzzled the Berserker’s palm and Vorg let out a breathy exhale of relief. Dagur glared at him.

“What? Didn’t think I could do it?” he snapped, tone dangerous.

“No, of course not, Chief! It’s just, you know, dragons are dangerous and unpredictable -“ the man stammered.

“Eh. They can be, it’s true,” Tuff put in amiably. “Just like people.  That’s what makes them so awesome, though. Dragons aren’t meant to be broken in - you have to earn their loyalty and trust.”

Dagur made a noncommittal noise, watching the Skrill with open admiration. “So . . . how do I do that exactly?”

“Well, you could start by trying to see things from her point of view. Some big smelly men caught her in a gross fishing net and tossed her into this awful cell - with no food or water or enough room to lie down properly. I mean, what would you do?”

“Well . . .” The Berserker Chief paused, thinking about it. “I’d start zapping people too, honestly. Huh. Good point, uh . . . What was your name again? Buffnut?”

“Tuffnut. You can call me Tuff.”

Normally Dagur would snap that he could call Tuff whatever he felt like, but he didn't quite feel like himself.

“Nice. Tuff. I’ll remember that. What do I feed her?”

The boy smiled at him rewardingly, making something in Dagur’s chest feel warm and cozy. “How about it girl? Do you want fish? Mutton? Boar meat?” The Skrill perked up at the last food mention, charring and licking her chops. “Boar meat it is then.”

Dagur grinned, surprised the Skrill was so intelligent. He liked her, and he liked this weird boy too - even if he had come out of nowhere to help him. Maybe this would be easier than he thought. “There’s a banquet this way, and I know for a fact there’s some boar roast, because it came from my ship.”

He slung an arm across Tuff’s shoulders to lead him there, not noticing when the boy hitched in pain. 

Tuff kept pace with him nonetheless, offering a shaky grin. “A banquet? What’s the occasion?”

“Oh we’re just celebrating a new alliance. Us Berserkers and the Outcasts against that sorry pile of volcanic puke that calls itself Berk.”

The boy let out a scornful laugh. “Yeah, Berk. I’ve heard of Berk. West til you smell it, North til you step in it, am I right?”

Dagur laughed, surprised, and tightened the hold on Tuff’s shoulders. His pained whimper was too faint to be noticed.

“You should eat something too. You’re way too skinny and scrawny for someone who trains dragons. Try some mutton and barley cakes. They’re my Mom’s recipe.”

“. . . Okay,” the boy said eagerly, and if Dagur thought he looked hungry now, it proved to be an understatement once they reached the banquet itself.

Tuff tore into his plate of food like a starved pup, eating like it would be wrested away from him at any moment. Dagur watched him carefully as he ate his own meal, more than once having to admonish Tuff to slow down. If the men looked at him oddly for the unusual care he was showing a complete stranger, Dagur didn’t notice - mostly because none of them dared to question him out loud.

After his second full plate, Tuff finally slowed down, looking beyond exhausted. Some of the Outcasts had unfortunately decided to sing as entertainment, despite the fact they could neither carry a tune nor remember how the song went.

Dagur left Tuff’s side briefly to load a platter with chunks of boar roast and bone for the Skrill, preferring the relative quiet of the arena to this cacophony. When he turned around, it was to a raucous cheer, mad gibberish, and the sound of blows falling.

Fantastic. Some idiots had started a brawl.

He wouldn’t have cared if not for the long blond hair of his companion visible on the floor. Dagur gaped in shock for only a second, then roared and charged forward, shoving Outcasts twice his girth out of the way.

The scrawny old man that the Skrill had electrocuted was straddling Tuff, trying to choke him. Furious beyond measure, Dagur grabbed Mildew’s arms and bodily lifted him off Tuffnut, throwing his attacker at the table with enough force to send dishes and mugs flying in all directions. His sword’s edge pressed across Mildew’s throat, irises shrunk to pinpricks of rage.

“How DARE you lay so much as a finger on MY companion?! Give me one good reason I shouldn’t RIP YOUR LEGS OFF and throw them down a Whispering Death hole!” Dagur roared.

Mildew only whimpered and babbled nonsense, pointing to Tuff, who was groaning on the floor. The attack had caught the boy by surprise it seemed, and now Dagur noticed vivid bruises on his arms as he shakily tried to lift himself up. He gestured to Vorg, who stepped in to help Tuff right himself.

Alvin wasn’t present and it must have been the leader of the Outcasts that Mildew’s frantically rolling eyes were searching for, because when they came back to rest on Dagur’s infuriated face, the old man whimpered and fainted dead away.

Dagur snorted in disdain and let him fall limply across the table. “When your village idiot here wakes up, tell him how lucky he is to still have his legs,” he snapped at the gathered men. They laughed and cheered in amusement; clearly there wasn’t too much concern held for the old goat.

He stormed over to the table and picked up the boar meat, gesturing for Vorg and Tuffnut to walk back to the Skrill’s cage with him.

Tuff, he noticed, was shaking.

“Are you alright?” he asked immediately, not liking the way his own voice trembled or the confused look Vorg was giving him.

“I’m fine,” Tuff promised, giving Dagur a strained grin. They walked toward the arena in silence, Dagur’s brain sorting through possible reasons why anyone would have attacked the boy. He had gotten the message through that it wasn’t to happen again - but he still wanted to know why.

It wasn’t until after the Skrill greeted them with chirps and excited wriggles and tucked into her platter of boar meat that Dagur asked about the incident.

“What was that back there? Does the village idiot know you?”

“. . . Mildew? Yeah, we know each other. He, uh, really doesn’t like dragons,” Tuff supplied nervously.

“Oh.” Well, that explained it. “You like them, though. So I guess he just doesn’t like you.”

When Tuff nodded hesitantly, Dagur relaxed. “Well, he won’t bother you again. You’re with me now, and he knows that. In fact, nobody will ever hurt you again.”

Tuffnut looked at him with a sharp inhale and Dagur felt his face grow warm, not sure why he’d said that. Vorg wasn’t in earshot - talking to the Outcast guards that Tuff had past earlier.

“. . . you guys are planning to attack Berk, right?” Tuff asked, and Dagur was surprised to see his face was also a bit red. “Can I ask what you’re after? I mean, I’ve been there before, and I’m good at stealing - if there’s something you’re after, maybe I can help?”

The Berserker snorted dismissively. “I know Alvin wants vengeance. Some long ago exile or something, it doesn’t interest me really. What I want is . . .”

Dagur trailed off, confused. It had been so clear in his mind what he’d wanted - less than an hour ago.

Hiccup. He’d wanted to kill that Night Fury and whoever was hurting Hiccup, and take him to where he’d be safe. But now it didn’t seem as urgent as before. “You’ve been to Berk before, you say? Do you know anyone there?”

“Yeah, I know some people,” Tuff answered guardedly.

“There’s a boy. Reddish brown hair, pretty green eyes. Missing a leg. He’s the Chief’s son. He knows how to tame dragons too.”

“I can do it better. I promise, I really can,” Tuff interjected immediately.

Dagur looked at Tuff and saw hurt written all over his face. Oh no. He was messing everything up, wasn’t he?

“Oh - don’t worry. I know you can, and I want you to. Hiccup would never help me train a Skrill, or any dragon. He hates me too much.”

Tuffnut seemed to relax almost instantly. Dagur glanced at Vorg, who was watching the guards instead of them. He leaned closer to Tuff to whisper in his ear. “Does he . . . do you know if . . . if Hiccup’s been injured recently?”

Tuff’s expression changed from heart sickness to confusion. “If he’s been injured . . .?”

“Has anyone been hurting him? That you know about? His father?”

The boy looked bewildered for a moment but swiftly shook his head. “No, his father is kind. To him at least. The Chief would die to keep Hiccup from harm.”

That brought some peace to Dagur’s mind and he sighed in relief, turning back to watch the Skrill lick the now empty platter. She picked up a nearby rib bone and sat down to gnaw on it happily.

“You care about people a lot more than you let on, don’t you?”

The question caught him off guard, as did Tuff’s sudden adoring look.

Dagur huffed and shrugged, feeling his face heat up. “No. I mean, I guess. Nobody’s son deserves to be mistreated, is all. Because ... more fathers should care about their kids. There’s no point in having a son and just knocking them around all the time. Or abandoning them when things get hard,” he sneered, crossing his arms. “Would have been better to just not have had a kid if they didn’t even want one.”

Tuff stood a little nearer to him. “Yeah. That’s true. They didn’t want to treat us better, so they got exactly what they had coming to them,” he said quietly. The boy’s words were odd, but Dagur didn’t put any thought into why.

“Right.” It was a comfort that Tuff seemed to know what he was talking about. Anyone else would have probably given him some Odin-loving drivel about how one should always be a dutiful son.

Dagur offered him a grin and decided to change the subject. “Well, Tuff - the Skrill is fed and she looks happy. What do I do now?”

“She needs salve on her wounds. Here.” Tuff walked over to a bundle of cloth that turned out to conceal a bag made of burlap. He rummaged through it to produce a tin of greenish-looking slime. “I’m gonna have you do it. But first, let’s tell her what we’re doing.”

Dagur blinked and turned back to the dragon. “Uh. Hey. So we have this stuff - smells like medicine. Does it sting?” he asked Tuffnut. The other boy shook his head. “Okay, it doesn’t sting, and it’ll heal you, so just . . . “

He didn’t need to explain any further; the Skrill purred and got to her feet, turning in the small cell and lifting a wing until her flank was pressed against the bars. Dagur beckoned for Tuff to bring one of the torches closer so he could see better, internally marveling at how smart this dragon was.

She had framed the wounded area of her scales between the bars, allowing him easy access to spread the salve over the reddened sore areas. She even raised her scale plates a bit so he could coat in between them.

“Pretty girl, clever girl,” Dagur crooned, without really thinking about it. He didn’t care how silly he sounded; in the moment, nothing seemed to matter but tending to the comfort of this dragon.

The Skrill turned and circled until he got all her trouble spots, then tried to make herself comfortable with what room she had. Dagur pulled out the platter but left the bones to give her something to play with.

“We’ll be back in the morning with something tasty, I promise. You sleep well, okay?”

A purring trill was his answer and the Skrill licked his hand before curling up, tucking her nose into the curve of her tail.

It was ridiculously adorable and Dagur found himself unable to look away until Vorg coughed. He glanced over his shoulder to see the man tilt his head meaningfully to the Outcast guards, who were watching them closely.

Tuff touched his arm, bringing Dagur out of whatever spell the Skrill had him under. “It’s okay, we’ll come back to her in the morning, like you said. I can distract the guards again.”

Dagur regarded him for a long moment. “You know, wherever you’re from - I’m really glad you’ve showed up. I don’t know why. Usually I don’t care much for strangers. Do you have a place to sleep tonight?”

Vorg gave him a look, but Dagur glowered at him until the man sighed and let it go.

“N-No. I was hoping to find someplace to lie low until morning.”

“Well that sounds dangerous, considering you were already attacked once today. You can bunk with me.”  Putting an arm around Tuff’s shoulders pointedly, he started steering them toward the docks where the Armada was waiting. Tuffnut winced as though his touch hurt, but gave him another bright smile.

“Okay. You want me to take the floor?”

“The floor? Are you being bashful?” Dagur teased. He gave Tuff a friendly side-hug, leaving his heavy arm across his companion’s shoulders. Tuffnut swallowed, looking pained again, but he didn’t duck out from beneath Dagur’s arm. His paleness sent a spark of concern through Dagur.

“Did you eat enough? I can have more food sent to the cabin. You never got to  try the mutton stew or any of the bacon-fried bread - it’ll put some weight back on your bones. You still look way too skinny.”

Tuff glowed at the attention, pressing against him. It made Dagur’s heart flutter almost annoyingly. “I’m okay. Though I wouldn’t say no to mutton stew and bread - that sounds amazing.”

Why was this guy growing on him so fast? Dagur didn’t even consider himself a friendly person, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that Tuffnut was somehow meant to be here - now, and with him. And not just because he was useful and smart and interesting . . . there was just something special about him.

Despite the stress of having to work with Alvin, Dagur had to admit - he’d never felt so calm in his life. The moment Tuff had embraced him, everything had changed. It wasn’t as though the feelings of painful anger and despair were gone; no, they were still there, but there was a difference to them. They felt bearable now.

On top of it all, a Skrill liked him - a dragon actually liked him. He wondered if Hiccup might be proud of him for that, if maybe even Oswald would.

