#seen too much splinter bashing lately

[holystressresponsebatman]

Okay, so, I’ve seen other people post about this quite a bit—but it’s always bothered me how, in the season 1 finale, Splinter tells Leo that he has to save the world and that nothing else matters, blah blah blah, including that bit about sacrifice and junk and I just.

Why.

Why would you say that to your Teenage Son—who you know would do anything to protect his brothers? Who had already been shown to have those self-sacrificing tendencies in “Follow the Leader”?

Just makes you think about some things…

And I will never be one to suggest that Splinter is a bad father (because have you seen the way he interacts with his sons??). Like yes, he’s old fashioned and his wording can seem stilted or distant at times, but c’mon people! He makes sure to spend time with each of them individually. He is constantly helping Raph work through his anger issues, gets Donnie to see that his brothers rely on him more than for his intelligence and what he can make, makes Mikey see that being a goofball with a tender heart can be a good thing, and helps Leo see that not every decision needs to be made alone and/or at his own expense.

Yes, Splinter does make it clear to Leo that his brothers’ safety is of the utmost importance when they leave the lair, but at no point in time does he say that Leo is less important than his brothers or that he wants Leo to sacrifice himself!! Leo reads into the messages way too much in the moment (or perhaps doesn’t read into them enough??) and makes decisions that HE thinks are for the best.

[faithofgods]

flor. || first (past) romantic moment.

"Oh—do you need help?"

A soft voice beside you, their presence at your side gone unnoticed until now, lost in your own head as you were.

The cup you were holding—were returning to the same table it was first grabbed from some few hours before—had missed its destination, clattering instead to the marble floors. Made of thin metal, there was thankfully no splintered glass to worry over, but in its place came the much louder ringing of its body striking stone.

Burning gazes move to your back, heads swiveling from across the large hall to focus in on the source of the disruption, but at the moment, they were secondary to the last person you expected to see standing beside you.

Flor Vinhara, child of one of Dira's Saints.

You've seen them in passing before, often at gatherings similar to the one you're currently attending, but you've never once spoken. They've always seemed shy, the type to keep to themself even as the other nobles frequently sought to bring them in as one of their own.

They're not looking at you, and they don't insist on a response, their head ducked as they kneel on the ground. A small cloth is in their hands, swiped from the table and being used to soak up the remnants of aren that had spilled from your cup at the drop.

They don't meet your eye when they stand up either, the cup set gently on the table and the burgundy-stained cloth folded loosely and placed beside it. Their eyes are averted and their mouth keeps opening, their jaw working as if on the brink of saying something, but no words ever come.

You glance down and spy the way their fingers toy with the tuck of their shirt, how they keep smoothing the rich fabric into their waistband before immediately pulling it loose, over and over.

Nervous, but over what? Surely not you, with as much a pariah as you are at these events. The strange one, the cursed one, watched by the birds and pretending to know the will of the divines.

The lightest of accusations leveled against you.

—

"Thank you," you finally say, awkward and more than a little forced, eyes casting about the room for an easy escape to this conversation. "The late hour must be making me clumsy."

It gets a small laugh out of them, their head dipping briefly as if to hide it. Bashful, or just self-conscious?

"Evening tends to make fools of us all." They meet your eyes for a brief moment, their faint smile flickering as they realize what they've implied, their jaw working once more as they tumble over a correction. "Not, uh, that you're a fool—I mean—I had only meant—"

Is it cruel, to let them continue to ramble so helplessly? You're unsure, but you make no move to stop them either way. Their thoughts keep tumbling from their mouth before they've fully formed, their retraction almost incoherent but…

Part of you finds it a bit endearing, how earnest they are to correct themself and how apparently little they want to offend, a kindness other nobles have never offered. And part of you wants to watch them flounder a bit longer, wants to see whether they're the type to keep digging or one to cut their losses and leave. You wait, prepared to settle in, but they surprise you.

"All I had meant was… would you like to walk the gardens with me?" A sincerity in the question, a concern. One they shouldn't feel for you, strangers as you are, but one you still pick up on. "It can… these gatherings can be overwhelming sometimes. And fresh air tends to help infinitely more than staying put and trying to bear it." A pause, before they add more hesitantly, "Listening to our limits is often the hardest part."

It's unexpected, both their words and how genuine they feel. There's a quiet intensity in them, but not one that feels smothering. Their eyes share it too, though they prove more distracting—a pretty shade in the low light of this far corner, the lanterns hanging from the walls picking out the strands of green and gold buried deep in the dark brown.

The others still watch, their eyes on your back, your neck, and your mouth is opening before you can think better of it.

"Lead the way."

—

You're walking through the lower gardens of Dira, the converium cresting at the top of the terraced fields surrounding them. A few minutes walk at most to return to the others, but this far from the lights and music, with only the soft glow of the three moons to contend with?

It's created an entire other world, one just for the two of you.

You think they've noticed it in their own way, their nerves seeming to dissipate the longer you both walk.

Conversation has been sparse, your voices hushed, the peace broken only when they point out each new flower you pass by on your slow venture through the gardens. You had asked them how they could even tell when you could barely see them at your side, and had earned another soft laugh in response—a warming one, as equally unexpected as you finding yourself out here.

Their trips here were frequent, they had explained, and the gardens were committed to memory; the type of plants, what their flowers looked like, the locations of each one. When they were in bloom, what time of day was best to view them, all of it was ingrained.

In turn, you had told them of the birds. Their migrations, the way they flocked together for storms and how they nested for the changing seasons. The ones you saw each day and the ones you only ever saw in the dark winter months. Their different calls, how you slowly came to learn what each one meant, how good you've gotten at telling the different species apart.

Never once did it feel like something forbidden. No fine thread to balance upon, no half-truths to skirt around, no awkward lulls where you were left to internally fret over how to shift the subject.

A layer of naturality to speaking with them, an open understanding just their presence at your side offered you. And never once did you ever sense any judgment from them, anything beyond a true interest in you, what you were saying.

An intoxicating feeling, to have captured their attention so fully.

—

Several circles of the gardens later, you've finally come to a stop beside the worn-down steps leading back up the terraces, the curved arbor that signifies the ascent framing you two against the dark night sky.

Flor is looking at you fully now, not shying away, a softness to their gaze. Their lips are bent into an even softer smile.

"I should probably get back before my absence is noticed, but… I hope we'll have the chance to speak again? Whether at another time like this or… before."

"I do too." Magnetic, something about them that pulls your thoughts so freely from you.

No need to hide in their presence, to try and bury the uglier sides of yourself. Not that they've seen them, but there's something heavy in your chest—a comfort, not a weight—that insists to you that they wouldn't pull away if they ever did.

"Goodnight." Low, almost whispered, and it's hypnotic how smooth their voice is, how deep and warm. "And until then."

You reach out, the lightest touch to their shoulder, stopping them as they turn away. Your fingers ghost over the muscle there, a hesitation almost having you pull your hand back; you fight it, ignore it, press your palm fully to their arm, feel the heat of their body through the thin sleeve of their shirt. It's a friendly gesture, a casual one, but one that feels far more intimate with them.

"Until then."

[whaleofatjme1920]

Right Back Where You Started

Right Back Where You Started

[Masky/Timothy Wright X F!Reader]

[Warnings: slight blood, slight violence, language]

[AN: Four of my OC's are in here! This was also requested from a friend a while ago.]

The beauty about being able to live a life outside of murdering people and being at the whim of a monster that fancies itself as a god is a variety of your own accord.

For instance, you can wake up whenever you feel like, take a job wherever there’s openings, meet new people and not have to bash their brains in just for asking about your life and only need to pick up a blade to cut food or occasionally packages you impulsively bought on the nights that feel like too much and not enough all in one. You can breathe and not worry about inky black tendrils crushing your throat for doing so without his permission. You’re able to sleep at night knowing that no higher up in your group will attempt to kill you in an act of proxy related hazing. You can clear your mind temporarily of the thoughts of what may come next in trade for semi-normalcy even though you know those thoughts won’t go away anytime soon. The weight of what you’d done was too much to bear, and Atlas can only disappear for so long.

When you first decided to betray your boss, the tall man in the woods, the faerie that steals children away, you acted on impulse. It was an impulse that was born from being all too exhausted with risking your life, committing sin upon sin and other terrible, no good things that should ever be uttered. The decision you made on impulse had no foresight or planning, and when you decided to run, you ran as far and as hard as you could away from him. Away from them. Away from it all. Of course, you know there were going to be repercussions for running like so few others did.

The ire of the Slender Man being the worst.

Most days, you try not to think of him. There’s no point - well, maybe there is a healthy fear you still have - but to worry yourself into a stupor would be silly now. You’ve been free of him for a year. He hasn’t sent you any signs, nor has he sent anyone… Maybe you weren’t important enough to set him off like some of the others had.

These are the things you like to think about as you sit on your couch watching the late night news that’s barely audible as you scroll through your phone. You never really did like the total silence an empty house provides. There’s a simmer cup of tea on the coffee cup and a few snacks laid out that you have little plans of eating while you relax and enjoy the midsummer night. Outside, you can hear crickets sing and cicadas accompany them. It’s peaceful, and while your mind would like to think of it as such, you can’t ignore the ringing in the back of your head. Things have been pleasant, too pleasant. There’s bound to be a storm due to roll in.

Still, you try not to think of these things, and instead focus on the content that scrolls in and out of your vision. It’s nothing particularly interesting, but helps get your mind off the things that often keep you up. And you continue to sit there on the couch, wrapped up in a light blanket to combat your AC as the hours of the night tick by. Your mind is completely off of really, any higher cognitive thought, when you hear something. It’s soft, low, sounds like two, maybe three people and they’re out in the distance. Must just be stumbling onto the borders of your ‘farm’.

See, the funny thing about trying to integrate into normal human life is that you physically can’t. You can follow all their customs, get into their society, look like them, but you’ll never be fully human. You want to know why? Proxies can never go back to what they used to be. They’re forever changed, and no force on heaven of earth can ever get rid of that. He can take your memory and dump you on the side of the road, but your biology has forever been changed. In most cases, it’s a nice thing to have: faster healing, better pain tolerance, heightened senses, and a better sense of problem solving than most people. Other days, it’s a hindrance for reasons you can’t quite explain. Some call it Slender Sickness, and the only way to remedy it is to be under the tall man’s care.

Because you’re not, you’ve found other ways to remedy the sickness he inflicts on practically everything he touches. Pills. You find them in odd, strange places, but they get the job done. So long as you have them, you can be free of his grasp and his connection.

But goddamn, the hearing is mostly a hindrance. On the account of you living on the edge of a college town, you’ve got land and are surrounded by farmer’s fields. You heat it all- critters in the night, teens messing with the patches, arguments, sometimes crimes, and it keeps you up at night. That’s a downside to not having him in your life- he’s not there to dampen its effects when it becomes too much. However, in this specific instance, your heightened hearing is a blessing.

The feeling in your gut only furls together tighter as you hear the three strolling down your dirt road. They’re close, much too close. You know that they’re here for you.

Frantically, you jump off the couch and start to damage control by making the place look like no one inhabits it. The TV and lights are turned off, the mug emptied of its contents, snacks put away and other leads buried. Your heart pounds a mile a minute - you know that if he finds you, it’s all over.

He’ll kill you - the Slender Man is not known for his mercy.

You feel like a chicken with its head cut off as you look around the house for weapons before settling on the kitchen knife. It’s cliché and reminds you of someone you once heard whispers about, but it’s all you can think of in this moment. When you left this life, you left the physical parts of it as well. All your gear, weapons, they’re hidden in a place that’s too risky for you to even attempt getting. Armed with the kitchen knife, you debate running out the back or hiding, then running. You always were good at staying out of sight, hiding it is.

Your eyes dart to the basement door and you slip through right as you hear the three outside your front door. There’s a window that opens in the direction of the town. If you slip out of it, you’ll be able to get a good headtstart through the field. The moment you start booking it down the stairs, you hear your front door get blown open.

“Wallace, what do you think?” You hear a male’s voice ask.

“Someone’s been in here recently,” a deeper male voice responds - must be Wallace, eyeing over your living room.

In the darkness, you quietly maneuver the crowded, cluttered basement, mentally cursing you left your phone upstairs in your haste.

“It feels like someone’s been in here,” Wallace’s voice continues. You can practically hear him smelling the air. “Ruth, tell Nyein to sniff this one out.”

You hear boots scuff against your wooden floor and stop somewhere in the doorway. “You could always just ask them yourself,” the female voice identified as Ruth verbally shrugs. She clicks her tongue, and you hear even more steps. How many of these people are there? You hope it’s just four. That’s a well sized group, come to think of it. “Ny, can you please sniff this one out? Seems like they’ve done a good job at scent covering.”

A beat of silence passes.

“Don’t give us any attitude,” the first male voice hisses slightly. “Do what you’re told-”

“Theo,” Wallace sharply reprimands.

You hear Theo sigh right as you reach the window. You pray to whatever deity will have you that it won’t squeak or make any loud noises, but the thing hasn’t been opened in gods know how long. You use the blade to lightly cut through the layers of off-white paint before the window is free. You mentally smile before attempting to lift it.

Meanwhile, upstairs, Nyein got your scent. Their pupils dilate upon realizing you’re the one the Slender Man has requested alive. You hear someone rapidly padding to the basement.

Panic fills your veins as you struggle to get the window open, not even caring that it’s making all the noise in the world. You need to get out!

“She padlock this thing?” You hear Ruth ask before she grunts. The door can’t hold them back forever.

You frantically push up on the window - it's a quarter open, not near enough for you to slip through. Shit, shit, shit! You need to go NOW.

“Jesus- just break it already,” Wallace sighs.

A few more grunts and you hear the wood splinter. You hear them descending the steps quickly.

“There!” Theo points.

You hold your breath and push the window up with all your strength before hosting yourself up.

“Shit! Out the front! Ny, keep on her,” Wallace commands as he smacks Ruth and Theo’s shoulder, the two quickly following him up the stairs.

You begin to shimmy out the narrow window as the being called ‘Nyein’ eyes you down. You don’t think you’ve ever seen an independent like that before. They look absolutely feral, and the scent of you has them locked on your crawling form.

Their eyes narrow, teeth bared, and they quickly lunge across the space for you, right as your legs reach the windowsill.

You cry out in surprise as their clawed hand digs into your ankle, drawing blood you know you can’t afford to worry about.

“Get off!” You shout in retaliation, kicking at their face. Freed, you begin to sprint into the field.

Nyein snarls and crawls out the window as well, running after you with a speed that has you on edge. You continue to run. Behind you, you can hear the other three quickly gaining on you as well. How badly does the Slender Man want you? Your lungs light on fire as they chase you through the field. Soon, you’ll be hitting the small stretch of trees before you reach the town. With other people, you’ll have a better chance at being safe. But the stretch of woods is an awful mess of brush and loose soil. You can’t afford to misstep now.

You take in a deep breath as you hurl into the small stretch of trees, all too aware of the proxies and independent that are hot on your trail. In the back of your head, you can tell they’re tired of you. Good. They should be. You narrowly avoid twisted roots and piles of mud and grow closer and closer to other people.

It’s so close that you can almost touch it.

Lost in your thoughts and too tunnel visioned in on reaching the town, you fail to recognize the steel jaw trap in the darkness and send your shoe right on it. It clamps down, bites, and holds you. You screech and fall forward, careening into the forest floor. The pain in your leg is absolutely agonizing, and you claw at it in vain to free yourself as your pursuers close in on you.

“Gave us quite the chase, Reader,” Wallace says with a slight scowl as he crouches a healthy distance from you. “Should let you rot here,” he muses. You can’t see his face both from the darkness of the night and the fact he’s wearing a mask, but you can tell he’s upset.

“Or let Ny eat her. Been a while since they’ve last had anything,” Theo adds on, glaring at you through the eyeholes of his mask that’s the head of a pig.

“He said he wanted her alive,” Ruth chimes in, a sigh in her tone. “She’s already fucked herself up enough, let’s not rub salt in the wounds.”

“Put her to sleep then,” Wallace shrugs.

You look up at these people like a caged animal, your eyes narrowing and slightly watering at the pain of the steel jaw trap. You feel yourself inching closer and closer to the earth subconsciously as Nyein eyes you like a prize.

\ They reach their hand out to touch you before you smack them away. Their snarl, their eyes traveling down to your ankle where the blood smells the strongest.

“Do it before they eat her,” The deep voiced man says again. “Though, last I checked, Ny doesn’t eat proxies.”

“She’s a traitor, not a proxy,” Ruth lightly corrects, her gaze alone shushing you from making any noise.

Not wanting to work yourself up, you settle for cursing them under your breath.

Without any other words, Ruth comes up to you, resting her boot on your chest to keep you down. You attempt to grab at her leg, throw her off balance, but she’s stronger than you on account of still being an active proxy. Her dark eyes scan you up and down before she reaches into her back pocket. “Take a deep breath for me,” she murmurs before smacking the rag to your mouth and nose.

You flail about, screaming and cursing before reluctantly taking that breath.

“... Thank you, you’ve done well. Head out to - yes, that’s right, Theo - head there and I will give you further instruction.”

You blearily come to on the carpet of an office you hoped you’d never be back in. The smell of jasmine and incense hangs in the air. You hear a door shut and catch the boots of the people who brought you back to him leave the room. He must be sending them out to their next assignment; it’s probably some poor other bastard that won’t escape like you did. You take in a few timid breaths and allow the light to filter in.

There he is, your boss. He stands in front of you like a god. He has no face, but you can tell he’s more than upset.

“Miss Reader, what a pleasure,” he says in a deep, authoritarian tone.

On instinct, you feel yourself shrinking.

“Really?” He muses, inky black tendrils sprouting from his back. “You have the nerve to run from me, suppress me, and now you do this? You dare show your submission?” He hisses. The tendrils move like bolts of electricity as they wrap around your exhausted, terrified form.

You cringe as the tendrils take over every part of you, squeezing as if they’re threatening to break your bones if you so much as breathe out of turn. Tears well in your eyes as you remember the fear you used to feel rushing back and overloading your senses.

“You’re absolutely pathetic,” he spits as the tendril wrapped around your neck begins to constrict. You notice his body language bristle as he looks at you longer. “I could pop your eyeballs out of your sockets. I could tear you limb for limb,” the Slender Man continues like it’s nothing.

You feel nothing but malice radiate off his form. It’s heat that singes your very soul. “S-Sir,” you gasp out. “Why would you b-bring me here just to k-kill me?” You attempt to reason, eyes watering and vision going fuzzy. You weakly attempt to use your fingers as a barrier between the constrictor and you. You can’t take this low oxygen any longer - not with him physically inhibiting you.

A cold chuckle reverbates in your head while the vision of wolf’s teeth smile at you, as if they’re ready to snap. “You always were smart,” he notes, loosening his grip ever so slightly. “I could rip your head from your shoulders and it would make none of the difference.”

“Answer my observation,” you weakly cough out before he holds you tighter. You struggle to move your limbs. Your blood feels hot.

“Masky,” he suddenly calls out, hand gesturing to his office doors.

You’re barely able to move your head and settle on shifting your eyes instead to those large, oak doors as they open just a crack.In slips a man in a tan coat. He’s got dark hair, bags under his eyes, and he looks exhausted - more exhausted than you feel. He doesn’t look at you but instead focuses on the Slender Man.

“Sir,” he greets, bowing his head slightly in reverence.

The Slender Man hums, clearly pleased. You see the wolf’s jaws smile in your mind’s eye.

