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poppitron360 · 5 months ago

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I know that I have to, at some point, post my Leo Villain Arc AU.

Currently I am in a perpetual state of “Lemme just proofread it one more time-“ But if I don’t post it now, it will never get posted. I’ve been working on this off and on for about a month.

Summary: Takes place after the events of TLH- Leo deals with the aftermath of revealing his powers to the camp. In a confrontation with a few other campers, he finally lashes out and they get a little more than their comeuppance. Frightened by his own abilities, Leo runs away from camp, and Jason and Piper have to find him and stop him before he hurts anyone else- by any means necessary. When the time comes, Jason can’t bring himself to hurt Leo, and he pays the price. Piper has to then finish the job.

Please ignore any plotholes- I wrote it for the angst not the story.

Cw: Talk of suicide, talk of abuse, depictions of self-harm, major character death, blood, swearing, bullying, just all-round nasty stuff- I didn’t hold back on this one.

Word Count: 8,043!!! (Eight chapters in total, but not of equal length)

Who’s Afraid Of Little Old Me?

Leo has a villain arc AU (Dark! Leo)

I- Leo

Leo was avoiding people.

Okay, so he wasn’t avoiding all people. Jason ate lunch with him on the stands of the Chariot Tracks as they looked out across the springtime trees beyond. No. He was avoiding the other campers. He couldn’t deal with the weird looks they gave him when he ate at the dining pavilion. It had taken a lot of courage to reveal his powers to the others in Cabin 9, his siblings had been mostly cool with it, if a little weirded-out, but the other campers had been less accepting. Nobody had said anything to him yet, but he knew they were all thinking it. He was a freak.

“So, Piper’s been putting her hair up more as the weather’s getting hotter,” Jason said. Leo was only half-listening, but he nodded between bites of his burrito. He appreciated Jason’s company, and he understood that Piper was a big part of his life, but the constant girlfriend talk made him nauseous. Still, it was better than talking about monsters or Gaia or the impending Apocalypse.

Jason faltered, and the conversation stopped when Leo heard the familiar drooling voice and signature vocal fry of Drew Tanaka and two of her cronies. Leo hated that girl. She was less of a threat now that Piper had taken control of the Aphrodite cabin, but she was still a bitter and sneering bitch. Piper had been too nice. If Leo had his way, he would’ve taken a leaf out of the Heathers book and just put Drain Cleaner in Drew’s Hangover Cure.

Jason scowled at Drew as she walked out onto the course. Leo tried his best to shrink behind the terraced seating in front of them, hoping she hadn’t noticed him. But of course, she had. Her two minions sneered at him, baring their perfectly white teeth.

“Well, well, well,” Drew drooled, placing a manicured hand on the railing and advancing up the steps of the bleachers. Her cronies flanked her, one on each side, like an attack formation, “If it isn’t the arsonist.”

Leo’s stomach dropped. Jason snarled in his terrifying raised-by-wolves way. Drew’s friends snickered, but Drew kept her eyes locked on Leo.

“Why aren’t you eating lunch with the rest of the camp, huh? Is it because you know nobody wants you there? Even your dirty little siblings know you’re a freak. I mean, I thought I’d seen the worst of those filthy little Hephaestus kids, but this…” she looked down at him with her piercing eyes, “this is a new low.”

Leo scrambled out of his seat. Drew smirked, like his anger was amusing. Maybe it was, considering how he was at least two inches shorter than her. She backed away, slowly but confidently, as Leo advanced.

“Face it, freak,” She said, “You belong in Tartarus with all the other monsters.”

Leo’s hands balled up into fists. Jason tried to grab his wrist, but then yelped in pain and pulled back. Leo’s skin glowed white hot.

“Leo, stop it,” Jason pleaded, “Don’t listen to her, she’s trying to provoke you.”

Drew was still walking backwards down the aisle of the bleachers, smiling. Leo kept advancing, his body was smoking. His fists caught fire.

“Oooh, fire boy’s getting feisty,” She was walking quicker now, “I’ve done some research on your name, I have my ways of finding things out, y’know. And I uncovered a little secret of yours. Something you failed to mention to your siblings when you told them about your powers?”

Leo’s whole body was aflame now. Drew cackled.

“What are you gonna do, kill me?” Her back was pressed up against the wall of the stadium, an amused glint in her eye, “Just like you killed your-“

And the world erupted in flames.

II- Piper

The first thing Piper had registered was two of her siblings running scared out of the Chariot Stands, yelling something about a fire. Then she had heard the screaming.

She’d rushed in, shaking her can of hairspray that transformed into a fire extinguisher (a gift from Leo). What she saw filled her with fear and dread.

Drew was on the floor, backed up against a wall, shielding her face with her arm. Leo stood in front of her, surrounded by flames. His eyes were deep and dark and maniacal, his hands clenched tightly into fists. He was advancing slowly towards her, Jason stood helpless just out of reach of the flames, pleading with him to stop. Drew was screaming. Piper aimed her fire extinguisher at the scene and sprayed. Foam went everywhere, smothering the flames. When she was done, the bleachers of the racecourse were blackened and smoking, the chairs around her charred.

“Leo, what have you done?” Piper whispered, staring at him in horror.

“My face!” Drew cried, clutching the left side of her face, “He tried to fucking kill me!! My beautiful face!!”

Piper scowled at Drew, and then turned back to Leo. For a second, she caught a spark of pure hatred in his eyes, but then they welled with tears. At the sight of the shocked expression on her face, he seemed to realise what he’d done. His face contorted in remorse, and he tried to take a step towards her, but she felt herself flinch and back away in fear.

“Piper, I…”

Suddenly, the sound of voices made their heads turn. Chiron, and the other campers, led by Drew’s two cronies, were marching into the stands.

Piper turned to Leo.

“Go,” She commanded. There was no gentleness or sympathy in her voice, just a stern coldness, “Run. Now.”

And he did.

“Stop him!” One of the campers called, and began to chase after him, but Jason stood in their way, he kept his ice-blue eyes on Chiron, as if daring the centaur to scold him.

“He’s getting away!” The camper protested. Jason didn’t move.

“Let him go,” Chiron instructed, “Let us focus on repairing the damages.”

They took Drew to the infirmary. She was alive, you could tell by the wailing, but her face was badly scarred. Chiron held Jason, Piper, and Drew’s two friends back to ask them what happened.

“Me and Leo were eating lunch in the stands when Drew came up to us and started insulting Leo,” Jason explained. As he talked, he never broke eye contact with Chiron, giving him an aura of confidence, “The things she was saying- it was like she wanted him to flip out. She was trying to get a reaction out of him.”

“That’s not true!” One of Drew’s friends, Chloe, complained, “Drew just wanted to talk to the boy, when all of a sudden he started throwing fireballs at her face.”

Chiron turned to Piper, “And what did you see?”

“I only came in after Drew was attacked,” Piper explained, “But Leo wouldn’t just explode like that. He’s not a monster. Drew was probably using charm-speak on him to make him attack her- that way she could use it as leverage to turn the camp against us.”

“That’s an unfounded accusation,” Chiron said, “But I’ll admit, I am rather sceptical that Mr Valdez would attack her unprovoked. Jason, what was it she said to him?”

“She called him a monster, and said he belonged in Tartarus,” Jason said, “Then she… brought up the death of his mom.”

“That Valdez boy killed his own mother in a fire and then ran away!” Chloe said, “Drew was concerned at his failure to inform his siblings about that-“

“Because it’s a personal thing!” Jason yelled, “You shouldn’t expect him to give detailed outlines of all the traumatic things that ever happened to him!”

“I’m sorry for not feeling safe with a murderer around!”

“IT WAS AN ACCIDENT!!” Electricity crackled around Jason. Piper wondered if he’d gotten taller somehow, but then she looked at his feet and noticed he was levitating a few inches off the ground.

“We should track him down and make him pay for his crimes!” Drew’s other lackey suggested. Chloe nodded in agreement.

Jason glowered at them, lightning crackling some more.

“You’re right,” Chiron said.

“What?” Piper and Jason protested in unison.

“It’s not safe to have a powerful Pyrokinetic demigod out on his own, afraid and dangerous,” he explained, “For Leo’s own safety, we need to bring him back to camp.”

“We volunteer,” Chloe said.

“No,” Jason replied, ““After the way Drew treated him, I don’t blame him for running away. And frankly, I don’t think it is necessarily safer for him to be in a place that would shun him instead of teaching him how to actually control his powers,” he stared at Chiron, but he took Piper’s hand and squeezed it.

“But Chiron’s right. Leo’s afraid. If he sees you two coming, it’ll scare him away, which will only make things worse… But he trusts us. And we know him better than anyone. If anyone’s finding him, it’s me and Piper.”

III- Leo

Leo had lost control.

Dangerous. A freak. A monster that belonged in Tartarus. That was what Drew had called him. And she was right- he’d proven that much. He’d flipped out and almost killed her because he couldn’t do a little anger management. He remembered the terrified faces of Jason and Piper. His best friends had looked at him like he was unrecognisable. They had been afraid of him. Piper hadn’t told him to run out of the goodness of her heart, but as a warning. She was letting him scarper instead of face the consequences of what he’d done. Chiron and the other campers wouldn’t be so merciful.

Of course he had run. He always did. He always will. He had thought Camp Half-Blood might be different, but he’d ruined it like he had in all the foster homes, schools, even with his own family. He will never not be running.

He stared down at the valley beneath him. Camp half-blood gleamed in the spring sun. Next to him, a cliff ran along the edge of the Long Island Sound.

Gods, it would be safer for everyone if he just jumped.

He hadn’t had thoughts like that in a while, not since he was a kid. But he approached the edge of the cliff and looked down. The tide was out. He imagined his tiny body slamming against those jagged rocks, the waves coming in and carrying him away. He could be at peace. And everyone he loved would be safe from him.

No. He couldn’t think like that. He had to keep moving.

He’d kept an emergency backpack in Bunker 9 in case he needed to split. He’d been hopeful he didn’t need it, but obviously he had been wrong. He took it off his shoulder, and double-checked its contents. Inside, he had a spare change of clothes, a refillable water bottle, some cereal bars, a blanket, a map of New York, five dollars in cash, and his second-favourite screwdriver. If there was anything he didn’t have, his tool-belt would provide.

He made the trek halfway to Queens, before it started to get dark and he decided to hitch-hike. He was hesitant to at first- he wasn’t exactly in a position to interact with people- but he needed to get into the city before nightfall. He tried his best not to get carsick as the driver drove down winding outer-city roads.

Sitting alone in the back of a stranger’s car gave him time to think. His whole life, he’d been manipulated by the Gods. By Hera and by Gaia- trying to shape him into the perfect chess-piece for their stupid game, moving him around, bending him into the right piece for 20 moves in the future, toppling over all the other pawns at once. Okay, maybe Leo didn’t really know the rules of chess. But his mom had died as a result of the Gaia’s meddling, in conjunction with the narrative he was being forced into by an ancient being, planning around his future. Was he expected just to sit here and let her?

He’d always tried to do the right thing, never lose control, never get angry. When people gave Leo shit, he was supposed to just take it on the chin and bear it, because if he lashed out-

Well, he didn’t wish the fate of his mother on anyone, not even Drew Tanaka.

But Gods, it had felt so freeing to not have to keep it in anymore. To let it go.

Leo looked at his hands. He could do it again…

No. He couldn’t. But still, something had changed inside. And that terrified him. What scared him the most was how much he’d… enjoyed it. It was exhilarating. He’d fought back, defended himself, proved himself not to be messed with. He’d felt powerful. So powerful, even Jason had been afraid of him. Leo had to admit, the thought made his skin tingle with a strange feeling- not quite pride, exactly, but close.

Leo looked out at the bustling city streets of NYC. His goal had been to get away from Camp Half-Blood. But now, where would he go? This was the first time he’d ran away actually knowing who he was. He wasn’t just a scared little boy anymore, he was powerful. And he had a taste for revenge.

IV- Jason

This wasn’t a quest, Jason had decided. Quests were noble and brave. No. Finding Leo was a wild goose chase.

That kid had experience in running away.

“He’d probably go somewhere where he’d feel safe. Where is safe in New York?” Piper asked.

“Maybe a workshop? Or… scrapyard? Somewhere with machines?” Jason suggested.

“Think. This isn’t the first time he’s run away. Where has he been in the past?”

Neither of them had an answer. Leo really never talked about his time on the run. He’d mentioned a few things, sleeping in a sewer, hiding in alleyways to avoid the cops, eating out of dumpsters. Grim stuff. It had always shocked Jason how much he’d been through.

The Hermes cabin had been their best bet for advice on missing demigods. Travellers. They had told him every possible route into the city, the best places to go to hide. Scrapyards had been a good idea, they’d said. Lots of old cars to steal, things to make. And, for a massively overpowered son of Hephaestus, a lot of fun toys to play with. That was their best bet.

Jason got out a map and circled all the possible places Leo might go. They studied it for a few seconds, discussing which points to systematically hit first.

Piper looked at Jason, a sad yet serious expression in her multicoloured eyes.

“Jason… If we can’t… If we can’t stop him…”

Jason didn’t meet her gaze. He knew what she was saying. He hoped she didn’t say it.

“If we can’t convince him to come home… if he becomes dangerous… you know what we have to do, right?”

His skin tingled with electricity.

“How can you say that, Piper? How can you even think to suggest-”

“I don’t like it either. And, believe me, I am praying that it doesn’t come to that, but if it does… we need to be prepared to make that call. I am prepared. Are you?”

“No, I’m fucking not,” Jason roared, angrily, “You’re asking me if I’m prepared to kill my best friend? No. The answer is no.”

“Jason-“ Piper’s eyes scanned Jason’s face, worriedly, pleading with him to see her reasoning, “You always want to see the best in people, and I love that about you, but I don’t wanna see you get hurt because of that.”

“Leo would never hurt me,” Jason told her, but he didn’t entirely believe it. Something about the look in Leo’s eyes as he had attacked Drew made Jason’s skin crawl. Vicious, wild, and maniacal. Jason had a horrible feeling that if he had stood in Leo’s way, Leo would not have stopped.

He thought about everything that kid had been through. Orphaned at the age of eight, manipulated by the Gods, abandoned by his family, forced to grow up alone on the streets, bouncing around foster homes, treated as a freak by what was supposed to be the only place that was safe for him, and probably a lot more- Leo never really talked about his past, but Jason got the sense it had been harsh and brutal. From what Jason could remember, he’d grown up in the demigod world, fighting monsters and facing death and danger. But the mortal world could be dark and cruel in ways Jason couldn’t even imagine. Subtler, more twisted ways. In a sense, he had been sheltered from that, facing the more explicitly terrifying monsters. Leo had been exposed to those tender cruelties in full force- no wonder he was filled with so much bitterness and resentment. Jason didn’t blame him for wanting to get back at the world.

But would he really go as far as Piper feared?

Jason had to believe he was still worth fighting for. That he was still in there, buried under layers and layers of pain and resentment. That there was still hope.

The first three places were dead ends. Nothing. No Leo.

Dusk had fallen by the time they had arrived at the fourth place.

An abandoned landfill site- mostly cars and old machinery. Heaps of junk towered above them, piles of corrugated iron sheets as high as small buildings. Everything from empty tomato-soup cans to out-of-order JCB diggers. They split up- Piper taking the east side, Jason taking the west. The sunset backlit the mountains of scrap, making the shadows loom over him.

Huge peak, black and huge, Jason thought.

Huh. Since when did he know Wordsworth? He didn’t have that many memories of his past, but he didn’t figure himself a literature geek. He thought about that poem, though. A man being so shocked by the vastness and power of nature that it kept him awake at night- “A trouble to his dreams”. He kind of related that to what Leo must’ve been feeling- terrified by something that was beyond his control. Tempted by the allure of power, only to realise how frightening the reality of it actually was. The poem starts with the man thinking he’s superior to nature- that he can command and control it. Then, when he sees the mountain, he realises his mistake. He realises his insignificance against the vastness of the peak. He realises that it was not him controlling nature, but in fact nature controlling him. He turns back, but the experience scars him. It haunts him for the rest of his life.

Jason shook his head. He couldn’t let his mind wander. Leo Valdez was not an epic poem- he was a scared, lost, and extremely dangerous teenager. There was nothing poetic or mysterious about the shit he’d been through. And comparing thee to a summer’s day would not help Jason find him.

He picked his way through the undergrowth of landfill, searching for a sign of life.

And then he saw it- a shape of a person in the passenger seat of a car. He saw the bounce of the curly hair, the long, bony, twitching fingers tapping on the dashboard. Aside from that, the shape didn’t seem to be moving. Just… waiting.