Tuff was going to have to show him all kinds of things - like how to fly on her at breakneck speeds and train her to do barrel rolls. Eventually he’d have to get himself a dragon too - probably a Nadder or maybe a Razorwhip. Or maybe he had one already.

“Do you have a dragon?” Dagur asked once they got to the door of his ship’s cabin. Tuff had gone a bit glassy eyed, but he looked up sharply at the question, like a deer caught in the hunting lanterns.

“Uh. What?”

“You know, a dragon. Surely someone who knows how to train a Skrill has his own dragon. I understand - it probably would have caused some alarm if you just flew in here on one, so you must have told the dragon to hide in a cave somewhere. Right?”

Tuff blinked and then shook his head.  “No, I rode a Gronckle here, but I told him he could take off. I figured I’d just meet another wild dragon and coax them to take me somewhere else - you know, if you’d told me to get lost.”

Dagur stared. “Well, I’m glad I didn’t tell you to get lost. But seriously - you can just go up to wild dragons and ask them for rides and they don’t bite your head off?” He looked Tuff over critically. “Are you a sorcerer?”

The boy snorted with laughter, apparently finding that hilarious.

“Okay, not a sorcerer, that’s fine. Still pretty cool. In you go. ” He opened the door to his cabin and put a hand on the middle of Tuff’s back, gently pushing the boy in ahead of him.

That wrung a sudden yelp out of Tuff and he jerked away. Dagur felt a surge of panicked loss, automatically reaching out to grab the other boy’s arms so he couldn’t retreat any further. “Sorry! Are you okay?”

Tuff blinked but instead of pulling away, he drew closer to him.

“Yeah, I’m okay,” he grinned, apologetically. “Old wounds acting up. You know, Viking wounds - it’s an occupational hazard, right?”

Wounds? Frowning, Dagur lit a lantern and pulled Tuff further into the light, looking him over carefully. If that Mildew jerk had injured Tuffnut after all, he swore he was going to use the old fool’s severed head as a tether ball.  

The dragon-rider swallowed nervously, but said nothing until Dagur touched his shoulders, tugging at the material of his tunic. “I can’t have you wounded and going untreated for it. Let me see?”

Tuff looked anxious for far too long a moment - making Dagur’s chest ache.

“It’s okay. You can say no. Nobody will hurt you, remember? That includes me. But if you’re hurt, I’d like to help.”

Gray eyes widened, then filled with tears. Dagur stared but didn’t mention them, even when they spilled over to fall freely down Tuffnut’s face, leaving him shivering and leaning in close.

Where had Tuff come from? Had his family abandoned him too? Dagur made his best attempt at soothing noises and tugged again at his tunic, until Tuff nodded reluctantly and assisted in removing it.

Dagur drew in a sharp hiss of air at the marks on his body; dark purple lines of bruised flesh and inflamed blood-crusted weals. He recognized infection when he saw it.

Tuff’s wounds had been washed and treated a few times, but clearly by himself more often than with any help. As a result, he’d missed several areas and now Dagur knew why he’d been carrying that tin of salve in the first place.

Where was the salve now? He had to help Tuff treat these first -  then he could maim whoever was responsible. He’d chop their hands off, he decided. So they could never hold a whip or anything like it again. Yeah, that was what he would do - but later.

“Sit on the bed,” he muttered and Tuff nodded, obeying him.

Dagur opened the cabin door, bellowing for Vorg. His captain showed up within moments, with his ever-present scowl. He opened his mouth to give an order and then shut it when he saw that Vorg was not alone.

The captain had in one hand, Tuff’s satchel. In the other hand was the scruff of the scraggly old man who had earlier attacked his companion. The old man was stubbornly clinging to something leathery.

“Thought your guest might want his things,” Vorg explained. “So I went back for them and found this guy going through his pack like a filthy Bog Burglar. He’s apparently found something he wants you to see.”

Mildew’s beady eyes were full of terror and malice as he thrust the object out in front of him as though it could ward Dagur off. The Berserker sneered at the man but glanced at the object.

“Okay. A saddle. Was it a worthy find, you goat? Now not only have you attacked my dragon trainer, you’ve gone through his personal belongings. If he’s not offended by that, I am.” Dagur made as if to draw his sword, but Vorg stopped him.

“Sir, you should know something first. Mildew here is from Berk. He’s a traitor who has told Alvin many secrets - from Hiccup’s dragon-taming techniques to details of Berk’s new defenses and where their guards will be during an attack. It’s likely he knows your companion better than you might.”

Dagur scowled. “Wherever my companion is from, I think it’s safe to say he doesn’t miss home all that much. I need that salve.”

Vorg handed the bag over, still frowning. “Whether or not you trust him, sir, if Alvin finds out Tuffnut is from Berk, he may demand you hand him over.”

“Too bad for him because I won’t. Alvin can huff and puff all he wants. Technically, I caught Tuff, so that makes him my prisoner,” Dagur said distractedly, feeling through the bag for the salve. He found the tin and set the bag down on the floor of the cabin. Then he yanked the saddle away from Mildew and whacked the old man over the head with it.

“Listen up, old coot! I'm going to give you some free advice. Right now, my companion is injured - injuries that you no doubt aggravated with your pointlessly stupid attack. When I find out the person responsible for him needing this in the first place -“ Dagur waved the tin under Mildew’s quivering nostrils - “I’m going to hunt them down and make them wish they had never been born.”

He gave Mildew one of his sharpest most devilish smiles. “So I advise you to think about that, before you say or do anything that might cause my friend further discomfort or pain. Think about the lengths that Dagur the Deranged might go, to protect what’s his. Nod if you understood all that, and I’ll permit you to leave my sight with every limb still attached.”

Mildew, eyes wide as saucers, nodded frantically. Vorg let him go and he scrabbled frantically off the ship and down to the docks, clearly terrified Dagur would change his mind.

Dagur took a breath, pulling himself together. He noticed Vorg staring at him oddly.

“What?!”

“Sorry sir, it’s just . . . Are you certain you don't have a Mark?”

Dagur blinked, too taken aback to fume. He had assumed everyone figured it was Hiccup, that Hiccup was who the Gods had given him.

But then - why would they? Dagur had never given anyone an explanation as to why he wanted to hunt Hiccup down. For all they knew it was a vendetta thing. The son of Chief Stoick had humiliated the entire clan by his treatment of Dagur, after all.

And yet here they were - all still following him.

Dagur swallowed a sudden lump in his throat, temporarily unable to meet Vorg’s gaze.

Maybe his people were hoping his Mark would come soon to calm him, like his mother had calmed his raging father? Oswald had been a madman in his day; Dagur had grown up knowing all the legends, but he’d never actually seen his father rage.

As annoying as it had seemed to have such a kind and understanding father . . . he sort of missed it. He even missed the stupid smacking noises when Oswald chewed.

Dagur frowned, shaking his head to clear his thoughts. “I . . . will go check,” he muttered distractedly. He went back into the cabin and shut the door behind him, leaving behind his very perplexed and concerned captain.

—

Tuff was on the far edge of the bed, his tunic wadded up in his hands and currently hiding his face. His body was curled over and trembling, and Dagur approached slowly, so as not to alarm him.

He wondered how much of all that Tuff had heard.

“Hey there,” he muttered awkwardly, sitting next to him. “Um. You alright?”

After a long moment, Tuff lowered the tunic to peer at him, looking only slightly calmer.

Dagur didn’t know what to say, but he knew he could at least do something. He opened the tin and coated his fingers in salve. “We found your medicine. Lay down so I can treat you. However comfortable you can make yourself.”

He tried to keep his tone calm, like his mother’s had always been. Tuff responded to his efforts like a kitten to cream. He crawled toward him immediately, draping himself across Dagur’s lap and burying his face in his arms. Oh … okay ….

Dagur felt his pulse kick up at the eagerness Tuff showed to be so close and vulnerable to him but kept his movements slow and purposeful, gently moving Tuff’s long hair so it hung away from his back. As gently as he could manage, he started to coat the welts curling over the tops of those thin shoulders. “Who did this to you?” he asked after a while. “And … when?”

“My Elders,” came the mumbled answer after a long silence. “About three days ago.”

A formal beating. And … three days ago? Dagur's heart did a funny skip in his chest and he paused, processing that for a moment. Shaking his head, he moved on to the next cruel laceration on Tuff’s back.

“Why did your Elders have you whipped?”

Under Dagur’s fingers, Tuff started trembling again.

“Oh. You don’t have to be ashamed,” Dagur assured him. “It’s me, the ‘evil’, deranged Berserker Prince, remember? Go on, try to impress me.”

Tuff either hiccoughed or snickered, Dagur couldn’t tell. He wiped his eyes with the back of his hand and looked up over his shoulder. “I - I released a dragon. I wasn’t supposed to. The Skrill.”

Dagur stared at him. He’d expected something like a carelessly broken wagon or shattered prized dishes, or maybe even a theft of sheep. But releasing a dragon . . .?

“Are you Berkian? Did Hiccup catch the Skrill first? Was he trying to train her himself?” Dagur blurted. Tuff made a thin noise of distress, starting to look panicked.

“Of course you’re from Berk. It explains how you know so much about dragons and why Mildew attacked you and also why I’ve never met you until now. Look, it’s okay, I’m not going to hurt you for not telling me. Because of you, I have my Skrill, so why would I want to?” Dagur reassured him, beginning to treat the lash marks further down his back. “Looks to me like you’ve been punished enough.”

Tuffnut swallowed and looked up plaintively, trying to gather his nerve.

“It’s more than that, actually. I . . . I was a dragon-rider - one of Hiccup’s.”

Dagur stared at him, trying to jog his memory. He'd never really looked close enough at Hiccup’s Greek chorus but he’d figured there were about four others. “I don’t remember you fighting me.”

“I … generally I was just air support,” Tuff said, flushing. “We never … we never fought up close. My sister and I rode the Zippleback.”

“Oh yeah, the green one. So what made you not want to be a dragon rider anymore? Leaving Berk I understand, but … your sister? Your dragon?”

Tuff looked sad, but nodded. “My sister will take care of Belch. I couldn’t stay on Berk anymore. Some people in my family … didn’t think I’d been punished enough.”

“What?” Dagur asked, fury swelling inside of him. “What does that mean?!”

“I’m okay,” Tuff said quickly, sounding scared. Dagur took a breath and tried to calm down.

“Sorry. You’re just … I think you were overly punished for letting some dragon out of a cage.”

“She wasn’t in a cage. ” He hesitated, but went on. “She was completely frozen in a block of ice. Hiccup knew Berserkers revered the Skrill and he was scared of you getting a hold of her. But I couldn’t leave her like that. I decided I wanted her to be free to find her own way, even if she was dangerous and even if it did mean you’d find her. Hiccup went off to talk to his father and I was left with my sister and Snotlout to guard her frozen body.”

“So you just - what? Chipped her out? Melted her out?” Dagur asked, entranced.

“Blasted her out,” Tuff admitted sheepishly. Dagur gave a delighted cackle. “And within minutes, she thawed out and was able to fly away, no problem.”

“Bet old Stoick and Hiccup had piglets! Oh boy, if I could have seen the looks on their faces! I bet they didn’t like that one bit!” Dagur laughed. Tuff shifted with a pained expression on his lap and that smacked the jubilance right out of him. “Oh, sorry. Right. Yeah, that probably wouldn’t have been so great for you.”

“It’s fine. It was worth it. Hiccup wasn’t going to train or even revive her, he was just going to keep her in the same big chunk of iceberg we found her in. He cared more about you never getting to fly than what became of her. Dragons aren’t problems to solve - they’re living, breathing, harboring era of destruction and chaos! Hiccup needs to realize and respect that! I thought … I really thought we were the good guys, but I guess I was wrong.”

Dagur blinked, made solemn by Tuff’s sorrow.

“Well, it sounds like you had a good reason to free her and then leave. Now you’re here and you get to help me. I can help you find a new dragon. Probably not another Zippleback though. Oh, ooh, awkward memory - that wouldn’t have been your dragon I almost killed for dragon blood ink, was it?”

Tuff regarded him with surprise and nodded, in a way that made Dagur flush self-consciously. Of course -  it had to have been his dragon that Dagur had nearly beheaded, all for the sake of exposing a theory that Berk was secretly raising a dragon army.

Well, he’d been right about that part, sort of.