“Reader, you will be under his care now,” the Slender Man says. “If you successfully spend half a year at his side, I will reconsider tearing you apart.” He says it so nonchalantly that you feel chills run up and down your spine.

You furrow your eyebrows. “What?”

“Do you oppose me?” The Slender Man asks. “I am being more than generous, aren’t I?”

“Don’t take this offer for granted,” you hear Masky quietly add. Somewhere, deep in the back of your mind, you can hear Masky telling you not to push him too far.

Hesitantly, you nod, voice too weak to say anything physically.

The Slender Man’s tendrils suddenly retract from you, sending you roughly to the carpeted floor.

You yelp as you come into contact with the carpet and slowly gather yourself as you try to push down the aches and pains that bloom on your joints and shins that hit the ground particularly hard. You cough a bit as air returns to your lungs and struggle to stand.

“Do what you must,” the Slender Man waves off, turning his back to both you and Masky.

Masky finally breaks from his stance and moves quickly to your side to help you up.

At first, you try to smack his hand away, but upon realizing you’re too weak to even see straight, accept his hand and his arm when you’re standing upright. He smells of cigarettes and some out of date cologne. It’s not bad.

The two of you hobble out of the Slender Man’s office with Masky’s eyes never leaving your form. After all, you are his responsibility now. He continues to lead you through a mansion you’ve grown to despise and out into the warm summer morning. The Slender Man could never imitate the beauty of earth to its entirety, that much was apparent.

“Where are we going?” You ask in a rough voice, attempting in vain to clear it by coughing.

“Stop that,” Masky sighs as the two of you cross the lawn. “To the parking lot, getting in the car, then driving across the border to Mississippi. We’ve got a temp there,” he murmurs. “You good?” He’s mentally wondering why your healing hasn’t damage controlled this yet. Probably the boss still being mad at you is the best reason he can come up with.

“Do I look like I’m good?” You dryly respond, eyes squinting slightly as the fog begins to kick up. You know you’re reaching the end of his reach. Once the fog clears up almost as quickly as it appeared, you realize the Slender Man’s practically kicked you both out of his realm. The walk was always longer when you truly were his. He must be severely pissed off at you. In a way, you’re lucky he didn’t kill you from the get go.

It’s best not to dwell on that thought though.

The rest of the walk is quiet and you’re in the car before you can count to 100 (your numbers are very jumbled though). You slide into the passenger seat and feel a little better at being able to rest.

Masky slides into the driver’s seat and sighs as he grips the wheel. “You have any questions, you ask them now in the car. I’m not putting up with your bullshit when we get to the temp.”

You roll your eyes and look out the window. “Who are you?”

“Masky, you heard him,” he’s pulling out of the parking lot and mentally thanking the gods he wasn’t killed alongside you. When the boss is in such a questionable mood, there’s no telling what’ll happen.

“You know damn well what I meant,” you cough slightly.

Masky scoffs before reaching into the backseat for a moment. His fingertips brush a water bottle, and upon realizing that’s what it is, grasps it and then tosses it to you.

You nod and take a sip, mentally frowning that the water’s been heated in the morning summer sun.

“I’m a group leader. Probably haven’t heard of us though, we’re not terribly monumental,” he begins as he flicks the turn signal on. “You’ve got three other people to watch out for. Hoodie, he’s the right hand, Toby, he’s essentially our middle child, and Kate. You’re replacing her and the hazing process will start up,” he finishes, now matching pace with the other cars that sparsely decorate the expressway.

You pout slightly and press your lips into a thin line as you gaze out the window at the rolling scenery. You’ve been here before. You’ve brought people back here this exact way before. They’re all unwanted memories. In response, your body language becomes unreadable.

This does not go unnoticed by Masky. “Yeah the attitude isn't gonna work,” he says as he glances over at you. “C’mon, you’ve been through this process before. We all have - what gives?”

With a sigh, you flick your eyes over to him to gauge his mood. He seems genuinely curious. “You do know that I ran away for a reason, right?”

Masky nods. “Sure, it was stupid though.” He takes a hand off the wheel for a moment to open his window. “What did you think would happen?” Sounds like he’s trying to pick at your brain.

“Anything but this,” you gesture angrily to your current situation. “I hoped to never see him again,” you groan, clearly frustrated. You chug some more water.

Masky breathes out slightly, as if he’s judging your answers. “Whatever. Forget about pulling something like that again because I’ll personally come after you if it comes to that,” he claims in a tone that’s far too serious.

You roll your eyes slightly, “sure, like you’ll-”

His eyes shift on the expressway, and after ensuring there’s no one that’ll cause a pile up on behalf of him, he hits the brakes, sending you lurching forward into the dashboard.

“What the hell?” You cry out in an exasperated tone, struggling to peel yourself up from the dashboard. You cry out in shock again as you feel his hand at the back of your head, successfully grinding your skull into the heated polyvinyl chloride.

“Get that thought of your fucking head,” he hisses, raising your head slightly before smacking it back down.

You growl back and relent. Once the pressure from his arm is gone, you shove him off of you. The car picks up pace again and you notice him wave to a person who passes by - they have a mildly concerned expression - and he smiles like he didn’t just slam your skull into PVC.

Welcome back to the proxy life.

You make it to Mississippi by mid afternoon. Masky brings the car down some dirt path where a house lays right on the Mississippi river, and you can smell traces of blood. They must’ve cleared the previous residents out.

There, on the porch in a muscle tee holding a can of coke is a man with his left cheek missing. He twitches slightly as he waves at you and Masky.

“T-This her?”

Masky nods.

“Can’t b-believe she g-g-gave Wallace’s g-g-group the s-slip,” he says in a slightly amused, slightly annoyed tone.

“Word travels that fast?” Masky replies with a slight chuckle.

The proxy before you nods with a small smile, “c’mon. I wanna g-g-get out of this h-heat. It’s a-a-awful out here,” he says with a playful grimace as he slowly rises from the front step where he had been sitting.

“Is Kate happy?” Masky asks as he watches Toby head in, then nods for you to go.

With a small frown, you do so. At least it’s air conditioned.

“Over the moon,” a feminine voice cuts in from the kitchen. She’s stirring a thing of lemonade.

Masky smiles slightly and takes a seat at the table. “We weren’t that bad,” Masky notes as Kate slides a glass of lemonade to the group leader.

She raises a brow at Toby who glances down to his open pop can. “So, this is the one he wanted alive for this term?” She questions as she glances at you, silently asking if you’d like some.

You mouth a ‘please’ before getting comfortable at the table.

“Weirdly, yeah,” Masky replies before taking a languid sip. “Thought he was gonna go for someone with more street cred, but, whatever. She’s our problem now,” he shrugs.

You look down into the pastel yellow liquid and furrow your eyebrows in annoyance. All of this, it was wrong. You hadn’t had to play by proxy rules in a year, and here you were, bottom of the rung, the runt. You hadn’t been a runt in gods know how long.

Conversation begins to flow between the three people around you as glasses of lemonade are poured. You sit in silence, listening because you know it’s not your place to speak. As far as proxy culture goes, you don’t really have any rights. Well, you’re in a better place than independents, but according to other proxies, you’re a glorified errand boy. They say to jump and you’re supposed to ask ‘how high?’ Your group’s word becomes gospel.

Apparently, Kate was this group’s runt before you came in. But, runts only stay runts for a certain amount of time. It’s possible for groups to not have runts - and that’s essentially what this group was doing. Kate had outgrown her runt status and was well considered the youngest (in experience) member of their group but had the same social standing as Toby. While it was a joke to refer to her as a runt, they hadn’t had one for a while.

That’s where you come in. You’re the first member to be considered a runt in quite some time. And you can tell they’ve been itching to take it out on someone.

“Where’s Hoodie?” Masky asks as his fingertips trace the lip of his glass. “Should be thrilled to see we’ve got another one.”

“Only t-thing holding h-him back from h-hurting you is the f-f-f-fact the O-Operator asked f-f-for us to t-take her,” Toby giggles slightly as he crushes another pop can. “He’s h-h-handling something, Should be c-c-coming back now, though.”

“Speak of the devil and the devil will appear,” you hear another man’s voice chuckle as the front door swings gently open.

Standing in the doorway holding a crowbar and wearing a white t-shirt is Hoodie - sans hoodie. It’s much too hot to be wearing one anyways. He haphazardly tosses the crowbar to the floor before closing the front door behind him, then begins walking towards the kitchen.

“This is her?” He asks as he takes a seat next to Masky, silently thanking Kate for the lemonade.

“Disappointing, right?” Kate lightly jokes, making Hoodie smile.

“In this form, sure,” Hoodie observes as his hazel eyes rake over your form. “She looks weak, scrawny, low endurance, probably forgot all her skills, what, with her being missing for a year?” He says it like it’s a game but looks at you like he despises you. “Not training her. Not my problem, and especially not in this heat.”

“She’s part of our group,” Masky replies in a slightly exasperated tone.

“No-Nose goes,” Toby suddenly blurts out.

Everyone presses their index to their nose except for Masky, who sighs dejectedly.

“For fuck’s sake,” he grumbles. “Let’s go, Reader. You’ve been awfully quiet.” The brown haired man says in a less than pleased tone, picking his glass up and momentarily pausing to place it in the sink.

You quietly follow in suit, nodding to your other comrades before following him out.

The nice thing about waiting for Hoodie to stir things up was that it was the late afternoon. The sun was beginning to sink below the horizon, and a breeze was beginning to shift through the air. It wasn’t near as hot due the sun no longer beating down on you. Besides, it was nice to get out of the house for a bit.

Masky and his group must have been staying here for a while, because he walked into the woods on this deer path like it was nothing and led you to a clearing. There were a few training things, but nothing of any substance - just a temporary fix until they were somewhere more permanent. Proxies are nomadic, after all.

“You still have a knife on you?”

“I would’ve stabbed you with it.”

He shoots you a look as if to tell you to watch your mouth and you holds your hands up.

“I’m joking,” you defend. “When I meant I wanted to never look back, I truly, deep down to my bones, meant it.”

Masky’s hand goes to his belt loop where he takes out a knife. It’s… severely dulled. Looks like he doesn’t trust you just yet.

“See that dummy? Show me what you remember and I’ll decide if we’re out here until midnight or not.”

The dummy in question looks gods awful. It’s missing an arm, the stuffing is all over the grass, and the poor thing looks like it can’t support its own weight anymore. You wonder which one of your comrades got it to this state of if this was a group effort.

You narrow your eyes and get a hold of the blade in your grasp. It’s much nicer than a kitchen knife - reminds you of what you used to use when you were but a shadow in the night. You glance at him, then the dummy, and decide to get to work.

There’s no use in running. The Slender Man will hunt you down regardless, and he won’t be as merciful the second time around.

“Stop stalling,” Masky chides.

You take in a breath, and do as told.

To say six months passed with ease would be a lie. It’s been six months of hell - and that’s mostly because you’re a runt paired with the fact you never wanted to be back here to begin with.

It’s been strange, you’ll give it that. The proxy in you took over faster than the human side of you could and you integrated back into proxy culture and society far easier than anyone expected. Of course, there were some moments where your group members would ruffle your feathers and put you in your place, but that was expected. To be a proxy is to be put under fire until you prove yourself otherwise.

You’ve gone on operations with them. Took lives again. Stole things again. You settled back into the life you originally left behind as if you’d never departed to begin with. That’s how deep the proxy mindset and muscle memory is embedded into those it takes hold of. It sets itself out to be the only thing you’ll ever know. You live by it, you die by it.

So, where have you been for the past six months? Well, still in Mississippi. About two weeks after you first arrived with your new group, you and the group moved down south near the ocean and have been staying there the entire time. Luckily, this place was considered a temp house for the people who owned it - they liked spending time in Europe - which left this place as yours. Besides, the Slender Man likes having you close. He was able to periodically check in on you with you being a few hours away as opposed to days. Why he was so interested in you, you’ll never know.

According to both him, and Masky, you’d been making good progress. By the end of your six months (lovingly referred to as a “trial run” by your group), you were half way back to what you used to be. It was disheartening to only hear “half” but it was better than nothing. A part of you wonders why you’re so inclined to get better when you should be focusing on leaving.

It’s not like you didn’t try.

You tried so many times that your group started a tally board and whoever found you first got a mark under their name. Whoever hit five before the board was reset got the next operation (or operation of their choosing) off. For the first few weeks when you were but a stranger with them, the punishments were harsh and unforgiving, like they hate you to your core. But, as the months went on, they went from fists to phrases. Eventually, you stopped trying to run so they no longer had to beat you. Every time you got that far off look in your eye, someone would reprimand you. It’s probably because they cared about you.

That’s common for proxies, bonding with your teammates on a level outsiders can’t understand. It’s mostly to keep you safe while out in the field. And unfortunately for you, you’ve been feeling that way towards your group. You’ve covered for each one at least once, and that gesture doesn’t go unnoticed. You’re in a strange place, if you’re being honest.

Take for instance now, back in the passenger seat of a car and heading back to Rosswood with Masky (he told you his real name is Tim) to talk with the Slender Man face to face. While the others in your group have been keeping up with him regularly, you haven’t seen him in person since well, six months ago. You’d be lying if you said you didn’t have butterflies in your stomach as you draw closer to the woods you once considered home.

“You nervous?” Masky hums as he turns the radio down.

“Yeah,” you reply, gazing out at the rolling fields again. “What if he-”

“It’d be stupid of him,” Masky cuts you off. “Six months of putting all this time and effort only to off you? Just… Just don’t say anything stupid,” he reminds you, a slight teasing tone lingering on his words. He looks at you with gentle eyes.

You scoff playfully. “Eyes on the road, weirdo.”

Standing in the Slender Man’s office this time as a welcome guest is weird. There’s still the scent of jasmine and incense, but there’s also something sweeter - like a memory he’s trying to provoke specifically for you. It’s warm, but not uncomfortably so, and it doesn’t feel near as suffocating as did that first time.

“You’ve certainly changed,” a deep voice says with an audible smile as it reverberates through your head.

“Sir,” you bow your head slightly.

“I’m going to make this short,” the Slender Man begins. “Miss Reader, I am satisfied with your progress these past six months.”

“Thank you, Sir,” both you and Masky reply.

The tall man hums. “However, you have only reached half of what you used to be. I believe the longer you stay in this group, the better you will become.”

You take in a sharp breath.

“Does that bother you?” The Slender Man doesn’t sound mad.

“I…”

Masky mentally clicks his tongue at you, and you glance over through the corner of your eye.

You decide to respond carefully. “I know normalcy… Sir, I don’t know if this life was ever meant for me, but,” you take in a deep breath and ball your fists to ground yourself. “If this is what you want of me, I will do it.”

The Slender Man chuckles. “Timothy, you’ve done an excellent job with this one. Perhaps I should have placed Pariah with you,” he emptily thinks aloud with another slight laugh. “I regret to inform you Miss Reader, that normalcy was never an option. You will go back with your team and you will continue to better yourself until I say otherwise.” He makes no move to stand from his desk, but his hands reach out.

Taking that as a nonverbal cue, you and Masky stand and each take a large hand.

The Slender Man’s fingers close around your much smaller hands before his hand leaves your grasp entirely. Instead of striking you, he gently cups your cheek. “Now go. I look forward to seeing you in six months.” The warmth is gone from his tone but lingers like doused coals in a still simmering fireplace.

“Thank you for your time,” Masky bows slightly, nodding for you to follow.

Without any other words, you nod to your boss and follow Masky out. The two of you trade silent conversation as you exit the mansion and back to the car. You slip in just like you did six months ago, and so too does Masky. The car comes to life, and you begin to peel out of the parking lot, back to Mississippi.

“How are you feeling?” Masky asks as he pulls down the sun visor after squinting at the beams of light.

“Not as bad as I thought,” you say in slight surprise. “Maybe it just hasn’t sunk in yet.”

“Or,” Masky begins. “You were always meant for this.”

You laugh in response and smack his shoulder lighter. “You know you’re not slick, right?” You tease as you stick your tongue out.

Masky chuckles deeply and gets back on the expressway. “I try when I can.”

“Oh really?” You pretend to be shocked. “Where was that smooth talking when I first met you?”

“Out the window because I just met you,” he retorts, a smirk playing on his lips.

“You are literally the worst,” you teasingly scoff.

“Right back at you,” Masky breathily laughs. His dark eyes stay focused on the road as

you get comfortable in the passenger seat.

“Really though,” you say as you stretch slightly. “Thanks for not killing me.” You look at him with such gentle eyes that he can’t help but smile just as genuinely in response.

Masky won’t lie, he was admittedly worried for you in the beginning. What with you running away all the time, speaking ill of literally everyone, almost getting everyone caught by the cops… You were colorful, for lack of better words. It’s been nice cultivating that into something better. Maybe you’d make something of yourself out of this garbage fire of a hiccup.

“It’s nothing,” he shrugs. “It’s my responsibility to watch out for you anyways,” he says as before honking at someone who almost swerved into your lane. “Besides, you’re not all too bad, and as long as it’s me making sure you don’t set shit on fire… Think we’ll be just fine.” He looks over at you and smiles warmly - it feels like the sun - before he turns back to the road.

You hum contentedly as your hand reaches for the radio. You turn up the music and let it play, a serene, comfortable silence falling between the two of you.

[artnerd1123]

A Familiar World

A Terrifying Tempest  ——————————————

Things weren’t always peachy in Roo’s early days. Aiden’s out of the house, and our favorite little paint cat comes head to head with something he’s never seen before. It’s more than a little scary.

This is a two part chapter! The first part is here!

The masterpost for AFW can be found here. The chapter post for AFW can be found here.

——————————————

oh? two chapters in two days? what am i, some sorta competent??? nah, i’m just riding on a wave of productivity. Happy to have this one out tho!!! ‘s about time i finished this ;w;

enjoy some fun times with roo and his feral form, y’all ;3

WARNING FOR BODY HORROR! if that’s not your deal, skip what’s between these ( ~~~ ) and keep readin!!!

                                                      ————

Rain hammered against the villagers’ roofs. Thousands of its tiny droplets pounded against soaking wood. Lightning slashed through the sky, leaving jagged wounds of light against the ashy clouds. They vanished as soon as they’d come. Thunder roared deafeningly, like some monstrously angry beast. The wind howled back in fury. In the void-like darkness of the night, there were only a handful of people out, trying futilley to prevent the storm’s damage. All else stayed huddled in their dark houses. There was only one thing to do in a storm such as this. Wait it out. And hope that your fear didn’t invite it inside. For some, this was a feat greater than the squall. For some, the tempest outside was much more than a storm. For some… it was a nightmare.