Jason saw Piper emerge from behind another large pile of trash. He waved her over and pointed to the car. Piper nodded. Jason approached. Leo didn’t look up, or give any indication that he saw Jason. Jason put a hand on the driver-side door and opened it.

“Leo?”

Leo was sitting, facing forward, tapping his fingers on the dashboard of the car. He didn’t answer. Jason sat down in the driver’s seat and closed the door.

“Leo, listen to me,” Jason pleaded, “You have to come back with us. I know it wasn’t your fault what happened at camp- but they don’t know that. You have to come and prove to them that you didn’t mean to hurt her. We can fix this.”

“I’m not going back, Jason,” Leo said, quietly, still staring through the front window, “You can go home.”

“But they’ll listen to you if you come- you can convince them you didn’t mean it. We’ll help you.”

“But what if I did mean it?” Leo turned to Jason, his eyes dark and hard and serious.

“Leo…”

Leo’s eyes flashed with anger, then he turned and looked through the window again.

“I’m not going back,” He repeated, his tone final.

“Leo, I know that you’re probably feeling a lot of emotions right now. You’re hurting. You’re… wait- what’s happening?” Jason felt the car start to move underneath them- inching forward sluggishly over the broken tarmac. Jason turned to Leo, “Leo? What-“

Without a word, Leo grabbed the handle to the side door and walked out of the car. Jason tried to open his own door, but he heard a click. It was locked. How was Leo doing this? Then he remembered during their quest- how easily Leo had deactivated the traps to Midas’ mansion. How he had known how to fly that helicopter just by listening to it. If Leo had some sort of telepathic ability with machines, he would be able to control the car without even touching it. That was frightening.

Jason watched the scene through the front windscreen. Piper was pleading with Leo. He could hear her voice, but her words were muffled. She tried to grab Leo’s wrist, but he shook her off. They were directly in front of the car now- Leo tried to walk away, towards the exit, but Piper was standing in his way. The car kept inching forwards like it was rolling down a very gradual hill. He was close enough to make out what Piper was saying now. Jason could hear her yelling, “Then why did you wait for us here only to refuse to come back with us?”

Leo pushed past her. Piper followed. She reached for his wrist again, but he pulled away, pushing her backwards in the process.

The car crept forward.

“Where are you gonna go, Leo?” Piper called, “What place is gonna take you in if not Camp Half-Blood?”

Leo flicked his wrist, and there was a metal clang! Piper stumbled and fell to the ground, right in the direct path of the car. The hem of her jeans were caught in some elaborate bear trap, scattered among the scrap that littered the floor. Katoptris clattered to the ground and skidded across the tarmac, just out of reach of Piper’s grasp.

Jason realised with horror that the car was not stopping. It began to pick up speed- faster, faster, it was barreling forwards now. He tried slamming on the breaks but it was no good. The accelerator was held down without his foot even on it. Piper was in front of the car. She screamed. Jason knew that she had no time to get out of the way. Leo’s lips twisted into a smile. Jason closed his eyes. Oh gods… Piper…

And then he heard tires screeching. He felt the car skid to a halt. Piper was still screaming. When Jason opened his eyes, Piper was on the ground, the front of the car was inches away from her trapped leg. The engine still revved like an impatient lion, wanting to cut to the kill.

“Promise to let me leave, Jason,” Leo said, his voice firm, “Promise you will let me go and you will not follow me.”

“Leo… don’t do this…” Jason pleaded.

“PROMISE ME OR PIPER GETS PANCAKED!!” He bellowed.

The engine revved again.

“Okay… okay… I promise… but Leo…”

“SWEAR IT ON THE RIVER STYX. BOTH OF YOU. AND SWEAR THAT NO-ONE ELSE FROM CAMP HALF-BLOOD WILL FOLLOW ME EITHER.”

Piper pleaded, “Leo, they’re out for your blood, we can’t stop-“

“SWEAR IT.”

The car inched forward, slowly. Piper caught her breath, and squeezed her eyes shut. Jason tried to get out of the car, but the door wouldn’t open.

“Leo. Stop it,” Jason begged, “This isn’t like you.”

“Isn’t like me?” Leo scoffed, “The dangerous freak is finally showing you just how dangerous and freaky he actually is. Or did you think I was just an innocent side-character? Your sassy comedic relief? You never thought I’d actually do something, did you?”

“Leo…”

“No, go ahead and save the girl. I’ll be waiting off-stage for my cue to be the funny best friend. I’ll tell my dumb jokes. Nobody actually gives a shit about who I really am. How I really feel.”

“That’s not true, Leo,” Piper assured him. Her voice was surprisingly calm for how much danger she was in.

“You don’t really believe that, or you wouldn’t be charmspeaking me, huh, beauty queen?” Leo’s eyes danced with malice, “No. The only person who ever cared about me WENT UP IN FUCKING FLAMES!!!!!!”

The car sped backwards, away from Piper. The tires screeched on the tarmac. Then it proceeded to drive towards her, picking up speed. Jason did the only thing he could- he put a hand on the dashboard, and sent a bolt of electricity through the body of the car. Luckily, it did what he wanted, and didn’t explode. It short-circuited the vehicle, giving Jason time to get out of the car before Leo could force-lock it again.

“Leo, I know you’re angry. I know you have a lot of resentment for the world-“

“YOU DON’T FUCKING KNOW ANYTHING!!” He yelled, “You had your happy reunion. Both of you. Jason found Thalia, his long-lost sister. Piper rescued her dad. You both have people- family- who care for you. My only family… my only blood relatives kicked me out, cast me aside, and blamed me for the death of my mom.”

“That’s where you’re going?” Jason said, “Back to Texas? To get revenge on your Aunt?”

Leo said nothing. That was answer enough.

Jason took a tentative step towards Leo, but Leo’s eyes gave him one quick flash of malice and then he turned and darted past a pile of scrap, squeezed through a gap in the surrounding fence, and disappeared. Jason wanted to bolt after him, but he couldn’t leave Piper. He walked over to her and examined where the fabric of her jeans had been caught in the trap. Luckily, the metal teeth had not caught her leg. Jason picked Piper’s dagger off the ground and cut into the denim jeans, slicing off the corner that was stuck in the trap. Piper wriggled free.

“Another perfectly good pair of jeans, ruined!” Piper complained.

“Oh my gods, how will you cope?” Jason replied, helping her up, then he turned serious, “Are you okay?”

“Physically, I’m fine. But seeing Leo like that…”

Jason remembered what Piper had said about Leo, about him becoming too dangerous, and he knew she was right. Leo had just tried to kill them. He was on his way to kill someone else. They had to stop him. Even if that meant…

No. Jason couldn’t. There was some part of Leo still left there. He had to believe that.

“Come on,” Jason said, “We’ve got a rogue demigod to find.”

V- Leo

Leo had done a lot of thinking on the long bus ride to Texas

The ride was meant to take six hours. Leo hadn’t had the money to pay for it, but luckily he had quick fingers. He felt bad about pickpocketing, but strangely not as bad as he should have felt. That filled Leo with dread. It felt like his emotions were freezing over, becoming closed and calloused just like the skin on his hands. Numb. Desensitised. He was doing bad things, making dangerous choices, but he no longer cared. He was going to kill someone, and he wouldn’t even be sorry.

He studied his arms. Scabbed-over cuts, faded scars, bruises new and old.

He remembered the bullies in the foster homes, cornering him and beating him up. Kicking and pummelling him as he crumpled to the floor. He remembered thinking, as he lay there, I deserve it.

He remembered his abusive foster mom, [this is cannon, mentioned in BoO], the look in her eyes as she hit him.

Slap! I deserve it.

He remembered running away, surviving on the streets for weeks with nothing in his stomach but bile. The agony of hunger blurring his vision, making it hard to think straight. Still one thought remained clear, I deserve it.

He remembered the knife in an alleyway, dragging the cold blade across his skin, blood trickling down his arm. I deserve it. I deserve it. I deserve it. I deserve it.

He remembered the confrontations he’d had at Camp after he’d revealed his powers. They’d cornered him, too. Throttled him and punched him. He’d let them. He’d curled up on the asphalt of the basketball pitch, thinking: I deserve it.

He’d tried to hide the bruises from Jason, but Jason still noticed them. He’d been outraged, shouting at Leo, “You could’ve stopped them! Why didn’t you?!”

Because, Leo had thought, I deserve it.

All these things had left him scars. Every mark on his arm a painful memory of the things that had happened to him. Every single one of them he deserved.

And now…

Oh Gods, what had he done? He had tried to kill his two best friends. He had actually, genuinely wanted to hurt them. Wanted them dead.

What would they think of him now? Would they forgive him? No, he knew they wouldn’t. They’d try to stop him. They’d try to kill him.

I deserve it, Leo thought.

Leo knew he was unfixable. Broken beyond repair. No rescue. No salvation. So if he was throwing his hopeless little life away, he might as well take someone else down with him.

There were people out there who deserved it, too.

Leo clenched his fists in anger just remembering everything Aunt Rosa had done. She had called him terrible names, yelled at the social workers to take him away, turned his whole family against him. She had ruined Leo’s life- abandoned him and left him in the hands of the worst people. She was the reason for all those scars on his arm.

I deserve it.

Yeah, well, she deserves it too.

Six hours until Texas, and Leo had already been awake for the past thirty four. He decided to close his eyes and sleep.

The nightmares came at him, fast.

He dreamed of the night his mother was killed. The low, cold, sleepy voice of Gaia as she told him of what was to come. He remembered the flames caressing his skin as his hands caught light. “They cannot stop me from breaking your spirit,” She had said to him. For years, he had dwelled on that line. For years, he had kept up appearances- kept up the Mask of the jokes and the sarcasm.

He remembered the sleeping face of the woman. Her shifting, dirt-like clothes. He was always the life of the party, the class clown, the comedic relief. He’d made everyone believe he had kept his spirit- that he’d never lost it in that fire. That it was more than just shattered remnants of happiness.

He remembered her coming towards him, advancing slowly and drowsily. He could not let anyone see that his spirit was broken. Not his friends. Not Gaia. Not even himself. Because he believed that if he let that Mask down for even a second, then she’d won.

He remembered the fear he had felt when the door had locked itself. The utter dread that rose in his stomach. Always positive. Always happy. Happy lil’ guy Leo. But the weight of that Mask had been crushing him. Now he’d shown his true, terrifying colours. And gods, it was like a heavy load had been lifted off his shoulders. He wasn’t afraid of being judged. Of bullies. Of monsters. He wasn’t even afraid of Gaia anymore. He wasn’t gonna be weighed down by the need to pretend just because some goddess thought she could control him. She was no different than Drew Tanaka- whispering cruel insults just to provoke him- and Leo had burned her putrid little face off.

He was there again. That night. Fire rose up, threatening to rage and roar. This time, Leo didn’t stop it. He let the flames engulf him and he actually smiled. He remembered the walls of the workshop blackening and crumbling. He remembered the ceiling falling down around him. For the first time, he’d seen that night as a display of his power- he had burned an entire building down at the age of eight, without even trying. He’d spent the next seven years suppressing his abilities, squashing it down, never giving in to the temptation of lashing out. Now, knowing the extent of his powers… imagine what he could do with some practice, maybe some training. The world had wronged him, but he was powerful. And he was gonna get it back.

He remembered the police sirens singing quietly in the distance. The flashing lights revolving silently across the world, washing it in red, blue, red, blue.

He was angry. He was gonna kill her. He was gonna fucking kill her.

Leo woke with a start. He felt the heat in his body rising, and quickly tried to squash it down. Luckily, there was no-one sitting next to him, but the stench in the air and on the leather seats at the back of the bus smelled incredibly flammable. Leo’s skin was scolding hot to the touch. He looked up at the no smoking sign, and chuckled at the irony of it.

Outside the window, the bus was pulling into a depot, manoeuvring into a space. He heard, or rather, felt, the tires underneath him slow to a halt. They had arrived.

VI- Jason

Texas was six hours away. They could get there quicker by plane, but they didn’t have the money for a ticket. They couldn’t even afford a coach, but luckily Piper had a solution. With a quick help from the Human Spark Plug that was Jason, they managed to get the car that Leo had tried to pancake them with up and running. Piper had gotten private driving lessons from her dad in the run-up to her sixteenth birthday. She’d put them to good use when she’d joyridden that BMW. They just prayed that she looked old enough to not be asked for a license.

It had taken them an hour to get out of the New York traffic, costing them valuable time. If they really were on their way to save a life, Jason hoped that getting stuck still behind a taxi cab for fifteen minutes didn’t cost them that. From what he’d heard about Leo’s Aunt Rosa, Jason figured she was a nasty and unpleasant piece of shit. But that didn’t mean she deserved to die. Besides, it wasn’t her that they were trying to save- it was Leo. Taking a life changes someone. He wanted to stop Leo before he went down that path. Jason couldn’t lose Leo like that.

“How’re we gonna stop him?” Jason asked, the long, winding upstate roads twisting before them.

Piper sighed, keeping her eyes on the road, “I tried charm-speak in the scrapyard. It didn’t do anything. He’s too far gone- too stuck in his own head to listen to reason.”

“There’s gotta be some way we can get through to him. There’s gotta be hope.”

“But what if there isn’t?” Piper’s voice cracked slightly, “What if…”

“We’re not having this conversation again, Piper. We’ll find some other way.”

Piper looked like she wanted to argue, but she kept her mouth shut.

They drove for several more hours before they arrived in Huston. Daylight rose up as they entered the city. Neither of them had slept. The streets became progressively more packed and winding as they delved further into the city.

The only question was- Where was Leo? How were they gonna find one scrappy twig of a boy in a big city like Huston?

Luckily, as they drove down the busy streets, a fire engine raced past, sirens blaring. Piper and Jason exchanged looks. It very well might not’ve been Leo, but it was their best lead. Piper stepped on the gas, and they went after the engine. Several cars honked at them angrily, but Piper ignored them. She sped up, going through a red light.

The car skidded to a halt when Piper saw that the firetruck had stopped outside a building. Smoke was pouring out of one of the ground-floor windows, but it wasn’t alight yet. Jason sighed with relief when he saw that a crowd of people- he guessed most of the inhabitants judging by the size of the apartment complex- standing safely outside. No-one looked badly hurt, but there was no Leo.

They got out of the car and moved closer towards the crowd. Nobody stopped them in the chaos.

“A teenage boy,” Jason head one of the residents say to the firefighter, “Stormed into our neighbours apartment. We heard yelling, then we heard the fire alarms.”

“What did this boy look like?”

“He was skinny, looked about fifteen, maybe sixteen- he had dark hair and his clothes and face was covered in dirt.”

Yup, that was Leo alright.

“He’s still in there,” the witness said, “I-I didn’t see him or our neighbour come out.”

Jason thanked the god of eavesdropping on people giving valuable exposition, and grabbed Piper’s hand. Before the firefighters could stop them, they rushed into the building.

Jason ran down the hall. One of the doors was ajar, and thick smoke was pouring out of it. Jason pulled Piper inside.

Leo was standing there, his body aflame, looming over an old woman, cowering on the floor. Leo was approaching her, slowly.

“Say you’re sorry, Aunt Rosa!” Leo yelled, “Say you’re sorry for everything you did to me.”

“Leo, stop!” Piper cried, and for a second, Leo did. But then he shook his head, and kept advancing.

“Say you’re sorry!” He commanded.

“I-I-“ The woman stammered. Leo’s fire burned brighter. Piper rushed forward and grabbed Leo’s Aunt by the shoulders and pulled her out of the way. She pushed her towards Jason, who grabbed her and shoved her towards the door. She ran without looking back.

Leo turned to face him. He was still wearing his Camp Half-Blood t-shirt, which was now tattered and scorched and ripped. He glowered menacingly at Jason, fire danced in his eyes. Some twisted muscle in the corner of his mouth curled into a smile, as he sent two lines of flames racing towards Piper. Jason ran and pushed her out of range of the attack, just before walls of fire closed in around him. Heat hit him in the face with an unbearable force. Searing pain. Jason felt the strength seeping out of him. Leo was advancing slowly down the alleyway he’d created with his flames.

“Leo, please,” Jason begged, “You don’t want to do this. Please, I know some part of you still cares.”

At Jason’s pleading the corner of Leo’s mouth twisted into even more of a cruel smile. It wasn’t Leo’s smile- that flash of that playful grin, the mischievous twinkle in his eye, the cheeky little dimple at the corner of his mouth. No. This smile was cold and menacing, and it was disturbing how genuine it was. Leo was enjoying this.

Jason’s skin blackened and blistered. He wanted to cry out in pain, but Leo’s hand shot out and closed around his throat, cutting off what little oxygen Jason had left in the smoke-filled room.