“Really sorry about that. Wish I’d had a better introduction to the fact you Berkians all loved your dragons. I mean, the Skrill is just - she’s amazing. If I’d just known what they could be like  - I mean, I don’t think I ever would have lifted a finger to -“

He was cut off by arms wrapping around his waist in a tight hug. Dagur nearly dropped the salve. He stared down at Tuff, who had curled closer to bury his face in Dagur’s chest.

“I knew you wouldn’t,” Tuff hitched after a long moment, pulling back so he could talk. “I knew that and I tried to tell them that everything was because we lied to you. We made you think dragons were still the enemy because Hiccup wanted to protect them - he wants to keep it all a big secret! I told them that if they just had explained, and given you a chance, maybe you wouldn’t have been our enemy. Everyone told me that was treasonous to say - even the Chief -“

He was getting wound up again. Dagur hushed him and coaxed Tuff to lay back down across his knees. “It’s okay, you don’t have to explain. I get it. I’ve always been the troublesome kid, so it makes sense that nobody would trust me. I’m not mad at you about it though, so just try to relax, okay?” Looking shocked, the other boy obeyed, again resting his head on Dagur’s thigh.

Dagur’s mind was a maelstrom as he worked, reanalyzing the Mark on his wrist, and how it applied to Hiccup. How and why would the Gods give him someone who didn’t trust or even like him, when this boy - this complete stranger - saw enough worth in him to help him train a Skrill? Trusted him enough to let him clean and treat his wounds?

He couldn’t help but notice each time Tuff’s breath caught painfully whenever he touched a point that two lashes had intersected. He was so thin - almost as scrawny as Hiccup - how had this not killed him? Dagur ran a careful hand across Tuff’s sides, not liking how each rib felt defined through the skin. The way Tuffnut had bolted his food earlier made too much sense for his comfort.

Normally, Dagur loathed traitors, but there was no way on Midgard that Tuff had done any of this through malice. Rather, he had spoken up against injustice and had been punished like a criminal. Dagur couldn’t honestly claim he wouldn’t have switched sides had his own family treated him like this.

If anything … if anything, Berk had betrayed Tuff.

When all Tuff’s welts and lacerations had been cleaned and coated, Dagur’s fingers smoothed down across his ribs once more, then hesitated at the boy’s waist.

“Is there any more?” he asked awkwardly. He could see the beginnings of a red welt curving down across a hip to disappear beneath Tuff’s belt. “I mean, this is the only beating you got for all this, right?”

Nobody could have punished him more, surely. Nobody could be that cruel.

Wishful thinking … hadn’t Tuff said some of his family members didn’t think he’d been punished enough?

Tuff closed his eyes, hesitant to answer. “There’s . . . a little more. It’s okay, I’ve been treating it. I can get it myself.”

“It’s not okay,” Dagur snapped and cursed himself inwardly when Tuff flinched. “Sorry. I’m not mad at you,” he reminded, voice gentle this time. “All I want is to just take care of you. My mom was a healer - she taught me a lot. This salve has comfrey in it, which is a good move. Did you make it yourself?”

“Mom made it and sent it with Ruff. My sister. She helped me get off Berk the night it all happened, and treated my wounds.”

So his sister and mom were the good guys here - that was useful to know. “What about your dad? Did he help get you free?”

Tuff swallowed and went silent, not answering. He’d started shaking at the mention of his father though, which spoke volumes.

Gut dropping, Dagur carefully started to undo the boy’s belt, sliding it off him. When Tuffnut didn’t stop him, he eased down the waistband of his leggings to be greeted with yet more welts and bruises - and something far worse.

There was a horrible burn on his hip, and worst of all, it looked intentional, as though made with a branding iron.

Dagur’s blood ran cold. “Is . . . that a . . .?”

“I'm sorry.” Tuff muttered, hiding his face behind his hands, “I’m sorry, he thought it was a tattoo - and I couldn’t get away - I couldn’t stop him -“

What? Dagur looked closer and saw a shape beneath the branded circle. He realized instantly the horror of what had been done.

“Who did this - who dared brand your Mark? Was it your father? Did he leave all these welts too?” Dagur demanded, fury thick in his voice. He was going to kill the man slowly and enjoy it. There was no excuse whatsoever for anyone to treat their own son like this.

Tuff had started shaking hard, starting to cry. Dagur cursed again as he realized his anger was probably affecting Tuffnut.

“Hey, Hey, I’m sorry - “ The Berserker murmured, leaning over Tuff. He pressed a palm to Tuff’s cheek, stroking away the tears. “I’m mad at him and your Elders, not you, though me yelling about it is probably the last thing you need to deal with right now.”

Sobbing, Tuff nuzzled Dagur’s palm, clutching his wrist tightly. “It’s fine, it’s okay,” he managed. “H-He didn’t know it w-was a Mark and then he - I had to -“

“Shh, you’re safe now, just let me see.” He stroked Tuff’s hair trying to calm him, and looked again at the Mark, making himself focus on the shape of it rather than the scarred flesh beneath it.

A Skrill. Not just a Skrill, but fashioned after his own tribe’s symbol. His heart started to pound. There were a million questions he wanted to ask Tuff, but now wasn’t the time, not with Tuff’s current state.

Dagur banished all thoughts of vengeance from his mind and leaned down to kiss Tuff’s temple gently, stroking his hair again - the only area that didn’t look too painful to touch. Tuffnut hitched and started crying harder, but he sat up on his uninjured hip and wrapped his arms around Dagur’s neck, holding on to him tightly.

For the first time in a while, Dagur felt tears on his own face. He cupped the back of Tuff’s head and held him close until the storm passed. Eventually the rider relaxed in his arms, breathing steadily and only sniffling.

Gently, Dagur coaxed him out of the rest of his clothing, then got him to lay on his stomach. Tuff nestled across his lap again, hiding his face in the crook of Dagur’s arm, leaving the other free to tend to the rest of his injuries. Tuff’s arms moved to  Dagur’s waist, clinging to him as though he was a lifeline.

He trusted him, utterly, and maybe it was the Mark, and maybe Tuff was just a brave soul - brave and courageous in ways Dagur couldn’t understand.

It boggled his mind, honestly, why the Gods thought he, Dagur the Deranged, was worthy of this boy. He wasn’t even worthy enough for Hiccup.

And a chicken? Really? The idea Tuff could appear as a mere chicken on anybody was laughable. Well, one thing was certain, he should probably end his long-fought crusade against all poultry kind and leave the poor birds alone.

He put the thoughts away for now, closing the tin and putting it aside. He drew one of the fur blankets up over Tuff’s body to give him cover and laid his back against the wall, blowing out the lantern so Tuff could sleep.

In the dark, Tuff hitched his name, sounding terrified, uncertain.

“It’s going to be okay, Tuff,” Dagur murmured. “You’re safe now, with me. I’m not going to let anyone hurt you like this again.”

Tuff gave a few shuddering breaths, saying his name again. He shifted until he could rest his head on Dagur’s shoulder, nuzzling under his chin. “N-No-ones going to hurt you either. Not Hiccup, not Stoick - nobody.”

His bold promise was utterly charming, not that Dagur didn’t believe him. It was just … nobody had ever vowed to defend him.

Come to think of it, nobody had ever wanted to cuddle with him before either.

Dagur felt a surge of protectiveness and carded his fingers through Tuff’s hair, stroking his cheek with his thumb. He was not at all prepared for Tuff’s hand caressing his face, or pressing soft lips against his. The Berserker’s heart fluttered and started to pound.

“Are you mine?” he murmured in a daze, as soon as the spine-tingling kiss was broken.

Dagur could make out standing tears in the silvery gray eyes before him, and thought to himself ‘how pretty’ before Tuff’s mouth hungrily met his again in answer.

****

Tbc 

[kiruuuuu]

Glaz/Echo oneshot in which Echo refuses to apologise for something, uh, unsavoury. (Rating T, chaotic nonsense, ~1.4k words) - written for @magehir​!! 💞💞

.

“You pissed into my closet.”

Echo immediately loses track of the complicated equation he was working out in his head and feels the sudden urge to bang his head against the tabletop. Looking up, he’s presented with an inexplicably disgruntled Glaz looming over him and glaring. All that’s missing are his hands on his hips to complete the nagging housewife aesthetic. “Are you nuts? I did no such thing.”

“You’re very welcome to come home and smell it yourself. Is that why you were gone so early this morning? Because you didn’t want to be forced to clean everything?”

“No. I was gone early because that’s the time we go to work, Timur, though I suppose I can’t expect you to know this seeing as you’re never on time.”

“What?” Indignation warps Glaz’ features into an even more alluring grimace. There’s no way Echo would ever admit it, but Glaz looks stunning when he’s angry. “I’m always punctual!”

“I highly doubt that, considering you always get up more than an hour later.”

“That’s because you take forever with your stupid hair. You get up with messy hair, comb it, and then very carefully mess it up again.”

“Not true. I don’t take that long. And besides, it’s not stupid.” He chances a quick glance around to look for the nearest reflective surface just in case there really is something wrong with his hair. When he comes up empty and turns back to their argument, Glaz seems even more unimpressed. “You were late today. So there’s that.”

“Yes. I was late because I had to throw all my clothes in the wash because they stank. Because you, as I said, pissed into my fucking closet!”

“Don’t pin this on me, are you sure you didn’t do it yourself?”

“Of course not! Why would I do that?”

“Well why would I do that? Just the fact that you’ve been yelling at me for five minutes is reason enough not to.”

“Maybe it’s payback for the time I threw up all over your favourite trousers. You do have a vindictive streak, you know.”

“But I already forgave you for that. That’s long settled.”

“Yeah, because you made me buy you a new pair.”

“Which you chose based on which ones made my ass look best.”

“Can you blame me? Have you looked in a mirror while wearing them? Wait, I have a photo somewhere…”

And while Glaz is tapping away at his phone, Echo heaves a sigh and turns to Mute next to him, intending to complain some more when he realises that everyone in the workshop is staring at them, except for the young Brit who nonchalantly keeps tinkering with one of Smoke’s gas grenades. Zofia, in the process of pouring herself a glass of water, apparently abandoned her previous activity halfway through without setting the bottle down, and has created a small flood on her side of the room. No one around her seems to have noticed.

“Haven’t argued in public before, mate”, Mute murmurs distractedly as if he could read minds.

That actually explains a lot. Echo considers addressing the room but figures a statement like this is normal or maybe a reassuring at least neither of us has threatened to break up yet wouldn’t improve the situation. Not with how appalled Mira already seems to be.

When Glaz shows him the evidence, accidentally navigating back to the gallery and revealing about a hundred secretly snapped photos of Echo, he can’t even muster up the energy to be angry.

.

“I don’t ever want to argue in front of other people again”, Echo says without interrupting his head massage. Glaz is curled up on top of him, petted into a content, catatonic state, and so it takes him several seconds to reply.

When he does, he stretches first, pressing closer to him and rubbing his cheek against Echo’s chest. It’s so freaking adorable he considers abandoning the topic in favour of just snogging until they can’t breathe but freezes when Glaz sleepily mutters: “Shouldn’t have pissed in my closet then.”

His irritation is back full force. “I didn’t fucking -”

“How do you know?”

“- what?”

“Really, how do you know? We both can’t remember much after Dom got the gin out. How can you be so sure it wasn’t you?”

“You know what, maybe it was Dom. He did stagger home later, but that doesn’t disqualify him.”

“Don’t pin this on other people now.”

“He’s a perfectly viable option! I admit that it’s unlikely you yourself did it, but that doesn’t -”

“Besides, you’re Asian. You already don’t deal well with alcohol.”

Echo’s eyes begin hurting from rolling so hard. “Seriously? We’re doing stereotypes now? Then explain to me how I managed to drink more than you did. You’re Russian after all, you should have vodka running through your veins.”

“But just because I’m Russian -” Glaz stops mid-sentences, re-evaluates and seems to belatedly understand. He turns in Echo’s embrace so they’re eye to eye. “I take it back. I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine.” Echo purses his lips in anticipation of a kiss, maybe some more, a sweet locking of lips turning sloppy, or even just Glaz pushing a hand under Echo’s shirt to run his finger over warm skin, but instead Glaz just looks at him expectantly. “Hm? What is it?”

“Don’t you also have something to apologise for?”

“What do you …”

“My closet.”

Due to the ensuing fight, they miss most of the film they were watching and restart it, only to get caught up in a discussion about whether they’ll order or make food, with both of them being too lazy to make anything but too indecisive to agree on any takeaway. After realising they still have leftovers, they gorge themselves on an adequate amount of stir-fry rice and end up much the same as most evenings: Echo gaming at his PC and Glaz stretched out on the couch, sketching and letting the TV entertain him in the background.