                                                     ————

Thoughts swirled around in Roo’s head. The thunder outside threatened to drown them out, but they hissed louder in protest. He trembled fiercely as he dug under the blankets on Aiden’s bed. No matter how much of his paint stained them, they were safe, right? He was safe there, right? Right? The little cat curled himself into a tighter ball. His ears pressed against his head, eyes squeezed shut. Why hadn't his originator come home yet? Had something gone wrong outside? Where was he? It was so dark, so loud, so horribly nerve-wracking. Where was he?! He desperately scrambled to calm his rising panic. It was like trying to stop the tide from coming in. Sooner or later, there’s nothing you can do to stop it. No matter how hard you hold on, there’s bound to be a swell that sweeps you away. Unfortunately, the water was getting higher. And Roo didn’t know how to swim. Wh-what’m I suh-supposed teh do? He whimpered, paws over his ears. Aiden’s not- h-he’s not h-heah- Move. Wh... what? The sudden impulse- no, urge- nearly brought his fear to a halt. Where had that come from? … For the first time, the cat realized his chest felt much too tight.  His anxiety trickled back like a creek before a flood, bringing violent shivers with it. He didn’t like this. He didn’t like this at all. Get out. Run. His breathing picked up as he glanced around. Paint spattered blankets and darkness surrounded him. Where could he go? Where could he get to? Aiden- Aiden said he couldn’t leave the house right now- he couldn’t get out anyways! Have to go. Have to go right now. He couldn’t get enough air. Were the blankets starting to curl closer? He grit his teeth, baring tiny desperate fangs at the darkness. B-but where? I don’ know where i could- Go! NOW! GET OUT! The kitten pawed at his head, cringing at the claws that sliced through his fur. Why wouldn’t it stop?! W-where do I go I’ve got nowhere to go I c-can’t- I can’t! GET OUT OF HERE! Panicky whimpers started bubbling up from his maw, his fur following suit. It felt like his whole body was boiling. As if something was building- expanding- rising- like the ocean before a tsunami. W-why was he- what was he- wh- What’s happenin to me?! Where’m I supposed to go?! I’m- I’M STUCK! THERE’S NO WAY OUTTA HEAH-! NEED TO GO GO GO GO NOW RUN- The cacophony of wailing instincts and fear and terror was too much- too much- too much bad bad stop sTOP STOP I CAN’T I CAN’T I C-CA-HAN’T-

Roo felt something inside of him give a horrible, splintering snap. Everything suddenly stopped. It was just… silent. Numb. Jarringly disconnected.  But only for a moment.  Everything came crashing back down with a vengeance.

~~~

The little kitten let out a frightful cry as pain surged down its spine. Bubbles popped and roiled across its fur. It felt like the horrible flashes outside had come in- latched onto it- sent white hot tingling down all its limbs- the familiar thrashed about under the covers, just trying to get free. It’s head was a whirlwind of shrieking and agony. Nothing was processing besides pure panic. At least, not mentally. Magic was already at work. The kitten’s limbs began to stretch like taffy. It felt as if boiling lava was pouring all over it. Malleable and impossibly bendy, it’s arms and legs quickly stiffened into steely rods of bone. What began as tiny paws started sharpening into wicked claws. Each digit practically had a sickle attached to it- all the better to rend things in its path. Fiery limbs and flailing claws tore at the sheets desperately, hoarse gasps accompanying the ripping of fabric. A round of crackling sounded off from its back, and it shrieked again. It bucked and thrashed as the line of bones lengthened, making a stubby tail long and an aching body longer. The rest of its form was struggling to play catch-up. Ribs pushed out against skin, vertebrae poking up in a garish path towards its head, all the growth making a skeletal nightmare out of the once-fluffy kitten. From the crunch of its muzzle, it was clear that its skull had some reshaping to do. It’s screams were muffled now, but slipped out with increasing fervor. A stubby snout morphed into a slavering muzzle, baby teeth gnashing into deadly fangs. Big ears were shoved flat against its head, paint dripping down in a waterfall over ringed orange eyes. The blindness only stoked its terror higher. The thrashing became horribly violent, dumping the familiar off the bed and onto the floor. Shreds of the sheets clung to razor claws as it howled in pain. And just when it seemed things couldn’t get any worse... … The familiar’s form began shifting. Getting bigger. Taller. Swelling from an already-stretched foot and a half of agonized cat to a five foot horror panther. And all it could do was roar.

~~~

                                                       ————

“There’s too much water coming in-!” “We don’t have enough lumber left for this-!” “We’ve just got to give it up and move people until the storm dies down-!” Shouts like these were barely heard above the deafening pounding of rain and thunder. The storm had come up so suddenly that a family’s roof caved in. Too much water, not enough time to put up spells. Aiden had been laboring alongside three other questors to get it fixed for hours- all to no avail. No matter what they tried to do, their magic sputtered out in the rain. The work just left them all shivering and upset. And, for whatever reason, Aiden was feeling sore. His chest in particular was bothering him. The more time he’d spent working, the more it was bugging him. He’d chalked it up to his lack of training as of late. Either way, it’d gotten bad enough that he needed a break. The questor took a moment to breathe, setting down a large wooden board. It was as soaked as he was, if not more so. Not the best for building at all. He sighed in frustration, swiping bits of loose hair off his face. He grimaced as his sopping hair stuck to his hands. Evidently, his waterproof cloak hadn’t helped. Revaew. This was horrible. As much as he liked water, he hated being drenched like this. They weren’t making any progress here. Looking to his companions, he opened his mouth to suggest they give it a rest- Only for a deafening roar to cut him off. Blue mist flared to life on his fists before he knew what he was doing, gaze instantly searching for the source. He couldn’t see anything through the driving rain, and hearing? He might as well have been underwater. What was that? Was it a monster coming into town? Now, of all times? A look at his companions yielded just as much confusion. “The hell was that?!” One of them shouted over the rain. “No clue!” Aiden called back. “Whatever it was, it sounds big and mad!” “Should we send someone over to check it out?!” Another yelled, gesturing towards the source of the noise. “Probably!” Aiden spoke up again, following their gesture. Was it on the same side of town as his house...? “Someone’s gotta take care of it before anythi-“ Another roar rang out through the rain. It was a horrid, desperate sound. A zing of pain tore through Aiden’s chest, stealing his words as much as the sound. He grimaced, gasping. What in revaew’s web was going- It was then that something clicked. The chest pain. In the middle of a storm. More work meant more time away from his familiar. His familiar, who got stressed when he… left… Oh. Oh no. The questor didn’t wait another second to process. He was off like a shot. Yelling an apology over his shoulder, he dead sprinted over the wet stone path. Puddles splashed freezing water all over him. From the way his boots slid with every step, it was a miracle he didn’t fall. The thump of his belt pouch on his hip was practically promising to leave bruises. But he didn’t care. All he could think about was getting back to his familiar. The third roar just made him pick up his pace. Dark house after dark house slipped by as he wove his way through the village. His place was on the edge.  For the first time since he’d moved here, he regretted picking a house so removed from the main square.

As aiden ran the final stretch to his cottage, the squelch of mud beneath his boots had never sounded sweeter. He was drenched, dirt splattered, and had a nasty scratch from bashing his arm into a mailbox, but he was almost there. Rather unfortunate that the sight of his home didn’t have the same effect. The windows were dark and empty. The next roar was so much louder now. In a flash of lighting, he could see something big zip past the glass. Oh Revaew- was that Roo? His chest was already aching, but it was downright painful now. Putting on one last burst of speed, he made it to the door before thunder started to rumble. The questor nearly slammed into it, gasping. Thanks to a short overhang over the door, he was out of the rain. … And in more than a little pain. His lungs heaved desperately. His legs were on fire. His bruised hip and scratched up arm were throbbing. His head, too, had decided to ache. Sure, he was here. But at what cost?  Maybe running that fast was a bad idea, he thought dully. However. It had gotten him there. And the mad dash was over. All he had to worry about now was getting inside. Adrenaline starting to wind down, he pressed an ear against the door. He could make out anxious yowling under the sounds of the storm. He flinched at a dull crash and thunk, grimacing at the accompanying cries. Yeah, he needed in. He needed in before Roo hurt himself. If he hasn’t already, he thought fearfully. Waving a hand from his head towards his feet, he muttered a quick spell. Water came rushing off him in waves. It sent a violent chill down his spine, but at least he wasn’t wet. After all, he wouldn’t be able to touch his son if he had rain clinging to him. Slowly, he took one more breath. He faced the door. A little grumble of thunder roiled across the land as he stared at the damp wood. One last hurdle to clear. His hand raised to take the handle. I’m here, Roo. With a soft click, the door slowly swung open. I’m home.

Everything was loud. Cold. Dark. So, so dark. No matter how many times it tried turning its head, how many directions it looked, everything was dark. It felt like it was suffocating. The loud rumbling and crashing wasn’t helping at all. The thundering of rain was grating on its ears. It couldn’t stay here. Lashing out, it roared again and again. Pleading- begging someone to come help. All that met it was pain as its paws and tail snagged on unseen assailants. They were everywhere! All around it! There was no way to run from them. And it tried. Oh, how it tried. It kept bashing into invisible walls. Smashing into obstacles. Roaring and thrashing and scrambling around in the dark. Slipping desperately into a new space, only to bash into something else. An unending nightmare with deafening sound. … Until something new cut through the cacophony. A creak. Long and soft, bringing a freezing draft with it. It froze, back arched. Fangs bared. Low yowls drifting from its maw. Smells tickled at its nose, but it was too worked up to identify them. All it knew was something had just walked in the door.

Aiden’s eyes widened in shock. Hand trailing to his face, he just… stared. He hadn’t known what to expect. Even with his memories of feral familiars, even after the pain in his chest, even after the shadows and yowls from inside the house… he had no idea. But he knew, instantly, what was standing in the darkness of his house. Or, more accurately… who. Roo. The questor stood silently in the doorway, across the room from a five foot long panther. Paint dripped steadily from every part of it, leaving streaks and puddles on the floor. Mangy fur stood anxiously on end. Fearful breaths hitched through deadly jaws. Though its eyes were covered in a waterfall of indigo, Aiden knew its gaze was on him. He didn’t know if he could move. The panther wasn’t budging either. They seemed to be at a standoff. But how long would this last? Minutes? Hours? Seconds? Someone’s gotta make the first move, Aiden thought grimly. Might as well be me. Holding his breath, he took a hesitant step forward. The panther’s ears flicked towards him. It curled its lips a bit higher, tail twitching. Aiden paused. Okay. One step at a time, then. Slowly spreading his hands, he tried for some words. “... hey roo. I’m back,” Aiden called softly. Where the step set the panther on edge, the voice received a warning yowl. Its spine curved higher, claws digging into the wooden floor. It looked like a skeletal fluffball with how much fur was puffing up. Aiden tried not to flinch. He just stood his ground. If he was gonna get through to Roo, he had to keep going. “It’s- it’s just Aiden, bud,” he tried again. “You know me. Nothing to be afraid of.” The name gave the panther pause. The sounds of driving rain seemed to fade as it thought. Aiden. Aiden. It knew that name. But… from where? Its brows furrowed, a halting yowl drifting from it. It wanted to keep the person away… didn’t it…? … then why did it wish they’d come closer? Aiden advanced a bit more. Gently, as the panther hesitated. Though it bristled again, it didn’t make any noise. It just crouched. Aiden eyed it uncertainly. “... you ok, Roo…?” he continued. “It’s alright. You’re safe.” The panther shivered. Meowed softly. Safe. It was… safe? The person… they… no, he was… was safe…? It’s tail curled around its feet. Nervous. Afraid. Aiden took another step. Nothing happened. Another. Nothing. Two more, and he’d be right next to the panther. He was almost close enough to touch it. Yet, he stopped. The panther couldn’t see. It was so afraid. He had to make sure it knew it was safe. He had to. “... roo…” he started softly, crouching down. “It’s okay. Really. Aiden’s here. Dad’s here. You’re safe.” The panther trembled. Another soft meow slipped out. A questioning sound. A skittish sound. It knew the person was right there. It wanted him closer. Please, come closer. Safety was nothing without him. Without… … without… Aiden. Silently, everything fell into place. Tears rose to Roo’s eyes. Aiden. Oh Revaew. Aiden. His body shook as he tried to process, little huffs bubbling out of his mouth. There he was. The familiar was back, but his fear had gone nowhere. It was still so dark here. He didn’t know what to do. He just shivered, pawing anxiously at his eyes. ‘Aiden?’ he tried to say, meows coming out instead. ‘D-dad? Aiden? P-please- please, i-i nuh-need help-’ The questor understood the moment Roo teared up. To call his sigh relieved might have been an understatement. He closed the gap without words. Pulling his familiar into his arms never felt so sweet. Roo latched onto him. Aiden did likewise. Just sitting there, quietly shushing the big kitty. “Dad’s here, Roo…” he murmured. He held Roo as his sniffles bubbled into sobs. “You’re safe…” He held him even as his painted form started running like a busted faucet. “You’re alright…” He held him as his body shrank down smaller and smaller. Held him as he morphed back into a scared little kitten. Held him as little paws clutched handfuls of his shirt. Just… held him. Eventually, Roo tried to speak. His little voice broke and mewled too badly to make out words. But Aiden knew what he meant. Cradling his familiar in his arms, the questor got to his feet. He shut the door with a small wave of magic. The mess could wait for the morning. They weren’t going anywhere but bed. Roo mewled again as he carried him back to the trashed bedroom. Aiden shushed him quietly. Gently. “You’re safe, Roodle,” Aiden hummed. “I’m here.” Carefully, he wrapped the kitten in a torn blanket. Good enough for now. Good enough to sleep. He settled himself up as best he could in bed. Just letting roo curl up on his chest, arms still cradling him. The rain was the only sound for a little. Ever present drumming from the sky. Roo dozed off easily.

After awhile, a bit of thunder rumbled over the house. Roo shivered in time, curling up tighter. “... mrr…” Aiden’s hand gently smoothed Roo’s fluffy fur. Tired. Half awake. But still determined. “I’ll be right here, Roo. Don’t worry.”

“You’re safe.”

[fairestmusesismoving]

Somewhere to Begin

A headcanon short story featuring Doc, Bashful ( @thexforgottenxones ) , and Grumpy ( @piiixiedcst ). Before the curse is cast, Doc is eager to return to the mountain where Bossy had taken him from years before. Taking Bashful and Grumpy with him to see the dying mountain, Grumpy seems to realize this is somewhere he knows. Inspired by Lily Allen’s cover of Somewhere Only We Know.

Tired, gray eyes scanned over the desolate base of the mountain. Hugging onto the fallen tree, he lifted himself over and landed on his feet. Dry and withered leaves crunched beneath his feet. Doc knew this place far too well and it was a relief to his aching bones that he was able to see it one last time. The curse was biting and scratching at their heels and he desired only one last thing before the unthinkable could happen. This was home. This was the home he was taken from. Though he loved his brothers dearly, they had been chosen by circumstance and by heart. The dark truth was that they had been pulled from their homes and had forgotten their lives and families. Somehow he held onto fragmented pieces of memory. It would have been easier to forget. “Hey! Slow down!” Glancing over his shoulder, he heard the huffing and puffing of Grumpy. He had lagged behind. Bashful stood nearby quietly while marveling at the dwellings carved in the mountain and the grand, yet very empty city square they stood in. Once there had been a city and it thrived. It wasn't a remarkable city but it was something and it had belonged to the proud Dwarfs. Doc felt his breath still as his feet carried him through the square. The marketplace was still standing against all odds, though it was worse for wear. Fabric billowed in the breeze instead of serving as covering in the sunshine. Wood had been smashed and splintered. “Home,” He uttered softly. Grumpy wheezed as he hobbled behind the older dwarf and hunched over. “You...you weren't kidding! So we aren't...” Bashful cast a glare towards Grumpy and kept a hand on the dagger strapped to his belt. For all they had been told about being hatched, things just never added up. How could they have been hatched? Did it make sense to not feel? To not love? Sneezy was a challenge to Bossy's declaration that they couldn't get sick with his hayfever and Doc's existence to help and heal others was another threat. Why did they exist? Dud eggs, then? More than one errant pixie spilling her dust? The odds seemed less likely the more excuses piled up. Who was born an old man and in their pajamas? It all just didn't make sense. Before Grumpy could ask for more clarification, Doc had headed off in another direction. He was being pulled by something. Through the winding alleyways carved into the very mountain, Doc moved easily and comfortably. The stone beneath his feet was a friend welcoming him back to the path he knew very well. This was what made him complete again. Having lost sight of their eldest brother, the two found themselves with a choice of right or left. With very little hesitation, Grumpy chose left. Bashful turned his head to Grumpy with a confused look. “Are you sure this is the way? Neither of us have been here before.” Becoming more certain of their brother's stories and memories, Grumpy swallowed a lump in his throat. “Are we so sure about that? I mean... It feels right. The left feels right!” The surly dwarf narrowed his gaze. This path felt right. Though the mountain was devoid of life except for the three, it was almost like he could hear laughing and the buzz of conversation. Were these echos of the past looking at him now? Were they looking for him? As they moved further down the twisting path and the sunlight trickled through, Grumpy could have sworn that color came back to the mountain. Colorful scraps of fabric began to fly in the air like flags being raised high with pride. They flickered out of his vision and left the graying landscape once more. He knew this place. How did he know this place? Did Doc know? He could feel his feet urging him further on to seek out where he had gone to, but it seemed like the maroon colored dwarf had all but disappeared. Bashful desperately wanted to speak up and pointed out they may have needed to pick the other path. A clearing had appeared with Doc paused in front of a rather large stone flanked by two braziers. The fire had gone out a long time ago and the stone was massive. It was easily bigger than any human they had seen. A troll? Certainly. The older dwarf had slipped to a knee and clapped his hands in front of him. He was silent. As Bashful and Grumpy approached, they noticed Doc was so deep in concentration that he hadn't fixed his pair of glasses that had slipped to the tip of his nose. He breathed softly and didn't acknowledge the two, though they were certain he knew they were there. Bashful remained close. Grumpy, however, was too enthused to sit still. The forgotten mountain was something he could only dream of. His only regret was that Doc had only trusted him this late to allow him to see where they really came from. It was the key to everything. With the curse approaching quickly, they had no time to ask the questions of where they truly came from... Or where survivors may have gone. Turning slowly, his eyes settled on Doc. He no longer saw his brothers before the stone. He saw a laughing couple. Was that what dwarven women looked like? She was short, like them. Her hair was curly and she had a smirk every time she ended a sentence. The crowd was enormous and... Suddenly he was in the middle of it all. He took only a brief glimpse at the groom, dressed in white like the bride and noticed it was Doc's face. How could he be so young? How could those eyes, grey as the mountain, have once been filled with love and a spark that faded into the harsh and pained gaze he knew now? He looked to the bride once more and heard a sound... “Little brother.” “Brother, we're going. Brother?” Doc had stood from his prayer and meditation. “Grumpy, you've been staring. Should we stop before we head home? There's still much to prepare before the Queen's curse.” The dwarf gave a gentle warning. “We can go back in the dark. It'll be safer with the Black Knights still roaming around.” Bashful was about to voice his approval but Grumpy never spoke in return. Trying to pull him from his daze, Bashful decided to comment on just how haunted Grumpy seemed. “You look like you've seen a ghost.” “...Doc, what is this place? Not the mountain. Here. This level.” Grumpy gestured to the stone. “It's special, isn't it? I just wanna know. I don't wanna eat a live chicken or nothing. No rubbing oil on my face and being part of some scheme or...just tell me.” Doc began to smirk. “Well uh... it was a place for ceremonies. Naming Days. Memorials...” “Weddings.” Grumpy quickly answered. “Weddings. Dwarfs got married here.” Doc raised his bushy eyebrows in interest. “That's...y-yes that's true. Grumpy, did you-” “I don't think nothing. I don't see nothing.” Accepting Grumpy's reluctance to speak up, Doc gave a nod and gestured for the group to start making their way back. “I've made my peace... thank you for helping me return to my mountain. I can't call it home anymore because home is the castle. Home is where my brothers are. I chose you... and I'm happy I did.” He seemed to brighten as he walked away. Grumpy remained behind. This curse could be the end of everything and they would never remember their true past. The mountain had offered him one forgotten memory and a bit of understanding.