“JASON!!” Piper yelled

It was now or never. Leo had Jason pinned against the wall, but Jason had the physical advantage over him, despite the energy seeping out of his muscles as Leo throttled him. He could muster up enough strength to overpower Leo, bring his sword down on his skull, end it all here. His vision was clouding fast, and Jason could feel his empty lungs screaming for air. If he didn’t act now, he’d quickly lose consciousness. But something made him hesitate. He let his sword clatter to the ground. Leo kicked it aside, keeping his eyes locked on Jason. Jason raised his hand, and touched Leo’s cheek. The last thing he saw was Leo’s dark eyes, cold and cruel, as the life drained out of Jason’s body and the fire swallowed him whole.

VII- Piper

Piper couldn’t see. Smoke filled the room and stung her eyes. She could just make out the vague silhouette of Leo holding Jason up by the throat- pinning him against the wall. She saw Jason struggle, gasping for air.

She called his name.

She unsheathed Katoptris and rushed forwards, but the heat from the flames was too much to bear, so she staggered back. She stood there, helpless, as Leo chocked Jason to death. She saw Jason drop his sword, and Leo kick it away. It skidded to a halt at Piper’s feet. What the fuck was Jason doing, letting go of his weapon? Leo was gonna kill him! She saw Jason reach out towards Leo, then his limbs went slack.

“NOOOOOO!!!!!!” Piper screamed.

Too late. She watched in horror as Jason’s limp body disappeared behind a column of flames. Piper picked up his sword with trembling hands, as Leo turned to face her.

She couldn’t believe it. Jason was dead. And Leo- Leo, his best friend, his closest companion, had killed him.

No. It wasn’t Leo. The man that stood in front of her was barely recognisable as that scrawny kid she’d met at the Wilderness School. His pointed facial features were darkened in the fire-lit room, the muscles around his mouth were contorted into a deranged grin. The look in his dark eyes was of pure malice. That. Was not. Leo.

Jason was dead. Whatever it was that stood before her had killed him. And it needed to pay.

It advanced towards her, but she was ready. She held Jason’s sword firmly in her grip.

As she slashed the blade across its chest, she saw that warped smile falter and for a moment, she caught a glimpse of Leo’s fearful expression. Then the light in his eyes died, and he crumpled to the ground, lying still.

He didn’t turn to dust like a monster.

He just lay there. Blood seeped out of the gash in his chest. So much blood.

Piper stood there as the world blurred around her. She felt someone grab her and rush her out of the building, but it all seemed like it was happening to someone else. The paramedics ran to her side, tending her burns. Firefighters doused the building in water. She replayed the moment she had killed Leo over and over again in her mind- that flash of remorse as the golden blade struck across his skin, blood trickling from the wound she’d made. So much blood. Oh gods, there had been so much blood. How can a body that tiny have so much blood?

She could’ve found another way. She could’ve saved him. If she had just hesitated-

No. Jason had hesitated. Leo had not. And now Jason was dead.

She knew it. In her heart, she knew it.

She knew that there was no hope of the firefighters finding Jason’s body as anything more than a blackened corpse. No rescue. No salvation.

Leo hadn’t been a monster. He was just a scared little kid.

She thought about everything he’d been through, everything he’d seen. He’d done terrible things. He’d let the power corrupt him. Let the anger and the pain take over until it consumed him. He was not controlling it. It was controlling him. He surrendered himself to it, believing he himself was not worth enough to be saved. It was better to submit. Leo could not see the good in himself, so threw himself into his power and let the cruelty take hold. Deep down, Piper knew he was just scared. He was just a kid- a barely fifteen, 5’1, runty little boy. Leo was badly damaged and broken and hurting. He didn’t ask to be born into this cruel world. To lose his mom, his hope, his home, his everything. He didn’t choose this life of torture and suffering. He didn’t want to be a half-blood.

He did not deserve it.

——————————————————————————————————————————-

A few author’s footnotes for the end:

I know Drew is a more complex character than that, but I needed a someone to bully Leo and she seemed like a better choice than to just create one.

I did start suddenly talking about Wordsworth there- I’m a huge literature geek and I really wanted to make that connection. I started writing a mountain and suddenly my brain jumped on the whole “Power of nature controlling you” metaphor.

About the car telekinesis thing- I’m pretty sure in MoA or something he actually moves some gears through a brick wall, just by putting a hand on it, which gave me the idea that he probably could drive a car with his mind if he was angry enough.

Also, I’ve just read the ending of BoO (I wrote this fic while I was still working my way through HoO), and we don’t talk enough about how in the battle against Gaia (also Ik I probably spelt her name wrong, I listened to the audiobooks, ok?) Leo was so powerful his body was actually made of fire- like Jason describes how you could see the flames inside him illuminating his skull!! Y’all say Percy is the most powerful demigod, but nobody fucking talks about Leo!! Percy didn’t even kill Kronos himself, he just handed Luke the knife. Leo DESTROYED MOTHER EARTH!!!! And, as I’m pretty sure mentioned in the story, he’d been suppressing his powers his entire life. Now he can finally let loose, he gets to be actually scary.

And not just with his fire as well- Leo is easily one of the most talented Hephaestus kids with machines, so much that he’s able to communicate with them. I wrote that scene in the junkyard to allow Leo to be fucking terrifying.

Aaaaand writing that just now, I’ve realised that might be my own automatophobia (fear of freaky animatronics and shit) being projected through my writing. Wow, the things you learn about yourself through fanfiction.

Also, everything I wrote about machines is probably SUPER inaccurate. I know nothing about them.

Similarly, I have never been to Texas or even America so I have no clue if any of my descriptions were accurate

Idk why I put “He didn’t want to be a half-blood” at the end. But I think it’s an interesting parallel to the themes explored in the first series with Percy and Luke- to be so wronged by the world that you just want to get back at it. But Luke had been wronged by the godly world, Leo had been wronged by the mortal one (but also by Hera and Gaia).

I’ve wanted to write this fic for a long time, and started getting ideas even before finishing tlh- but it was a post by @malrie that inspired me to start actually writing it, linking that here.

Also ty to @lavenderfairiez for helping me proofread some bits I wasn’t sure about and giving me some advice

This IS lowkey inspired by Shakespeare’s “Othello” (Like I said, literature geek)- a guy goes evil bc of the shitty way society treated him and everyone dies in the end. It’s a great play.

Vague undertones of Valgrace bc I couldn’t help myself, but it can be interpreted however you want. I didn’t ship Valgrace when I started this, and in fact I think I began writing it the day I began writing my first Valgrace fic, which then led me to start shipping them. Most of this was meant to be written platonically, but now I’ve made it a bit gay. Ooopsie daisy.

Also, sorry if you’re crying now. Actually, I’m kinda not sorry. I’m like Rick after writing the end of MoA.

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lazarusphenomenon · 3 months ago

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Can you teach us how to make explosives? Piper had mused. That’d be useful, right? I won’t do that. It’s a delicate science and I can’t have you stealing all of my tricks. Whatever, Piper huffed. She flashed a small smile Leo’s way, a real blink and you’d miss it sort of moment. Frank never blinked around Leo Valdez. Leo’s returning smile lingered longer. You know how to make explosives? How? Frank had asked.

another entry for summerween 2024 and my apocalypse / post-apocalypse fic series i'm in love and it is probably too late.

#books #chbc #liper #loveforge #valzhang #warmachine #fic hell #* mine #summerween 2024 #gift #mel tag

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yangxiaolongstan · 2 months ago

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Nick Valentine, the magnificent Nicky V. I like Nick. I've done him once before and I don't remember much but I remember liking him. just the idea of this pre war detective brought back to life by the Institute and lost, stuck out of time like you is brilliant. one of the most genuinely creative and interesting concepts of any Fallout companion. but not perfect. so let's fix him.

I'm actually gonna start before Nick becomes a companion. Vault 114 is fun, I like how it establishes Nick as a brave guy who's willing to charge into a vault full of gangsters after a missing person. although I wish we could talk to Skinny Malone and end things peacefully before turning about a hundred men into carefully modeled red goo. I also think Nick, and all the other companions you get to meet before they become available to travel with, could gain affinity before you start traveling together. if you successfully get Darla to go home without violence and talk down Skinny Malone, that should earn you some credit with him. anyway, since I already killed Kellogg with Codsworth we're picking up Nick in his office afterwards. I like the different detective cases he's got, the mysterious stranger one is especially fun. he has nice insights in the case file quests but I wish he wouldn't just handhold you through them.

his affinity goes up pretty quick as long as you're decent. I think his morals are a good fit for his character as an old private eye. although he should like when you pick locks like Piper does.

first conversation works well. gives us a feel for who Nick is and his history. I think it's better for the first conversation to be exposition than the second. I do think it should tie into his position out of time and his disorientation in the post apocalypse more though.

Nick needs a lot more play with Kellogg. maybe have Kellogg's memories and personality help Nick figure out Eddie Winter, he needed that dangerous merc's brain to understand a vicious bastard like Winter. I'll talk more about the quest when we get there, but for now I just think it needs a connection to Kellogg to help tie Nick together a bit more. as is the Kellogg stuff feels kinda out of place

for the second conversation we get a bit more Nick exposition, he's programed with the original Nick Valentine's memories and doesn't know who he is in the post apocalypse. I really like his backstory like I said before. I might make the conversation more about how disoriented he still is rather than about how people helped him and he's trying to return the favor, but it's pretty good all the same.

I like the conversation between Nick and DiMa a lot. Nick being the start of the replacements, where DiMa is the starting point for synths not based on a person like the Coursers. also the idea that Nick was the first escapee.

75% affinity baby! third conversation. starts on a very strong note, with Nick lamenting his disorientation, and even outright saying he's not a real person. it's interesting he doesn't actually think of himself as being Nick, but I think that needed to be set up a bit more in conversations 1 and 2. and his quest starts right after, kinda weird that it's not really part of the same conversation but it happens right after.

I think Eddie should have already been running his gang. it's just bizarre that he's been alive but doing nothing. I think he could be interesting as a kind of mastermind over the different triggerman gangs in the Commonwealth. the idea that the code to get to him is in all the different police holotapes is a bit contrived but it's also super fun. I might change it but it doesn't really need to be. I like the conversation between Nick and Eddie. it fits the wackier quests from other fallout games. the final meeting between an ancient ghoul crimelord and the robot recreation of his prewar detective nemesis sounds more like something from Old World Blues than Fallout 4. Nick desperately needs better pathfinding on the way to the place Jenny died, but I like what he says when he gets there.

the final conversation is good. Nick finally makes peace with who he is and has been and recommits himself to justice. I don't have much to say about it tbh. It's well done and mostly just the culmination of his quest. I'd include a romance option but that's just because I'm a nasty robotfucker.

all in all Nick was great. probably the best written companion so far. so I probably should do the worst next, fucking Strong. then maybe Preston.

Original fixing Fallout 4 companions post

Piper

Codsworth

MacCready

Strong

Preston

#fallout 4 #fixing fallout 4 #nick valentine

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saint-sebastian-coded · 10 months ago

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since its femslash february in like a week here's my sapphic fics to get people in the mood

fandoms: riordanverse, avatar the last airbender/legend of korra, derry girls, nevermoor, rosewood chronicles, her royal highness and doctor who

Riordanverse

Won't Cross Any Lines

ruegard + university au + pining

a conversation between us

jadie songfic series (ongoing)

and all the things i have seen (will be gone, with my eyes, with my body, with me)

mallory introspection

long time ago; galaxy far far away

gallory + star wars

holding hands while the walls come tumbling down

ruegard + apocalypse

relax

tattoo artist silena + ruegard

dànadas

ruegard + soulmates + roommates

ursa major

jemmie + stargazing through the years

son and heir (of nothing in particular)

ruegard + butch clarisse

between comfort and chaos

pipeyna + godly parent swap

μνασεσθαι τινα φαιμι και ετερον αμμεων

post toa. actress piper + make up artist shel

οτα παννοχος ασφι καταγρα

rachel and annabeth have been paired togehter on a project. neither of them are thrilled about it

Δέδυκε μεν α σελάννα

piper and annabeth medieval au

αλλα παν τολματων, επει και πευχτα

gallory superhero au

παντι τουτ α γαρ πολυ περσκεθοισα καλλοσ

reychel + bodyswap

without changing a part of me (how do i get to heaven?)

mallory in a church before she dies

And They Were Roommates

billie hates drew, her new roommate. or does she?

My Flowers Blood Around You

when drew meets reyna, she starts coughing up petals

It's Always Colder On Your Own

piper and annabeth get snowed in together

Cottagecore

drew and billie move in together

Library Card

rachel gets a library card. and a crush on the librarian (rachabeth)

i'd be the voice that urged orpheus (when her body was found)

artemis relives zoe's death three times

leaves from the vine (falling so slow)

ruegard and the battle of manhattan

Twisted Ankle

jadie historical au. sadie has to visit a healer

i'll carry you home (no you're not alone)

gallory + patching each other up

oh wow, sports

samirah joins a soccer (football) club

Here Come The Brides

jemmie get married

Is This Seat Taken?

reychel + university au

Valkyrie

gunilla and mallory on the daily battlefield

Staring

this new hunter keeps looking at emmie

you're coming back (and it's the end of the world)

shelper angst

dinosaurs, dinosaurs fell in love (but they didn't say goodbye)

idk why its called that either. mallory after gunilla's death

there were chains, so i loved you

ruegard through the years

La rivière est profonde (S'y noyer avec toi pourrait être adéqua)

shelper angst

i'll make you a constellation (you're a star in my eyes)

shelper + stargazing

from the midnight sun where the hot springs flow

gallory in the nineties

Nevermoor

i sing sometimes to know i’m alive

morrigan centric morridence angst

danish and a latte

morridence university au

chilly

morridence + a tricksy lane

(till our fingers decompose) keep my hand in yours

cadence gets a job at a coffee shop. morrigan keeps her company

cut it off

anah and thaddea. a haircut and some hurt/comfort

strung out and spellbound

five times morrigan's head wasn't right around cadence and one time cadence's wasn't right around morrigan

Oblivious Crushes

everyone knows morrigan has a crush. except morrigan herself

First Dance

morrigan and cadence at marina and roshni's wedding

Avatarverse

kiss your knuckles before you punch me in the face

(azutara) katara starts sparring with a new girl at her club

Five Times Korra And Asami Were Nearly Caught And One Time Tenzin Decided He Didn't See Anything

korrasami + shenanigans + star wars au

Rosewood Chronicles

do you see us getting scraped up off the pavement?

ellie and lottie become roommates. again (post canon, divergent from princess at heart)

Derry Girls

ribs get tough

michelle and clare hanging out after gcses

we're dancing in the dark

clare + michelle + a party

Doctor Who

a long way back to where we came from

the doctor meets an old friend after she breaks out of prison (thirteenrose)

Her Royal Highness

apples, oranges, peaches, plums

millie does a few buzzfeed quizzes

your deep seeing eyes (ancient stars)

rocksalt + soulmates

i wanna hold your hand

rocksalt fluff

standing on your mama’s porch (you told me that you'd wait forever)

more rocksalt fluff

it's about ascension i guess (don't put me to rest)

rocksalt + i love you

yeah, i'm gonna kiss you

rocksalt fluff

it is the east, and Juliet is the sun

millie and flora after their final exam

#nevermoor #riordanverse #femslash february #avatarverse #fic recs #my fic

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fearlesstigerquotev · 5 months ago

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Masterlist

✎﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏

Introduction

Welcome to my Tumblr! My name is Tiger and I’m a hobbyist author and Quotev Refugee. Currently, I’m using Tumblr as a backup for all my oneshot works on Quotev, as well as the occasional meme. In the future, I’d like to post more oneshots on here as well <3 Currently moving all my full stories to AO3, I have linked the account in my bio, and will link all stories as well on here.

I mainly write yandere x reader stories, dabbling in horror, thriller, and romance. Some of my stories contain smut and dubious themes. As is the case with such types of stories, please refer to the tags and trigger warnings beforehand! Read at your own discretion. Minors do not interact with me concerning R18 stories.

Asks about my thoughts on topics, stories, headcanons etc. are allowed but I do not take oneshot/story requests.

With those disclaimers out of the way, I wish you happy reading!

Please note that this is still a WIP, only stories marked with (X) are available to read currently on Tumblr and/or AO3! For works without links, please check out my Quotev page.

✎﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏

New Works Post-Quotev Apocalypse

Coming soon!

✎﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏

Oneshots imported from Quotev

Yandere M!Pied Piper Halloween Oneshot (X)

To see townsfolk suffer so From vermin, was a pity. — From The Pied Piper of Hamelin: A Child's Story by Robert Browning

Winterkälte Halloween Oneshot (X)

Winterkälte: A strung-together German word that roughly translates to "winter coldness." It is a childhood folk story from Switzerland, but as far as I'm aware, there is no official name for this tale. Depending from canton to canton, many variations exist. But all of them share the following structure: A boy, his father, and their dog hike up a mountain. A blizzard causes them to take refuge in an alpine hut, where they are confronted with the personification of Death. This story is told to children in order to warn them against staying out too late, especially in the cold winter months.