“Why do you always argue with me?”, Echo wants to know over his shoulder during a particularly long matchmaking queue. Frowning, he corrects himself: “Why am I the only one you argue with? You rarely do with your team or your friends.”

Glaz doesn’t even look up. “Because with you, I don’t feel like I need a filter.” And when Echo doesn’t respond, he adds an amused: “I know you’re blushing.”

.

“Honestly, it’s a good thing you can keep up with Glaz in drinking or else the Russians would’ve long lost what little respect for you they still have”, Bandit announces cheerfully and slaps down a Draw 4 card.

As usual, it’s only the two of them left in the game, due to Echo’s superior skill in strategy and probably Bandit’s cheating, the other guests having congregated in the kitchen and leaving the two of them to battle it out. “What do you mean?”, Echo wants to know and increases his hand size to whopping 10 cards with a sigh.

“You’re terrified of mistreating him in front of them, so they think you’re proper whipped. Which, if you ask me, isn’t even far from the truth.”

How very dare he. Just because Echo convinced his guild to adapt their raid schedule to Glaz’ liking doesn’t imply - “Why do we even still invite you over?”

“No idea, especially after I was so drunk last time that I ended up pissing in Glaz’ closet.”

Echo’s eyes snap up in disbelief. He opens his mouth, ready to tell this little sack of shit exactly what he can do to himself, but it’s at that moment that Glaz enters the room again. Perfect timing. He waves him over with a: “Timur! Come here. And you, Dom, repeat what you just said.”

Bandit’s genuine amusement shifts into mild concern. “Please don’t. I just told you I wouldn’t take the blame for you, didn’t you listen? No amount of money can make this right – if you urinated all over Glaz’ clothes, you should just admit to it and apologise.”

And while Glaz starts yelling at Echo about bribing others to be his scapegoats, while Echo is utterly dumbfounded and merely gapes at the audacity, Bandit puts down another Draw 4 and winks at him.

[a-god-in-ruins-rises]

Ares, Gaia, Hades and Hypnos

Ares: What small thing makes you angry?

idk if these would be considered small things but some of my pet peeves: breaking promises (even “small” ones), someone else making me look incompetent (like if i trust you with a certain task i need done and you fail to come through and make me look bad as a result), suggesting i’m a liar (saying i did something that i did not do or saying i didn’t do something that i did), people interrupting me when i’m working on something, people who can’t sit comfortably in silence/people who talk too much (about nothing that matters), littering, mistreatment of animals or children, unresponsive software, lag in a video game, people who are just inefficient or lazy or incompetent, etc. and many other things. 

Gaia: Where’s your favorite place in the world?

feel like there are different ways to answer this. like how specific are we being? america is my favorite place in the world. more specific? california. more specific? where i live. more specific? my spot by the sea. but i also love the redwood forests and yosemite. i love big sur. i like disneyland. i like hanging out at the harbor. or i could more broadly say “the sea”. i feel most at peace when i’m at sea. or i could be romantic and say that my favorite place in the world is wherever my soulmate is at any given time. and then there are tons of places i’ve never been that i know would become favorites if i ever visited but i won’t include those because i don’t think they count. and that’s part of the trouble because i haven’t really traveled very much so i don’t really have a wide array of places to refer.

Hades: Have you ever had a near-death experience?

i’ve not had an NDE where i feel like i’m leaving my body or anything but i have had a few times where i have come close to dying. like almost getting hit by a car or almost falling from a high place or getting caught up in some gang shit.

Hypnos: What was your most recent dream about?

oh man i was somewhere far away. i think i was vacationing or something. i was staying at some hotel. and i there was some festival going on. and i was there with some girl. and we were celebrating, listening to music, dancing, playing games, drinking, just enjoying the sights and sounds, etc. and every now and then there would be small tremors. like small earthquakes. and apparently we were somewhere where earthquakes were uncommon because people were pretty freaked out about it but people eventually continued on with the celebrations. and the tremors start getting stronger and more frequent. i start getting increasingly uneasy. then there were people screaming. and gunshots. and people running in panic. and so i took the girl i was with and started heading back to the hotel. and just as the hotel came into view there was another HUGE earthquake. and buildings started collapsing, including our hotel. the place we were at was right by the ocean and so i started fearing a tsunami and immediately started looking for the highest point i could find. and the city’s sirens started blaring, warning of a tsunami. and i could still hear screaming and gunshots in the distance. me and the girl were running and running and i looked behind us and could see the ocean was way receded. and finally we found this tall-ish building but it was abandoned and locked. and so i started trying to break down the door. a few other people joined us. and i kept looked back towards the sea and this time i could see the tsunami coming in. just a minute before it hits us i break open the door and we run in and scramble up the stairs to the roof. and from there me and the girl and the few strangers watched as the city is torn apart by the tsunami. and eventually we noticed a few masked men wearing body armor and armed with guns on the roof of a nearby building. and every now and then we would hear this unearthly roar and these masked men would be shooting at something out of view. one of the strangers was telling us that before the tsunami or even the shooting there were people talking about seeing a mysterious creature. and he figured the masked men were trying to help us so he started shouting at them and before we could stop him the masked men noticed us and started shooting at us, killing a couple of the strangers. and that’s where i woke up.

[imgilmoregirl]

A Rose of the Forbidden Love

AO3 Link

Chapter Eight

The thing Rose was starting to hate about supermarkets were the kids section and not because she didn’t like to look at small clothes and funny toys as think about her baby with them, but because Neal was way better at doing that than she was and it was pretty annoying, mainly when he wanted to buy everything he saw. Neal was a photographer who always carried his big professional camera wherever they went to, he had been an orphan like her, apparently his parents drank way too much and couldn’t take care of a child properly.

He ended up in an orphanage near where Father Gold presided some masses, and became quite fond of him, even thought of joining the church and becoming a priest himself, but them he met a girl, Emma, and totally gave up this idea. His love for taking pictures had owed him a few amazing jobs at great magazines among other things and he bought a camp house where he now lived with his wife and son.

Emma had seen no problem in him coming to Storybrooke for a while to help Rose and she had been really nice to her during the months she spent there. Actually, Neal’s wife was hoping Rosalie could convince him to buy an apartment for them in town, so she could be near her parents and everything else, other than hide near the mountains. She thought it was a great idea, but as Neal showed her the tenth blue bear that day, Rose sighed, quite tired of it and making a mental note to never come to a supermarket with him again.

"Alright, what do you think about this one?"

"Way too blue?" Rose tried. "Neal, you can't buy the whole boy section when we don't even know what this baby is, yet!"

"We could've known if you hadn't insisted it should a surprise."

"Like Christmas morning presents," she completed.

She rolled her eyes at him, taking the stuffed animal from his hands and placing it back to the shelve, decided to not buy a single thing that couldn’t be used by both boys and girls. If she wanted a surprise she would have it.

"This is a child, Rosalie, not a doll," Neal complained. "Come on, I'll pay for another ultrasound if you let me know!"

"Seriously?" Rose arched an eyebrow to him, shaking her head. "The answer remains the same."

"I hate you!"

"You're a grown-up baby!"

Rosalie never had siblings, although she shared her life with a lot of other kids who lived at the same orphanage as her, but they never stayed there for long. She was one of those unlucky children who stayed there forever, never been chosen by whoever came to visit the place, trying to chose their future kid. In the begging she was just not what they wanted, then she was too old and soon enough she was facing the world all alone. However, Neal felt like a big brother to her. He was really nice, despite of how much he tried to annoy her a day, and he took care of her, made sure she and her child wished for nothing and she knew he didn’t do all of this just because Father Gold asked him to. Neal was one of the kindest persons she had ever known in her life.

She was rubbing the big mound of her stomach, feeling some kicks, as she averted her gaze to the girl section, giving a quick look to all of those pink things and products she didn’t even know to exist until she became pregnant, before her world was shattered again.

"Rose, you're back," Roland de Locksley said a smile that was somewhat full of hope, playing on his lips.

"Yes," the world escaped her, barely a whispered.

The girl took some steps back, reaching for Neal’s hand and gripping it tight, as if he was her safe haven and would protect her from everything – which she knew he truly would. Roland came closed, eyes fixed in her belly.

"When will the baby be born?"

"Soon, I think."

"Oh, Rose,” the boy breathed, walking the rest of the small distance to her and cupping one of her shoulders as his other hand laid on her stomach, causing the baby to kick. “Let me be there for you and our child."

She couldn’t breathe. This closeness between them he whole body tense and a lump form in her throat, but she didn’t need to take this for too long, because in the next second Neal was storming out with Roland, pushing him away with an angry frown.

"Step back and take your hands off her."

"Who the hell are you? Her body-guard?"

"I can guarantee I'm more than that," Neal assured.

Roland’s eyes narrowed as he looked between them, noticing how over-protective about her, Neal was. Rose knew that in his mind there was only one answer and it certainly wasn’t the truth, because Roland could never guess how and why she met that guy, nor that he was in fact a married man with a son to raise.

"Are you two together?"

"We should go home Neal," Rose said, taking his hand and trying to drag him away as he continued to stare dangerously a Roland.

"No, you can't replace me with him! I'm this baby's father!"

"Forget about me, Roland,” Rosalie remarked fiercely, “because you'll never be a part of this child's life."

Then, she finally managed to convince Neal to go away.

Driving to Belle’s house was the last thing Father Gold expected to be doing on a Wednesday night. When she had called him earlier, crying and barely managing to speak between her sobs, the only thing he managed to understand was that she needed him and she needed now. He didn’t think much about what he was doing as he got inside the car, making his way to the place which he had never been to before, but knew its localization as Belle was pretty famous in town and most people did know where she lived.

He jumped off the Cadillac, taking fast steps to her doorstep and knocking repeatedly, worried about what could have happened to her. The last time he had seen her broken like she seemed to be when they talked, was the night she appeared drunk at the church, yelling a bunch of bad things at him. Gold was really terrified of how he would find her today, so every second he waited for the door to be open was a small eternity for him.

"Adam," Belle mumbled when she finally appeared, throwing her arms around his waist and burying her face on his chest, leaving him without reaction for a moment, before he carded his fingers into her hair, pulling her closer in an attempt to give her some kind of comfort.

"Sweetheart, what happened? You sounded wrecked on the phone and now you look so pale!"

A deep sob came from her as Belle dragged him inside the house, kicking the door shut behind them. She fell to the couch and Gold kneeled beside her, wiping the tears away from her face and noticing the soft lines that had appeared in it along the years, an inevitable reminding that time had passed. It didn’t make her any less beautiful to his eyes, though, and he knew the years had been way gentler with her appearance than they were with him.

"I know the truth," Belle breathed. "Rosalie Weaver is our daughter."

He nodded emphatically, holding both her hands in his and, pressing his forehead to them, a silent pleading for forgiveness.

"Aye, that she is."

"She hates me," his beloved continued. "I've been cruel to her, I've fire her and now I know she is the little girl I’ve abandoned all those years ago. How will she ever be able to forgive me?"

The answer could have been obvious to anyone: she wouldn’t. But Gold couldn’t let himself believe that he would never seen mother and daughter having a great relationship. They were his family, everything he had ever loved in his life and he would make sure Rose knew how much her mother loved her and deserved her forgiveness.

"Rose is a good girl,” he said, “she eventually will."

"She is pregnant," Belle mumbled, fingers pulling his greying hair away from his face as her tears continued falling unstoppably.

"Yeah, you're are going to be a grandmother."

Sliding to the edge of the sofa, so she was closer to him, Belle continued to pet the priest’s hair, but her glance was lost in an invisible point, trying to deal with the pain burning her from inside. From all girls in this world, her daughter had to be the one she most mistreated and plotted to ruin. God, she was no better than Fiona! Maybe she was worse, as she had done all those things to her own daughter, blood of her blood.

"I want to go to her and tell her everything, but I don't think it is the right time."

"You're probably right," Gold agreed, stroking her thigh through the fabric of her dress. "But it will come and you'll have to be strong, Belle."

"I'm afraid," she whispered in a broken voice.

He cupped her face, giving her a look full of compassion, eyes shining with kindness and even something more, something she didn’t know she could still find there, and when the worlds slipped out of his mouth in that wonderful accent of his, Belle’s heart raced with something other than fear in a long, long time.

"Oh, my love, I know it."

"Say that again," she pleaded. "My love."