[haledamage]

Sleepless

(I waited until after midnight to post this so I could count it for Watcher Wednesday :P Rekke POV, Rekkai unrequited crush (or is it? :3), early enough in Deadfire that he isn’t yet fluent in Aedyran but has started to learn it. Seki is in italics)

It was late at night when Rekke woke suddenly from his sleep. It took a moment to remember where he was, to recognize the sound of the ocean, the barely familiar language spoken in murmurs around him.

He was on a ship, in a land far, far from home, and he should have been sleeping.

He opened his eyes. The hammock across from his belonged to Edér, and it's empty. He sat up in time to see Edér disappear into the Captain's quarters.

He felt a stab of jealousy, but quickly pushed it away. He shouldn't have been surprised that he wasn’t the only one interested in her. She's beautiful and clever and fearless and Edér had years to win her heart while Rekke had barely known her weeks.

He rolled back over and pushed it from his mind. He was already asleep again when Edér returned.

The next night, Rekke was awoken again as Aloth climbed from his bunk above. He caught the elf’s eye as he walked past, and he didn’t catch all of the half-whispered Aedyran Aloth said to him, but he got the gist of it. ‘Everything’s fine, nothing to concern yourself about, go back to sleep.’ Like that’d ever worked to make anyone less curious, especially a man like Rekke.

He watched as Aloth carefully entered the Captain’s quarters like Edér had the night before.

Last night’s jealousy was overwhelmed by tonight’s curiosity. It’s doubtful this was another clandestine rendezvous, which meant the other probably wasn’t either. Which meant they’re up to something else and he suddenly, desperately wanted to know what that something else was.

It took Rekke a long moment to realize he wasn’t alone with his thoughts. Next to his hammock was the little girl he’d seen climbing around the rigging of the ship sometimes - Vela, that’s her name. Edér had said she’s an orlan; near as Rekke can tell, she’s a very young girl with furry ears and a smile full of trouble.

She had that smile pointed at him now. She offered him a hand wordlessly, and he barely hesitated before taking it. She led him to the door and knocked.

It’s Edér that opened it. Rekke hadn’t even noticed he wasn’t in bed either. He looked confused before turning a look of paternal annoyance on Vela. Before he could say anything, Vela spoke up. “Rekke wants to help Mama, too.”

The look Edér turned on Rekke was less paternal and more annoyed. “Does he.”

Rekke tried not to look like he had no idea what’s going on. His Aedyran was heavily accented, but confident. “I want to help.”

“Let him in, dear,” he heard her say from further in the room. She sounded like she was in pain or very, very tired.

“Kiki,” Edér started, turning from the door to look at her. Rekke caught a glimpse through the open doorway. She met his eye and gave him a listless smile. Tired, then.

She waved off whatever protest Edér had. “Let him in,” she said again. “He’ll just hover outside the door until you do.”

Edér moved aside to let him in, though he didn’t look happy about it. Aloth gave him a polite, tight-lipped smile from where he sat in a chair in a far corner, book open in front of him. Vela dropped his hand to instead sprint across the room and scramble into her lap.

Her. Rekke wished he knew what to call her. Even in his head, she was only “her.” Captain was just a title, too formal. He’d heard some people call her Watcher, always with a hint of awe or fear, but she didn’t seem to like that and no one would tell him what it meant. But her name was all vowels and he still had trouble shaping it right, though not for lack of trying. So he didn’t call her anything. He just said, “hello.”

“Good evening.” Her accent in Seki was as thick as his in Aedyran, but he liked that she was willing to learn. “Or good morning. I guess that’s more accurate.”

This close, he could see the exhaustion clinging to her like spiderwebs. Her hair was a mess, even by her normal standards, and her normally bright green eyes were dull and shadowed. Her smile was a distant, ghostly thing. There’s a cup of coffee on the table in front of her; as he watched, she touched a hand to the ceramic cup and steam started to rise from it where it had previously been cold. She lifted it to her lips and drank it all in one gulp, grimacing at the bitterness of it.

He sat at the table with her and offered her a hand. He didn’t touch her, didn’t know her well enough yet to know what she’s comfortable with, but he tried to make it obvious what his intention was. He put the offer on the table - literally, in this case.

She took his hand. Her fingers were cold. How did a woman who controlled fire with her mind have such cold hands?

She laughed, tired but warm, and Rekke realized he said that out loud. He blushed, embarrassed, but she didn’t appear offended. If anything, some of the light seemed to have returned to her eyes. “Ask your questions, dear,” she said. “I can see them in your eyes. Ask.”

He asked. Already, he knew he couldn’t deny her anything. “What’s wrong? Why can’t you sleep?”

And, amazingly, she told him.

In a careful, meandering combination of Aedyran and Seki and, briefly, another language he didn't know but he’d heard her speak before, she told him of her curse. Of what it meant to be a Watcher. She was thrice haunted, once by the dead, once by the gods, and once by her own distant past. They whispered in her ear, danced in the edges of her vision, and tormented her sleep.

Edér and Aloth reluctantly filled in the spaces that she couldn’t, pieces she’s missing from the time they first met when she lost herself to the voices. Also, at least two times that her… soul was kidnapped? That didn’t sound right, but perhaps his grasp of Aedyran wasn’t as good as he thought it was.

It’s a fantastic story, and Rekke’s pretty sure he only believed a quarter of it. How was he supposed to believe that this tiny, tired woman in front of him was the resurrection of a woman who had created and then rebelled against her gods two thousand years ago? That because of this, she could read a person’s memories and life story from their soul? It’s impossible. Wasn’t it?

She must have seen his disbelief on his face. “I wouldn’t believe me either. It’s a ridiculous tale, truly. I can prove it to you, if you’d like.” He nodded, too confused and curious for words, and she smiled at him and squeezed his hand. Then her eyes went… blank. Empty. A few moments passed in silence before he noticed the glow in them, violet light curling in their depths like smoke. Where their hands touched, he felt her skin go colder, almost painfully so, like wherever the life in her eyes went it took all her warmth with it.

She started speaking, in a distant voice but flawless Seki, and Rekke realized with a jolt that he knew the story she’s telling. It’s his own. He heard in her words (though not in her hollow, lifeless tone) his pain and fear and stubborn refusal to surrender to the storm they call Ondra’s Mortar as the waves and wind ripped apart the boat around him. He heard how close he came to drowning when the ship splintered and he was thrown into the sea.

The light faded and the life returned to her and silence reigned over the room. Rekke watched her face as all the emotions from what she saw (what she read. From his soul) caught up with her, tears filling her eyes and spilling over silently, falling on their joined hands. She brushed them away quickly.

“I didn’t mean to put you through that,” he said, as if he had any control over what his soul remembered. “I’m sorry, Kiki.”

The pain on her face was chased away with surprise and then a beautiful, bashful smile. “Kiki?”

“That’s what Edér called you earlier. Is it okay if I call you that?” It’s much, much easier to say than her other name and it suited her more than just calling her Captain ever would. But maybe it wasn’t a name? Maybe it meant something in Aedyran that he hadn’t learned yet; maybe he just insulted her, or it was a term of endearment or something.

The smile lingering on her face said she wasn’t offended. “It’s… a nickname my family gave me, that’s all. I don’t mind if you use it.”

He beamed at her and she blushed, her cheeks and the tips of her pointed ears turning a lovely shade of pink. There was something shy in the way she looked at him now, and it was new and intriguing and beautiful. He wished he knew exactly what made her look at him like that. He’d do it again in a heartbeat if it meant she’d keep doing so.

Aloth said something, his accent much different than Rekke had heard before and tone sly and playful and completely not like Aloth. Rekke didn’t understand the words, they weren’t quite in Aedyran - but maybe something akin to it? - but whatever he said made Kiki blush darker and Edér chuckle.

“Iselmyr, please don’t say things like that in front of my daughter,” Kiki said primly, motioning to Vela still curled up in her lap. The little orlan was fast asleep.

“I should probably get her back in bed,” Edér said. He scooped the child out of Kiki’s arms; Vela didn’t so much as stir in her sleep. “You okay, Kiki?”

“I’m fine.” There was that tired smile again, even more exhausted than it was before. “You should sleep, my dear.”

“You should sleep,” he said, and his worry was audible.

“I don’t think I have a choice at this point. I’m…” she huffed an almost soundless laugh, “done. Someone come wake me if I start screaming about shipwrecks.”

Edér hovered about for another minute, but when Kiki just repeated 'I'm fine, go to bed' he reluctantly left. Aloth approached, leaning down to have a brief and very quiet conversation with Kiki before he left as well, wishing them both a good night.

And then it was just the two of them. Rekke wondered if he was supposed to leave now too, but he didn’t want to yet and Kiki hadn’t made any indication that he needed to. She was still holding his hand. Did she know she was still holding his hand?

“You’re going to have nightmares about my shipwreck now?” he asked to fill the silence.

She shrugged, casual like they’re discussing the weather and not the fact that Rekke has just become another of the ghosts that haunted her. “Probably. The things I See in other people’s souls tend to leave a mark, at least for a while. Don’t worry, dear. It’s still better than my usual fare.” She gave his hand another squeeze, then pulled away and ran it self-consciously over her hair. Her eyes stayed on his face, though, studying him as if trying to read his thoughts; briefly, he wondered if she actually could. “I hope I did not scare you. This… Watcher business, it unnerves people sometimes. They think it’s creepy.”

“I think you’re incredible.” It wasn’t what he meant to say, but it was true so he didn’t take it back, though he knew his face must be red. “I have never met anyone like you before.”

“I could say the same to you,” Kiki said, and she’s blushing again too. “Thank you. For wanting to help.”

Rekke smiled, sly and mischievous. “I thought you and Edér were having an affair. The way he sneaks in here in the middle of the night is very suspicious.”

She laughed at that, real and joyous and livelier than anything he’d heard from her all night. “I told him that would happen. I don’t know why he’s trying to keep it secret. I don’t make any effort to hide my condition.”

“He is trying to protect you.”

She pursed her lips sourly. “He always does. So does Aloth. I’m still not sure if I think they’re sweet or obnoxious.” Her frown turned into a fond smile, though, and he got the impression that her protests were habitual and not sincere.

“They are family. I think that makes them both.” Kiki turned that fond smile on him now, and it made him feel warm all the way down to his bones. It made him want to do something reckless, something to impress her and earn that affection for himself. Instead he said, “Do you want me to leave so you can sleep?”

“You can stick around a little longer, if you’d like. I can’t promise I’ll be much of a conversationalist, though.” Rekke believed it. Even though she was still smiling, her head was leaned heavily on one hand, elbow propped on the table. She was struggling to keep her eyes open.

“Do you want me to stay?” He thought he knew the answer, but he needed to hear it. Wanted to hear it.

Her eyes snapped open and she met his gaze in obvious surprise. She seemed taken aback by the question, like she didn’t expect to be allowed an opinion on the matter. “Yes. Just… Just until I fall asleep. If that is okay.”

He grinned. “I’ll stay as long as you wish, Kiki.”

There’s a few moments where neither of them moved, where the air in the room started to feel heavy and charged. Kiki cleared it with a shake of her head, like she simply didn’t have the desire for things to feel awkward and so they didn’t. She walked over to her bed and nudged at what looked like a pile of blankets. It turned out to be a large black dog and an absurd number of cats. The menagerie reluctantly moved to sleep somewhere else.

Kiki crawled into bed without hesitation, too tired for decorum, and Rekke claimed the nearby overstuffed reading chair. She gifted him with another warm smile, but he could see sleep pulling her down and away. Within minutes, her breathing slowed and evened out and she was out.

Rekke knew he should leave now that she’s asleep, but he lingered a little while, watching her. There was a knot of a frown between her eyebrows already from something forcing its way into her dreams. Without thinking, he reached out and smoothed his thumb over it, smiling as her expression cleared and she relaxed back into sleep. He brushed a few wild curls out of her face, then pulled his hand back and moved away from the bed in an effort to remove the temptation to keep touching her.

He took the opportunity to sate his curiosity and look around the room instead. He hadn’t had the opportunity to explore this corner of the ship yet. 

There were a lot of books. What use could she possibly have for this many books? There seemed to be one or two on every surface, gathering in piles and drifts on any available space except the bed and the desk.

The desk was mostly covered in paper, haphazard stacks of letters and half-finished replies. He picked one up, but he couldn’t read it yet so he just shrugged and set it back down.

On a small shelf next to the desk was a collection of knick knacks that caught his attention. A pair of broken swords and a third sword that was still whole. Twin intricate bronze daggers. Several amulets tied together, all bearing the symbol of a black key. A speckled bird feather. A fox carved from white adra. A diving helmet. A stone bust of a woman whose eyes seemed to follow him wherever he went. He got the feeling that the woman was judging him, though he couldn’t say why.

Kiki made a small, distressed noise in her sleep and Rekke immediately abandoned his exploration to return to her side. She had curled into a ball, hands tensed into white-knuckled fists. He knelt next to the bed and covered both her hands with his. Her hands were alarmingly warm.

She whimpered again and he shushed her gently. “Shh. You are safe, Kiki. No harm will come to you while I’m here, I swear it.” When she didn’t immediately calm down, he did the first thing he could think of and started to sing. It’s a lullaby his mother used to sing to him, the first song that came to his mind, and he didn’t remember all the words, but he knew the tune enough to hum the parts he couldn’t recall. 

Some of the tension drained from her as he sang, so he kept going. Most of the songs he knew were shanties or pub songs, but his singing voice wasn’t half-bad, and Kiki’s asleep so he doubted she’d judge his taste. He’s in the middle of the third song when she finally relaxed again and after a moment, he relaxed too. He rubbed his thumb over her palm, trying to soothe the crescent-moon marks left by her fingernails.

A few minutes passed and she didn’t stir, breathing still calm and even, so he reluctantly pulled himself away from her once more. He went back to the reading chair and, after a moment’s consideration, picked it up and moved it next to the bed before settling down into it. “If you need me, I am right here. Good night, Kiki.”

Rekke watched her for a little while longer, but whatever had been troubling her didn’t come back and her sleep remained undisturbed. He leaned back in the chair and closed his eyes.

Aloth found them the next morning when he went to check on Kai. She was curled up on the bed, the big black hound draped over her legs like a blanket. Rekke was still in the chair, with a cat on his head and two more in his lap. With a small smile, Aloth backed out of the room and let them sleep in.

[vernonfielding]

Gotta address the elephant in the room

Story No. 11 of my Season 7 Countdown Project. (Please note that there are (mild) descriptions of sexual harassment in here. Take care of yourselves, readers.)

Summary: “We can be different and still have the same cause.”

Amy and Rosa go to Shaw’s after taking the second sexual harassment statement. Takes place at the end of He Said, She Said. (Read on AO3.)

Alexandra’s story isn’t nearly as horrible as Keri’s – there’s not as much drunk late-night desk wrestling, and no penis-breaking – but it’s still awful. Amy and Rosa go back to the firm and grab Beefer (because of course it’s Beefer) and somehow by the time they haul him back to the Nine-Nine for questioning he’s already got a lawyer and he’s in and out in under an hour. And that’s it. Amy is sick of it. Just fucking over it.

She turns to Rosa and says, “I need a drink.”

Rosa arches an eyebrow. “It’s 11:45 a.m.”

“I need five drinks,” Amy says, and she knows she’s got steel in her eyes when she stares down Rosa because she’s practiced this look in the mirror often enough.

Rosa nods and says, “I’ve got to file a B&E from yesterday. I’ll meet you at Shaw’s in ten.”

+++

Amy tells Captain Holt that she’s been up for almost 48 hours straight and needs to leave early. She tells him that Rosa isn’t feeling well either, and he says that’s fine and lets them go. Amy feels a little guilty but this is what a lifetime of responsibility has earned her and anyway, she suspects Holt knows exactly what’s up.

Amy stops by Jake’s desk, long enough to brush her lips against his temple and say, “I’m okay, I’ll see you at home tonight.”

He squeezes her hand where she’s dropped it on his shoulder and nods, and doesn’t say anything at all.

Dear lord, she loves this man.

+++

They start with whiskey –  neat for Rosa, on the rocks for Amy. Rosa’s already ordered when Amy arrives. They sit in a booth at the back, and they don’t talk while they sip. Amy has her hands cupped around her glass. The pale pink polish on her thumb has chipped off at the tip, and it bothers her. She wants to pick it all off. She wants to not have painted her nails in the first place. She rarely does – it’s such a dumb thing, when she’s constantly getting her hands dirty, when her nails are always splintered and rough at the edges.

When Rosa brings them a second round, Amy says, “It happened to me at the Six-Four. My captain.”

“Turner,” Rosa says, lips arranged in a snarl. “I heard things about him.”

“I never did,” Amy says, and she shrugs a little. “He was my mentor and then he tried to kiss me, and I thought it was me, you know? I hated him, but I hated myself a little more.”

Rosa just nods. She tosses back her second drink and gets up for another, and this time she brings back two more for both of them. She drinks one of them all at once, nurses the other.

She says, “I was in the Academy. Lt. Baker. He was always doing that thing where they give you the slow look and don’t say anything, but you know. One day he asked if I’d been a cheerleader in high school.”

“That’s so gross,” Amy says, wincing.

“Yeah, and when I just stared at him he said, I’m not even joking, that I was probably a real ‘wild cat’ in the sack.”

Rosa pauses, runs a finger around the rim of her glass. Rosa isn’t an open book for anyone, certainly not Amy, but it’s impossible to miss the grimace, and the shame that flashes in her eyes. It makes Amy’s stomach hurt to see.

“I was struggling in the first couple of weeks,” Rosa says, “didn’t have the upper body strength to keep up with the guys. Baker holds me back one day, says he can give me extra PT – extra attention, you know? And I fucking knew better, but-”

She’s staring into her glass, and Amy takes a sip from her own, ice cubes bumping cool against her lips.

“It was actually Jake who made it stop. He doesn’t know that, by the way,” Rosa says, giving Amy a wry smile. “Baker had me on the chin-up bar, put his hands on my ass, and I went, I don’t know, just cold all over. Like, is this really happening? And Jake walks in all dumb hair and dumb grin and has no clue what’s going on. But I got out of there, and that was the end of it.”

Amy feels a flush of ridiculous pride for her husband, though she knows it’s not about him, that he didn’t do anything remarkable other than not be a jerk. Still – she chose well, and she’ll never tire of being reminded of that.

“Did you report him?” Amy says. It feels rude to ask. She didn’t, of course. Most of them don’t.

And Rosa shakes her head, says, “No. He’s still at the Academy.”

Amy buys the next round.

+++

It’s close to midnight when she gets home, and Jake is passed out on the sofa. The TV is on low, on an episode of The Golden Girls Amy’s seen before.

Jake has tucked himself into a corner, and Amy slips off her shoes and drops her purse on the coffee table and settles in beside him. He’s warm and he smells like the citrusy soap they share and faintly of the pizza he probably had for dinner.

She never feels safer and more comfortable in her own body than when she’s like this, close to him, and she drops her head on his shoulder and sighs. The room spins lazily and she’s glad she’s not (yet) sick from all the whiskey.

Jake stirs, and she feels him kiss the top of her head. He shifts a little so he can tuck an arm around her shoulder and press her a little closer into his side.

“You want to talk?” His voice is husky, and she can hear the sincerity in his words.

“No,” she says, and she can feel him nod, his chin tipping against her head.