Itto the Irresistible Beetle Battler (X)

Itto X F!Reader | You and your Oni boyfriend have a beetle-fight competition. Short, sweet, fluffy.

A Friendship Tested

Heizou X F!Reader | A oneshot where you are a thief and Heizou chases you through Inazuma.

My Queen

Itto X F!Reader [Royalty AU] | A short oneshot where Scaramouche is a prince, and you are his bodyguard. Even though he doesn't need one.

Study Buddies

Kaveh X F!Reader X Alhaitham [R15] | A oneshot + crackfic where you are an underclassman at the Sumeru Akademiya, and ask Alhaitham and Kaveh to tutor you before an exam. But you're a simp, and both of them have different styles of teaching.

A Wholesome Genius Invocation TCG Session

Tighnari X F!Reader [Platonic relationship] | You and your friend/mentor play an exciting round of Genius Invocation TCG. Short, sweet, fluffy.

[Reminder: Add all The Royal Tutor Oneshots]

Full stories [links to AO3]

Dies Irae — Days of Wrath [R18] | Various!M!F!Yandere Reverse Harem x F!Reader (X)

After nearly half a decade of war and turmoil, Princess (Name) hears the sound of war trumpets playing: Her empire has won the war. Being the sole heir to the throne, she is quick to rejoice and immediately rushes to provide an official statement. Fate, however, has other plans for her. When her own soldiers storm the castle and usurp the sovereign, she is faced with a nasty truth: Her childhood best friend has joined the enemy side. The kingdom has won the war, but at what price? As she navigates the treacherous web of politics, societal pressures, and negotiations, Princess (Name) finds herself forming unexpected and complex alliances with a group of captivating individuals, each with their own secrets and desires. She must not make a single misstep, lest she wants her head rolling on the ground.

Playing with Fire | Yandere Diluc x F!Reader [Royalty!AU!] (X)

After countless years of war and turmoil, Natlan has fallen. Too bad you were the War Maiden of Natlan during the conflict. In order to salvage the remnants of your country, you agree to a peace treaty brokered by the rulers of Snezhnaya and Liyue—An arranged marriage. But instead of marrying Mondstadt's sovereign, you find out you're betrothed to Duke Diluc, an esteemed nobleman from the Ragnvindr clan. He claims to be acting in your best interests, but something tells you that he cannot be trusted. And when secrets of both your pasts come to light, you find yourself struggling to maintain Teyvat‘s political stability. One wrong word could lead to your demise, a fate you must avoid at all costs.

Bad Liar | Diluc x F!Reader (Known as Malefactor on AO3) (X)

In which you, a Fatui member who is fiercely loyal to the Tsarista, is tasked with stealing the Anemo Gnosis. But Diluc, the Uncrowned King of Mondstadt, is dead-set on making your mission a living nightmare... In more ways than you could possibly imagine.

Snake Eyes | Yandere M!Naga x F!Reader

Upon the request of your former professor, you travel to India to aid his research team on their quest to find the Ivory Serpent. However, due to unprecedented circumstances, things go awry right from the start, including the disappearance of your close colleague. Paying no heed to the warnings of your team members, you head off into the mangroves in search of her, ignorant of the ancient curse the land is bound to. Before you know it, you find yourself caught in the coils of an ancient deity of the mangroves. It will take more than mere prayers to wriggle yourself free.

Infiltrator | Yandere M!Harem x M!Reader [Cyberpunk Isekai]

After a gruesome murder makes headlines, a rookie journalist finds himself chasing the scoop of a lifetime. But he soon finds out that the Underworld doesn’t give out secrets so easily, vying for control over the story only he can tell. In a world where information is the highest currency, he's the richest prize. And the crime lords he's entangled with hate sharing.

Bibliophilia | M!Yandere x GN!Reader

Getting locked inside Sanfatio Library by accident was the last thing Y/N expected. Their only option is to enter a strange stone door leading to a whimsical alternative version of the otherwise quiet and quaint library. However, they soon realize they aren't alone. Something sinister is lurking between the bookshelves, stalking their every move. The once docile and humble Y/N is forced into a race against time with only a little red book to guide them. And if they don't find the exit in time, they risk being trapped inside this demented reality forever.

#masterlist

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paigemathews · 7 months ago

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When three planets burn as one over a sky of dancing light, Magic will rest on a holy day to welcome a twice blessed child.

I'm never not fascinated by Wyatt Halliwell and the prophecy surrounding him. But let's investigate the second half, shall we?

Magic will rest on a holy day to welcome a twice blessed child

Magic itself, good and evil, completely ceases. What power has done this before? The closest that I can think of is the Hollow, but that consumes magic. This is magic itself pausing just to welcome Wyatt's arrival. This has never happened before, nor do we get any indication that it'll happen again. And while there's a lot that you could do with this, this post specifically is going to be a theory for an AU, similar to that post about the impact being conceived on the ghostly plane had on Chris. This does goes significantly more hardcore on powers, however, because, well. It's Wyatt.

What if Wyatt wields control over magic itself? Magic rests to prepare to be wielded be a child, which is why everyone is so desperate to either stop him from being born or be able to wield him as a weapon. (And, of course, no one wants to tell the sisters about any of this.)

And none of the Halliwells really know about it. Because evil has no intention of empowering the sisters with that knowledge and the last thing that the Elders need the sisters to know is that the baby can control literally all of their magic.

With Wyatt being how he is, and the tentative settling of the Underworld post-finale, it's not like they'd stumble across it very easily. And Wyatt is so hesitant when it comes to using his powers, struggles to deal with the power that he thinks he has without knowing how much stronger he truly is.

And his spells and potions are so much stronger than everyone else's, even his mother's. They don't always go the way that he wants them to, but everyone quickly learns that if Wyatt casts a spell or brews a potion, it'll do something big. Which is great for demon vanquishes, not so much for hangover cures.

Still though, no one realizes this. Until, until, until... well, what could possibly drive Wyatt to a point that he realizes?

May I offer a possibility? (that also inspired this.)

Wyatt, under a demon's control - and have you seen a dog in a cage with the door pushed to but unlocked? how they think themselves trapped, despite all it takes is a push to be free? - and turned against his family. And soon enough, even the Elders drop in, lightning at their fingertips, because an out of control Twice-Blessed isn't a threat. It's the apocalypse waiting to happen -

And the unchanged future, a world that a haunted-eyed brunette witchlighter came back to change but never breathed a word of his brother's real power for fear of what everyone'd do (of what the giggling baby would do if he perceived him as a threat). What it must be like to feel your magic, an element of your essence, something that travels with you throughout lifetimes, a part of your soul, be twisted out from underneath your grip in the midst of a battle? To look up to see a malevolent smile across the battle field as your powers slowly falter and fail before turning against you? What witch could possibly remain?

- and the Elders cannot risk it, no matter how useful the asset. But Warrens are loyal beyond the bone, to the very soul, and not willing to let the Elders destroy one of their own because they're a threat (aren't they all threats, anyways?) (and none notice the moment of hesitation that Piper and Phoebe have, a single look and memory of five strangers vs. one sister, except for Paige, who doesn't know that lesson (who would've never learned it) but says with ferocity that they're the Charmed Ones and they're bringing him home.)

And they initially think to reason with them, until it's too late and they realize that it's a trick after Wyatt, eyes hazy and unfocused, is surrounded. Chris and Melinda, the only two left in the circle trying to convince Wyatt to break free, deflect attacks for as long as they can until even they go down, not prepared to fight a battle on two fronts. And it's a pity to lose them with Wyatt, but two witches aren't worth the risk to the world, so they don't stop, even as Piper is screaming and the two realize what's about to happen.

But here's the trick: Wyatt is a Halliwell and an older brother. They'd never do it, but here's the trick: he'd drop anything the moment they call for him. Here's the trick: there is no trick but loyalty and family and devotion stamped across his heart and soul and magic that hears his brother and sister scream for him and acts.

Lighting arches towards them on all sides, towards two injured and desperate witches and Magic himself. The moment before it hits, the lightning hits a shield, glowing and sparking with electricity.

Chris and Melinda, wrapped around each other in a futile attempt to get the other out alive, look up to see their brother, eyes glowing neon blue and murderous, standing over them. When he drops his hands, every sign of magic from every being in the room - bar one - dissipates like it was never there.

His voice couldn't be more than a whisper but is heard by every being inside.

"Touch them, and I'll destroy you."

#charmed #ficlet #charmed aus #fanfic fuel #wyatt halliwell #this was initially meant to be a meta post #now there's a ficlet #oops #in my defense i've been dying for an excuse for that scene forever #but i genuinely have nothing that it fits with so i guess it got incorporated into #idk this wasnt what i meant to do but im not mad about it #ogwork

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blurred-lines19 · 5 months ago

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I uploaded this chapter last year, but I'm just now posting it here! I'm going to be doing this with the rest of them over the next couple of days :P

"One bite and five days are all it took for the world to come to an end. Nearly two months after an unexplainable, violent illness swept throughout the globe like a raging wildfire, after cities have crumbled to ruin and most of humanity has been wiped out, only a few survive. Some of those still alive are just trying to survive, while others are searching for an answer—a reason why and what caused people to turn into walking, cannibalistic corpses that decay but never seem to truly die. Now, a group of survivors—a dog, few adult figures, and a bunch of teenagers—search for a cure and must figure out how to live with the undead amongst them, and how to deal with each other as relationships strain and tensions rise."

†· Word Count: 2395 †· Fandom: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types †· Rating: Mature †· Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death †· Relationships: Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson, Jason Grace/Piper McLean, Nico di Angelo/Will Solace, Hazel Levesque/Frank Zhang, Silena Beauregard/Charles Beckendorf, Thalia Grace/Reyna Avila Ramírez-Arellano †· Characters: Annabeth Chase, Percy Jackson, Leo Valdez, Nico di Angelo, Frederick Chase, Frank Zhang, Luke Castellan, Hazel Levesque, Jason Grace, Piper McLean, Grover Underwood, Juniper (Percy Jackson), Katie Gardner, Travis Stoll, Connor Stoll, Chiron (Percy Jackson), Will Solace, Silena Beauregard, Charles Beckendorf, Clarisse La Rue, Thalia Grace, Reyna Avila Ramírez-Arellano †· Additional Tags: Angst · Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence · Inspired by The Walking Dead · Title from a My Chemical Romance Song · Found Family · Bittersweet · Based on a My Chemical Romance Song · I'm so sorry · Everyone Needs A Hug · Hurt/Comfort · Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse · Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson-centric · Betrayal †· **First Person POVs** †· Rated Mature for strong language, violence, sexual references, etc..

Annabeth

I am so lost. Worst of all, I’m alone—with about twenty reanimated corpses chasing after me like they haven’t eaten in decades. (Based on the thick, dark red blood dribbling down their chins, though, I doubt it.) Despite my own desperate situation, I’m pleading and praying that Thalia, Luke, and Leo—all of them—are okay. How did we even get split up? We were all next to each other this morning, then—God, they all came out of nowhere.

The undead snarl and snap their jaws at me, showing their rotting, foul teeth—the insides of their mouths black and corroded, filled with flies and their larvae. The thundering of their clumsy, heavy steps gets louder and I snap my head back to see the growing crowd. I bite back a curse. My legs are throbbing and ache from the exertion, threatening to give out on me at any moment. Obviously, I can’t keep running forever. But I also can’t stop unless I want to get torn apart.

I’m reaching an intersection and take a sharp right turn.

Bad idea.

My feet nearly slip out from under me as I scramble backward, running away from the cluster of walking cadavers and back the way I came. Out of the corner of my eye, I see the horde almost right next to me, snarling and outstretching their decaying arms toward me in a horrific embrace. My lungs sting as if I’m trying to breathe in hot, rusty air, the eye-watering stench of rotten flesh burns my nose as a half-decomposed hand claws at the back of my shirt, tearing a hole in it as I pull away. I yelp, forcing myself to push through the aching pain.

I turn another corner (thankfully, one without any ghouls), chucking some food from my backpack down the street as far as I can throw it, and slip into a shadowy, narrow alleyway, skidding to a stop. With my breathing ragged and unsteady, I have a hard time staying silent as I press my back flush against the hot brick wall, sweat running down my temple. Almost as soon as I step into the alleyway, the stampede of rotting corpses rushes past me, none of them appearing to have noticed me. For who knows how long—it’s hard to estimate time when you’re playing a lethal game of hide-and-go-seek tag—I’ve been rushing through Midtown, a labyrinth fallen to ruin, with only a few breaks (to say that I’m exhausted would be an understatement). And yet I still have a lot further to go to get out of here. Well, if I manage to. Honestly, I should be dead right now.

After listening for a minute or two, I exhale, collecting my wits before peaking around the corner. I sink to the dirty alleyway floor, a rat scurrying past me, and take a few minutes to catch my breath. As much as I want to rest here and not move for the foreseeable future, I need to get further away from the undead that are feasting on something—or someone—and completely ignoring the pack of beef jerky I threw. Rude. I take a quick swig of my water—quenching the dry, sandpaper feeling in my mouth—readjust my pack on my shoulder, and start walking down the alley, taking the opportunity to ease up a bit and give my legs a break.

After carefully walking a few blocks away from the horde, I found a safe place to rest and eat something. I hadn’t realized how hungry I was until my stomach growled and scared the hell out of me. From my hiding spot behind the dumpster, I pull out the little bit of food that’s left in my bag: a grand feast of a fourth of my water and a sandwich. Go figure, I think to myself. Even though I tried to conserve my rations for the past few days, it was a pathetic notion, thinking I could manage, really; I hadn’t had that much, to begin with.

How is this going to work?

After pondering it for a minute or two, I decided to only eat as much as necessary to keep myself from passing out. Almost a month into the apocalypse, it’s hard to find anything. Especially in the city.

While I was staring off into space, I failed to notice the low snarling from my right. I sharply turn my head, peeking through the crack behind the dumpster. I don’t see anything... A horribly mutilated face meets mine, gnarling and screeching as it tries to reach its arm through the small gap. I fall backwards and bump into the other dumpster behind me with a loud thud, but quickly stand up. The one got itself stuck, its skin tearing off its arm as it still tries to grab at me, except the three down the alley aren’t and are already making their way toward me. I turn on my heel and bolt, my pack unzipped and its contents spilling out.

Thankfully, I make it out of the alleyway.

On the other hand, after I make it out, I trip over a raised chunk of concrete on the sidewalk and go sprawling forward, a sharp, blistering pain shooting up from my ankle as it fails to turn with the rest of my body. The side of my head bangs against the bumper of a dusty red sedan, sending a rattling feeling throughout my body—I’m only vaguely aware of the sensation of blood on the side of my head. Stars swim in my vision, but I can’t blink them away. In my dazed state, I can see (and hear) the small yet approaching group and start hacking away with my bronze dagger, praying that I’m hitting my targets. One falls on top of me, but I push the heel of my hand against its gross, rotting forehead, trying to keep its snapping jaws at bay. I plunge my dagger into its rotten pumpkin-like skull and roll it off of me.

Did it bite my arm? God, no—please. I’m not sure.

My vision inevitably clears and I manage to find my balance and stand to take down the last two undead barreling at me; I stab the first, my blade making a squelching sound when I pull it out and shove it aside as the second clumsily races forward.

Closer... Closer... THUMP!

I step out of the way at the last second, shoving the half-dead man face-first onto the hood of the car. Grabbing it by its thin, greasy hair, I pull it back and bash his head against the car over and over again until its brains splatter the hood. Then the car alarm goes off. I let go of the man carelessly, limping to the driver’s side of the car. Locked. Damnit.

I feel something trickle down my lip. I wipe my upper lip with the back of my hand, only to see blood. Great. First, my ankle, then my head, and now my nose. I’m practically a walking “Eat Me” sign.

The setting sun glares at me, and I'm only now aware of the number of dead bodies lying behind me. If there were that many earlier, who knows how many will come out—especially with the blaring car alarm.

The world seems to tilt, and my body sways as a wave of vertigo washes over me. This isn’t good, I think as I cling to a street lamp for stability. Nightfall is coming, and I’m exposed here, out in the open. And in the middle of Manhattan, to boot. Just my luck. Turning my head as quickly as it will let me, I look for somewhere to hide for the night.

I can hardly think straight... The sudden urge to vomit overwhelms me, but I choke it back down. No. Please, please, please, not now. If I got bit I swear— No. I’ve got to get a grip. ‘Panic’ is not in my vocabulary. ‘Logic’ is, however, and I need to use that right now. I make a mental note of it: Plan now, panic later.