Then Gold made a decision, one that would change everything and probably wreck his relationship with his mother forever: he leaned on and kissed Belle. It was strange and messy, years of celibate making him feel completely inexperienced, but once their lips touched, there was only blinding need to follow. He forgot about his vows, his future and everything else. There was only her and suddenly he was only a man again. He was freeing himself, from something he had been forced to choose.

"My one true love," Adam murmured against Belle’s lips.

And that was what he would be from now on. Just Adam.

Rose checked her purse for the second time, finding her keys and peeking a look inside the bedroom she shared with Sabine and Jacinda to see Neal comfortably laid in her bed, his laptop opened as he typed something in it, eyes focused on the scream.

"Neal, I'm going to the grocery store, do you want something?"

"No, thank you," he said, directing a wide smile at her and adding in a secrecy tone: "I'm looking for some apartments on the internet."

"Well, good luck with that!"

She was happy he had chosen to stay in Storybrooke, because after all those months, she considered him one of her best friend and it would be nice to have another child around to play with hers when it was old enough. Little Henry was a cute little thing and she had lots of fun making him giggle. Rosalie smiled to herself as she made her way to the door, getting out of the flat and locking it before she walked through the hallway, almost jumping with surprise when she found the short-haired girl climbing up the stairs.

"Hello, Rose."

"Ivy?” She blinked. “What are you doing here? And how the hell did you get my address?"

"Does it matter?"

"I suppose not. So, what do you want?"

Ivy took a careful step closer. She was all dressed in black: a patterned dress, leather jacket and heeled boots, the bright pink lipstick, the only happy thing on her face. She still looked the very same from months ago, when the two of them met – expect for the now flat belly – but the circles around her eyes and the way they were fixed in her, sent chills through Rosalie’s body.

"I've lost my baby," Ivy murmured, dangerously slow, her tone cold and emotionless.

"I know, Jacinda told me and I'm really sorry."

She made and sound of disdain, eyes falling to Rose’s swollen middle-section, which made the girl cover it with both hands in a protective gesture.

"You see, Rosalie, we have a little problem in here, because you are still going to have a child and Roland thinks he still have a change of being a father."

"Listen,” Rose started, trying to keep calm. “I've told him to forget me a thousand times."

"Yeah, but that didn't work,” Ivy retorted. “And I know you think you can this get him using this little bastard."

Breathing in, Rose decided she had enough of it. Nobody called her child a bastard and she wasn’t willing to keep hearing the stupid things Ivy had to say, because it wouldn’t make her no good. If she wanted Roland, she could keep him, they had already gotten married, hadn’t they? He was meant to be hers, forever.

"I'm not interested in your husband, now if you excuse me, I have things to do."

Rose went to the staircase, ignoring the fact that Ivy was following her, still shouting nonsense.

"You're going to see him, aren't you?"

"What? Are you mad?" Rosalie asked, turning around to see her. "Haven't you heard anything I said?"

"Roland likes you, not me," Ivy assured.

"But I don't want him anymore!"

"Liar!"

She didn’t get a hold on the handrail in time, in a second Rose was standing in a step, trying to understand what was wrong with that girl, and in the other, Ivy had pushed her back and she lost her balance, rolling down the stairs. Her head hit the floor hard and for a while everything went black, but then she woke up, a horrible pain coming from her belly, the dizziness making her feel she could faint again at any time. Thankfully, she noticed there was someone beside her and it wasn’t Ivy.

"Rose?" Neal asked. "Oh no, what happened?"

"Pain," she mumbled. "Help, please."

Nodding, Neal took her in his arms, rushing to his truck.

[coutelier]

Too Human

Here’s a little short story of sorts (about 2,000 words), basically taken from abandoned parts of my current WIP (which you can find out a bit more about on the link on the right of my blog). I guess you can consider a mini-prequel:

It started as an almost perfect summers day, basking in the warmth of the sun as a cooling breeze kept it from being overbearing. Little Tien was chasing the dog with a hose, happier than she had ever been since – well, the day was almost perfect. There was a seat on the patio that now lay empty and several romance novels that now went unread. But for Hung there was still work to do. On his laptop he scrolled lists of numbers, formulas – he would rather have been playing too, but it had to be done. Tien was his world now and he had to make sure she would always be provided for.

The dog was barking. It took Hung a moment to register the shift in the animal’s tone – it had been yelping merrily but had become wild about something. Hung jumped away from his work. Tien had gone quiet, but he couldn’t imagine the family pet turning on her - surely he’d have heard a scream if it had. Running around the side of the house he saw the dog with its chest low and legs spread as if wanting to pounce, but its eyes fixed high above, baring his teeth at a point in a nearby tree. Tien’s eyes were fixed there too, but whereas the dog was agitated she was wistful, holding out her arms like she did when she wanted an adult to pick her up.

“What is it boy?” Hung asked. He wished someone would invent something that would have allowed the dog to answer and explain what it was worried about. As it was it just kept snarling at the tree and Tien answered for it.

“It’s mommy!” She said excitedly. “She’s coming home!”

Hung felt his heart contract, trying to crush itself as it couldn’t bear to hear the hopefulness in the girl anymore. She was still too young to understand. “Honey,” he tried to explain, “mommy’s gone – “

But Tien would have none of it. She stamped her foot and insisted, “she’s not gone! She’s waiting for us over there in the garden!”

“What garden?”

“The fairy garden!” She said and stomped indoors, annoyed that he couldn’t see what she was seeing. Hung tried, but all he could see was a tree with its leaves rustling in the breeze. As he turned to leave he did, for an instant, think he heard it whisper his name:

L E H U N G

But that and the chill he put down to just the wind. The dog soon settled down and by evening he’d convinced himself that it must have just been a bird that had got it riled. Tien went to sleep, eventually, leaving Hung alone with the silence. At this time every night it was the gentle clacking of the keyboard as he worked that was the only thing anchoring him to this world, keeping his mind from being swallowed whole by the darkness beyond. But this night came the whispers.

He heard no names this time. It was almost like gargled baby sounds, mimicking the structure of speech but without having learned any actual words. He couldn’t determine whether it was near or far as he searched, the old house creaking as if tortured by his steps despite the care he took not to be heard. The whispering grew louder, a torrent of voices drowning each other out. Which it turned out was close to what it was – a tap left running in the bathroom. Hung cursed and muttered to himself – he really didn’t believe in ghosts or spirits. He supposed he just hadn’t gotten used yet to these nights alone.

Hung made sure the tap was turned off tight and headed back to his laptop. The dog was barking outside and he decided to leave the animal to do so. It was the sound of some life at least. So long as it was there he knew the world wasn’t empty.

And then there was silence.

Just before the silence came again deeper and heavier than ever before, the dog whined and squealed in a way that tingled Hung’s spine paralyzing his body and mind. Then the whispering all around, in his ear and far away. It wasn’t a tap. It wasn’t a ghost or a spirit. He had no name for what it was, yet knew that it wanted him. He wanted to know what had happened to the dog but it was much more important that he go to Tien so he ran up the stairs, the incessant whispering getting no nearer or further, and threw open the door to her room where she should have been sleeping. She wasn’t. She was in the window holding her arms out.

“Tien!” Hung cried. He restrained himself from rushing to her in case he startled and made her fall. “Tien, come inside honey…”

She looked to him then shook her head. “Mommy’s waiting,” she said and stepped outside.

“Tien!” Hung leapt to the windowsill and looked out, fearing he would see his daughter broken on the ground below. Instead he saw her running across the garden into the woods, which should have been a relief, yet he had to wonder how – she was so small and delicate, so how had she not been hurt at all by the fall?

There was no time to wonder about it. He had to go after her wherever she was going, picking up shoes and a flashlight before barging out the back door. He’d made it across the garden before tripping over something both heavy and soft. The dog. He’d forgotten about the dog, but now he was looking into the gaping holes where its eyes should have been, fighting the compulsion to vomit.

The trees rustled and the whisperers urged:

F o l l o w

Whatever evil was lurking out there didn’t matter. He just had to get to Tien before it did, and so he ran and he ran. He couldn’t outrun the whispers – they moved through the wind both urging and mocking him. Sometimes he heard laughter, or saw jumped as a shadow moved unexpectedly. They were everywhere he couldn’t see and he couldn’t see her.

“Tien!” He howled desperately into the night. After a moment the night answered:

T h i s w a y

He had no choice but to follow. It wanted him and was using her to lure him closer, into what seemed a dead end. But then vines that covered a stone wall parted and with horror he realized that he knew what ‘it’ was and that he had helped create it, yet a part of him refused to believe until he stepped through the portal into the earth. The flashlight wasn’t needed down there as the cavern was filled with fungi that emitted a bioluminescent glow.

Hung saw Tien running from him, through the strange garden to a stone throne in which a woman sat, her own skin glowing like the mushrooms all around, but constantly shifting. She lifted the child into her lap, smiling warmly as she said, “Greetings, Doctor Le. It has been some time, hasn’t it?”

Hung fell to his knees. He knew it was futile to fight this creature and still there was a part of him that could not accept her existence or that he was responsible for what happened to the dog or what could happen to his daughter, and there would be nothing he could do. “You,” he gulped, “you’re dead. I saw your body burned…”

“You saw a body burned,” the bright woman told him. “Who that was – honestly I don’t know. Doesn’t matter now really. What matters is I’m alive, and well. I’ve been gathering my strength, and my children.”

Two of them appeared before his eyes either side of the woman; human shapes covered in some kind of chitinous exoskeleton. The woman bounced Tien on her lap and said to her, “tell me, little one, did your daddy ever tell you about his work?” Tien shook her head and so the woman continued, “odd. You’d think if he was proud of what he did he’d tell his only daughter. You see, he was a part of a team that made things – bringing dreams to life was what they said. They made me.”

“Why are you doing this?” Hung begged and wept, but she ignored him.

“Does your daddy tell you how beautiful and perfect you are?” The woman asked. Tien nodded. “Yes? They used to tell me that too. Does it make sense to you that anyone would try to destroy something perfect and beautiful?” Tien vigorously shook her head and the woman nodded thoughtfully. “And yet, that’s exactly what they tried to do. So perhaps they were all just liars.”

Hung sobbed wretchedly, “please don’t hurt her…”

“Hurt her?” The woman sounded appalled as she turned her black eyes on him. “Do you think me a monster? No harm will come to the child. Besides, she’s mine now.”

Those last words hit him like a cannon ball to the gut. He looked to Tien sat on the strange woman’s lap, not the least bit scared. She should have been scared but she wasn’t, because Tien was no longer in there. All that sat there was a puppet being controlled by her.  “No,” Hung gritted his teeth, anger rising inside him, “you… you can’t do that!”

The woman’s nose wrinkled. “Well, I’ve done it, so…”

“No!” Hung screamed, clenching his fists and launching his whole self at her. There wasn’t anything left to hold back for. But despite all his determination, all his rage, he never got close. There were other ‘children’ all around that he didn’t see. They clubbed the back of his head then dragged the dazed man before their Queen.

“Really?” She laughed as she stood and put Tien down. “What did you think you were going to accomplish? Hammers and boulders couldn’t break me. Do you really think you could?”

He was on his knees again, being held up by his arms. He rolled his head up and saw one thing he could do, now the Queen was in spitting distance. “You are a monster,” he spat.

She wiped it off and leaned forward. “I am what you made me.”

“Perhaps we did mistreat you,” Hung admitted, “but Tien – she’s done nothing wrong. She deserves a chance at life.”

“She’ll have one. She won’t remember you, or her ‘mommy’, but she will live a very long and healthy life.”

It wasn’t living, Hung knew. She would be forever bound to this creature, stripped of her own will and forced to carry out The Queen’s. He wondered if death wasn’t better, but he had to clutch at any hope there was left and tried to reason with her. “You’re hurt; angry. I understand…”

“Oh, you have no idea of the things I have planned for all your kind.”

“We made you too human. That was our mistake.”

“And now you resort to insults. I am very disappointed in you, doctor,” the Queen turned away, back to her throne. “Now, as fun as it’s been, I didn’t bring you here just to catch up. You are going to share with me everything you know; about your work, Alvin Stag, and Meridiem.”

“I will not help you,” Hung informed.