He picks up the remote from the arm of the sofa, and turns up the volume. It’s late, but Jake knows that sometimes Amy needs to spend some time with her girls. When the episode is over, after Rose and Blanche have hugged it out, Jake gets up and offers her a hand, and she lets herself be pulled up and into his arms, lets herself be held for a long breath and a sigh, and then she lets him put her to bed, finally.

End Notes:

Title is from Bikini Babe Workout (Bash Brothers). I love this entire verse of the song.

This story kind of bummed me out but it also felt necessary? I love this episode and I love that Amy opened up to Jake about her experiences, but I felt like maybe she and Rosa had some stuff to talk about too. I’ve had so many of these conversations with (girl)friends over the years. Sigh.

That said, I will never grow tired of writing Jake as the best and most supportive boyfriend/husband.

[lostinthewinterwood]

Crossworks 2020

Hello friend!

Right, so, ah… sorry this is late.  Got incredibly caught up in other exchange nonsense—I’m sure you know how it is, unless you have reasonable decision-making skills and executive function, in which case can I have some too?

…anyway.

Some of these have way more rambling/commentary than others but I am desirous of them all, don’t worry.

If you’re browsing for people to treat, 1) thank you, you’re awesome; 2) I will gladly accept treats in any medium :D

General DNW

Rape/non/dub-con; non-canonical major character death; heavy angst; hurt no comfort; graphic depictions of deliberate and methodical self-harm*; graphic depictions of suicide; anything E rated; smut; gore; heavy gender dysphoria; grimdark; complete downer endings; character bashing; incest; cringe comedy; a/b/o; mpreg; graphic eye trauma; graphic and/or permanent hand trauma (unless the setting can provide a more-or-less fully functional prosthetic or equivalent); issuefic; unrequested identity headcanons; a focus on unrequested romantic relationships**.

*I don’t include things like, say, punching a wall in a fit of emotion under this. however, something like cutting would not be appreciated.

**canonical levels of canonical ships are perfectly fine; background non-canon ships that I haven't dnw'd are okay too, unless otherwise specified in a request.

  General Likes/Other General Info

So, since most of my requests are for fusions, I should probably lay out what I tend to consider a fusion—it’s a little broader than the official Crossworks definition, I think, which is “A work in which characters of one canon are treated as if they always belonged in another setting, or their world has always had elements of another canon.”  All of that falls under my personal definition, as do fusions that are basically Characters A playing out the story of Canon B, even if the setting is still mostly that of Canon A.  For the one crossover I’ve requested, as noted in that prompt I really don’t care how that crossover comes about, just that it does.

 Generally—as you could maybe, possibly, tell from the theme of many of my requests—I’m a total sucker for fairytale fusions; I haven’t really elaborated on all of those combos, just know that I adore characters I know and love playing out a fairytale plot; if you’ve matched on that, I don’t really know how you could go too far wrong.

 Other general likes I think are most relevant for this exchange include:

– I really like plotty fics

– Secret identity and disguise shenanigans, the more layers to them and more absurdity the better.

– Found family; families of choice

– Character studies

– Worldbuilding

  Specific Requests

 Superhero Fairytales

Miraculous Ladybug, Rapunzel's Tangled Adventure (Cartoon), Østenfor sol og vestenfor måne | East of the Sun and West of the Moon

Fic/Fusion

request-specific dnw: breaking up Rapunzel/Eugene, romantic Rapunzel/Cass, romantic Varian/anyone else from the main cast (unless you age him up/them down)

Would love to see Rapunzel et al as Miraculous holders, or the Miraculous kids with the Sundrop and Moonstone and all that goes with that, or the characters from either series facing the plot of East of the Sun and West of the Moon.

For the comparison of ML and Tangled—there’s a lot to explore, I feel, with the creation/healing vs destruction/decay powers that the series both have going, along with the idea that if united the power becomes much, much greater, and far more dangerous.

 As a side note: I’m very not up to date with ML; the last episode I’ve currently seen is Chameleon. I know some spoilers, and I’m not super concerned about them overall, but if you write a fic that relies on an intimate knowledge of events post-season-two I will be lost.

  Time-Travelling Imposters

Mother of Learning - nobody103, Rigel Black Series (Harry Potter fanfic) - murkybluematter, Tam Lin (Traditional Ballad)

Fic/Fusion

request-specific dnw: romantic Harry/Archie, explicitly breaking up canon ships fandom-specific exception: as long as it doesn't violate another dnw, if you do a Tam Lin fusion, the ship it's for (platonic or romantic or somewhere in between) is up to you.

Mother of Learning/Rigel Black Chronicles: I think it would be interesting to toss the RBC characters into the world/plot of MoL--who's the time traveler? who's the tagalong? The noble/nonnoble distinction in MoL and the Splinter Wars and the Weeping would be very interesting to warp into the RBC setting/plot, I'd expect, what with the pureblood/not!pureblood things and the Fade. (i'm not really requesting this, obviously, it's not in my fandoms, but if you're at loss for the angels--or indeed the faeries for a Tam Lin fusion--i always delight in the Tortallan gods showing up in RBC fic)

RBC/Tam Lin: don’t have too much to say here, but I think that RBC has plenty of relationships that you could fit into the dynamics here.

MoL/Tam Lin: in a weird way, MoL already has its characters in the roles they need to be in for a Tam Lin fusion, though the structure is of course very different--what is Zach if not a sacrifice against Panaxeth's release? What is Zorian if not the one who fights nigh-impossible odds to save him from that fate?

  Fairytale Gamer Kids

Hanging Out with a Gamer Girl (Manga), Fairy Tales & Related Fandoms  

Fic/Fusion

Fandom-specific DNW: sexualization of Kaoru’s crossdressing, full justification of Kaoru’s fears re: Nanami’s dad request-specific note: romantic Kaoru/Nanami is okay here if you want to fuse with a romantic fairytale; I'd equally enjoy such a fairytale being made more platonic or more ambiguous.

So, if you put the kids into the fairytale—who are they?  What fairytale are they in?  Can you work in the initial identity confusion, the ongoing ruse?

  Superhero Gamer Kids

Hanging Out with a Gamer Girl (Manga), Miraculous Ladybug

Fic/Fusion

request-specific DNW: sexualization of Kaoru’s crossdressing (or equivalent character's, if you fuse it the other way), romance between Kaoru and Nanami beyond light shiptease à la canon, full justification of Kaoru’s fears re: Nanami’s dad

 I'd love to see Kaoru and Nanami as Miraculous-holders; Marinette and Adrien as slowly-getting-less-reclusive gamers would also be fun, and there are some interesting parallels you could make with their family lives.

There are so many things you could draw from HOwaGG to make parallels to ML; is it that Ladybug is apparently a boy but Nanami a girl, and Chat Noire apparently a girl but Kaoru a boy—does that help them keep up their façade?

In terms of other parallels, there’s also Nanami and Marinette both being the only children of two loving parents, and Kaoru and Adrien both being the only children of distant/absent fathers and (seemingly) dead—and certainly absent—mothers.

As a side note: I’m very not up to date with ML; the last episode I’ve currently seen is Chameleon. I know some spoilers, and I’m not super concerned about them overall, but if you write a fic that relies on an intimate knowledge of events post-season-two I will be lost.

  Star Wars Fairytale

Star Wars Rebels: Servants of the Empire - Jason Fry, Østenfor sol og vestenfor måne | East of the Sun and West of the Moon  

Fic/Fusion

I don't have anything very specific here, at least not right now, but the idea of the protagonist questing to a near-impossible place to rescue a loved one is a parallel that I think it'd be interesting to draw out—in some ways the situations are utterly dissimilar, but they’re surprisingly alike in other ways.

  Superheroes Galore

僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero Academia, Super Powereds - Drew Hayes

Fic/Crossover

fandom-specific dnw: non-canon ships

I'm very interested in the similarities and differences between these two superhero worlds--there's the Powered vs Super distinction in Super Powereds that's absent in bnha with its quirks, the wildly different (but both still formalized and structured) paths to becoming a hero, even just how common powers are in the different worlds. I'm not sure how well trying to wrangle both of them into the same world in the same era would work, but more power to you if you manage that, or maybe it's dimension hopping or time travel shenanigans that bring them into contact with each other--I really don't care on the mechanics here.

Also, the first time I saw Izuku my brain immediately went "hey, it's tiny green Vince!" and I think seeing them meet, at any point in their respective journeys, would be pretty funny and/or interesting.

I'd be into the other characters too—there’s also a comparison to be made, I feel, between Izuku as both powerful and analytic, and Roy and Hershel who are kind of the same but More and also split apart.

  Anyway, that’s probably enough rambling from me for now.  Good luck with the writing!

[moonlightxarcher]

Selene’s Log, Day One

Update, 7:40 pm. 

“The flight from Sinnoh to Alola took over twelve hours. It was supposed to take eight. Given the shaking in my legs, the unconscious balling of my hands into fists, and the sheer degree of negative thoughts entering my mind, it appears that I may have been more frustrated by the delays than it appears. Further research may be needed to examine the extent of this effect.” Nonetheless, she continues.

“It was past sunset when I touched down in Alola, leaving the bureau on Melemele Island in the middle of the night. Normally at these hours, I would want to take a long bath, enjoy a warm mug of tea and read a good book. However, this flight has left me... now what was that word. Ah yes, restless. Relaxation is not what I need this moment. As such, I have found it wise to begin my studies.”

There is a muffled sound of items being shuffled through a bag and the tell-tale zing of the edge of a spiral notebook rubbing against something hard. “Professor Kukui has recorded data on these nocturnal Ratatta that call this region their home, and I should like to observe them for myself.”    

---

Update, 8:30 pm. 

“Though it may seem odd, I feel a need to apologize to this audio log for not adding to it earlier. It would seem that Alola is as active at night as the city dwellers in Unova. It was not an Alolan Ratatta that I discovered on Route 1, but a Yungoose. These tan and yellow furred mongoose Pokemon are diurnal, so one of them appearing active at night was surely indicative of something gravely wrong. The look in its beady eyes- it seemed frantic, scared. Something capable of scaring even a Yungoos would be trouble. And that something I learned rather soon after was a flock of Spearow. While nature’s course would normally have led to the consumption of this Loitering Pokemon, I fear I could not let it perish, not when I had interfered already in the chase.” 

“As luck would have it, my bow was within easy reach, Drawing its sleek wooden form from its case, I took aim at the lead Spearow, hoping to knock it out of the sky and scare off the others, but I need not have. A determined squawk cut the tension like an Air Slash. A small, screeching, ball of owl careened into the lead Spearow, kicking it in the beak.”

“Between that owl’s attack and the warning arrow I loosed, it sent the flock packing. Though the Yungoos appeared to be scared off as well.”

“Professor Kukui then found me, a bit embarrassed that the surprise had been ruined prematurely. See, he had been intending on giving this owl- Rowlet, to me as a gift for my help in the last paper we wrote together on Grass Type Moves.” A few taps and beeps are heard as an image flashes up on her recording device’s screen.

Name: Strix

Gender: Female

Nature: Bashful

Characteristic: Quick tempered

There is a muted sound of hooting in the background and a dull thud of something weighted landing on a shoulder. “I am sure Strix and I will work well together. She seems to line up well with my sense of justice, what with how she handled the Spearow.” The owl hoots in agreement.

“On Professor Kukui’s advice, we are heading up to Iki Town to talk to the Kahuna-” Her words are briefly interrupted by the dulled sound of an excitable male, happily calling out to the girl and her Rowlet. It would seem that he and the blue sea lion Pokemon walking with her know this owl. Their conversation is muted, but a few small remarks are caught, namely the mention of a battle and a rivalry between the Rowlet and Popplio.

“Leafage, Strix-” comes Selene’s voice clam and clear, just as the recording cuts out.  

---

Update, 9:00 pm.

“Once again, it seems I must apologize. I must admit I accidentally bumped my thumb against the end recording button. I will take measures to ensure that this does not happen again, moving forward.” She pauses a moment to clear her throat. “Having listened back, it appears the recording cut off during my battle with the boy and his Popplio. Hau is...” There is almost a sense of hesitation in the feminine voice, as if trying to find the word that best applies. “...excitable. Perhaps too excitable. But he seems to be a good-hearted kid.” Says the girl only two years his senior. “His attacks left many openings and were poorly planned, but he did pack a punch. The kid has potential, I will give him that.”

“Professor Kukui ran into us not long after our battle ran to its natural completion. Entering the town together, it became quite clear to the locals that the Kahuna was not here. In the meantime, Professor Kukui suggested I head along Mahalo Trail to the shrine of Tapu Koko, to introduce myself to the Island Guardian. It is a custom I am unfortunately not familiar with, but one that he had educated me on prior to my arrival. It seemed more than reasonable, and the walk has given me time to recount the previous-”

The audio recording stutters, the device clacks as it hits the ground. Two different feminine voices mutter apologies to each other, their words unintelligible at first until the device is picked up and handed back to Selene. Both girls suggest that it was her own fault for not paying attention to where she was walking. The distant, tinkling cry of something small, a Pokemon perhaps, is also audible. 

As is the increasingly loud screech of a flock of Spearow.  

“Nebby! Please, can you-” That second feminine voice is heard once more before it is interrupted by the rough squawking, which is in turn interrupted by the hoot of a Rowlet smashing into the side of the smaller bird. Sounds of battle ring out, the device shaking as it is roughly stowed away in a pocket. The clattering sounds of sandal-covered feet clacking against wood can be heard, as well as the telltale flutter of leaves released like darts from the wings of her partner. From amidst the clashing sounds, a whining cry cuts in, and the deep thrum of a shockwave rocks recording, staggering multiple times. 

A shattering snap, like that of splintering wood, and a sudden shriek of fear are all that can be heard... until the ethereal hum of another creature cuts in, sounds of sparking lightning quite nearly cutting off the recording then and there. 

“T-Tapu.. Koko?” Selene’s voice comes in clearer now, though it seems that the damage the device had suffered was making it sound more mechanized. She is left panting, out of breath at the sight of such a lovely creature. If only her device could record video, then she’d really be able to keep a perfect record of sheer beauty of this legend in the flesh.

The device fizzles out.

---

Update, 10:45 pm.

“...And there we go, all fixed up. The device should be picking up my speech clearly enough now.” Selene’s voice seems tired and slightly crackly, but she isn’t wrong; it was far better than the mechanized voice from earlier. “Our encounter on the bridge left the recording device damaged. With the spare parts I had on hand I was able to repair most of the damage, but it may not hold for long. Further investigation into another option to record my experiments or find more parts may be needed.” She clears her throat a moment, seemingly distracted by the onset of sleep.

“Right. An explanation. According to Professor Kukui and Kahuna Hala, it was in fact Tapu Koko that has saved me and that strange space cloud Pokémon Nebby. But before I could say a word to it, much less thank it for saving my life, the legend was gone. But it did leave a gift of sorts. Kahuna Hala refered to it as a Sparkling Stone, and with its smooth black and intricate colored markings, I can see how it would sparkle when held at the right angle in the right light. I have given the stone to the Kahuna, as he has stated that he can make something for me out of it.”

“But I digress. The other girl accidentally recorded on this device is Lillie, she works for the Professor as his assistant. I have spoken with her once or twice, but she had not known that I was coming to Alola in person. It was...” She stops a moment, seemingly thinking better of it, but continues anyway. “She thought it was ‘cute’ that I was making an audio diary. I tried to explain to her that it was to record my research, but she did not listen...” A short pause, the ruffling off hair can be heard. “But I suppose she is not wrong. Alola is a region rich with culture, mythology, and variant Pokemon. Perhaps recording even my daily life could reveal something interesting with further study.”

Now, where was she? Lillie’s words had thrown her off a bit. “Ah, yes. The Spearow that attacked were without a doubt the same ones as before, so I tried to explain to Lillie the fact they all very nearly got hurt was my fault, but... Lillie refuses to let me take the blame. She really is a kind soul. I am not sure I would have been able to say the same. When we returned, Lillie explained what had happened to Kahuna Hala, and that was when I showed him the stone. I am not sure what he could be doing with it, but the thought intrigued me enough.”

“It was rather late by then, so the Kahuna sent us all off. Professor Kukui had prepared a bed for me in the basement of his lab, so I walked with him and Lillie. I had asked why they had not already converted the basement into a larger room for Lillie, but it seemed like the girl actually enjoyed her little loft area. It personally seemed too small in the video footage I had seen, but if it worked for her, I cannot argue.”

“Back at the lab, the Professor was happy to present me with another gift. He would have given it to me earlier, but it had not been ready yet: A Rotom Pokedex. I had read about them in a recent tech magazine, but I have to say they are far more impressive in person. The Professor went all-out in this, I will give him that. He had modified the Pokedex to include a proper camera for taking pictures and video, and the Rotom placed inside it to act as the AI was very well trained. I was able to speak with it briefly before it had to enter a shutdown mode to properly update and install all the programs.” She pauses, the light sound of fingers tapping as she mentally trails off a bit.

“I wonder... Maybe once he is up, I will ask the Rotom if he would help me with my logs...” A longer pause, for a moment it seems like the recording has died, but then she picks it up again. “Fatigue appears to be setting in. I ought to sleep, there is a long day of science and research planned for tomorrow.”

End Day One.

[dinoswrites]

Clothed in Light || Chapter 3: Just Friends

Arranged Marriage AU. Asra/Apprentice/Muriel. Ongoing.

| Previous | Masterpost | Next |

It takes nearly two weeks just to clear the garden out.

Muriel helps as often as he can. He’s the only one who can lift the dead trees, though that doesn’t stop Asra from trying with spells he’s half-mastered. And it’s faster to get rid of all the dead plants if he just carries them out into the street. After all the neighbours have happily taken all the free firewood and kindling they can carry, Muriel borrows a cart and brings in as much rich soil in from the forest as he can, while Asra helps Kai sort out the new layout.

Or, as Muriel sees the minute he and the overburdened cart turn the last corner to the shop, Kai decides on the layout while Asra lounges on top of the tall stone wall that surrounds the garden. On his back, one leg hanging over the side, and his hat over his eyes.

Muriel can hear Kai’s voice through the wall, muffled as it is. “I think this was supposed to be a reflecting pool. Before the uh, turtle got to it.”

It takes Asra a moment to respond. When he does, his words are slow, and his tone lethargic. “What’s it supposed to reflect?”

“The sky, silly. The moon, the sun, the stars… It’s a very easy way to enhance rituals performed here. Not that you could sit anywhere the way this garden was laid out to begin with.”

Asra hums. “Sounds nice.”

Muriel brings the cart to a halt beside the wall. He stands under Asra and scowls up at him, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Get down before you fall.”

Asra doesn’t even react. “Missed you too, Muri.”

He hears a scrambling sound, and then Kai grunting once or twice before her head appears above the wall. “Hello Muriel! You’re back sooner than I expected.”

Muriel glowers up at her. “Stop climbing the wall! It’s dangerous!”

She gives him a bashful smile. “Sorry,” she says, before her head disappears again.

Muriel sighs, shakes his head, and grabs the handles of the cart again. Before he can go anywhere, he hears the slip of a bare foot on stone, and Kai yelps.

He drops the cart again, heart hammering in his chest. When he looks up, Asra is sitting up and leaning over the side of the wall—but then he hears Kai’s nervous laughter, and sees Asra’s shoulders relax.

“Whoops!” she says, still laughing. “Nearly slipped!”

Muriel scowls at the wall. “Stay there,” he says.