First things first, I need to find shelter and then deal with my injuries. A barricaded apartment building catches my eye. It looks safe enough. Well, for the most part. There are a few broken windows and boards torn off and chunks of brick missing. Other than that, however, it appears pretty much untouched compared to everything else. It’s not my brightest idea, but I only have two options in my concussed state: stay in the open street, or go into the decimated apartment building, which may or may not be inhabited by the living dead.

I look both ways—fuck, I feel awful—catching a glimpse of three ghouls down the street. Since they have likely been dead since the start, their vision should be terrible. Still, to be safe, I jog across the road (more like hobble, given the state of my ankle), hiding behind various objects until I’m sure the coast is clear.

When I make it to the apartment, I only hesitate for a moment before crawling under a wooden board.

†††

I grip the railing as I begin ascending another flight of stairs, my knuckles white and palms clammy. My footfall echoes throughout the stairwell and I cringe with each step as the sound bounces from wall to wall. Could they be any quieter? Every breath sounds louder than it probably is and my footsteps thunder against the metal stairs. Having said that though, I haven’t seen or heard anything in the ten minutes I’ve been in here, so that’s a good sign.

I hope.

A white-hot fire burns in my legs, snaking its way up from my ankles to my hips. I haven’t had a chance to look at it, but I can already tell I hurt my ankle pretty bad.

Finally, I reach the third floor. (The stairs weren’t too bad, but with the condition I’m in, it was absolutely exhausting.) A dirty window at the end of the hallway allows the dim, fading sunlight to shine through as the only source of light. It looks, well, abandoned; papers, trash, clothes, and broken glass are scattered through the hallway with dried blood everywhere. On the walls and the floor, really the only sign that there were ever people here. A child’s toy is laying on a dark—almost black—stain on the floor, covered with so much blood that it took me a minute to figure out what it was.

I shiver at the sight, my skin crawling, and quickly avert my eyes to the woman dressed in a dirty, torn green dress appearing in the hall. I almost call out but stop myself. The undead woman doesn’t notice my presence, going straight for the apartment a few doors down from me, and thumps her head against the door like a bird flying into a closed window. Certainly not the brightest of the bunch. She continues to try to walk through the closed door, which would be almost comedic if it wasn’t such a melancholic and dangerous situation. That woman was alive at one point; now, she has been degraded to a walking corpse. All that noise is going to attract any more that might be in here, though...

I walk towards her, carefully side-stepping the clutter on the floor, and sneak up behind her. When the half-dead woman with dull, cloudy eyes notices me it's too late. As she starts to turn around, I silently plunge my dagger up the nape of her neck and out as her body falls to the floor with a muffled thud. I frown at the sad sight and drag her out of the way.

The fact that (other than the one I just killed) there are no undead nags in the back of my mind, but what intrigues me more is the question of who or what is in that apartment. It might be stupid—extremely stupid—but it seemed like there was something in that apartment that she was trying to get to, which could be either a good or a bad sign. Best case scenario: it's empty and the dead woman was acting off of what is left of her muscle memory. Worst case scenario: undead dwell inside, eagerly waiting to tear me apart.

I press my ear to the door and listen carefully for any noise. Surprisingly, it's eerily quiet. No ragged breathing or shuffling sounds. No groaning or moaning.

Nothing.

Now that I think about it, I haven't heard anything other than myself. I'm still strongly against the idea of just waltzing into a random room, but I'm about to punch a wall if I can't find somewhere to sleep for the night. Right then, an idea pops into my head. I test the doorknob and, sure enough, it's locked. I wriggle the door knob rather loudly, waiting for something to happen. But nothing comes.

Deciding that it seems okay, I pick the lock and nudge the door to the dark room open, closing and locking it behind me. After my eyes adjust to the lighting (or the lack thereof) I scan the room cautiously. The apartment is in a state of disarray, yet spotless compared to the bloody and chaotic mess outside; an armchair in the corner overturned, stuffing spilling out of a tear in the upholstery, water dripping from a leak in the ceiling somewhere, broken and dismantled furniture spread across the room. It feels empty, yet also lived in. I swear I hear something attempting to get in, then I realize it’s just a mouse. I let out a shaky breath and try to shrug it off, narrowing it down to paranoia and exhaustion. I’m too tired to defend myself at this point. The door is locked, and there isn’t anything in here—I’m somewhat safe, for now. If I can make it through tonight, I can make a plan in the morning and figure a way out of this stupid goddamn city.

Right as I get myself calmed down, though, the atmosphere shifts. Suddenly, the air feels denser. Heavier.

Something is wrong.

The hairs on the back of my neck prick up, sending a chill through me. Before I can turn around, I hear the sound of a gun cock behind me.

“Don’t give me a reason to shoot you.”

Read on archiveofourown.org <3

#pjo #percy jackon and the olympians #the walking dead #percy jackson #annabeth chase #percabeth #percy jackson and the olympians #ao3 #fanfiction

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socialistexan · 9 months ago

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After my full series watch through, I've put together a list of guilty pleasure Doctor Who stories.

These are stories that are either 1) rated poorly by the Doctor Who fandom but I really enjoy, 2) stories that I ranted poorly but really enjoyed, or 3) have aspects that are widely mocked but I love. I'll try not to count stories that are rated above a 7 by the fandom that I am even higher on (like Warriors' Gate, Kinda, The Haunting Of Villa Diodati) with one notable exception.

(formated as Story (my score / fan score): reason why)

The Chase (7.9 / 6.6):

I adore the campy and just flat out wacky vibe of this serial. From the companions dancing to the Beatles on the Time-Space television to the Daleks fighting Dracula, the Frankenstein Monster, and a Banshee and LOSING. Just so much fun. Pure 60's nonsense.

Monster of Peladon (6.6 / 5.3):

Anyone noticing a pattern? I love camp. I love wacky designs. I love off the wall ideas and bizarre design. I love Alpha Centari. Is this story good, oh g-d no. Did I have fun? You bet.

Invasion of the Dinosaurs (8.0 / 7.5):

Only because people love to hate the rubber Dinosaurs in this episode, but I absolutely adore them. I'm a sucker for kinda crappy practical effects, like, that's why I'm watching this show. I ordered the lemonade!

More under the cut since this is a long post

Image of the Fendahl (8.1 / 5.8(!)):

How is the story not more embraced as a near-classic by the fandom? I'll never know. It has fantastic direction, acting (even from the guest cast which was a rarity in classic Who at times), tone, atmosphere, and vibes. The story is a little derivative of, say, The Daemons, and it has a slightly slower pace with more quiet scenes (though that's a positive for me), but that's really it.

Black Orchid (7.8 / 6.5):

I tended to be higher on shorter serials that felt right for their length and didn't overstay their welcome, and this is that kind of story. Was it amazing? No. Did we get a few fun moments in a non-scifi story? Yeah.

Timelash (4.0 / 4.2)

This is one of the worst episodes the show has ever done, but at least it's the fun kind of bad. It's just so out there and takes so many chances, I kind of commend it for that. It's in that So Bad It's Good territory for me.

Paradise Towers (7.4 / 6.4):

This was camp from the lens of the late-80's. The aesthetics and tone are like a surrealist dream. I think Happiness Patrol is a better version of this story, but you really can't top the neon crab eyes, the roving girl gangs in bright colors, the Monty Python style farsical parody of fascism, or the evil lesbian cannibal grandmas.

New Earth (7.3 / 6.1)

This might be nostalgia talking, but I love this episode. Tennant and Piper are delightful. The cat nurses are so much fun. AND CASSANDRA MY BELOVED. I know 10's first season was rough, but man I loved this.

The Halloween Apocalypse (8.0 / 6.6)

I can could put A LOT of 13's episodes on here, because I was higher on a lot of her episodes (Eve of the Daleks is another I could have chosen here), but I'll pick this one because I was just delighted the whole way through. Big ouppy! Dan's house shrinking! A Nitro-9 reference! And it's set on the best day of the year, Halloween!

#Doctor who #the chase doctor who #image of the fendahl #monster of peladon #invasion of the dinosaurs #black orchid #paradise towers #new earth #the halloween apocalypse

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slocumjoe · 2 years ago

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Peer-Reviewing “The Synthetic Truth.”

And a long rant about irresponsible journalism

This will be a long read. As mentioned before, I was going into careers for this thing. But I’m not anymore, it’s been a while, and I’m doing this for fun in my free time. So, if you notice something I don’t, feel free to point it out. The coolest thing about my Piper rants are the other writers nodding furiously. But at the same time, disagreement is a source of learning, so don’t be shy if you have a counter-point to anything.

The point of this is to pick apart Piper’s reporting and figure out everything wrong with it. Why? Because people agree with me when I say she’s bad at her job, but I don’t think they understand just how bad. The articles themselves are long, boring slogs to read through, full of filler paragraphs and unimaginative ways of making a point. They’re forgettable. Pair that with the fact that many likely haven’t read them, and it’s easy to buy into Piper’s shtick of being a sharp, charismatic field journalist.

Consider this post a refund.

Noodles. We all eat them. We all love them. And Diamond City's Power Noodles has supplied this sustenance for the past fifteen years. From the stilted mechanical cadence of Takahashi's programmed Japanese, to the fragrant steam that wafts from each bowl, to the scalding tang of each delicious mouthful - the ordering and eating of noodles is but one of many shared human experiences. Or is it?

October, 2287

The Synthetic Truth

Piper Wright

This opening is weak and poorly connects to the next paragraph. The thesis of this article seems to be that Diamond City has a synth issue; we’ll get to that later. Noodles have nothing to do with the overall idea of the article, and she’s wasting a lot of ink on it. Remember, this is a post-apocalypses newspaper. You’d think she’d want to make things easy on her printing press and not waste her resources.

Now, the closing line here is awful. I’ve seen classmates ripped to shreds for hypothetical questions. Do not ask hypothetical questions, especially if you’re not going to outright respond to them. It’s a lazy way of getting to your point. I can just see my writing workshop teacher’s red ink on this one.

Also, I have two nitpicks. Firstly, the description of the ‘noodle experience’ doesn’t work. It described Takahashi, but then the noodles. If it was Takahashi’s Japanese, then something else, then noodles, it would work better. When doing a three-point description, you want 1-1-1 or 3 of one thing. This is 1-2. Doing 1-1-1-1, or four points, is on shaky grounds. 3 is a magic number; not too little, not too much.

Secondly, the line “And Diamond City’s Power Noodles has supplied this sustenance for the past fifteen years” is awkward. With the first three sentences, this paragraph opens with “Noodles. We eat noodles. We Love noodles. Power Noodles makes noodles.” It’s clunky. I won’t suggest fixes because the entire paragraph needs to be thrown away.

I was struck by this very question as I sat at the counter of Power Noodles last Wednesday night, just after 5:00 pm, enjoying a dinner I had so many times before. That's when I noticed our very own Mayor McDonough sidle up to a stool, and engage in the very same ritual. Right hand extending. Mouth opening. Teeth chewing. Yes, eating noodles. The shared experience of almost every Diamond City resident.

This paragraph also needs cutting. Really look at the content of it. It describes the act of eating food. This paragraph wastes ink and paper, time, and most importantly, reader attention. The average person is not going to sit down and read through this, Piper. Aside from the creepy, stalker-like tone of this paragraph, it’s also counter-intuitive to her point.

Piper is trying to convince everyone McDonough is a synth. Here, she describes him doing something that would be very odd for an Institute agent; he goes and gets dinner at the same place she does, while she’s there. Knowing he’d be scrutinized for it. This paints the rest of the article in an unflattering light, as Piper is accusing McDonough of being a synth, while not providing proof, at the same time she’s describing ordinary behavior.

This paragraph also fails to connect to her hypothetical question. Piper asks the question, and describes when she herself asked it. She doesn’t properly acknowledge it. This is a journalism crime. Hypothetical questions are bad, and using one, then shuffling past it, is even worse. So much red ink needed here.

So it must have also seemed to the residents of Diamond City nearly sixty years ago, on an uncharacteristically warm May evening in 2229, as they sat around this very same counter. But that was before the days of Takahashi and his noodles, when the bar served not noodles, but ice cold Nuka-Colas, frothy beers, and stiff shots of whiskey. The barman's name was Henry, and that night, he facilitated the shared human experiences of drinking, smoking, talking and laughing. That is, until tragedy struck.

The focus has shifted from an odd, pointless note about McDonough eating dinner, to the Broken Mask incident. The first paragraph is about noodles, the second is about McDonough eating noodles, and this third paragraph is about how this noodle stand used to be a bar. If Piper was writing about the noodle stand itself, this would be acceptable with some changes. But this isn’t about noodles, it’s about synths in Diamond City, but we’re still talking about the damn noodle stand.

Some nitpicks: ‘uncharacteristically’ can be cut; ‘facilitated’ is an odd word choice; 1-1-1-1 description use, ‘talking’ and ‘laughing’ could be lumped in together under ‘merriment’, ‘partying’, or some such.

This is a matter of personal taste, but I would have left out the final line. That way, it would be of some shock when the tragedy actually strikes. It would better fit the tone Piper is going for. If this article were more objective and historical, prefacing that there is tragedy would be appropriate.

There aren't many among us who are even old enough to remember that evening - although some of the city's Ghoul residents certainly could have, had they not been forcibly removed, thanks to Mayor McDonough's anti-Ghoul decree of 2282. But there is one person among us who does remember, distinctly, the events of that evening: respected matriarch Eustace Hawthorne, who recounted her story in a Publick Occurrences exclusive interview.

Unless Piper wants to make a point about the ghoul exile, half of this paragraph is unwarranted. Simply take the last part about Eustace and put it on the end of the last paragraph. “Eustace Hawthorne remembers the evening well.” That’s all you have to do. Saves ink, time, and reader attention.

"Oh, I was there all right. Sitting right at the bar, sure as you're sitting in front of me now. Twenty-two years old or so, and just looking to have a good time. I was safe behind the Wall - we all were - so what was the harm? And let me tell you, that Mr. Carter made it easy. He came into town earlier that day, said he was from out west somewhere. It didn't really matter. What did matter was his smile, and his laugh, and the way he'd make everyone feel at ease. That night, at the bar, we all just sort of crowded around him. Everyone wanted to exchange a word, or hear about the state of the Commonwealth. And Mr. Carter, he was all too happy to oblige. It was just so wonderful. Until it wasn't."

What Eustace is describing is, of course, is the infamous event known as the "Broken Mask," when the people of the Commonwealth learned for the first time that the Institute, the shadowy scientific organization responsible for the creation of combat androids, had actually succeeded in creating a model so advanced, it could effortlessly infiltrate human society. Unbeknownst to the people of Diamond City, the Institute had somehow evolved their androids into true synthetic humans. Synths.

Eustace continued her account of that evening, and the moment when things turned sinister, and the truth about Mr. Carter was revealed.

"We'd been drinking, and carrying on, must have been three hours. Mr. Carter had four or five drinks in that time. He seemed a bit drunk, I guess, like the rest of us. Then something just sort of happened. He was smiling, but the smile sort of went from his face, all in an instant. And then his cheek started twitching, kind of funny. And I remember watching him, clear as if it happened just yesterday. He reached inside his coat, took out a revolver, and then 'Blam!' - He shot Henry, the barman, right in the head. Didn't hesitate, didn't show any emotion - Mr. Carter killed Henry as casually as if he were paying him for a drink. But his cheek never did stop twitching. Let me tell you, all Hell broke loose after that."

"After he shot Henry, that Mr. Carter shot three or four other people, too. Like I said, all Hell broke loose. The guards came running, they opened fire, and Mr. Carter he kept shooting, and throwing people around left and right. Finally, those guards put him down. Seemed like they had killed a man who had flipped his lid. Gone crazy. And he lay there like a dead crazy man, sure enough. God, it was horrible. But then we saw the plastic and the metal - this was one of them early synths, you see - and we realized it wasn't a man at all. It was then we all knew. The Institute wasn't just 'out there.' The Institute was everywhere now. Among us."

Oh, Piper. Sweetheart, god bless.

Never, ever, ever use a full quote like this. Ever! A cursory Google search will tell you to use quotes sparingly. Any middle-school teacher will tell you to not just drop them in and leave, like you’ve written a paragraph. Every writing resource out there will tell you to do something with a quote, and give it a point. This paragraph fails on all metrics.

When using large blocks of quotations like Piper is doing, for the love of god, paraphrase. Piper, in this section, has two paragraphs; one is saying that Eustace’s quote isn’t done yet, and the other is describing what Eustace is already describing. If I put anything like this in front of any of my teachers, they’d call in for a welfare check, asking if I’d lost my mind over night.. Piper writes nothing of her own substance here. You cannot use a quote like this. Sure, this is an interview, and maybe interview articles have different rules, but surely this is a massive amount of ink, spent recounting Eustace’s winding manner of speech.