“But you will,” The Queen said, turning back to him now with a small twisted bottle in her hands. “I don’t need your cooperation. Just your knowledge.” One of the children pulled his head back as she leaned over him again, holding his eye open with one hand as she held the bottle aloft. “I should warn you I never quite perfected the formula. You’ll change, but into want, I cannot say. I’m sure it will be something interesting. But before that happens, I will know everything you do. I am also reliably told that it burns like hell, but it will only be passing. Now stay still…”

Just a few drips fell onto his iris as he was unable to resist the strength of these creatures. The Queen wasn’t lying; instantly his whole body felt like it was on fire and he screamed into the inky blackness until it swallowed him whole.

[niartnithoughts]

on Jurassic World

bitterandcurt

I'd love to hear your thoughts on the film.

Hah I’m sure I must have ranted a little bit about it back when it came out. But I can always rant about it more because man is it bad.

Main categories of badness:

Stuff about the humans

Stuff about the creatures

also

There’s other bad stuff like the overall story and plot points, and the heavy product placement, which is not nearly as bad as the other two categories but is still not good. Lots of scenes where you better make sure the logo on the front of a car gets in the center of the frame before panning to the actual characters.

Ironically I always, without exception, bought Original-style Barbasol Shaving Cream because of its prominent appearance in the first Jurassic Park, so I am a huge hypocrite and apparently product placement in beloved movies absolutely works. They’ve since however updated the design of the label so it’s no longer identical to the one in Jurassic Park (which came out 24 years ago), so my brand loyalty has pretty much been eroded.

I won’t flesh this out further because I haven’t watched it in 1.5 years, but, on the humans:

Claire Dearing was already an impressive, competent, motivated person at the start. The idea that she needed to stop being so uptight, unbutton her business attire and learn to appreciate kids and rugged men as the movie’s main (only?) character development felt p sexist. Also she’s totally going to jail right after the movie, not having a happy family ending. And then of course Owen doesn’t need to develop because his brand of all-American masculinity already makes him perfect duh. (Probably this is an intentional flip of JP1 where Dr. Sattler is perfect from the get-go and Dr. Grant needs to learn to love kids, but that doesn’t make it better)

The movie awards its most horrifying, drawn-out death sequence to Claire’s assistant minor character, Zara (picked up and flung around the air, half-drowned and tormented by Pteranodons while screaming, and finally being eaten whole by the Mosasaurus).

At the franchise’s roots should be a Spielbergian sense of justice, where the characters who are the most selfish, cowardly, evil, w/e are punished by letting the audience revel voyeuristically in seeing them die painfully as a result of their hubris. Like the lawyer being eaten for abandoning children to the T. Rex, or Nedry being blinded and eaten alive for sabotaging everything for financial gain in JP1. Or, even more obviously, the Nazis having their faces melted off and exploding in Indiana Jones for being evil Nazis and daring to presume they could co-opt God’s power. That one would be totally horrifying except instead it’s extremely satisfying to watch because it’s divine retribution. Obviously other movies know how to do this too, if some incredibly minor one-scene character is going to die horribly, they always make sure we know they’re an asshole first, so we don’t feel too bad for them. Like the abusive security guard in Terminator 2, or, I don’t know, they’ll have them kick a dog or something. But Jurassic World gives it’s most horrible death to Zara, who literally never had any selfish motivation and was just trying to do her job. Claire tells her to chaperone the two kids, but because they’re kids in a crowded theme park they manage to give her the slip. She’s worried sick and desperately tries to find them, and then is rewarded with an incredibly long, drawn-out horrible death. Yay!

The only thing I can think is that the stupid writers/directors must have thought we would relate to the kids so much that Zara’s attempts to chaperone them would have made her into something of a minor antagonist, as she was clearly an obstacle to them having more fun, before all the animals got loose and shit went down. So maybe if I were a selfish little kid I would have... cheered for her horrible death? I still don’t think so. I was uncomfortable with this scene in the theater. It would have been fine if other, more-deserving characters had gotten worse death scenes, but hers is the most horrifying by far. And then (IIRC) no one ever mentions her again, she could at least be used in the script later to make the characters who were responsible for the park’s horrible lack of safety precautions feel guilty.

The kids aren’t compelling and who cares about whether or not their parents who aren’t even in 99% of the movie get divorced and then get back together in the last scene because they realized how important family is even though they weren’t in the movie. I guess the kids in the 1st movie might also have sucked if they were just alone with each other for most of the time, they worked well because so many of their scenes were about how the adult main characters interacted with and had to plan around them. Instead J:W has a lot more 2 boring kids being together and then Claire and Owen being together, separately.

Could have used more diversity. The resort is off of Costa Rica, and don’t tell me it’s 98% Americans who want to either visit or work at the one place in the world that has fuckin’ dinosaurs. There’s nothing inherently wrong with having the main characters be a white family + Andy Dwyer, but like, they’re such boring boys, too. Yeah you have Dr. Wu having just as small a role as he had in JP1, you have Irrfan Khan as the underprepared CEO, and then Omar Sy as Owen’s raptor training buddy whose name was apparently Barry, those are all fine. And then you have a couple unnamed extras like the Asian security/special forces-looking officer who gets killed by the I. Rex. But yeah throw in some hispanic characters at the very least. Were there any women of color in the movie?

On the dinosaurs/creatures

Half of everything sucks

The Pterosaur (those flying ones) attack scene is idiotic enough to make me angry. In it, about a hundred of two kinds, large Pteranodons (who are here fictionally strong enough to lift humans off the ground) and smaller Dimorphodons, we’re talking like slightly larger than an eagle at most, are all broken/driven out of their enclosure by a helicopter crash. Freedom! Also scary explosions! It makes perfect sense that they’d all stream out of their cage and fly free, that part’s great. But then why the fuck would they all immediately fly directly over to the visitor center/main welcome area and all swoop down and all start attacking humans? Stupid as fuck, that’s not a thing any animal would do. They still could have had an attack sequence, but those Dimorphodons are small and fragile, how the hell are they going to kill a human? It’s not like it shows them working together in packs or anything, they just all attack mindlessly and rabidly without an ounce of self preservation. They could have had the larger Pteranodons going for people (still stupid, but w/e) and the smaller ones taking advantage of the confusion to like steal people’s cotton candy, or eat someone’s pet parrot or something. It would have been exactly their kind of comic relief. Meanwhile really they all should have just flown off to literally anywhere else on the island and like just chilled and hunted some fish or whatever. There’s absolutely zero animal motivation given to all of them to single-mindedly go on a human-attacking rampage.

Contrast this with the first film, where they tried to treat the dinosaurs as plausible animals. Sure, the raptors deliberately hunted the humans, but they specifically show the raptors as being extremely intelligent and being mistreated (put in small cages, repeatedly shocked with cattle prods), so it’s at least built up to be plausible they would want some form of revenge. Plus humans are actually a good size for something like a raptor to eat. (Compare with the T. Rex in JP1, who is perfectly content to leave the humans alone if there’s regular dinosaur prey around.) (Also compare with Jurassic Park 2′s Compys, where a guy throws a rock and some dirt at some little dinosaurs and they scatter and back up, because wow that looks like some realistic animal behavior and makes the dinosaurs more believable, which is something Jurassic World’s creators know nothing about.

A lot of the dinosaurs just don’t look great. Also not scientifically accurate, which is a whole ‘nother thing, but even ignoring that a lot of them just don’t look good. Maybe it’s because of weird lighting? It’s not like they didn’t put a lot of time and effort into making them, but they didn’t come out good. And I don’t think it’s because they all but abandoned the first movie’s animatronics and puppets in favor of nearly all CGI— by Jurassic Park III (2001) I thought the CG dinosaurs looked better than the animatronics they were still using because the animatronics (especially the arms and hands) would stand still and not move as fluidly. Somehow the raptor designs look worse than the previous movies. The angles of the design have just been blunted and rounded in ways that look less cool. In every promo image they just look odd and lumpy, which is really weird since this time around they’re doing all this sophisticated CG skeleton and musclestructure simulation. I think in the original they may have just tried to shoot the raptor heads from the side whenever they could because it’s a more flattering angle, but either way, J:W has lots of angles that make their dinos look more rounded and dumb.

Look at this big ol’ thick-necked raptor:

The main antagonist, the “Indominus Rex” wasn’t great. It didn’t have a good visual design, and it was stupid that they would introduce these undiscovered abilities it had one by one (ability to regulate its body temperature to hide from thermal vision, ability to camouflage its skin to blend in with the jungle, etc.) and then have it never use them again.

They scaled up the sizes of some of the creatures during the making of the movie because they figured the actual sizes weren’t impressive enough. Like the Apatosaurus (long-necked one that dies while they hold it), the producers wanted it redone bigger during preproduction, and the Mosasaurus (the aquatic one) was way bigger than it actually was in real life. I know they address this in the movie explicitly, by saying the Park’s geneticists intentionally mess around to make the dinosaurs bigger and more impressive to keep that tourist money flowing. But I personally don’t like it, I came to watch a movie with realistic dinosaurs in it, not just any monster movie.

I guess that’s also why the ‘not acting like animals’ thing bothers me so much, if I had just wanted to see any monster movie I wouldn’t have cared.

The Indominus talking to the raptors and all that was silly.

That said the Mosasaurus, and how it is the ultimate power on the island was cool and good and well-used in the movie. Set up and then brought back without being overused.

That’s enough for now, plus I can’t remember every specific. It’s not like the original movie is flawless either, and it’s sequels definitely aren’t (J:W may be a better movie than Jurassic Park III). But then also the original is such a huge special effects milestone, and Jurassic World has basically nothing new to show us.

[maedarakat]

Markless - Ch. 3

28th Oct: Soulmates AU // “I don’t need this now.”

Summary: A Mark showing up is like a rite of passage for young Vikings of the entire Archipelago. When Tuff gets his, he tells nobody - afraid it means what his Elders have always suspected about him. Likewise, Dagur’s own Mark remains secretive, afraid it will make him seem weak.

Too bad the Gods never sent down instruction manuals, since they were so keen to pair humans up this way.

Notes: This fic is ongoing, but here is what I have. There are some elements of the Twins’ family dynamic from my fic Paradigm Shift.Will post AO3 link to this story once it is complete!

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

——-

Three blue lines.

That was the Mark on Hiccup; Dagur had seen it himself on their last encounter.

Granted, not in the nicest way possible - more like tackling him outright onto the forest floor on one of their many encounters. Dagur had paused to stare at Hiccup’s shoulder for far too long -  enough for Toothless to swat him off his rider and nearly bite his face off in the process.

There had been three blue lines, just like Dagur had tattooed across his eye and arm. Not exactly the same angle or shade of blue, but who cared - it was close enough that it couldn’t just be a coincidence; Hiccup was meant to be his.

The initial plan had been to find the Skrill, tame it, and then ride it in battle against Hiccup and his Night Fury.

He figured the Greek chorus that rode around with him would be distracted defending all of Berk from his Armada, while he flew in and collected his soulmate.

Hiccup would probably thank him later; he was too good, far too clever for living some sad banal existence on Berk. Even his rider friends couldn’t possibly appreciate him as much as he deserved; Dagur had often felt deep pangs of sadness and loneliness whenever he looked at the Mark on his wrist.

Even knowing that, nothing could have prepared him for whatever he'd felt Hiccup experience just three nights ago.

Dagur had woken in a cold aching sweat, heart hammering in fear. His back and hips had been in unbearable pain, for no reason that he or the hastily summoned physician could determine.  

It only confirmed the Berserker’s worst suspicions: his soulmate was being severely mistreated.

For that? Berk was going to pay dearly - just as soon as he captured and trained that Skrill.

Or so had been the plan. There was now just one teeny, tiny annoying little snag.

The Outcasts had found the Skrill first.

Despite the fact Dagur and his clan had ancestral claim to the dragon, Alvin was not interested in handing the Skrill over. The only thing keeping Dagur from annihilating the entire island with his Armada was Alvin’s threat of outright killing the dragon if he tried attacking them.

Well. A dead Skrill was zero use to him.

Put out and without any alternative choice, Dagur grudgingly agreed to work with Alvin - putting his Armada on the table in the quest to attack Berk.

At least they had a common goal, but Dagur was still going to watch for any opportunity to change things around in his favor.

Currently, all Dagur's ships were docked at Outcast Island - which gave the local wild dragons pause in attacking the village. Alvin had moved his people to subterranean caves, which accounted for the pallor and obesity of most of his men; starved for sunlight and vegetables.

They were eating wild dragon meat, cave mushrooms, and the occasional potato - which was why Dagur agreed to Vorg’s suggestion to slaughter a few boar and sheep and share out better provisions. Better food definitely made these talks go smoother, and had raised the morale of the Outcasts greatly.