He can feel Kai’s embarrassment as her laughter fades. “Okay.”

Muriel finds the handholds that Asra carved out of the side of the wall—which got him an earful from Jay—and he’s at the top of the wall as quick as he can. He sits at the top, and peers down to see Kai, still hanging onto the top of the wall. Her hair is tied up in a bun, and there’s dirt under her nails and smudged on her forehead.

She is biting her lip to hide a smile. Her embarrassment vanishes, and he can feel that she is… happy. Happy to see him.

Muriel helps her back up onto the top of the wall to sit between himself and Asra, ignoring his burning cheeks.

“Thank you, Muriel.” She dusts off her pants, then glances over her shoulder to the cart Muriel has abandoned, and the wolf at its side. “Hello to you too, Inanna. Oh! Muriel! You brought so much!”

Muriel takes a deep breath, but the late afternoon air is still too warm to cool his face down. “It’s a big garden.”

“No that’s great! I think this is just as much as I need! Thank you!” Then she squints, and starts to try to turn around on the wall. “And that bag, is that…”

Asra reaches over, and steadies her with a hand on her back. “Let’s try not to make Muri panic anymore today, Kai.”

“Sorry. Did you bring something else? Is that bag full of…”

Muriel clears his throat. “Eggshells. For compost.”

Kai beams up at him. “Have you been saving them up all week? Muriel that’s so sweet of you.”

He looks up, and wishes the sun would go ahead and set already. “… Usually just throw them out.”

“Did you get sunburnt? The aloe vera plant perked up yesterday, I think we could risk a trimming.”

“… S’fine.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I’ll just go get it now.”

“Wait!”

But Kai has already scrambled down the wall. She lands harmlessly on the dusty earth, and then vanishes through the shop’s back door.

Muriel glances up at the second floor window. Kai’s aunt leans one elbow on the sill, smoking her foul-smelling herbs, watching Muriel and Asra on the wall.

She’s smiling. When Muriel scowls at her, she winks and takes another drag.

Muriel sees Kai run past her aunt, and hears the disgusted noise she makes. “Must you smoke that in the house? It smells awful.”

Jay rolls her eyes. “Stars, girl, you sound older than I am.” But she extinguishes her joint on the windowsill before stepping back and letting the curtain fall.

Muriel glances back at Asra—who is smiling at him, cheeks dimpling, as if he knows some big secret Muriel doesn’t.

“W-what?”

Asra tilts his head to the side. “Just happy to see you making friends, that’s all.”

Muriel tries his best to scowl. “Am not.”

Asra laughs. He swings his legs over the side of the wall and jumps down, landing on the street with a flare of magic to protect him.

“Am not!”

“Sure, sure. Can you tell Kalani I’ll come back to walk her home?”

“Where are you going?”

“Trade meeting,” he answers with obvious disdain. He stops to pet Inanna, who leans into his hand happily, before waving and taking off at a jog down the street. “See you!”

Muriel glowers after Asra, before climbing down the wall himself and bringing the cart around to the front of the shop. He pokes his head in the front door, sees that Kai and her aunt are still upstairs, and then reaches into his pocket and pulls out a small satchel of protection herbs. He leaves it tucked into the corner of the doorstep, where it won’t be disturbed, and then turns back to the cart.

As he’s bringing the soil through the shop and out to the garden, Kai slowly makes her way downstairs again. But she doesn’t say anything—and she seems suddenly subdued, in quiet contemplation, so he lets her be until he brings in the last sack, the one full of eggshells, and dumps it on Kai’s budding compost pile.

He steps back into the shop—and there’s Kai, still sitting on the bottom step, turning the broken-off aloe leaf over and over in her hands.

He clears his throat, and she startles, jumping to her feet.

“Your face!”

She actually reaches up—and he freezes in place, torn between stepping back and not wanting to hurt her feelings—but she looks up at him, and her expression falls just a little. A tiny, tiny wave of misery escapes her.

“Oh, Asra got it already.”

Muriel shifts his weight, watching her hands fall, and her gaze with them.

When the silence stretches a little too long even for him, he says, “Didn’t burn.”

Kai sighs, and that tiny wave of misery spikes. “You don’t have to lie to me to make me feel better, Muriel.”

“… What?”

She sits down on the bottom stair. Her misery stews a bit, growing strong enough that Muriel starts to feel it in his own chest.

He is struck by the urge to sit with her. Shake her out of it. Almost does, but he’s too big to sit next to her on the stairs.

All of a sudden, Kai takes a deep breath, and, still looking down at her hands, says, “Just because Asra and I got married, doesn’t mean you two can’t still… you know.”

No. No he doesn’t know. “What?”

Kai buries her face in her hands. “I know you’re in love with each other,” she says into her palms.

Muriel stops breathing.

… What?

What?

What?

“And Asra only married me to help me,” Kai continues on, her voice still muffled by her hands. “We don’t… we don’t do anything. We even take turns sleeping on the floor every night. We’re just friends. So you two can just… go on like you were before.”

Muriel’s chest feels tight. His heart feels like it’s trying to climb out through his throat, battering his whole body on the way out.

She knows.

How does she know?

Does Asra know?

“I’m so sorry I made all this so complicated. Maybe if I wasn’t so useless I could have seen it without my aunt telling me, and I could have just said something from the beginning, and we could have avoided this whole misunderstanding entirely.”

Her aunt knows?!

Her misery has been steadily growing this entire time—and it feels like that time Inanna got trapped in a sinkhole, after the monsoon, and he had to go in and get her. And while Kai is sitting in the middle of it, unmoving, steadily sinking deeper, Muriel is on the edge of it, feeling it suck at his ankles, the forest fire of his own panic burning him alive.

If her aunt knows, then Asra…

Muriel turns on his heel and leaves.

“Muriel?”

He ignores Kai. He ignores Inanna’s curious whine. He storms out of the shop, not even waiting for Inanna to catch up. He leaves the borrowed cart and charges directly for the alley across the street.

“Muriel!”

Does Asra know? Has Asra known this whole time?

If he knows, then…

“Muriel!” Kai calls, her voice further away. “Muriel I’m sorry! Come back!”

He runs.

He runs as fast as he can through the back alleys of Vesuvia. Through familiar back ways and all the shaded places he knows will hide him from the people who live here, who walk and laugh and talk in the streets. Who would see him and be frightened, as he barrels from the magic shop to the city gates, his throat and eyes burning, his hands clenched into fists.

Don’t look at me. Don’t look at me.

Asra knows, Asra knows and he went and got married anyway—

He does not see the boxes until he crashes over them. He falls over them and they splinter under his weight, his foot and elbow breaking clean through two of the flimsy wooden boxes. He scrambles to right himself, kicking the box off his foot, and pauses, finally, to rub at his eyes with the back of his arm.

He’s bleeding through his hide boot, a long cut along the side of his foot. It stings, and then it starts to really hurt, and he tries to let that ground him. Tries to focus on that, and not the tears running down his face.

Inanna whines, and tries to lick the blood from his foot.

He shakes her off, and limps a few steps down the alley.

She whines again. And again—and as he keeps limping, he realises that she isn’t following.

When he turns back, she is half-turned herself; back the way they came, though she’s still watching him. Ears forward, eyes wide with worry.

“We’re going home,” he chokes out, his voice even rougher than normal.

Inanna sits down in the alley.

Muriel exhales, rough and ragged. “I’d like her better than me, too.”

Inanna’s ears flatten against her skull, and she lets out an annoyed huff.

“I’m going home,” he says, turning and limping down the alleyway.

He has to stop at the end and lean on the wall—and he curses, under his breath, at the pain in his foot and… and everything else, he supposes.

When he reaches down, Inanna is there at his side. Her rough fur coarse on his hands, leaning into his touch.

He swallows the apology he doesn’t give her. And then he takes a deep breath, and starts limping home.

 --

It’s getting dark, and Asra can’t find Kalani.

He showed up at the shop, and she wasn’t waiting for him. Knocked on the back door, over and over, until Jay opened it, her monkey on her shoulder and picking something out of her teeth with a sewing needle.

“What?”

He’d stared at her. “I’m… here to take Kalani home. She normally waits outside…?”

“Oh yeah.” She had taken a moment to pick at her teeth further, and then pause to examine the needle. “She left.”

“She what.”

“You got cotton in your ears or what, kid? I said she left. Ran off after your big friend, all in a panic. Wonder what it was about…”

“She—she ran off? And you let her?”

“I’m not her mother.”

“You’re her aunt!”

“And?” Jay had absently tapped the needle against her chin, while Zaru scowled at Asra and chittered under his breath. “She’ll find her way back eventually, kid. The palace is pretty hard to miss.”

“She could get mugged! Or fall into the ocean!”

“Relax, kid. Bet you ten silver she’s already back home safe and sound.”

Asra’s tried tracing Muriel’s usual route. Through back alleys and down narrow, shaded paths—but he doesn’t catch a glimpse of her, or even feel her when he casts spells looking for her. He grew up darting around street corners with Muriel, avoiding guards and angry shopkeepers alike—he knows this city like the back of his hand.

But… it’s a big city. And he has no idea where Kalani would go.

He spends an hour circling around Muriel’s usual route, looking into open stalls and clambering over garden walls, before it starts to rain. Slow, heavy, thick drops, that soon turn from two or three on his head to a heavy, skin-pelting storm. He hides under a canvas shade, conserving his magic for searching, and tries to think. Just… think.

Maybe she’s with Muriel. Maybe she wanted to go feed the chickens.

Friend? Faust asks.

“We’ll find her,” Asra assures her with a confidence he doesn’t feel.

He finds a barrel someone’s put out to collect rainwater, already overflowing. He drags it back towards the awning, ignoring the rain pelting his face, and then spends a painful minute waiting for the water to draw completely, utterly still.

He’s never tried this spell before, but…

He closes his eyes and tries to remember the Magician’s words. Sometimes it’s hard when he wakes up, but sometimes, if he just focuses…

It takes no effort at all to picture the strange fox, with his smug grin and clever, otherworldly eyes. Why do you always make this so hard on yourself, Asra?

When he opens his eyes, and looks down at the barrel, the still water looks up into the shadow of the tree making up Muriel’s hut. The image is distorted occasionally—ripples breaking up the surface as single drips fall from the branches and roots above. But the puddle, or whatever he’s seeing through, is stable enough for the spell to hold.

He can hear the steady, constant sound of an axe breaking wood.

Of course Muriel would chop wood in the rain.

“Muri!” he calls. “Muri!”

The sound stops. Asra waits, breath in his throat, until Muriel’s face appears above the puddle.

“… What?”

“Is Kalani with you?”

Muriel’s brow furrows in confusion. “No.”

“I went to get her but she wasn’t at the shop. Her aunt said that she ran off after you so I hoped…”

Muriel’s eyes widen, and the colour drains from his face.

“Did you two have a fight?”

Muriel moves to step away from the puddle.

“Wait! It’s okay Muri, I’m not mad. I just—we need to find her, okay? She doesn’t know her way back and it’s pouring rain and—and—”

Muriel mutters something under his breath. The rainfall from above distorts it further, and Asra almost loses concentration on the spell.

“What?”

“I’m coming. Wait—wait there.”

“Meet you by the gates,” Asra says instead, and takes off in that direction.

Muriel meets him there so quickly that Asra’s sure he must have run the whole way. Inanna is with him, rain-soaked and miserable, and Muriel immediately holds out his cloak for her to hide under as he pauses to catch his breath.

“Did you bring your runes?” Asra asks.

Muriel only nods. He’s pale, and the line of his jaw is drawn tighter than normal.

It’s not til Asra tries to tug him towards the closest awning, and Muriel hisses, that Asra realises something’s wrong.

“Your foot!” he cries, seeing now that he’s barefoot, and wearing bandages soaked through with blood. “What—what happened?”

Muriel clearly tries not to look embarrassed, but Asra’s known him too long for that. “Tripped.”

“On what? A sword?”

Muriel mutters something under his breath.

“For—sit down and let me heal that before you bleed out.”

“No.”

“What do you mean, no?”

“I’m fine.”

“You’re not fine, it’s going to get infected—”

Muriel shoves past Asra, nearly knocking him over. “Let’s just find Kai.”

“I’d rather find her without you passing out from blood loss!”

Muriel doesn’t even stop; he just keeps limping away, one lumbering step at a time. “Why.”

Asra lets out a strangled noise. Then he walks quickly to catch up with Muriel—even limping, he moves fast. “I don’t know, Muri, because you’re my best friend? Because I can’t carry you even if I use magic and you passing out in the street might be a minor inconvenience? Because I don’t want to explain to Kalani when we do find her that you were too stubborn to let me help you and that’s why—”

“She likes Kai better,” Muriel snaps.

Asra stares at the cloak blocking Muriel’s face, his mouth hanging open as they walk.

Muriel…

Muriel’s never interrupted him.

“You should know. You married her.”

Is he…

Is he imagining that bitter tone?

Asra’s steps slow, until they stop entirely.

Muriel’s never warmed up to anyone so fast. Not anyone who wasn’t an animal. They’ve only known Kalani a few weeks, and now Muriel’s this worked up that she’s missing, when he didn’t even want her there in the first place…

“You like her,” Asra blurts.

Several long paces ahead now, Muriel slows to a stop, but does not turn around.

“You… you like her.”

Inanna, still at Muriel’s side, looks up at him and whines.

Muriel doesn’t even budge. He just stands there, his cloak being steadily battered by the rain, facing away from Asra.

“Muri,” Asra says, “I—I didn’t really marry her, not like that. If you like her, that’s—that’s great! It’s great!”

He really wishes Muriel would just… turn around. Say something. Maybe roll his eyes, or that weird pout he does—

But he doesn’t. He just stands there, his back still to Asra.

And Asra just keeps talking, talking over the sound of his own heart in his chest, his pulse in his ears. “Muriel, you’re my best friend. If you want to… you know. Do stuff with her, or whatever. Whatever people do when they—”

“If I let you heal my foot, will you stop talking?”

Asra can’t help but laugh. It’s nervous, and too-loud, but it makes Muriel turn, finally, and glance over his shoulder just long enough for Asra to see his beet-red face, before he limps over to a couple of heavy wooden boxes on the side of the street.

Asra jogs up and joins Muriel, kneeling in front of him. When he reaches to take his foot between his hands, however, Muriel jerks it out of the way. Asra looks up at Muriel’s flushed face, finding that Muriel is still not quite meeting his gaze.

“Never tell Kai about this.”

Asra laughs, his own cheeks warm. “Yeah. Okay.”

Asra makes Muriel stay seated a while, after his foot is healed. He sits on a barrel nearby, his heels resting on the rim and his elbows resting on his knees. Muriel keeps looking at his hands, his brows furrowed, and Asra finds that he can’t not look at Muriel.

He’s happy for Muriel. Really. He and Kalani—Kai—would be great together. Muriel’s so gentle and protective and Kai is just so curious about the world, they could really help each other come out of their shells.

It would be great. They would be great.

Great. Together.

“Asra?”

Asra jumps. Muriel’s scowling at him, now, like he’s said his name a few times and Asra hasn’t heard.

“Great!” Asra blurts. “You’re—I’m—everything’s great. Except Kala—Kaila—Kai being missing, that’s not great, but now your foot’s great, so it won’t get gangrene and fall off, sorry, not talking. You were saying?”

Muriel doesn’t—he just reaches for his belt, and pulls his runes out of his pouch.

Asra clears his throat. “Good idea.”

Asra stays crouched on top of the barrel, shielding them from the rain with a barrier, while Muriel casts runes on the ground. Asra’s never gotten the hang of reading them, himself—mostly he keeps at it because it still makes Muriel laugh, sometimes. So he watches as Muriel tosses the runes, and then stares at them a while, his expression blank, before scowling and then picking them up again.

He does this three more times, each time drawing more confusion from him than the last, before he looks up at Asra and says, “She’s at the palace.”

Asra’s shoulders slump with relief. “Well you could have just said—”

“She’s not alone.”

 --

Muriel hasn’t snuck into the palace with Asra in years. Not since they built his hut in the woods together. It felt strange at the time, choosing to live so far from Asra—but his parents kept hinting that Muriel should stay more often, and trying to buy him things, and he just…

Asra and Kai have their own set of rooms, now. But Muriel’s shoulders won’t fit through the window, so Asra has to sneak him in through the servants’ stairs.

“Don’t worry,” Asra whispers, opening the door from the stairs to the hallway. “I fixed the singing problem. No one will even know you’ve been here.”

Muriel shrugs his shoulders a few times. “It’s itchy.”

“That’s uh. New. I’m working on it. Stay close, okay? If you get too far away I’ll lose the spell.”

He stays as close as he can without stepping on Asra’s feet. The hall is eerily quiet—but it’s late, and if he remembers correctly it’s about time for the servants to eat their own meals, or to finish up whatever tasks are required of them before they are done for the night. There’s not much reason to be up in this wing at this time of day, when the people who live here want privacy.

Probably no reason for Asra to make Muriel invisible, then—but he’ll take itchy skin rather than being seen up here.

“Whoever’s with her,” Asra whispers, “there’s a rope she knows to pull if there’s trouble. And she hasn’t yet. So there might not be trouble?”

Or whoever’s in there with her has killed her, Muriel thinks. But the hall is too empty, and too quiet, and he’s too worried his voice will carry, and also it would probably make Asra panic, so he keeps that to himself.

They get to the door to Asra and Kai’s room without trouble—Asra unlocks it with a spell, and Muriel strains but he can’t hear anything but he can feel… something… Kai’s in there for sure, teeth-grinding nervousness and worry radiating from her, but there’s something else in there that is feeling… curiosity? Contentedness? Not human, certainly.

Then Asra opens the door, and the only thing coming out of that room is a pure, overwhelming rage.

Kai shouts, “Wait!” just as a tiny black blur launches itself at Asra’s face.

Asra throws up a barrier—dropping the invisibility spell on Muriel—just in time to stop the world’s smallest, angriest cat from ripping his face to shreds. It’s smaller than one of Muriel’s hands, and has pitch-black fur and eyes that glow like hot coals, its ear flat against its skull and all its fur on end as it yowls, infuriated at being denied its target.

Muriel has seriously never felt anything so angry in his life. He actually takes a step back, before he remembers that the cat is smaller than his foot, and on the other side of Asra’s barrier.

“What the—”

Before Asra can even finish, the cat scrambles up Asra’s barrier and over it, launching itself at Muriel’s head. Muriel jerks to the side, so that the cat lands with all four paws on a tapestry on the opposite wall.

“Don’t let him out again—”

Asra drops his barrier, and steps aside, letting a wind-swept and frantic-looking Kai through.

She very nearly crashes into Muriel’s chest—he catches her by the shoulders before she does, and as she looks up at him, startled, all he can think of is how small she is, how close she is, how breathless she looks…

He drops his hands from her shoulders and takes a step back, face burning.

Kai immediately starts trying to shove him sideways.

Asra pulls up another barrier, just as the cat launches himself off the wall and at Muriel’s head. He tries to shred the barrier open with his claws, and when that fails, yowls even louder and launches himself back at the tapestry, claws ripping several long tears in it as he slides down the wall to the floor.

At that moment, Muriel hears shouting coming from down the hall.

“Up here, Lady Aisha, the demon—”

“I’m sure it’s not a demon.”

“Maybe get behind us just in case, though.”

The cat goes very still. His ears flick in the direction of the voices.