I’m doing the same thing here, but the difference is that I am directly examining each paragraph; Piper is just dropping in her quotes and continuing on. This is a rookie mistake. I know Piper wasn’t properly taught these things, but it still is a sign of weak, purposeless writing. If you have a point, and you care about it, and, crucially, it has the legs, you don’t need to prop it up with a quote dump like this.

It was never determined precisely why the synth known as Mr. Carter went on his killing spree. Some suggested he had somehow been remotely controlled by the Institute, who wanted to test his combat effectiveness. Still others felt he had simply malfunctioned (a hypothesis supported by the twitching cheek), and was never meant to kill anyone. But at that time, the "why" hardly seemed important. What mattered was that the humans of the Commonwealth had been truly infiltrated by an organization whose intentions and motives were, and still are, a complete mystery - using a model of synth even less advanced than the ones the Institute has in service today.

I can’t tell if this paragraph looks alright to me because of the horror of the quotation section, or it’s genuinely inoffensive. It’s boring, sure, but it has a point. It lays out the theories behind Mr. Carter’s attack, and then pushes the point that it doesn’t matter; there are now synths among them, hiding in plain sight. The last sentence is a bit of a run-on, though. It could have been broken up into two sentences.

This paragraph gets a solid B. Unimaginative, a bit too long, but it has a purpose and fulfills it competently. It uses too many adverbs, though, but that’s a common issue throughout the article. Precisely, remotely, simply, hardly, truly - it’s a small thing, but once you get an eye for it, you’ll never stop noticing it.

Which brings us to noodles. Specifically, the noodles consumed by Mayor McDonough last Wednesday night, in the same spot that Mr. Carter the synth went haywire, and mercilessly killed several people - after spending hours sharing an experience the people of Diamond City assumed was reserved for members of the human race. They were wrong.

This paragraph attempts to connect McDonough to Mr. Carter through this stand, citing it as a common denominator of Institute meddling, the heart of Diamond City now invaded. But she does this through the fact that Mr. Carter went haywire here, and the fact that McDonough eats here. This is false correlation. Piper herself eats here, but in her eyes, McDonough taking an action that Mr. Carter also took is proof that the Institute is pulling the strings. To her, this noodle stand is a symbol of a lost security. But objectively, she’s still just talking about McDonough getting dinner.

This is not how you do set up and pay-off. I’ll give a demonstration of tying the ending back to your opening at, obviously, the end of this post.

Are we?

You ended. On a two-word hypothetical question.

If my teacher received anything, no matter how well the rest of it was, with a two-word hypothetical question for a closing paragraph, she would have stood up on her desk, pointed at it with her red pen, and gone into exhaustive detail for the remainder of class why you don’t do this.

But for all the bad writing decisions in this article, they aren’t the worst thing.

Let’s talk about journalism, and the responsibilities of it.

Accountability

A keen eye will have noticed the inflammatory nature of this article.

This article is somewhat insidious, as the wording and topic choice leads to a subtle hint towards paranoia. “They were wrong...Are we?” wants the reader to wonder if they, themselves, are in danger of a synth going haywire, or a synth walking past them like anybody else. Piper wants her reader to keep this in mind, every single day. She wants them to never not think about the Institute infiltrating their home.

Piper writes about nothing, but the subtext is everything. She encourages a reader to view everyone with suspicion; after all, if a synth can eat noodles and drink and make merry with anyone, how do you trust anyone? It’s a valid point, yes. But it’s a shortsighted one. How do you trust anyone in the wasteland, synth or not? Someone could be trying to rob you, sell you into slavery, kill you. Piper singles out the Institute as the only real threat in her articles. Need I remind you, Piper is unaware of Quincy’s recent siege and take over by the Gunners?

Quincy was a large, thriving city, and was a major trading hub. There’s a reason Piper picked Quincy as your fake origin. The wealth and resources are why the Gunners attacked in the first place. It was a massacre. On a trading hub. Think of what that would do for the weak economy. Think of how many people would know the traveling traders, or had friends and family living in Quincy. Piper doesn’t go to the Quincy survivors for their account, or Preston for his side of the story as the failed protector. To Piper, the Institute is the most urgent threat to the Commonwealth. She fixates on it. The Institute is a threat, yes. Remember University Point? But Piper doesn’t write about that, either, and there’s been time for the news of U.P to reach Diamond City. For Quincy, I’m willing to forgive her. It was a recent attack. But as a reporter, Piper should be keeping her ear to ground for these sorts of things.

A quick list of things Piper should be writing about, for the good of her community.

The Ghoul exodus, and the pointlessness of racism in a time where you need every friendly hand you can get.

The Gunners and their encroaching presence in the Commonwealth

Quincy being commandeered.

The Brotherhood rolling into the Commonwealth.

News about crops and economy from other settlements.

Homesteading information that would be useful for a post-apocalypse home, such as preserving, tailoring, and the like.

The Railroad.

Goodneighbor, and the difference of leadership between Hancock and his brother.

Dangerous areas in the Commonwealth, safe routes you can take to other locations.

Merchant routes.

Bunker Hill.

The rebuilding of the Minutemen.

Institute top-side activity, such as in University Point, the Mayoral Bunker in the west, and more.

The destruction of the Commonwealth Provisional Government, and why the Institute wouldn’t want the Commonwealth to be united.

But that isn’t what she writes about. Piper writes about synths in Diamond City. Diamond City is already paranoid about the Institute after the Broken Mask Incident. Piper can write about the Institute; she just doesn’t do it in meaningful ways. Her paper literally has an advice column; this isn’t a reputable source of information, it’s her own think-pieces.

If I was a journalist in the wasteland, I would be trying to unify my community. I would be looking for important news, useful information and survival tips, and trying to find answers where there are questions. I would not be rallying my community against each other, telling them that our leader is a fraud, that any of them could be frauds. And then I wouldn’t insist to anyone willing to listen, that no one is believing me, despite the town being in a constant state of dread.

That’s the real problem I have with Piper; she can’t take no for an answer, even when she’s getting ‘yes’. Piper’s articles are working, but because they can’t just throw McDonough out, she blames the residents of Diamond City. She calls them cowards, sheep, brown-nosing. The guards are talking about synths, the residents are talking about synths, people want Nick thrown out after all his good deeds because they just can’t trust him anymore. If you walk around Diamond City, people will tell you they broke up with their girlfriend because she did something weird, so she must be a synth. Cathy at the barber thinks the mayor’s secretary is a synth, because her hair is too nice. The general store owner, Myrna, who has to interact with more people than most, can barely run her business because she’s so terrified that she isn’t interacting with who she thinks she is.

And Kyle, a DC resident, thinks something killed his brother, Riley, and stole his face. Angry, grieving, deluded, he tries to put down the mockery, only for guards to execute him. There were no synths, but someone still died because of the fear that there might have been.

And where does this happen?

In front of the noodle stand.

(See? That’s how you bring things back around.)

Piper writes that the Institute first invaded Diamond City at this stand, the heart of town, and now, a synth leads Diamond City while eating here. But the Institute isn’t what is hurting Diamond City. It’s fear. Everyone turns on everyone else, for fear they’re a synth. There is still violence, for fear of history repeating itself.

Fear that Piper will not stop perpetuating.

#fallout 4 #fo4 #Piper Wright

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voltstone · 10 months ago

Text

Back Again (F!SS x Piper Wright One-Shot)

|| Perhaps it’s your naive hope that keeps you from breaking down completely. But you know Blue will come back. She will. Blue said as much. ||

In other words, Piper Wright walked out of Diamond City with the woman written as the “View from the Vault.” Though, well, the city folk were quick to suspect that there was something else going on between them… And they weren’t wrong. So when Piper walked back into Diamond City without the woman, there was something wrong. Especially the longer she waited on the Publick Occurrences rooftop. Alcohol in her breath. Less shouting and interrogating for interviews. It was all just…wrong.

[8,547 Words] | [Last Edit: 4/15/2021] (Full One-Shot Post)

“GOD DAMMIT PIPER! I’LL FIND MY WAY, JUST GO! GO AND GET TO THE CITY!”

You still don’t know how you did it. Just left her like that.

“I’LL COME BACK AGAIN! OKAY?! OKAY?! JUST GO! GET OUT OF HERE!”

But, all there is to do is listen to Blue’s screams from when she hurled herself away, narrowly avoiding the two deathclaws that had sprung out of the horizon. Her voice drowned by the suit’s helmet. Bullets and fire igniting her face through the visor…

And then think. Listen to her voice, and then think about how you just left her with the traces of the Glowing Sea rife along the hazmat suit. Which you had to ditch after its helmet cracked from the gunfire of a few raiders—who you also ditched. In the same canal, in fact. Tied together by the ankles of the suit and just booted over the side.

Cracked helmet or not, you’re now really regretting that panicked decision. You don’t care if your haste had saved your ass because radiation is a bitch, and the last thing you need is to be caught in the building storm as it crawls from behind. Rancid thunder and lightening of spitfire—it’s all just the icing of your luck, honestly. And—

You stop short and hold out your hands to confirm that, yes, it is—in fact—raining, and absolutely, the water stings in ways you believe wasn’t a thing before the apocalypse some hundred or two years ago. That’s what Blue told you anyway…

“Shit…” you breathe tightly, forcing yourself further down the road. The echoes of gunfire and more of Blue’s voice replay themselves—the ones that melded in the distance, desperate to keep the deathclaws away from you and instead submerged within the Glowing Sea.

And it did work. Yet, that’s the one thing that keeps your jaw sewn together, and your eyes hard on the outskirts of the city. It worked, and Blue is lost in that radiated wasteland, and you’re alive, right at the foot of Diamond City. Your home. So yay, you’re alive and well. Good time as any to get struck down by the storm. With that thought, you almost just let yourself face-plant into the deteriorated asphalt and beg for the rad storm to just send a bolt right up your ass.

Almost.

You don’t really because…uh, well, to be frank, you’ve asked for similar things before, and the Commonwealth thought it would be funny to give you those scars. Hence why you’ve vowed to never ask for the impossible because—well boy howdy—turns out you would find the Children of Atom in the sewers. And yup, sure, you’d get poisoned too. Oh and let’s throw in the damn rad storm that, you know, just happened to make its presence right after your vacation in the Glowing Sea. Right. Real nice of the Commonwealth there. Quite the joker.

“Piper…” You barely acknowledge the guard before he adds to his grumble: “Paper’s been running good since you left.”

You halt in place with a groan. Who is that anyway? Johnny? Tim? Dan? You turn around and scowl, “Not a surprise. Nat’s capable.”

With his next, rather invasive, question, you know it’s Bobby from behind the mask: “So…that woman. The one from the newspaper? ‘Out of Time’ or somefink? Or 'View from the Vault?’ Y’ left with her, didn’t you?”

You narrow your eyes, working your jaw. Like you really needed the additional, constant reminder. “Yes,” you murmur, “I did… She’s capable.”

“R-Right…” You turn away and barely catch Bobby’s quiet, “Hope so.”

Oh what the hell does Bobby know? He’s just the stupid guard of the bunch. All talk and no brain. Or, well, brawn too. All talk and no double b’s.

So forget him. How about you deal with the closed gate that most certainly closed the moment you stepped out? Arms crossed, you watch the speaker with a tight lip. And, slowly, Danny’s voice mumbles, “…uh, Piper? Is that you again? Kinda creepy just lurking in front of the door like that.”

You roll your eyes and snap, “Would you just let me in, Danny?! I may be one for the law and all that, but don’t think for a second I’m out of stuff I can stick up your—”

“Okay! Okay! Jeez, Piper! Just like— Pipe down, will you?!" You arch a brow and tap your foot. "So, uh, like…go through the guard’s door. Mayor’s not too happy. Well, I mean, he’s never happy with you, but anyway, yeah. Still wants you out, and there’s a storm and everything, so you know, protocols.”

You hum, “Uh huh. Right, Danny…”

“So, yeah! I’ll let you in secretly. Wait, no. Discreetly… Discreetly? Discreetly, yeah. That’ll look better on my referral—”

“Uh, Danny? About that storm and everything?”

He pauses. “Yeah, what’s up? It’s getting pretty gnarly, isn’t it?”

“I’M STILL OUTSIDE!” you bark.

“Shit, right! Okay! Guard door! I’ll unlock it, okay?! I-I’ll make sure nobody sees you—uh huh!”

You click the roof of your mouth irritably as you stalk over to the door, and by the time his frantic jangling of his keys and lock wrenches the thing open, you’re sopping wet in acid rain. You flick your hat roughly in your hand as you storm inside, splattering fat droplets of water against the concrete. Danny wheezes and shuts the door, muttering something about how guard duty outside wouldn’t be fun at this hour. (Lucky they got the saps like Bobby to stand watch, then…)

He haphazardly reaches your side and rushes, “You’re not just going to walk out from the front door like that, are you?! People will see—”

“Make sure he writes discreetly on your referral then, Danny,” you retort, slipping on your press hat.

Danny deflates, and as you walk down the front entryway, he grumbles, “Ma’s right… You are a bully.”

Whatever. So you’re a bully. With a lazy, though gruff, wave of your hand, you stroll down to Publick Occurrences, which right front and center to the entrance anyway. So, like, Danny doesn’t need to worry his pretty head. Not tonight, at least. Well, really not ever since you’re still a citizen, and legally you shouldn’t be kicked out every single time you try to get back in. In short, you’re protected by the law. Some laws. …a law, with a former lawyer to back you up.

Every. Single. Time. You can’t just let yourself step two strides in front of you before reminding yourself of who just just up and left. You can’t, can you?

“Piper!”

You stamp to a halt and twist around. She’s gotten taller… A smile manages to worm itself on, and you squeeze Nat’s shoulder as she hops from the newspaper stand. “Hey! How’s the paper runnin’?”

“Good,” Nat chirps with a quick, added, “Ever since Blue fixed the printer…” Her frown is slow to come, and it has the same, conflicted grace that forces your smile to dwindle. “Wait, where is—”

“Glad that it’s doing well,” you cut across, slipping away from her lingering side-embrace. “I guess I was wrong about the ol’ nuts and bolts.”

“P-Piper…? What happened?” Your hand closes around the front door’s handle, though you hesitate to open it. You hear Nat’s footsteps behind you, and she asks, “Did… Did you guys make it to the Glowing—”

Your other hand raises, and you snap, “Just—!" It hangs there for a moment, and your smile is not one at all but instead a tight, distraught glower. You don’t guide it to Nat, however. You keep it focused on the door. "Just run the paper,” you deadpan before slamming the door behind you. The front of the house spits back at you as a welcome, the metal and wood groaning against your steps as you make your way up the stairs. And at the height of them, you pause, chewing the inside of your cheek as you hold yourself.

You need something to do. A way to think. But not too much. Just enough to forget about how to remember. So you sit your ass down at the terminal because, sure, here’s an idea: while you wait, you can write about some of your adventures. Maybe you won't publish all of them, necessarily, but to write about… About Blue and… And the struggles outside the city…

You feel your lips flatten into a hard line because you damn well know you’re not going to be typing anything. Not at your terminal for any private matters, nor the typewriter that’s not far from you—for printing. None of it. You just— You know that the story isn’t over, right? There will still be tales and news and paragraphs to detail. It— It can’t just end with two deathclaws tearing after Blue and into the Glowing Sea, gunfire and clips of her voice behind you… I-It just can’t be.

How… How did you just leave her…?! How were you able to just walk all those miles within that day, and wind up back at your house? It didn’t even feel like a home anymore, despite hearing Nat’s voice, and seeing your typewriter, and feeling the terminal underneath your palms as you strangle the screen through a hissed cry.

“D-Damn it…Blue,” you whine softly, resting your head against the screen. It blips to life, but all you can think about is that Pip-Boy on your vault dweller’s wrist, and then the blue of her suit, and a starry night… Her kisses and hugs and the way she cradled you that one night.

God, why did you leave?! Why did you listen?!

It’s all you ask. It’s the only thing you ask, and come to find, you have one answer:

Because Blue told you to, and she promised that she’ll come back. And she will.

I know you will, Blue… I-I hope you do.

[+ + +]

You don’t know how long you’ve just been staring at the ceiling for. An hour? A few minutes? Equally plausible. Oh, and did you take a nap? Who knows! Probably, if you’re feeling this sluggish. With a blink and a swallow, you also determine that you’ve been drinking too. On your bed with a leg hung over the side. As you move to reach for— Oh, yup. Here’s a bottle. With a light grin, you arch a brow and crack open the lid. One of Vadim’s concoctions, you’re sure. Nuka-Cola with some vodka—though he always adds something else. An extra kick since the vodka isn’t enough for him.