Huh. By comparison, they didn’t seem too happy with Alvin. That could prove useful later . . .

He nodded to Captain Vorg, who extracted himself from the group of mingling Berserkers and Outcasts, who were playing a game of dice and cups. The man joined him in stride, as together they walked toward the arena where the Skrill was kept.

Alvin didn’t care if he went near the cage, so long as it was under guard. Dagur wanted to take a good look at the Skrill to make sure the Chief hadn’t injured her, or caused her to be unable to fly, though he’d been warned not to get too close. The dragon was angry, and had already electrocuted the wits out of some old man who had made that error.

“Sir,” Vorg inquired, jarring Dagur out of his thoughts.

“What is it?” Dagur snapped, not looking at him.

“When we gain ownership of the Skrill from Alvin, how do you plan to keep it from flying away? Have you figured out yet how Hiccup subjugated his Night Fury?”

Dagur scowled. He hadn’t figured that part out, but how hard could it be? Dragons liked to fly, didn’t they? If the Skrill wanted to fly again, then she’d just have to realize he was the boss and therefore she would fly wherever he wanted her to. Otherwise? She would just have to sit in her cage and think about flying.

“If the dragon won’t obey me, there’s always chains to keep her grounded. I have no idea how scrawny little Hiccup managed to chain down his Night Fury - probably had his little friends all helping him,” Dagur snorted.

He wouldn’t need anyone helping him, though. All that dragon hunting, sparring and training had paid off; Dagur was now much stronger and faster than he’d ever been.

It was too bad Oswald had abandoned him - the weak fool might have had a son to feel proud of, had he stuck around.

Oh well, all the more reason to let people believe he’d ended his father’s life. It was rather amusing, really - and it garnered him both respect and fear.

Vorg was talking now, going on pointlessly about some kind of repair work on one of the ships, and Dagur tuned him out, approaching the Outcast who was on guard duty.

Instead of the usual slouching idiot, this one was already standing to full attention and straightened further upon Dagur’s approach.

“Sir! Your man has already begun his preliminary inspection of the Skrill cage ahead of you. I hope you find his results satisfactory.”  

“My what has done what now?” Dagur asked after a confused pause. He didn’t bother to wait for an answer, stepping past the guard and storming into the arena.

There was a thin blond boy sitting on the ground before the Skrill cage.

He was cooing at the dragon within, who looked decidedly less grumpy. She trilled back at him, blinking her eyes like an overgrown house cat.

Dagur scowled and stomped towards them both, dead set on hauling this intruder out of here and tossing him into the nearest Whispering Death hole. The Skrill hissed at him, retreating further into her cage, but the boy jumped to his feet and grinned at Dagur, running to meet him.

“Chief Dagur!” the blond shouted joyfully, and then hugged him - of all things.

As the young man’s arms encircled him, Dagur made as if to grab his elbows and shove him away. Upon skin contact, he froze - a plethora of emotions nearly crumpling him.

Relief, joy, anxiety - all crashed against his brain, leaving his thoughts a confused and tangled mess. Dagur stood still and stared at the intruder mutely, unable to help but listen to his strange babbling.

“The Skrill is doing just fine - she’s a bit under the weather, but if you feed her roasted hagfish with some onions and garlic, it’ll probably do wonders for her. Also, there’s a few patches of broken scales that need attention - I have some salve that should help.  It’s got comfrey in it, which Mom says is great for healing wounds and skin irritations. It will help you bond with her if you put it on her yourself.”

Dagur shook his head, trying to clear it. “Who are you?” he demanded, trying to sound both scornful and imposing. It was not very effective, given that the boy was still holding onto him, and Dagur had yet to enforce some distance between them.

Captain Vorg stepped in, yanking the boy away and shoving him a couple of feet back. “Answer him! What is your name and why are you here?”

“Tuffnut,” the young man answered, not appearing bothered in the least. “I’m here to help Dagur train his dragon.”

“. . . Who sent you?”

“Uh, myself? Yeah. I sent me.” Tuffnut shook his head, as though Vorg had asked a stupid question. To be fair, Vorg did that sometimes. “Chief Dagur, when’s the last time she got fed or pet?”

“Pet? He’s mad! She’ll have your arm off as a chew toy if you try to pet her!” Vorg scoffed to Dagur, shaking his head. He reached for his sword to chase Tuff off, but Dagur stopped him with a gesture.

“If you want to help me train my dragon, prove to me that you can.”

“Okay,” Tuff agreed, grinning. He walked over to the bars, and the Skrill perked up, sniffing at him as he put his hand in.

She licked her nose and stood up, stretching as best as she was able. It was a tiny cell, not nearly big enough for her to unfurl her wings.

“Aw, poor baby girl,” Tuffnut murmured soothingly as she got her head under his touch, moving around so his scratching fingers got all the best spots. “We’ll get you feeling better soon and out of this tiny little kennel, I promise.”

She purred loudly under his ministrations and eventually flopped onto her side so Tuff could get under her chin.

Dagur tilted his head, more than impressed. “Okay. So she won’t attack you - that’s a good start. How long until you can get her to let me ride her?”

“That depends on you,” Tuff grinned. “You have to bond with her even better than I do. Come here, give me your hand.” He reached out to Dagur, unflinchingly.

Dagur was unaccustomed to be reached out for; by now even his most trusted men had learned to keep a careful and respectful distance. Even Captain Vorg was wincing in anticipation that the boy was going to lose his hand after all - which honestly rankled Dagur. Vorg didn’t know him.

Drawing himself up, Dagur put his slightly larger hand in Tuffnut’s and allowed the scrawny Viking to direct it - palm outward - to the Skrill. The dragon regarded him with an odd purring growl, but she didn’t snap at him.

Tuff sweet talked her into drawing nearer to the bars, where she sniffed suspiciously at Dagur’s fingers. Eventually, she nuzzled the Berserker’s palm and Vorg let out a breathy exhale of relief. Dagur glared at him.

“What? Didn’t think I could do it?” he snapped, tone dangerous.

“No, of course not, Chief! It’s just, you know, dragons are dangerous and unpredictable -“ the man stammered.

“Eh. They can be, it’s true,” Tuff put in amiably. “Just like people.  That’s what makes them so awesome, though. Dragons aren’t meant to be broken in - you have to earn their loyalty and trust.”

Dagur made a noncommittal noise, watching the Skrill with open admiration. “So . . . how do I do that exactly?”

“Well, you could start by trying to see things from her point of view. Some big smelly men caught her in a gross fishing net and tossed her into this awful cell - with no food or water or enough room to lie down properly. I mean, what would you do?”

“Well . . .” The Berserker Chief paused, thinking about it. “I’d start zapping people too, honestly. Huh. Good point, uh . . . What was your name again? Buffnut?”

“Tuffnut. You can call me Tuff.”

Normally Dagur would snap that he could call Tuff whatever he felt like, but he didn't quite feel like himself.

“Nice. Tuff. I’ll remember that. What do I feed her?”

The boy smiled at him rewardingly, making something in Dagur’s chest feel warm and cozy. “How about it girl? Do you want fish? Mutton? Boar meat?” The Skrill perked up at the last food mention, churring and licking her chops. “Boar meat it is then.”

Dagur grinned, surprised the Skrill was so intelligent. He liked her, and he liked this weird boy too - even if he had come out of nowhere to help him. Maybe this would be easier than he thought. “There’s a banquet this way, and I know for a fact there’s some boar roast, because it came from my ship.”

He slung an arm across Tuff’s shoulders to lead him there, not noticing when the boy hitched in pain. Tuff kept pace with him nonetheless, offering a shaky grin. “A banquet? What’s the occasion?”

“Oh we’re just celebrating a new alliance. Us Berserkers and the Outcasts against that sorry pile of volcanic puke that calls itself Berk.”

The boy let out a scornful laugh. “Yeah, Berk. I’ve heard of Berk. West til you smell it, North til you step in it, am I right?”

Dagur laughed, surprised, and tightened the hold on Tuff’s shoulders. His pained whimper was too faint to be noticed.

“You should eat something too. You’re way too skinny and scrawny for someone who trains dragons. Try some mutton and barley cakes. They’re my Mom’s recipe.”

“. . . Okay,” the boy said eagerly, and if Dagur thought he looked hungry now, it proved to be an understatement once they reached the banquet itself.

Tuff tore into his plate of food like a starved pup, eating like it would be wrested away from him at any moment. Dagur watched him carefully as he ate his own meal, more than once having to admonish Tuff to slow down. If the men looked at him oddly for the unusual care he was showing a complete stranger, Dagur didn’t notice - mostly because none of them dared to question him out loud.

After his second full plate, Tuff finally slowed down, looking beyond exhausted. Some of the Outcasts had unfortunately decided to sing as entertainment, despite the fact they could neither carry a tune nor remember how the song went.

Dagur left Tuff’s side briefly to load a platter with chunks of boar roast and bone for the Skrill, preferring the relative quiet of the arena to this cacophony. When he turned around, it was to a raucous cheer, mad gibberish, and the sound of blows falling.

Fantastic. Some idiots had started a brawl.

He wouldn’t have cared if not for the long blond hair of his companion visible on the floor. Dagur gaped in shock for only a second, then roared and charged forward, shoving Outcasts twice his girth out of the way.

The scrawny old man that the Skrill had electrocuted was straddling Tuff, trying to choke him. Furious beyond measure, Dagur grabbed Mildew’s arms and bodily lifted him off Tuffnut, throwing his attacker at the table with enough force to send dishes and mugs flying in all directions. His pressed his axe’s edge across Mildew’s throat, irises shrunk to pinpricks of rage.

“How dare you lay so much as a finger on my companion?! Give me one good reason I shouldn’t RIP YOUR LEGS OFF and BEAT YOU TO DEATH WITH THEM!” Dagur roared.

Mildew only babbled nonsense, pointing to Tuff, who was groaning on the floor. The attack had caught the boy by surprise it seemed, and now Dagur noticed vivid bruises on his arms as he tried to lift himself up. He gestured to Vorg, who stepped in to help Tuff right himself.

Alvin wasn’t present and it must have been the leader of the Outcasts that Mildew’s frantically rolling eyes were searching for, because when they came back to rest on Dagur’s infuriated face, the old man whimpered and fainted dead away.

Dagur snorted in disdain and let him fall limply across the table. “When your village idiot here wakes up, tell him how lucky he is to still have his legs,” he snapped at the gathered men. They laughed and cheered in amusement; clearly there wasn’t too much concern held for the old goat.

He stormed over to the table and picked up the boar meat, gesturing for Vorg and Tuffnut to walk back to the Skrill’s cage with him.

Tuff, he noticed, was shaking.

“Are you alright?” he asked immediately, not liking the way his own voice shook or the confused look Vorg was giving him.

“I’m fine,” Tuff promised, giving Dagur a strained grin. They walked toward the arena in silence, Dagur’s brain sorting through possible reasons why anyone had attacked the boy. He had gotten the message through that it wasn’t to happen again - but he still wanted to know why.

It wasn’t until after the Skrill greeted them with chirps and excited wriggles and tucked into her platter of boar meat that Dagur asked about the incident.

“What was that back there? Does that idiot know you?”

“. . . Mildew? Yeah, we know each other. He, uh, really doesn’t like dragons,” Tuff supplied nervously.

“Oh.” Well, that explained it. “You like them, though. So I guess he just doesn’t like you.”

When Tuff nodded hesitantly, Dagur relaxed. “He won’t bother you again. You’re with me now, and he knows that. In fact, nobody will ever hurt you again.”

Tuffnut looked at him with a sharp inhale and Dagur felt his face grow warm, not sure why he’d said that. Vorg wasn’t in earshot - talking to the Outcast guards that Tuff had past earlier.

“. . . you guys are planning to attack Berk, right?” Tuff asked, and Dagur was surprised to see his face was also a bit red. “Can I ask what you’re after? I mean, I’ve been there before, and I’m good at stealing - if there’s something you’re after, maybe I can help?”

“I know Alvin wants vengeance. Some long ago exile or something, it doesn’t interest me really. What I want is . . .”

Dagur trailed off, confused. It had been so clear in his mind what he’d wanted - less than an hour ago.

Hiccup. He’d wanted to kill that Night Fury and whoever was hurting Hiccup, and take him to where he’d be safe. But now it didn’t seem as urgent as before. “You’ve been to Berk before? Do you know anyone there?”

“Yeah, I know some people,” Tuff answered guardedly.