“Oh no,” Kai says. “No, wait—”

The cat takes off down the hall, and Kai lets go of Muriel and sprints after it as fast as she can. Asra scrambles after her, and Muriel follows.

The cat reaches the corner nearly the same moment that Asra’s parents and a servant round it.

“Look out!” Kai yells, as the cat leaps directly at Aisha’s face—

Only for Aisha to raise her hand, and for the cat to be encased in a bubble.

Kai slides to a halt. Asra and Muriel catch up to her while she tries to catch her breath, and while the cat floats, weightless and all the more infuriated for it, a hair’s breadth from Aisha’s outstretched hand. Her familiar winds itself down her arm and smells the bubble with its tongue.

The cat bats at it, but that only makes the cat rotate in a slow, harmless circle in the air.

“Manners, dear,” Aisha scolds.

The cat lets out a low, angry growl.

“Fascinating!” Salim pushes his spectacles up his nose, and leans in to get a closer look. The cat swipes at him, but he doesn’t even flinch—only glancing occasionally over at Kai as he inspects the furious, slow-spinning cat. “Aisha, do you see this?”

“Yes, my love,” she deadpans, “I believe I see it.”

“I’d only heard stories about them, never seen the real thing—Kalani, wherever did you find—”

“I’m so sorry,” Kai blurts. “There were some children throwing rocks at him in a barrel and I couldn’t just leave him there but no one would help me find where he belonged and it was getting dark and it was raining so I had to bring him here and I told him so many times that he had to behave—”

The more frantically Kai speaks, the louder the cat’s growling becomes, until Salim leans back from the cat and looks at Kai with a lop-sided, and impossibly fond, smile.

“That’s all perfectly fine Kalani,” he says, “but would you mind telling your familiar that none of us want to hurt you? That should calm him down a little.”

No one says anything for a moment. Everyone looks at Kai, who stands there, wide-eyed and out of breath, for what must be a full minute before she says, “I’m sorry. My what?”

Salim laughs. Aisha, who this whole time has been fixing the cat with a severe expression, cracks a smile.

“Ester,” she says, “would you have some tea brought up for everyone? Up to mine and Salim’s rooms, please.”

Ester, the servant who came up with Asra’s parents, hardly lets Aisha finish before bolting back the way she came.

Tea comes shortly after they’re all settled. Asra’s parents’ sitting room is wide and spacious, with plenty of couches and cushions for sitting and every wall lined with bookshelves, those filled either with books or plants. Muriel has fond memories of sneaking up here, Asra teaching him to read under the canopy of pillow forts, eating as much food as they please while a snake or two slithers nearby. Sometimes he wonders how different his life would be if he had just stayed here—but then he thinks of the quiet still of the forest in the morning, the steady beat of Inanna’s paws on soft soil, and knows he would not have been happy.

After all, if it was so perfect here, then why was Asra always sneaking out?

Tonight, Kai sits on the softest chair, her new familiar in her lap glaring at Aisha with his ears flat against his skull. His overwhelming rage has calmed to a noticeable discontentment, his tail twitching every so often, but he has not attempted to claw anyone else’s face off since Aisha let him out of the bubble.

Asra and Muriel sit on the couch nearby, Faust happily slithering her way back and forth across their shoulders, and Salim and Aisha each take an armchair, close enough that their fingertips touch when their hands hang off the armrests.

Ester does not bring the tea. A familiar old woman with a cane enters first, followed by a much younger servant who carries the tray.

“Thank you, Serris, Amin. Just set it down, I’ll serve everyone.”

“It is no problem at all, Lady Aisha.” The old woman, Serris, smiles warmly at everyone without looking directly at them. Her pupils, Muriel sees, are clouded by cataracts. “Amin has brought some snacks for your family of serpents—and I heard something about a cat, so the kitchen has sent up some fish trim. Good for the fur, as I understand it.”

Amin sets the tray down with shaking hands, his eyes never leaving the cat in Kai’s lap.

Muriel thinks the whole palace has heard about the cat, by this point.

“You said you found him in a barrel?” Salim asks, while Aisha serves the tea.

The cat flat out refuses to leave Kai’s lap, so she holds the bowl of fish trim in her hands while he devours it. “Yes. On the south end of town.”

“Whatever were you doing there?” Aisha wonders, her brows furrowing. “Kalani, that’s an extremely dangerous part of town. Turning down the wrong alley could have landed you in serious trouble.”

“I—I didn’t think it seemed so bad…”

“But how did you get there? I can’t imagine your aunt sent you on an errand. She can’t be that foolish.”

From the tone of Aisha’s voice, and the irritation rising from her in a muddled cloud, it’s clear that’s exactly what she thinks happened.

Asra glances over at Muriel, but doesn’t say anything.

“Even if she did,” Salim interrupts, “clearly no harm came to Kalani. I’m sure Jay had her reasons…”

“I can’t imagine what those might be. Not one bit.”

Muriel may not be… very fond of Jay either. But he thinks of the garden, and how heartbroken Kai would be if she weren’t allowed to go back to it…

He thinks of towers. Far away in the mountains, or high above a city.

He takes a deep breath, and opens his mouth to speak.

“Oh!” Kai shifts in place, holding the fish bowl in one hand while the other digs through her pocket. “I almost forgot!”

The cat lets out a high-pitched noise of complaint as Kai shifts around, but does not stop eating. It’s… an alarmingly cute sound, for the angriest cat Muriel has never met.

Kai pulls a familiar satchel, bound in cloth and tied in twine, out of her pocket. “Muriel,” she says, “you left this on the doorstep.”

She’s holding it out to him, expectantly.

He stares at it. And then at her—at her smile, easy and friendly. Her hair tousled from wind and rain, her clothes splashed with mud, and covered in patches of black cat fur.

There is only kindness in her expression. From her he feels a touch of embarrassment, and a soft, welcoming fondness as she regards him.

His cheeks grow warm. He clears his throat. “I know. It’s… for protection.”

“Really?” Kai turns it over in her hand, and gives it a delicate sniff. “Protection for whom?”

Muriel feels his face begin to burn. He can’t quite meet Kai’s gaze, and finds himself looking down at the floor, and the eyes of everyone in the room on him.

Then he feels Asra’s hand on his knee, and the cool reassurance of his aura wash over him. “It’s to protect the shop,” Asra answers for him, “and the people who live in it.”

They spend nearly another hour discussing Kai’s familiar—how to ensure their bond grows healthily, a short tangent where they get sidetracked trying to pick a name for him, and a great deal of wondering where he came from—and by the end of it, Aisha and Salim won’t hear a thing about Muriel heading back out to the woods.

“It’s pouring rain out there,” Aisha says. “You can sleep in Asra’s old room—is Inanna nearby? She’s more than welcome, as you always are, Muriel.”

Muriel clears his throat. “She went home. Doesn’t like walls.”

Aisha is already standing and heading to another room. “Of course, of course. I’m sure we can magic up something for you to sleep in, let me see what we have in the closet…”

“Meanwhile, Asra, give me a hand making the bed?”

“Sure thing, Dad.” Asra gives Muriel’s knee a quick squeeze, before standing and joining his father in the other room. Leaving Muriel and Kai (and her new familiar) alone in the room together.

Neither of them say anything for a good, long time. Kai tucks her hair behind her ear, while her cat glares at him. Muriel looks down at his hands, at the things around the room, at the tea he didn’t drink, at his feet…

“I won’t tell Asra,” Kai blurts into the silence.

Muriel glances up at her. She’s biting her lip, and petting her cat, and not quite looking at Muriel.

“What… what I said today. Earlier. I won’t tell him.”

“… Thanks.”

“And um. I guess you can take this back,” she says, holding out the satchel once again. “Like I said, you don’t have to… you don’t have to be nice to me. Because of Asra.”

He looks down at the satchel in her hand.

“It’s not that I—I should say thank you. I really appreciate it. And the eggs. I really—it’s very sweet. I’ve never had friends before, and I really… really liked thinking we were friends. Because you wanted to be.”

He can feel her misery, again. Threatening to build just as strong as before—and her cat seems to feel it too, because he turns around and stands on his hind legs and buries his face in the side of her neck, suddenly purring louder than a cat that small and that angry has any business doing.

Kai lets out a surprised laugh, and blinks rapidly. Her eyes are suspiciously shiny.

“… Did it for you.”

Her eyes snap to his. “What?”

He swallows. “The… eggs. Satchel. They’re… they’re for you.”

She keeps staring at him, her brow furrowing. Her mouth hangs slightly open, as if she feels she should say something, but doesn’t know what.

So he shrugs, and glances down at the floor. “… I’d like to be friends, too.”

Kai’s happiness fills the room in a single, bright burst of warmth.

“Then we’re friends,” she says, with a soft voice that barely contains everything he knows she is feeling.

And he can’t help but glance over at her again, just to catch a glimpse of her smile; the corners of her eyes crinkling, how she bites her lip a little as she beams up at him, holding satchel and cat close to her heart.

You like her, Asra had said. And he had thought, in the rain, that it was just Asra getting everything wrong again—because what he feels for Asra isn’t what he feels for Kai, who is sweet, and small, and gentle. Who was so concerned over a sunburn, who plucked a stray cat out of the gutters of the city and brought him back to the palace to find where he belonged.

It isn’t. It’s… different. Isn’t it?

“Friends,” he agrees, still a little breathless at the sight of her smile.

[neriad13]

The Watcher as a Companion

A prompt fill for @ariela-of-aedyr‘s post! This was way more fun than it had any right to be.

If your Watcher, or other Pillars OC, was a recruitable companion instead of the main character, how and where would they be introduced to the main party?

Late at night, the Defiant’s spotter sights a sea battle going on in the distance. Cannons roar across the dark water. The scene is illuminated by flashes of cannon-fire and magelight. As your ship draws closer, the spotter identifies the colors of the ship under siege - a large, full-bellied galleon - as Vailian and those of the other - a smaller, sleeker affair - as Príncipi.

It’s too late by the time the Defiant arrives. The galleon is dead in the water, pirates swarming over its deck. However, it’s obvious that the pirates took more than a few hits themselves. What remains of their crew is easily overwhelmed by the Defiant’s boarding party.

The above-deck situation taken care of, you set out to check for survivors below. From somewhere deep in the hold, you hear an incessant pounding and an angry Huana curse that roars through the ship. Fractured psychic echoes batter your mind as you descend - the feeling of heavy chains around thin wrists, the ache of rowing for endless, sunless days without rest, a toothless cook slopping fish stew into a bowl hard enough to splash boiling liquid on an already beaten body.

“Fish for the Fish Face.” he laughs, his gummy smile rotten and hideous.

The images fade and you find yourself in the deepest cargo hold of the ship. Ahead, you see a large shape moving in the darkness, hurling itself against what looks like a nondescript wall again and again, grunting with exertion, crying with rage.

Creeping closer, you identify the shape as an Aumaua, but the kith’s skin is mottled and purple and the shell on their head that you initially took for a helm is a thick, bony carapace, built into the contours of the kith’s skull.

A death godlike.

The godlike screams, a terrible, soul-rending sound and heaves her shoulder through the wall with a mighty crack.

You feel the echoes of that scream in your soul and the psychic imprint of passion, of defiance. You feel the weight of the oar you were chained to for years on end in your hands and hear the resounding crack it makes as you use it to smash the head of the man who put you there.

The vision clears. Many hands are reaching through the wood paneling, tearing loose the last bits of the hidden door, reaching out to the person who smashed it.

One by one, kith after kith - Orlans, Vailians, what looks like half a tribe of bedraggled Huana - are helped up through the splintered door by the sturdy hands of their savior. A few of them flinch away at the sight of her face but most of them shower her with praise and thanks. They’re all pale and sweaty and weak. Some fall to the ground the moment they’re free of the secret compartment. The stronger ones immediately set to searching the hold for medicine once they’ve got their bearings.

Only when the godlike has emptied the chamber of occupants, does she turn around to face you.

The carapace covers her face down to the tip of her nose. You can’t help but think that it does make her look like a bony-headed species of fish that you’ve eaten once or twice since coming to the Deadfire.

“So I suppose you’re the one responsible for why my old crewmates aren’t down here scavenging for treasure.” she says resignedly, crossing her arms.

“Well, do what you like with the pirates, but I’ll not have you laying a finger on any of them.”

She steps in front of a little Huana girl protectively.

- Who are you?

A wry smile twists her purple lips.

“They called me Ika Maka. So that must be my name.”

[Deadfire Origin] …fish face?

[Insight] It’s…not a nice name, is it?

She smiles wider, showing her sharpened teeth.

Her stance is unsettlingly defensive.

- What are you doing here?

“Freeing slaves. Captain Esclavista ran a tidy operation under false colors and forged paperwork. I’ve been hunting him for some time. Delivered the killing blow myself. I’ll do it a thousand times over, until there are no more Crookspur captains left.”

- Crookspur?

She frowns.

“Slavers. They’ve got a fortress to the far east of here. Their main targets are isolated Huana tribes, though any person who falls through the cracks will do. They’re good at skirting the law. At staying just out of reach of the big guns.”

- Why were you allied with the Príncipi?

She shrugs.

“A means to an end. The captain is…was…particularly susceptible to…suggestion. I may have…suggested that he hunt this particular trader. I suppose your crew is pillaging what remains of his ship as we speak?”

Afraid so.

“Ah. Too bad. I’ll have to find someone else to suggest ideas to. Say…you wouldn’t be open to giving me a lift, would you?”

And who’s to say that you wouldn’t be suggesting things to me?

She laughs, her shadowed face cracking into the first genuine smile you’ve seen.

“No one, I’m sure. You’ll just have to trust in your own understanding, won’t you?”

Your new party member aboard and the Príncipi loot stowed away, you wave goodbye to the departing ship crewed by newly freed slaves.

Shipboard Dialogue Tree

Ika Maka has made a cozy nook atop a narrow shelf where you store the Defiant’s grog. She barely fits into the tiny space, but seems content. She hops down as she sees you approach and offers you a mug of lukewarm grog.

“To dead slavers!” she shouts, downing the mug in one swig.

To dead slavers!

“Damn straight.” she slurs, as she pours herself another mug.

To new friends!

She flinches as though you were about to slap her and chokes on her grog mid-swallow. Then she wipes her mouth and gives you a gentle smile.

- I saw echoes of your memories in the hold of Esclavista’s ship.

“Oh…did you?”

She fiddles with the handle of the mug nervously. It’s hard to read her face, hidden as it is by her carapace, but she seems bashful.

“Sorry about that. It happens sometimes, when I’m feeling too passionately to hold it in. I’ll see that it won’t happen again. At least…not like that. Though I can’t promise that your crew won’t be treated to the occasional nightmare on account of me.”

- You were a slave?

She purses her lips and squeezes the mug. Just when you think that she isn’t going to answer, she does.

“Yes. I was just a child when I was taken. I don’t even remember my tribe. I was Huana, if you couldn’t tell. Got sold to a Príncipi captain for a strand of shells. Sometimes he used me as shiphunter or brought me out to scare whatever poor souls he was about to send to Ondra but mostly…I was in the galley. Rowing.”

Her lip curls with disgust.

You feel the impression of chains around your wrists and an unfamiliar ache in your back again.

She composes herself and the feelings depart as quickly as they came.

“As I got older, I got better at shiphunting. And I figured out that my skills had other uses. It was little things at first. Suggesting that the cook be kinder to me. Then that he give me a bigger portion. That I be given deckhand duty more often. That the quartermaster misplace his keys one night…”

She smiles wickedly.

“The entire galley rose up and took over the ship. I took care of the captain myself. I don’t think I’ll ever have a moment better than that one.”

She takes a long sip of her grog.

- What happened after that?

“Oh, we got horribly lost. Threw the navigator overboard, see. But those that knew their homes found them eventually and as for the rest of us, we posed as Príncipi for a time. Pillaging what little prizes we could to survive, until we had supplies enough to get out of the Deadfire.”

“After that, I spent some time wandering the Eastern Reach, mostly doing mercenary work. Did a stint in Rauatai. Was an acolyte of Berath for a short while. It didn’t suit me. But, having no idea what to do with myself after leaving that temple…I decided that I wanted to go home…to…”

She takes another sip of the grog, draining the mug and slams it on the galley table.

“To use my skills to give to others what had been taken from me. So here we are. You know the rest.”

- Where are you off to next?

“Not sure. To be honest, I didn’t think I’d live much past Captain Esclavias’s death. Some of the Príncipi were catching on to me. The first mate…she was way too canny. I’ll have to find a new target…and a new ship.”

You think she’s side-eyeing you beneath her carapace, but it’s impossible to be sure.

She catches you looking at her and smiles sweetly in return.

“But in the meantime…”

She scoops up her mug off the table and raises it in a mock salute to you.

“To your ship’s fine hospitality!”

What would their companion quest involve?

You can feel the rage crashing off Ika Maka’s back like a physical presence as you walk down the stairs of the Vailian Trading Company. Once you’re well away from the company guards, she pulls you aside.

“They work with slavers!” she hisses, the words a snarl between her sharpened teeth. “He practically admitted it! Right there, in that…that fancy office! You…cannot be thinking of going through with this, can you?”

If the money’s good…

She levels with you.

“Look. I’ll plunder as much as anyone. Vailian, Royal Deadfire, Príncipi…it doesn’t matter. But this…this is where I draw the line. You cannot deal with them and expect me to stand idly by.”

We need a strong ally against Eothas. If this gets us in with them…

She sighs and squeezes the part of her carapace where the bridge of her nose would have been.

“I know. And the Royal Deadfire Company isn’t much better. But…please…don’t crush the little people in pursuit of the big man.”

No. Never.

She visibly relaxes.

“Hoo…thank you for that. It…means a lot. Truly. Uh…”

Her arms twitch as though to hug you but she quickly drops them to her sides.

“Shall we…carry on, then?”

***

Ika Maka stiffens as you walk across the drawbridge to Crookspur Keep. You can feel the fear radiating off of her. It’s making you sick to your stomach. You’ve seen her do this purposefully to enemy combatants a hundred times over and for the first time, you feel for the poor bastards.

The crowd presses in around you, the air thick with shouted bids and the energy of the auction. The auctioneer babbles a stream of what sounds like nonsense aside from the words “-and SOLD!” and a woman in chains is led off to an eager buyer.

“For our last item of the day…” the auctioneer goes on, swaggering across the stage, “A rare and handsome fellow!”

A tall, stooped death godlike is led up the stairs by the chain attached to his manacles. Growths cover his eyes and spiral up into a pair of amethyst horns far above his head.

Ika Maka is incessantly tugging on your sleeve.

“Buy him!” she mouths, jerking her head toward the stage in a way that isn’t subtle at all. The aura she’s putting off spikes in intensity and you try not to lose your lunch.

The auction begins.

The auctioneer rattles off bids almost too fast for the ear to follow. All you know is that the price is going up and an old woman on the other end of courtyard keeps outbidding you.

Then, all of a sudden, she and all the other bidders fall silent.

You turn to see Ika Maka concentrating intensely, a single finger against her temple.

“Going once for 800 pires?” the auctioneer says, a note of confusion in her voice, “Going twice, 800 pires. And…sold! To our first-timer friend there.”

Ika Maka relaxes and lets out a heavy sigh. The noise of the crowd resumes as though it were never disturbed.

***

Back on the Defiant, Ika Maka and Eliam are happily untangling lines together. They aren’t talking much, but you can feel a warm radiance when you get near to her and the echo of her contentment in your soul.

What traits would affect their approval, positively or negatively?