And not enough for you too, it seems. Especially tonight. You drain a good chug of it before coughing yourself back across your bed, the clinks of more bottles rolling underneath the bed-frame as you do so. The Nuka-Cola mix is still tight in your hand, and you rock your jaw in thought, eyes back to the ceiling. You also wonder if Nat had checked on you within the past few hours. Or, well, during the storm that had rolled by. Did anyone inside know about it before you did? Maybe not. Mayor McDonough has always been the worst with that… It’s like he wants everyone to go all ghoulish just to be able to kick—

H-Hey! Now wait a minute! Is that why that fuckin’ synth’s always trying to lock you out?!

You stew for a moment and hiss, “Dumb, wired bastard.” Another few sips. “Gonna earn yourself another fuckin’ story for that… Piece of scrap shit…” You teethe the edge of the bottle’s neck with a thoughtful eye closed. Of course…if you did do that, you would be tossed out with another gaping hole up your ass—one that isn’t natural. And dammit, Nat would be stuck here to pick up the pieces of your mess. Damn. And he’d get away with it. You know it. He knows it. All because he looked at you in the odd, inhuman way you grew to recognize from Valentine. Of course, Nick’s nothing less than human. He’s just, well, fitted with robotic parts. But there is that look. Oh, there is that look—especially when he’s brought in front of a bowl of noodles as if it’s nothing more than just calories to gain and burn.

The mayor, however, is nothing less of a scumbag.

Which is why you're sure that he’s absolutely a sy—

“ACK!”

You wrench upright and choke on the neck of the bottle, spraying the booze across your little nook. Holding the base of your throat, you scowl. (It’s not the first time you’ve accidentally tried to drink while laying down. It’s very embarrassing. You know you’re not three, but… Yeah. Embarrassing.) With the bottle now empty, you roll your eyes and toss it to…someplace. You aimed for the corner of the room, but you’re now watching it roll underneath your bed. There’s a brief blip of curiosity to what you’d find under there, though the list of all of your habits deter you. At this point, there might as well be a skeleton under there.

So with your hand kept on the base of your hat (for balance, you think), you teeter towards the roof door and step through. The rain has cleared by now, though the roof from its straight platform to its edges is still slicked with simmering water. You look across the main hub of Diamond City, and the steam from the acid rain wafts with the neon lights, and you can hear the sopping steps of very few of your city folk.

Up above, though, is what really draws your attention. It’s a complete and utter blanket of stars—bright pearls poked into a sheet of black, singed with purples and greens.

You trip over yourself and are nearly thrown over the edge. Lucky for you, your hand snagged the lone pipe that you’ve yet to figure out where it connects to. It fumes with heat, and sometimes it smokes, so it’s important in some whatever way. And tonight, it caught your fall. So yay.

With a light groan, you sink onto the rooftop, eyes back to the sky high above. It even looks similar to the night or two prior. Well, it should since the constellations haven’t really changed within seventy-two hours—give or take some. Or maybe forty-eight. Oh who knows and who cares? You're hammered!

You laugh quietly to no one. All alone. With those stars…

And, to yourself, you barely whisper the name of whom you hope is able to see them. But, well, Blue probably can’t. She’s still stuck in a haze of radiation, after all. Alive, dammit. Alive with two deathclaws wrangled and beaten.

There’s a choked cry that escapes you, and you rub your eyes with your sleeve.

She has to be alive…

[+ + +]

Because if she isn’t, then why was it just this night? How goddamn cruel does a joke from the Commonwealth have to be? After that first night, it just decides to whisk her away from you? Just like that?!

Whatever the case, cruel or not, you don’t stop yourself from revisiting it. How the two of you found a small, makeshift shack for the night—her power-armor off to the side with a hazmat suit at its feet. The two of you in its doorway, looking out into the night’s sky with a dim lantern set on a few broken shelves behind you. Tossed blankets and pillows (with curious stains, of course) scattered on the inside. You with a lit cigarette, and Blue with her share of the cram…

“Doesn’t get any calmer than this?” you muttered through an exhale.

She grinned into the can and nodded. “Yeah. Suppose not. Though there’s still a bit more excitement than when I just reclined in a chair way back in the day.”

You snorted a laugh, which forced your cheeks to burn and gaze to dart away (because what adult snorts anymore?). Even so, you remarked, “What an old timer you are…”

“An old timer slowly being roasted by the radiation…”

“Well, I mean, you do eat all of those canned food like they’re nothing,” you murmured.

Blue shrugged. “Yeah, I guess. Habits die hard, I guess. It doesn’t help that the cram tastes the same.”

“That should be concerning.”

“Oh, believe me, it is.” The can was tossed backwards into the shack, her eyes outward. You inhaled more of your cigarette as she murmured, “Still… Sometimes it’s nice finding the things that are kept the same. The stars are another thing, you know.”

You hummed gently, “I’m sure it is…”

“And…you know what? With those few things, it’s easier, I guess, to get used to everything else,” she said. You watched her profile, and deep in your chest, you felt more of the fluttering that had been plaguing you for months. A nice, timid thing. Coy though persistent. …especially the latter that night, as it turned out. With another exhale, you turned away to blow it to the side, if to also collect yourself.

“What other things?”

“Hmm?”

“The stuff that stayed the same.”

She pondered for a moment, then said, “Nuka-Cola. Probably is a concern too, but I’m not complaining…” Blue thought for another minute. “Codsworth—or, at least, most of him. I think he’s lost a few bolts while I was in the vault. …uh, and I think your hat too.”

You blinked. “W-What?”

Blue chuckled—the way that always twisted your heart and burned your gut—, and she turned towards you. “Yeah… I mean, of course I doubt I’ve seen that one before. And it's…dirty.”

“Hey, I’ve tried my best,” you retorted playfully.

“I know, I know,” she snickered. “But yeah. It’s what everyone always pictured reporters and journalists to wear. So, I mean…fitting.”

You felt the brim of it with a quiet smile, then murmured, “I mean, I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t inspired by the look. And lucky. Clothes that fit and match are rare, you know.”

“…yeah.”

You eyed the grey tie and under-layers of the Silver Shroud outfit, the trench coat laid on the floor behind you. “I guess costumes do well though,” you said, a bit sly.

Blue rolled her eyes and replied, “Well, it’s not so much a costume anymore.”

“I guess.”

“You guess?”

You giggled (again, what kind of adult—? Never mind), and answered, “Yeah.”

“Okay…” Her voice dropped, and it peeked the…well, persistent fluttering that really had no business growing throughout your torso the way it did. “And what’s your opinion on women running around in costumes all day?”

You swallowed. Well…damn, did you have an answer. But the answer was…something. Like a big something.

Even if you constantly get in over your head, and earning the wrong side of people is your talent, this is just— Wait, yeah. Forget even—you do get in over your head, and you do so through your talent—which is earning the wrong side of people. So what were you about to do? You didn’t know what you were doing. You’re still even surprised yourself. Maybe it was the smoke, or the booze the few hours before, or just…um, w-well, the mood of it all. Intimacy, you guess. Regardless, you leaned in after she arched a brow curiously, and the touch of her lips against yours was… It’s not like you’d never kissed anybody before—never mind had a short fling—, though this felt deeper. Like it meant something other than a drunken bump in the night.

Mainly because when you broke away at the feel of your scalding cheeks, startled by embarrassment, Blue had followed and quickly snagged you back in. She wasn’t going to let you get away with that. Not so easily, anyway. And with her leeching your timidity away, you numbly put out your cigarette with the edge of the doorframe, and she left you breathless as you flicked the rest of the stick away to somewheresville.

You didn’t really know if you should say something—about…well, something stupid, really. Probably about how gum-like her lips were, except without the radiation. But, again, stupid, so all you could do was groan into her and allow Blue to hold you tight. Which she did. Very, very well. Enveloped you from the rest of the world so she could have you, in that shack, all to herself. It was the reporter side of you that wanted to just have everything in words, or narrated, or anything in between, but the woman side of you—which Blue was most definitely focused on—wanted everything how it was: no words.

Retrospect is a bitch, yet you can’t help but feel that foresight was what drove the two of you that night. Keeping the words out of your mouths to not waste time. Neither of you knew that there would be two deathclaws, and then the prospect of traveling with both at your tails within the Glowing Sea… No. The most Blue probably knew was that you needed an itch to be scratched, and by her only.

And you? All you knew, and all you know now, is that you were falling… And falling… And falling…

You just don’t want to wake up. Not if it means slipping out of Blue’s arms.

[+ + +]

Well… Fucking ow.

You hiss as you strip yourself from the road of acidic mud and stare groggily into the outline you so graciously left. You can even see the rim of bubbles along the silhouette of your head that, ultimately, were the breaths which suffocated you awake. You gaze around in the midst of your stirring hangover, and everybody around you is frozen and rightly startled. Then you glance up at your roof as a bottle (maybe one that snuck out) teeters over the edge, only to clink its way down to a soft, gentle landing.

Right. Yeah, okay. Let the flesh and bone have the fun splat and just give the glass some cushion…

Oh, and where’s your hat now? Let’s see… Oh yes. Nice. So deep in the mud, having landed underneath your chest, that you have to go wrist-deep to get it out. What the absolute, applaudable, signature prank there, Commonwealth. Real snazzy and stuff. As you thwack! the mud out of your hat to pile itself in one slopped mound, you’re quickly discovering that you could have not landed in a more soggy part of the street. Whether that was luck or misfortune, you don’t know. Humiliating luck probably. Or petty misfortune. Tato tato.

“What happened?! Are there mole-rats—” Everyone turns to look at Nat, who stops dead to stare at you. For a moment, you seriously believe that she thought you’re a mole-rat yourself at first glance. “Oh…” she grumbles, deflating. Then there’s a frown, and Nat glances up at the roof before you again. “Did you just—?!”

“Ech…” you spit muck before getting to your feet. You stuff your hat into your coat pocket and mumble, “Imma shower…”

“What?! Don’t act like you didn’t just fall from the sky!” Nat bickers, and you groan before twisting around.

Already, before you even point towards her chest, the small crowd that had gathered is slowly stepping back into their morning routines. “What are they teaching you?! The sky isn’t the roof, Nat!”

“I— Well they taught me that that’s called a hyperbole!” She sets her hands on her hips in a way that terrifies you. It looks too much like a mirror’s reflection. You hate it. “I thought that was something you know well!”

Maybe the reflection standing right in front of you snapped something into place. Or you’re terribly, sort of, hungover. Regardless, you spit, “I know how to write the truth about what’s happening around—outside those walls and everything—whether people like it or not!”

“Well, okay,” she hisses, “you idiot. I was saying you know that 'cause you’re the writer. You actually care about that stuff!”

“Pfft.”

Her eyes bug out, and you turn your back to her and trudge towards the door. "P-Piper!“ you hear Nat snap. "Where are you going?!”

“I’m goin’ through the back!” you answer with a shove of the door. “Relax!”

“The back’s through the freakin’ roof!”

You bark through a hiccup, “L-Language! You little shit!” and stagger inside. You barely catch Nat slapping her hand across her forehead with a roll of her eyes. You’re half-way up the stairs (then down a few steps, then up again) when you hear Nat’s slam of the door.

“Piper! You just fell from the roof!” she snaps.

“I am not drunk…” you assure her, and though it’s the truth, it also feels like a lie. You can hold your drink alright, but damn, hungover doesn’t seem accurate.

Nat, too, finds a way to poke a gaping hole in your claim: “You just fell off it!”

“A-And?! I know how to get to the shower, Nat!” you retort. “Alone… It’s not the first time.” You push through the door to curl around its hugging wall, then down the staircase towards the back of the house. As you stagger across the dirt landing, you bet Nat’s really regretting her excitement to have the third door upstairs (to the roof) instead of the back like any normal place. Nevertheless, because yeah, you have indeed found your way to the shower while drunk before, she lingers at the height of the stairs with her arms folded—presumably with the familiar scowl in tact as well.

The shower is just a haphazard shack built into the side of Publick Occurrences. Enough walls to cover, though it’s all wood except for the makeshift plumbing. You sway at the clothing rack before you decide that, yes, you shall clean both yourself and your clothes all at once. And as soon as the faucet is turned, and the water garbles and spits the first wave of water out, the soaking of your clothes into your skin is, clearly, the correct choice. When it filters out into its usual stream, even more so.

You don’t, however, anticipate the soap and rag right underneath your boot, so the moment you reach to find said soap, you flip.

Har. Har. …Commonwealth.

Though you do have to give the vindictive, comedic force some credit: as it turns out, being eagle-spread, face-first into a clean pool of water is so much better than the packed, sopped mud of the street. So you just lay there, letting the water puddle around your cheeks while you inhale the metal that makes up the shower floor. The drumming of the water almost masks hurried steps from down the stairs. You can feel your sister’s dry sarcasm before you lift your head: “You know, this is a lot more sad than if I just caught you naked.”

You flop back. “Oh hush…” you muffle into the ground.

“A-Are you trying to drown yourself?!" Yes. Yes you are. So you wave your arms roughly from over your shoulder to get her away. This is a private matter, and it has nothing to do with Nat. Other than her being your sister, and you her…guardian. Of sorts. Kind of. Legally and by all accounts, yes, but sort of cause, hey, you’re a failure who always dips out, right? And oh look, you’re so much of one that she’s taking care of you; Nat, with a labored sigh, wrenches you upright by your shoulder and grumbles, "Now would you quit being stupid and take a normal shower for once?”

“Yeah, yeah…” you drawl, completely disregarding what she meant by for once… "Now git so I can…whatever.“

Nat squints at you, then mumbles, "Fine. I’ll just be selling…the newspapers…”

“Good.”

“…right.”

She does leave, though, and you’re still underneath the pattering of the shower. You can’t help but feel like it resembles the rain just the night prior a little too much. Nor can you help that, as the mud soughs off your clothes and face, you still feel so empty. Honestly, the mud might as well be all of your weight, and it’s now just going down the makeshift drain. You don’t know what to do with yourself other than just curl up and lean further against the wall. There still isn’t any tears that threaten—you’re just too dry even now—, and perhaps it’s your naive hope that keeps you from breaking down completely.

But you know Blue will come back. She will. Blue said as much.

[1 ½ Months Later]

An anomaly happened.

You were (and still are) slugged in the couch, Nuka-Cola in one hand with a cigarette in the other when, remarkably,Mister Zwicky comes in through the door to Nat’s directions for an interview. Just, like, without being prompted by you. No convincing to be had. By this point, you’re sure you reek of desperation underneath the nightly guzzling of alcohol, so maybe that had something to do with it. Or this is all a rouse and the city is plotting to throw you out through an over-arching scheme—who knows at this point?

Though the fact that it’s Mister Zwicky sitting on the other side of the couch, patient and collected as ever, is what peeked your interest. Not that you’re doing anything about it. You’re just sitting there, baffled, while trying to come up with a question. And after a minute passes, you come up with a well-articulated and definitely not pathetic, “So…um, you have something for the paper?”

“I believe so,” he hums. “Definitely something that could spruce up the news after last weeks article on…remedies for bloodbugs, was it?”

You answer, tightly, “That’s an important thing for people to know…”

“It is, it is,” Mister Zwicky says with a nod. “But…well,” he adds, “that was the most, err, striking thing you’ve written within the past few weeks.”

“…really,” you reply, blunt.

“Unless you count that…thrilling article you wrote after quite the trip to the Dugout Inn.”

You narrow your eyes. “How do you know that?”

The old man shrugs and says, “Well, Piper, you could’ve only written that drunk on Vadim’s drinks.” Mister Zwicky pauses, and he briefly eyes the small, gathering pile of empty bottles at the edge of your coffee table. “Not to mention that it had your infamous zest that you get those nights.”

“Huh.” So that explains the morning you woke up on the printer. And to Nat’s confused shouting once she realized your hand was in the ink. And that the ink was out in the first place. Nevertheless, you inhale more of the cigarette and lean into the couch. “I thought that one would’ve been a good one to read.”

“…if people got through the typos and awkward syntax,” he murmurs under his breath. You stare at him with a twitch, and the schoolteacher raises his hands. “Now, now,” Mister Zwicky says, “I get it. But never mind all that… Uh, well, sort of.” He scratches the back of his neck and breathes a sigh. “I'm here because I do have something for the paper. Nothing like what you’d usually put down, but…well, hopefully something to pick it all back in order. If you’re still able, anyway.”

“I can still write,” you grumble defensively.

Mister Zwicky nods along. “Yes, I think so too. So can you? Write about some of the stuff the kids are working on. Some nice things that they could turn in for the paper.”