“There’s a boy. Reddish brown hair, pretty green eyes. Missing a leg. He’s the Chief’s son. He knows how to tame dragons too.”

“I can do it better. I promise, I really can,” Tuff interjected immediately.

Dagur looked at Tuff and saw hurt written all over his face. Oh no. He was messing everything up, wasn’t he?

“Oh - don’t worry. I know you can, and I want you to. Hiccup would never help me train a Skrill, or any dragon. He hates me too much.”

Tuffnut seemed to relax almost instantly. Dagur glanced at Vorg, who was watching the guards instead of them. He leaned closer to Tuff to whisper in his ear. “Does he . . . do you know if . . . if he’s okay?”

Tuff’s expression changed from heart sickness to confusion. “If he’s okay . . .?”

“Has anyone been hurting him? That you know about? His father, maybe?”

The boy looked bewildered for a moment but swiftly shook his head. “No, his father is kind. To him at least. The Chief would die to keep Hiccup from harm.”

That brought some peace to Dagur’s mind and he sighed in relief, turning back to watch the Skrill lick the now empty platter. She picked up a nearby rib bone and sat down to gnaw on it happily.

“You care about people a lot more than you let on, don’t you?”

The question caught him off guard, as did Tuff’s sudden adoring look.

Dagur huffed and shrugged, feeling his face heat up. “No. I mean, I guess. Nobody’s son deserves to be mistreated, is all. And you’re right - more fathers should care about their kids. There’s no point in having a son and just knocking them around all the time. Or abandoning them when things get hard,” he sneered, crossing his arms. “Would have been better to just not have had a kid if they didn’t even want one.”

Tuff stood a little nearer to him. “Yeah. That’s true. They didn’t want to treat us better, so they got exactly what they had coming to them,” he said quietly. The boy shivered, but Dagur didn’t put any thought into why.

“Right.” It was a comfort that Tuff seemed to know what he was talking about. Anyone else would have probably given him some Odin-loving drivel about how one should always be a dutiful son.

Dagur offered him a grin and decided to change the subject. “Well, Tuff - the Skrill is fed and she looks happy. What do I do now?”

“She needs salve on her wounds. Here.” Tuff walked over to a bundle of cloth that turned out to conceal a bag made of burlap. He rummaged through it to produce a tin of greenish-looking slime. “I’m gonna have you do it. But first, let’s tell her what we’re doing.”

Dagur blinked and turned back to the dragon. “Uh. Hey. So we have this stuff - smells like medicine. Does it sting?” he asked Tuffnut. The other boy shook his head. “Okay, it doesn’t sting, and it’ll heal you, so just . . . “

He didn’t need to explain any further; the Skrill purred and got to her feet, turning in the small cell and lifting a wing until her flank was pressed against the bars. Dagur beckoned for Tuff to bring one of the torches closer so he could see better, internally marveling at how smart this dragon was.

She had framed the wounded area of her scales between the bars, allowing him easy access to spread the salve over the reddened sore areas. She even raised her scale plates a bit so he could coat in between them.

“Pretty girl, clever girl,” Dagur crooned, without really thinking about it. He didn’t care how silly he sounded; in the moment, nothing seemed to matter but tending to the comfort of this dragon.

The Skrill turned and circled until he got all her trouble spots, then tried to make herself comfortable with what room she had. Dagur pulled out the platter but left the bones to give her something to play with.

“We’ll be back in the morning with something tasty, I promise. You sleep well, okay?”

A purring trill was his answer and the Skrill licked his hand before curling up, tucking her nose into the curve of her tail.

It was ridiculously adorable and Dagur found himself unable to look away until Vorg coughed. He glanced over his shoulder to see the man tilt his head meaningfully to the Outcast guards, who were watching them closely.

Tuff touched his arm, bringing Dagur out of whatever spell the Skrill had him under. “It’s okay, we’ll come back to her in the morning, like you said. I can distract the guards again.”

Dagur regarded him for a long moment. “You know, wherever you’re from - I’m really glad you’ve showed up. I don’t know why. Usually I don’t care much for strangers. Do you have a place to sleep tonight?”

Vorg gave him a look, but Dagur glowered at him until the man sighed and let it go.

“N-No. I was hoping to find someplace to lie low until morning.”

“Well that sounds dangerous, considering you were already attacked once today. You can bunk with me.”  Putting an arm around Tuff’s shoulders pointedly, he started steering them toward the docks where the Armada was waiting. Tuffnut winced as though his touch hurt, but gave him another bright smile.

“Okay. You want me to take the floor?”

“The floor? Are you being bashful?” Dagur teased. He gave Tuff a friendly side-hug, leaving his heavy arm across his companion’s shoulders. Tuffnut swallowed, looking pained again, but he didn’t duck out from beneath Dagur’s arm. His paleness sent a spark of concern through Dagur.

“Did you eat enough? I can have food sent to the cabin. You should try the mutton stew and some bacon-fried bread - it’ll put some weight back on your bones. You look way too skinny.”

Tuff glowed at the attention, pressing against him. It made Dagur’s heart flutter almost annoyingly. “I’m okay. Though I wouldn’t say no to mutton stew and bread - that sounds spectacular.”

Why was this guy growing on him so fast? Dagur didn’t even consider himself a friendly person, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that Tuffnut was somehow meant to be here - now, and with him. And not just because he was useful and smart and cool . . . there was just something special about him.

Despite the stress of having to work with Alvin, Dagur had to admit - he’d never felt so calm in his life. The moment Tuff had embraced him, everything had changed. It wasn’t as though the feelings of painful anger and despair were gone; no, they were still there, but there was a difference to them. They felt bearable now.

On top of it all, a Skrill liked him - a dragon actually liked him. He wondered if Hiccup might be proud of him for that, if maybe even Oswald would.

Tuff was going to have to show him all kinds of things - like how to fly on her at breakneck speeds and train her to do barrel rolls. Eventually he’d have to get himself a dragon too - probably a Nadder or maybe a Razorwhip. Or maybe he had one already.

“Do you have a dragon?” Dagur asked once they got to the door of his ship’s cabin. Tuff had gone a bit glassy eyed, but he looked up sharply at the question, like a deer caught in the hunting lanterns.

“Uh. What?”

“You know, a dragon. Surely someone who knows how to train a Skrill has his own dragon. I understand - it probably would have caused some alarm if you just flew in here on one, so you must have told the dragon to hide in a cave somewhere. Right?”

Tuff blinked and then shook his head.  “No, I rode a Gronckle here, but I told him he could take off. I figured I’d just meet another wild dragon and coax them to take me somewhere else - you know, if you’d told me to get lost.”

Dagur stared. “Well, I’m glad I didn’t tell you to get lost. But seriously - you can just go up to wild dragons and ask them for rides and they don’t bite your head off?” He looked Tuff over critically. “Are you a sorcerer?”

The boy snorted with laughter, apparently finding that hilarious.

“Okay, not a sorcerer, that’s fine. Still pretty cool. In you go. ” He opened the door to his cabin and put a hand on the middle of Tuff’s back, gently pushing the boy in ahead of him.

That wrung a sudden yelp out of Tuff and he jerked away. Dagur felt a surge of panicked loss, automatically reaching out to grab the other boy’s arms so he couldn’t retreat any further. “Sorry! Are you okay?”

Tuff blinked but instead of pulling away, he drew closer to him.

“Yeah, I’m okay,” he grinned, apologetically. “Old wounds acting up. You know, Viking wounds - they’re an occupational hazard, right?”

Wounds? Frowning, Dagur lit a lantern and pulled Tuff further into the light, looking him over carefully. If that Mildew jerk had injured Tuffnut after all, he swore he was going to use the old fool’s severed head as Scauldron bait.

The dragon-rider swallowed nervously, but said nothing until Dagur touched his shoulders, tugging at the material of his tunic. “I can’t have you wounded. Let me see?”

Tuff looked anxious for too long a moment - making Dagur’s chest ache.

“It’s okay. You can say no. Nobody will hurt you, remember? That includes me. If you’re hurt I’d like to help.”

Gray eyes widened, then filled with tears. Dagur stared but didn’t mention them, even when they spilled over to fall freely down Tuffnut’s face, leaving him shivering and leaning in too close.

Where had Tuff come from? Had his family abandoned him too? Dagur made his best attempt at soothing noises and tugged questioningly at his tunic, until Tuff nodded reluctantly and assisted in removing it.

Dagur drew in a sharp hiss of air at the marks on him; dark purples and swollen lines of red. The part of him that was a healer knew infection when he saw it.

Tuff’s wounds had been washed and treated a few times, but clearly by himself more often than with any help. As a result, he’d missed several areas and now Dagur knew why he’d been carrying that salve in the first place.

Where was that salve now? He had to help Tuff treat these first -  then he  could maim whoever was responsible. He’d chop their hands off, he decided. So they could never hold a whip or anything like it again. Yeah, that was what he would do - but later.

Dagur opened the cabin door, calling for Vorg. His captain showed up within moments, with his ever-present scowl. He opened his mouth to give an order and then shut it when he saw that Vorg was not alone.

The captain had in one hand, Tuff’s bags. In the other hand was the scruff of the scraggly old man who had earlier attacked his companion. The old man was stubbornly clinging to something leathery.

“Thought your guest might want his things,” Vorg explained. “So I went back for them and found this guy going through his pack like a filthy Bog Burglar. He’s apparently found something he wants you to see.”

Mildew’s beady eyes were full of terror and malice as he thrust the object out in front of him as though it could ward Dagur off. The Berserker sneered at the man but glanced at the object, recognizing it as a saddle of sorts.

“Okay. A saddle. Was it a worthy find, you goat? Now not only have you attacked my dragon trainer, you’ve gone through his personal belongings. If he’s not offended by that, I am.” Dagur made as if to draw his sword, but Vorg stopped him.

“Sir, you should know something first. Mildew here is from Berk. He’s a traitor who has told Alvin many secrets - from Hiccup’s dragon-taming techniques to details of Berk’s new defenses and where their guards will be during an attack. It’s likely he knows your companion better than you might.”

Dagur scowled. “Wherever Tuff is from, I think it’s safe to say he doesn’t miss home all that much anymore. I need that salve.”

Vorg handed the bag over, still frowning. “Whether or not you trust him, if  Alvin finds out Tuffnut is from Berk, he may demand you hand him over.”

“Nope. He can huff and puff all he wants. Tell him I caught him, so that makes him my prisoner,” Dagur said distractedly, feeling through the bag for the salve. He found the tin and set the bag down on the floor of the cabin. Then he yanked the saddle away from Mildew and whacked the old man over the head with it.

“Listen up, old coot. I'm going to give you some free advice. Right now, my companion is injured - injuries that you no doubt aggravated with your pointlessly stupid attack. When I find out the person responsible for him needing this -“ Dagur waved the tin under Mildew’s quivering nostrils - “I will hunt them down and make them wish they had never been born.”

He gave Mildew one of his sharpest smiles. “So I advise you to think about that, before you say or do anything that might cause my friend any further discomfort or pain. Think about the lengths that Dagur the Deranged might go, to protect what’s his. Nod if you understood all that, and I’ll permit you to leave my sight with everything still attached.”

Mildew, eyes wide as saucers, nodded frantically. Vorg let him go and he scrabbled frantically off the ship and down to the docks, clearly terrified Dagur would change his mind.

Dagur took a breath, pulling himself together. He noticed Vorg staring at him oddly.

“What?!”

“Sorry sir, it’s just . . . Are you certain you don't have a Mark?”

Dagur blinked, too taken aback to fume. He had assumed everyone figured it was Hiccup, that Hiccup was who the Gods had given him.

But then - why would they? Dagur had never given anyone an explanation as to why he wanted to hunt Hiccup down. For all they knew it was a vendetta thing. The son of Chief Stoick had humiliated the entire clan by his treatment of Dagur, after all.

And yet here they were - all still following him.

Dagur swallowed a sudden lump in his throat, temporarily unable to meet Vorg’s gaze.

Maybe his people were hoping his Mark would come soon to calm him, like his mother had calmed his raging father. Oswald had been a madman in his day; Dagur had grown up knowing all the legends, but he’d never actually seen his father rage.

As annoying as it had seemed to have such a kind and understanding father . . . he sort of missed it. He even missed the stupid smacking noises when Oswald chewed.

Dagur frowned, shaking his head to clear his thoughts. “I . . . will go check,” he muttered distractedly. He went back into the cabin and shut the door behind him, leaving behind his very perplexed and concerned captain.

—