“Like some big group project for a grade…?” you ask lazily, through a puff of smoke.

He sways his head side-to-side as he answers, “More like a…'view from school’ sort of thing. Different perspective of the world? A new insight?”

You work your jaw in consideration. Mister Zwicky’s always known how to fluff your good side—even when you had to sit in front of his desk to hear about whatever detention Nat had that day. Speaking of, is there no school today? That or it’s one of his few break hours. “…m'okay. I’ll bite,” you drawl carefully. “What would they be talking about anyway?”

As you flick the end of your cigarette into the ashtray, Mister Zwicky replies, “Well, some of what they thing about the city, stories they’d like to share.” He pauses, and you brace for his next few words: “…what they think it’s like on the outside.”

You braced for it, and it still stings. You inhale another drag, turned away, and sigh a quiet, “…right.”

“L-Look, Piper. This isn’t you, is it? Hell, you’ve managed to get the folks around here worried.”

“Yeah, a good two if you’re up in arms with Nat,” you retort.

“There’s more!” he insists.

“By how much?!”

Mister Zwicky pauses again, this time with a slight wince. “More, I assure you… Even so, everyone’s noticed. You usually crank out a few months’ worth of articles and stories and such for the paper with each visit. About the outside. Everything you’ve investigated and the like…”

“Yeah? So?”

“You’ve gone radio silent this time, Piper.”

You tense your jaw and shake your head. With your leg folded over the other, and arms crossed, you grumble, “And what? This whole school-thing is this grandiose pity-party to get me to write a word about the Commonwealth? Well here you go! Bullshit. There. I did it.”

He watches you sadly, and dammit, how many times are you going to just take that side-glance without just hucking your bottle at a face? Okay, well, a couple more apparently because you can’t bring yourself to do it. Even so, you hate it. You hate the way his pity carves itself into the aged lines of his face, so you turn away. Mister Zwicky heaves a sigh, and he murmurs, “I should’ve known… You’ve been grieving, haven’t you?”

“Waiting. I’ve been waiting,” you correct, each word spat out.

“In this age…they’re the same thing, Piper. You know that,” he murmurs grimly. “What did it?”

For a split second, you forgot that the Nuka-Cola is just the soda you grew up with and not Moonshine. So much so you stare into the bottle in confusion before a slow, whispered, “A pair of deathclaws… Right at the Glowing Sea’s doorstep.”

He nods, hands together. “That’ll do it,” the old man grunted. “And, uh, you’re just hoping?”

“…waiting.”

Mister Zwicky thins his lips. “Yes, of course.” He turns to you again, taking his eyes off of his hands. “It’s that woman, right? The one in the blue jumpsuit— Or, well, in that Silver Shroud coat, yeah?”

“Y-Yeah,” you answer quietly.

“I see. And you think she’ll be back?”

You frown, though answer wholeheartedly, “I know, teach. She’s going to be back. I-I just know it.”

“She better…”

[+ + +]

You didn’t leave the couch hours after Mister Zwicky left, nor when Nat had trudged in, the stack of newspapers under her arm lighter than when she brought them out. Not by a lot, mind, but noticeably lighter. And then she slumps at the other end of the couch, to which you can’t help but notice how much it reminds you of yourself. If only Nat knows to never do that. Be like you. Since, well, you’re a secret-not-really alcoholic who likes to romp around the Commonwealth and get into trouble, write about said trouble, then advocate to other people about how to avoid those said troubles.

But you doubt she does, given that it seems to be her talent, parroting you.

Or sassing you, either or: “Are you dead or just lazy? You haven’t moved all day.”

“Dead,” you scowl. “How many got the paper?”

“More than last month,” Nat murmurs. “And they’re actually reading it and stuff.” Your scowl deepens. You almost ask what they do with it usually, but you figure learning about how defiled your line of work is on a regular basis is…not going to be something that will help your self-esteem. Like you have one to begin with. Regardless, even if you wanted to ask, Nat notes her own line of thought before you could: “Probably because it’s different than normal.”

You grumble a breath and finish your bottle of Nuka-Cola. “Yeah… Next week’s gonna be on the school.”

“Really?”

“Kind of.”

Nat ducks her head back and groans. “So he did ask you about that assignment.”

You hate that your knee-jerk reaction is to do the same, so you just tighten your grip on your kneecap, hunched forward with your head in your other hand. …so he did make that for a grade. Maybe a good trip down to the Dugout Inn is a good idea for tonight. “Yeah, I guess,” you finally respond, hollow, both to your internal decision and Nat’s outward comment. However, that said, Nat’s quieter than she usually is, and you turn to her passively curious. “What is it?”

She tenses before her jaw tightens in thought. “So, um… Well, it’s nothing.”

“Okay. What is it?” you press, the nosy reporter in you peering out.

Nat shifts in her seat and holds herself. “Um, so uh, why do you go with Blue so much?”

You freeze, then turn your eyes away. “Oh… Well, uh, she's…” You frown and shrug. “She’s real important, Nat. A-And I mean, I just… I—”

“If you’re about to try and say it, I already know you’re gay, Piper,” Nat deadpans.

Your words die at the base of your tongue, and you rush, “I-I’m not gay! I like men t—” You blink while she continues to stare at you, confused, and you sigh. “Never mind.” Preference for women or not, you’re definitely going to keep those few nights where some hotshot managed to find his way beside you at Vadim’s bar. Always some wanderer because the men in the city are…gross. But, you’re definitely not going to tell her because they all meant nothing other than letting off steam, which Nat wouldn’t understand anyway. You squint at her as her confusion begins to break. Well…Nat shouldn't understand.

“…ew.”

“Nat!” you snap, now wickedly flustered. You then tense your brows and ask, “Who told you that stuff?!”

“Sheng,” Nat answers bluntly.

You hiss air. “Sheng Kawolski?!”

“There’s not any other Sheng around,” Nat grumbles. “But yeah,” she adds, almost nonchalant, “he did. After he tried to kiss me again.”

You’re going to pummel a child. Over the head. With your typewriter. Maybe even sandwich his face into the printer so that he’s the next story. …but then again, that would be murder, so not exactly a good plan. Aggression towards one stupid boy aside, you slump back into the yellow couch. You don’t even know if you’re sober enough at the moment to walk out the door over to his house anyway. That, and now as you think of it, Sheng is the one who brings purified water to Diamond City. And good, purified stuff too. Better than the few who came before him, anyway. So…you guess you can’t pummel a good cause either.

“Piper?”

“Hmm?”

Nat frowns, her eyes to her lap where her hands wring together. “Why have you stayed for this long?”

You nearly choke when you ask, “W-What do you mean by that, sis?”

She watches you at the sound of your attempt to lighten it. You can practically hear it—how sis is continuously pinging around her thoughts. “I-I mean… You always leave. And I know it’s just 'cause that’s what you do. For the newspaper and stuff. And you’ve always done it 'cause…I dunno. But, like…” Her frown stitches itself tighter, and she pulls away. “You haven’t even walked out of Diamond City since you came back. Not even for some trading…”

“I, um—”

“Because Blue said?” Nat mumbles. You can’t find your words. You only manage a shrug and a meek nod. “…do you love her? Like, like that?”

It takes you a moment, though you nod again and whisper, “I-I do…yeah.”

“And that’s why you’re just waiting here? Because she said she’ll come back?”

“I know she will,” you murmur. “I know. She’s told me to run before, to this shed. Twisted my ankle before I could but I… I got to watch her.” You smile and say, “Took down this sentry bot on her own. And these things are huge, Nat. I always avoid them even when they’re off. But she did it. Ripped out its power cell and used it for her own suit.”

Nat blinks, in awe, and asks, “She has a suit…?”

“One of those military ones, yeah. Power-armor.” You hum a laugh and note, “Multiple, actually. She lugs her favorite around but leaves it outside the city.”

“Wow…” She frowns after a moment. “But…w-why did you leave?”

You shrug, drained by the sudden shift, and breathe, “Because… I don’t know. She told me to go to the city, and she never did before.” You chew the inside of your cheek and turn away from Nat’s grim sympathy. “Don’t look at me like that. I know she’s going to come back.”

“…but she told you to walk so far away. She—”

“Nat! I told you, she’s coming back!”

“I-I’m just saying! Why do you keep saying that anyway?!”

Your throat tightens, and you lean into your hand, against the arm of the couch. “Because the moment I don’t,” you whisper, “that’s when I’m going to starting thinking about it, and then I won’t stop believing she’s dead, and… Nat, she has to come back. I don't— She can’t be gone.” To your heavy chest, you feel Nat scoot over and rest into your side. It’s the closest she get’s to a hug, so it’s a nice thing. Subtle, though substantial in Nat’s own way. You swallow your whimper. “Sometimes you have to suspend the truth until your hope runs out…”

Nat shifts against your shoulder and murmurs, “Doesn’t that make you a hypocrite?”

“Or just human,” you mumble. You wrap your arm around her and rub the side of her bicep. “If or whenever you go out there for your own adventures, you’ll understand… The people here need the truth before it comes, but if it already has… I mean, let it pass in their own way.”

“…and your own way is believing that Blue’s alive?”

“She is,” you answer firmly. “She has to be.”

A long, long stretch of silence passes. And as the seconds drag by, stars pepper your thoughts again. Stars, and that shack, and Blue… You can’t stop thinking about it. You just can’t. So when Nat eventually breaks the silence, there’s nothing within you to defend against your gradual tears: “When she does come back, you’ll go outside again, right?” You hold your head weakly, and everything within the past couple months falls on you. One with Blue. The other without. But you hope that you’ll get another night again. At least one. Just one is all you as for now.

So you can’t answer your sister. You suspect she knows the answer to it, of course, but it’s never verbalized…

[+ + +]

It doesn’t come to a surprise that the last, good night comes back to haunt you again. And you know you’re still in that measly bed of yours with beer bottles just toppled over by the legs of its frame, but holy shit, you can allow yourself just one continuous sleep thinking about it, can’t you?! Just revisiting how Blue cradled you against the wall of that makeshift shack, teeth grazing and nipping new marks along your shoulders, clothes slacked and unkempt as the two of you continued to uncoil yourselves as the night went on.

Perhaps it was the mere inkling of something separating the two of you—something like a pair of deathclaws—that did it. Had you and Blue just explore, and touch, and kiss without rest. An in between of sex and lovemaking, you supposed then and suppose now. Not that it wasn’t the latter, though you wonder how much inexperience with Blue’s body would qualify as such. Maybe it does, you still don’t know.

Regardless if it was sex, or fornicating, or lovemaking, or just screwing around for the hell of it—that all doesn’t matter, does it? Not as you hold onto one moment in particular, where you clung onto her shoulders, hips moving to the rhythm of her hand, as she whispered delicate, sweet things in your ear. Things that, really in any other instance, would sound corny and ridiculous. But shoot you for finding “You’re so soft…” and “I don’t want to let go of this" nice to hear while she’s goading hot sex out of you with that starry night high above the shack. Corny and ridiculous be damned, her way of words with the melding edge of her tone did you just right.

Oh God, how right Blue did you.

Her breaths slicked along your neck as you hissed air into her ear, uncaring of the wall flushed against your back. And once you tipped over the edge, you couldn’t have been any happier with your bumbling, spur-of-the-moment kiss at the mouth of that little shack. Blue was right there. Right with you. So when she murmured, quietly, "There we go… I got you. I got you…” you believed every word.

You still do.

Though you wish you could’ve done the same as what you did that night: give back. Roll Blue against the strewn blankets along the wooden floor and just give it your all. Send her on cloud nine. Over her own edge. Right underneath the film of stars and night, glinting through the roof of that little shelter of yours…

[+ + +]

And now?

It is certainly the time of night where those same stars glisten, though you find that you’re not as fond of them anymore. Part of that is a lie, actually, since even the thought of those stars bring about the good memories of Blue, but then again, the good memories remain to be the equivalent of burning the back of your hand with your cigarette. And you like your cigarettes. So, you know, it’s an appropriate comparison.

You laze your way upright and meander over to your desk. With Nat asleep, now’s a good time as any to hit the bar, right? With a bitter scowl, you dawn your hat and creep down the stairs. From around the stairwell, you can hear her light, dozing snores. Good, you think. She’s having a good sleep tonight. You debate lingering to watch for a moment, though that’s immediately shattered since you don’t know what you’d do if she woke up to you standing there. So, within a few minutes, you’re out the door, striding mindlessly for that hitch of beer. Maybe you’ll try to scrounge up some pastry or bite to eat for Nat later, if you’re sober enough.

If…

On a stool you slump, eyes heavy and glazed from the neon lights hung around. They carve deep shadows along all of the shapes and curves of your hands, and you breath a deep breath before folding your arms and slouching over the counter. A thought then hits you: what if, just for fun, the Commonwealth is going to decide to poison you tonight? That would be fun, right? And this time, if you try to throw it up again, people don’t do anything about it? Or they will…but because you’re a pathetic scrub. Yeah? Fun, right? The world could just piss all over your parade right now, regardless of how lonely your parade is. And alcoholic.

Damn, you really are a mess without the consistent adrenaline pumping through you, aren’t you? A sack of fermenting tatos without that sweet, sweet ringing in your ears? Or the burn of radiation after a quick, accidental dip in a lake—and you really don’t understand how Blue’s able to just swim in the stuff…

You slump further into the counter, drumming your fingers in thought as you wait for whatever disgusting beer would be served—maybe poisoned, who knows? Though, at the thought of Blue coming by to lay eyes on your body sunken in the mud, suffocated and poisoned, isn’t something you want. Not even in the midst of your bitter, sour and snide turn of events.

Where the hell was Takahashi with the beer?

Wait.

Dammit. Hold on. That pile of noodle-serving scrap doesn’t sell beer… And you’re not— Oh for the love of God, you’re not even at the bar. Stupid noodle stand.

…oh well. Where the hell was Takahashi with the noodle cup?!

You slap down a handful of bottle-caps, and immediately a bowl of noodles slide themselves across the counter and into your cheek. Disgruntled, with a noodle plastered over your nose, you glare to the side where the robot stands, washing a bowl in their mechanical hand.

“Nan-ni shimasu-ka?" Takahashi buzzes.

You chew the inside of your cheek. That sounded rude. In a soured note, you grumble, ”No, I knew where I was!“ Even so, you get back to your bowl, starting with sipping the strand of noodle off your face. As you indulge, a second bowl slides by, and it clinks against your own. You pause and turn towards the robot. "W-Wait, what?! I didn't—”

Actually, did you pay for two?

Before you can investigate the exact number of bottle-caps you’d just slammed onto the counter, you see a shadow slink up the bar, and you hear the crunch of steps. That silhouette. You swear it looks familiar.

So, albeit with hesitance, you turn around.

Even in the dim, neon lights, you know this isn’t just the Commonwealth being the cruel jester it tends to be. If it is? Well then, you just hope your next spot of beer is poisoned.

Regardless, because you know it’s not, you whisper, “B-Blue…?”

“Well…I did say I would come back, didn’t I?”

“Blue…” You laugh through a choked breath and tilt your head to the side with a quiet, if sad, smile. “You… You um…”

She blinks, then shrugs. “Yeah. I mean, well, I did just get my hair cut.”

“N-No… Your—”

Blue plucks her sleeve. “Oh yeah. Found this in some bunker. Pretty nice, isn’t it?”

Okay, well…the maroon suit is nice, but, “That scar… You…”

Caught red-handed, Blue shrugs and grins sheepishly. Three jagged lines right across her face. Deep and unruly. “I, uh, actually lost those two by popping in this parking garage—it was…way off the map. But, uh, yeah. Didn’t expect the third one…” Her words trail off as you embrace her, head nestled against her neck. There’s nothing to stop your breathless cries into her collar, and she hums a laugh as arms wrap around your waist. “So, uh, yeah,” she murmurs quietly. “The Glowing Sea’s a bitch to go through…”

“God, Blue…” you breathe.

“But I did say I’d come back. Nothing was going to stop that…”

You nod and pull away to peck her cheek with a tender, long kiss. “I know. And you did.”

A/N: She is my wife and yes, Piper has blown me up on numerous occasions. With molotovs, any other throwables, and a launcher in a very, very small room. No I won’t stop giving her throwables. Did reconsider the grenade launcher though… Hope you enjoyed! :D

#volt's library #fallout 4 #fallout 4 companious #piper wright #female sole survivor #sole survivor #fanfiction #one-shot #ao3 #wattpad #Second-person #the commonwealth has a vendetta against piper #but she got a bowl of noodles #also loosely based on a frantic trip to the glowing sea in which i told piper to go (by accident lol)#there were three deathclaws and a radscorpion #and i play exclusively on survival mode #reposted from last account #if this looks familiar it's because i yoinked it from my last (dead) account

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