Your crew eagerly awaits your answer. A dozen unknowing eyes, staring at you beseechingly. What are you to tell them? The truth? The truth is outrageous. It sounds silly when you think it, let alone say it.

But you know that you can’t lie to them. They need to know what they’ll be risking their lives for. But how to say it? Perhaps if you wrapped it in an amusing facade…

Yeah. That would make it more palatable.

You strike a dramatic pose and point a finger across the horizon.

“We’re going after that naked blue giant who stole my soul!”

Nobody laughs. They’re all staring at you, dumbfounded.

Then you hear a snort, followed by a muffed snigger.

[Lighthearted] Ika Maka does a slow clap that doesn’t catch on and almost falls off the barrel she’s sitting on with the force of her laughter.

Which other companions would they get along with, and which would they bicker with, in Party Banter?

“So…” Xoti says, sidling up to Ika Maka as they hike up the Sacred Stair, under the blazing Neketaka sun, “Y’ever…considered Following the Light?”

“What?” Ika Maka snaps, her head abruptly turning to face her, “You think I can see light through this thing?”

She knocks on the front of her carapace. It makes a hollow sound.

Xoti turns bright red down to the tips of her ears.

“Oh, I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean”-

“I get around by smell, you know. And touch. Eco-location.”

She gives the worst impression of a crow you’ve ever heard. Xoti looks at her with a mixture of bewilderment and awe.

A few seconds pass.

“Kidding.” she says gently, resting a hand on her shoulder, “But…no. I’m not interested in any gods. I figure they abandoned me long ago. No sense in digging through that old pail of worms, y’know?”

***

“Heh.”

Ika Maka chuckles weakly, her arms dangling over the railing of the Defiant as it pulls away from the ruins of Hasongo. She nudges Edér in the ribs.

“That kid called you old.”

The faintest of smiles flickers across Edér’s face.

***

Ishiza bobs his head. Edér follows suit. Ishiza hops in place. Edér does the same, in the middle of the palace gardens, Queen Onekaza not ten feet away.

“Does your friend have a head wound?” Maia asks cautiously, eyeing Edér and then the queen.

“Aw, c’mon!” Ika Maka blurts out, draping an arm around Edér’s shoulder, “Let the poor old man talk to birds!”

“Old? You little - !”

Ika Maka squeals with delight as she breaks free, narrowly escaping a headlock. Before he can try again, she dashes across the rooftop, shrieking with laughter, Edér hot on her heels.

***

“Ika Maka…” Pallegina says, an ominous tone in her voice, “I feel obliged to warn you…if you stand for nothing, you’ll fall for the slightest thing. What is it you stand for? Surely there’s more than you’ve been letting on.”

Ika Maka regards her stiffly, thinking it over.

“Grog, mostly.” she finally answers.

Her lips are pursed in thought.

“Hmm…food a close second. Oh, and plunder. That’s pretty good. To buy grog with, you know.”

Pallegina rolls her eyes.

“This isn’t a laughing matter.”

“And what would you have me stand for, hmm? The high ideal of ripping rocks out of the ground and grinding them into fine powder to maybe delete all ills off the face of Eora or else destroy it? Nah. Keep your ideals. I’ll keep my grog.”

***

Everyone gasps as they emerge into the chamber deep beneath the Watershaper’s Guild. Edér whistles as he eyes the dragon before them.

“This’d make a great fishing story.”

Ika Maka nods and nudges him, a wry grin on her lips.

“If you’ll be the bait.”

Would they be romanceable? Would they end up in a romance with another companion, if both were left unromanced (à la Maia & Xoti)?

Your eyes snap open at the sound of splashing. Maia is chasing Xoti around the pool, flicking luminous water at her squealing self. Xoti eventually retaliates, hopping out of the pool and then swamping her with a painful-looking full body slam the force of which you can feel on the other side of the water.

Ika Maka chuckles next to you.

“I’m so glad she found someone else. Besides Gaun, I mean. She needed a more worldly love, you know?”

Any other opinions on romance?

“Hmm…Edér and Iselmyr makes a cute couple.”

She pouts as she thinks deeper on it.

“But it’s awkward. Very awkward.”

And what about yourself?

“Ohhhh, no. Not for me.”

She waves a hand in front of herself as though to ward off evil spirits.

“There…aren’t too many people out there who want to see Rikuhu’s face when they…y’know. After a point I just stopped trying.”

I wouldn’t mind you trying.

“Would you now?”

It’s hard to tell, but you think she’s blushing. She sinks below the water and you hear a muffled squeal followed by an explosion of bubbles.

Would anything make them leave the party, or would they be there for the long haul?

Master Nua flicks through his paperwork.

“Now about the problem of the Wahaki Tribe…they’ve been resisting us for some time but if you take out their leaders, well, that would be mutually beneficial for both of us, right?”

I’ll do it.

“Here, let me mark it on your map…”

All of a sudden, you feel a cold vise close around your body. You can’t move. You can barely think. With great effort, you crane your head toward the direction the feeling’s coming from and see Ika Maka, her mouth set in a hard line, a vein bulging in her neck. Her anger is a nigh-insurmountable wall around your psyche. You struggle to overcome it.

The vise tightens and your hand reaches for your weapon.

Nua, oblivious to what’s happening before him, is writing a note in the margin of your map.

[High Resolve] Gritting your teeth, you break free of Ika Maka’s control. Sweat is pouring down your back. You feel wobbly and weak, like you’ve just broken free of a tremendous undertow with great effort.

Nua looks up and hands you your map. He appears to have seen nothing of the psychic struggle inches away from his desk.

“Good hunting! And best of luck!”

Ika Maka’s face is blank. She refuses to look at you as you leave.

[Low Resolve] Her will overwhelms and crushes yours. You pull your weapon from its holster. Your hand shaking, you aim it at Nua’s bowed head.

At last, he looks up.

“Good hunting! And…”

The smile on his face dies. His eyes go wide.

You pull the trigger.

***

You shouldn’t have done that!

You’re surrounded by the bodies of the slavers you’d hoped would be paying you. Of the wreckage of the alliance you’d hoped would help you take down a god.

“Yeah?”

She spits at your feet. It lands on the cheek of a young guard, his eyes frozen open in death.

“And you shouldn’t have been making deals with slavers!”

I make my own decisions.

Ika Maka smirks.

“So do I. And y’know what I’ve decided?”

She crosses her arms and glowers at you.

“We’re done.”

Notes:

Credit for “Let the poor old man talk to birds!” to @cantankerouscatfish. Thank you for listening to my fandom ramblings and making me laugh. =D

I reeeeeeally wanted to write a banter with Iselmyr, but have less than zero confidence in my Hylspeak writing abilities at the moment. Suffice to say that the two of them get along famously. Her and Aloth, not so much, though he does eventually come around.

[theruneslayer]

Dig Me Two Graves

~Over a decade past~

There wasn’t supposed to be a hand in the purse.

Of course, his -own- hand wasn’t supposed to be there either, but there was no need to get all technical about it. Young Tryndan had marked his target fair and square, and hadn’t spied anyone -else- giving the old geezer a gander. The soldier slumped in his mail, drowsing through the evening’s duty. He sat far from the bonfire’s flickering light so as not to ruin his night vision, though how that would help when they were veiled behind weary lids was anyone’s guess.

The greybeard didn’t seem very good at his job, but soldiers his age weren’t given nightwatch if they were worthy of promotion. And he was too near the clearing’s edge to be an effective watchman either way, as even a child could have slipped the few yards from tree through shadow to slit his throat if needed.

But Tryn was neither a child (he was an apprentice of fourteen or thereabouts, thank you very much), nor of the belief that children should be running around slitting throats in the dark. And he certainly wasn’t in need of any throats being slit… most of all not his own, should he be caught.

No, he was merely the diversion. Get the watchman’s attention and rouse the encampment, then lead them on a merry chase while Crowley’s men took care of any stragglers, ransacking the camp for much-needed supplies. If there was any slitting to be done, it would be there. And if he could pocket a coin or two in the process… ? Well, the more the merrier.

But ‘more’ shouldn’t have involved another hand in the greybeard’s purse.

And it -certainly- wasn’t supposed to belong to a girl.

~Two years later~

Even amidst the carnage, he couldn’t help but watch her dance.

There was no other way to describe the grace with which she fought, and no other word that captured the poetry of her blades in motion. Braids flowed as gravity fought to match her moves, licks of flame reacting to the tumble of logs below.

Two men crumpled to either side in her wake, like a split tree felled in a single blow. It was too late to do anything about the one aiming for his back, however. He’d overextended himself leaping to her defense, a ‘hero’ to the rescue she never needed. But his world was already painted red… not from the blood that poured into his eyes down the gash along his forehead, but the rage that bloomed behind them.

He would die with that rage unspent, but he’d know she yet lived.

~One year later~

They watched from the shadows while Crowley was lead away, the rattle of his shackles muted where they dragged through puddles of blood and shit.

The City’s streets reeked of both as the fallen gave up their ghosts; bodies piled one atop another, or draped limply over the remains of splintered palisades and sturdy barriers. Some could barely be seen beneath shattered horses, and others survived only as parts that were, perhaps, once a whole. A few, here and there amidst the hellish landscape, continued to groan and wail, though their protests grew fainter as the ravens began to feed.

One would not know, merely by surveying the carnage, who here had won, and who had lost. In death, painted in swathes of mud and filth, rebels and royalists alike were equal… in both appearance, and in numbers.

But Greymane’s army had men to spare... and what was war, if not a game of attrition?

Two against many stood no chance, but still he shifted in the rubble, trembling with the tension of cramping, weakened muscles about to pounce.

But there was suddenly a hand in his, and this time he squeezed it hard.

For hers was -supposed- to be there.

~Hours later~

She’d saved him… just as she had not a year past, when he’d been certain the final blow was about to fall.

He could still close his eyes and remember the way he’d fixed her in his sight, during what he’d thought… what he could now only wish... had been the last moment of his life. He’d emblazoned the memory upon his mind’s eye, refusing to look away in the eternity of that single instant... but the only blow that came was the weight of a man crumpling atop him, her throwing dagger lodged in his throat.

She’d always been his better; in rank, in battle, in wits and even wine. She thought, while he seethed; held him in check, when he was too rash. Even when their hands first met in someone else’s purse, hers was there before his own.

Perhaps that had been what he loved about her most… not that she was perfect, but that she’d always left him striving for more. To be better, to keep up, to be worthy.

Worthy of her.

Sometimes, he’d thought, she -let- him catch her. But mostly, she merely lead him on a merry chase.

For she loved that he was a hunter at heart.

But it was -they- who were hunted now, remnants of rebellion who slunk back into shadow with the taste of death upon their tongues.

~Weeks later~

The Headlands howled with a mournful song, whistling through crag and ruin as if even the wind bore echoes of a nation’s lament.

But the hovel they’d found amidst the desolate hills rang with sounds of life, of love… desperate, perhaps, to keep the lingering echo of their comrades’ cries at bay. Their bodies clung to one another in pleasure as if to defy memories they could never forget… images of friend and foe, entwined with death’s embrace upon the battlefield.

~One year later~

He was awoken by a cry.

His child’s cry.

Rolling over with a sleepy smile, he watched as the fussy little girl fought the teat for a moment or two before latching on, returning their cabin to morning’s relative quiet.

The remnants of their hearth crackled softly, and the wind ruffled in peaceful little gusts through the thatch of the stone cottage’s roof. Neither sound bore reminders of the past; they were merely gentle reminders of the present, and his love gave him an apologetic little smile as the babe settled in.

More than the first time he’d found her hand in his, more than the image of an exultant warrior goddess that’d been branded in his mind’s eye at the moment he thought had been his death, it was this that he remembered most.

A child’s cry, and a lover’s bashful smile.

~Five years later~

It wasn’t often they saw another soul out here in the hills, and he almost shot the man before he realized who it was.

There were claps on the back and hugs all around as they welcomed the old comrade who’d managed to track them down. The tales he shared as they settled into a hasty meal were less wholesome, however, than the fare they grew on the little farm that’d grown up about the cabin. Murderous beasts, and outlandish stories about immense wolves who looked almost like men, ravaging the kingdom and its peoples far and wide.

There was little reason for them to spread to the Headlands, of course, given how sparsely populated the wild crags were. Most had been spied in forests or villages, though there was tell of gruesome findings in the city.

But they were all too happy to have found one another again, and the talk soon turned towards more pleasant topics.

And while he was not a priest, he -had- been their commanding officer.

Thus did he agree to marry them that night.

~Hours later~

It had been that same night, when they first felt the tremors. Their young daughter had awoken them with wails of terror, somewhat drunk as they all were, before any among them had even realized the ground beneath had begun to shake.

The very same night two old comrades decided to scout towards the city, leaving behind perhaps the best of them to tend a young child alone.

~Three nights later~

Neither of them thought much of the bite, though the man-beast they’d managed to put down had sobered them up soon enough.

What they thought much -more- of were the bodies they found, shredded beyond even anything shrapnel had done to their comrades only a few years past.

They managed to put down another two before returning to Keel Harbor, the city of his birth and the town he returned to now and again for supplies.

A town suddenly bustling and active as a town could only be when preparing for war.

There, the learned, the wall had fallen, and the armies of the dead advanced.

~A few, frantic hours later~

The flight home had been one of haste and terror, slowed only by the persistent bleeding and sudden fever that broke out within his comrade-at-arms.

He’d practically had to drag his old commander over the last few hills home.

The turn happened with the sound of sails tearing in a storm, the fire of newly-sprouted fangs lancing through the meat of his forearm.

Tryndan managed only to take out the beast because it was tangled in the leather straps of armor suddenly too small, panting over the bestial body of what had once been a friend as his mind caught up to the moment.

He knew, now, the sentence that would be carried out through -this- bite.

~Moments. Eternities. Images, in his mind’s eye, flashing like heartbeats.~

A young girl of six is not a heavy thing.

Still, in their mad dash from highland to low, bearing not only the child but whatever belongings they might need for the journey, their daughter began to slow his wife down.

“Help me!” She cried. “I can’t!” He replied, spying the path before them so as not to betray the tears that would not cease; dried, mercifully, by the highland winds almost as soon as they fell.

They would make it to the harbor before the forsaken advance.

But the howls at their heels were closer than before.

~Later~

They’d found him some time after the last boat had sailed, the only feral in a pack their potions had managed to save… if not cure. Tal’doren had been defiled by the Forsaken as their armies encroached upon all corners of the realm, and the ritual was long out of reach. For a time, he fought amongst the remnants of old comrades and new, all while fighting a beast no amount of potions could ever quite drown, striving to free a realm he could one day return his family to.

But with Crowley’s surrender, the Liberation Front was no more. Certainly, some few still fought, but the battle was lost. There was no heart in it, after all… why fight for a home, when those who lived in it had fled? Why not return to those who remained?

But there had been no record of them upon the lists, when he made the trek to Darnassus at last. Neither of the names of the women he loved, his wife, or his daughter, had been scribed upon the meticulously maintained rolls of those who’d made it out.

It had taken him years to remember the fever-blinded truth, spattered in rust-coloured stains upon the mouldy remains of a small stuffed bear, only a few yards shy of Keel Harbor’s outlying homes.

The flight from the hills had hastened the effects of that fever. If only he could have gotten them to the harbor, they could have boarded one of the ships… but he’d felt the scrabbling, scratching beast within, claws of bile that boiled through his blood, tearing at his senses.

He had fallen back, an anguished scream on his wife’s lips as he exhorted her to go on.

He had bought them some time, at least, as the beasts fell upon him.

And he turned in their midst.

It hadn’t been enough.

Not enough.

Time.

~Three years ago~

The teddy, decomposed to the point of crumbling in his grasp, collapsed against itself as rotten stuffing gave way beneath his tightened fist. Claws curled in silent grief, piercing the hardened leather and rough paws beneath his glove, coating the mouldy remains with a new trickle of blood.

Keel Harbor had not bustled in many years, the cacophony of a busy port utterly silenced in the hush that clung to these blighted lands.

Still, in the silence, he heard a newborn’s waking cry.

And when he closed his eyes to the tears,

He saw love’s bashful smile.

~Now~

Bubbles of blood frothed upon the mage’s breast while he tried to gasp his last, but the blade had shattered his collarbone on the way to piercing a lung.

The runeslayer wiped his dagger clean upon the fallen draenei’s robes, head cocked dispassionately to one side as he surveyed the damage. He scolded himself for having struck bone at all; his aim would need to be more certain next time.

For there would be a next time… and a next. And a next, and a next, until every last arcanist bled out their last.

With a sudden, violent stomp, he crushed the man’s ribs, ending the last of his struggles; less to put him out of his misery, and more to be done with this target... so that he could turn his attention to the next.

Bending forward, he swiped a paw across the frothy, pooling blood, the arcane crackle at his clawtips drawing threads from the magi’s tabard to stand stiff beneath their scrape.

Nostrils flaring at the scent, he smeared his foe’s blood across the matted fur of his muzzle, tongue lapping out where it dribbled over his lips.

Alliance. Horde. Friend. Foe. No matter. 

Let them smell the coming of death.

For he knew now who to blame.

And they would pay.

All of them.

[thelostandforgottenangel]

Planning and Surprises

@devilsnevercry1388 @homra-the-red-clan @tmntwhat-you-get-is-what-you-see @raphtherebel @raphael-the-ninja @saismatters @redsoldier516 @bluesakurablossom @bluegoddess17 @katana-weilding-terrapin @fyreball66 @tur-nerd-tle-girl @bunnyboo9889 @ihlni686 @melek90 @frecklecakes @lillianlinus @bakameganekko @hummerhouse @legandarybeauty @untitled4185 @tmnthood2 @tmnt2016raphfangirl @betelgeusessonajblog @sea-phoam-goddess @totally-turtle-imagines @cats-eye-galaxy @giochandoll @wrath-and-ruin @wildmaniacal @bodaciousturtlebro @duzmachines95

Sorry if you guys didn’t want to be tagged - thought of all of you while writing tonight forgive me if you didn’t want me tagging you in this just tell me and I won’t do it again

This was going to be the year he would finally accomplish the unthinkable… he was finally going to admit to Raven he was in love with her the only problem was how was he going to do it without being lame or looking stupid, he wanted to kiss her not get laughed at by everyone

His father had come into the lair this morning taking everyone completely by surprise. Master Splinter had waited until everybody was together to draw attention to himself by clearing his throat like he was about to tell them they were going to have practice.

They were supposed to have the day off to prepare for the Christmas party tonight

He stood still, arms behind his back as a small smile snuck onto his face using his tail to hold the mistletoe above him hearing the girls laughing, it had to have warmed his heart by the way he smiled as his daughter, April, and his sons all shower his furry cheeks with kisses.

His father had even been surprised when Raphael had leaned down kissing his master on the head as he walked to the kitchen to get breakfast from the stove and was that moment that he had gotten the idea

Mikey had his ways to get kisses under the plant and happily considers himself ‘The Mistletoe Ninja’ at this time of year, he had a tendency of catching the family off guard and taking the two women of their lives by surprise with all the elaborate ways he could get them under his absolute favorite plant in the history of ever.

He had gone as far as to knock on April’s window on his way back to the lair from patrol to sneak a kiss on her cheek when she had stuck her head out the window at four a.m. in morning three years ago, he seemed to like dropping down from the ceiling unannounced with the sprig in his fingers or wearing a mistletoe headband he had made to get Raven a few times

He had a million tricks to get his holiday smooches when it came to his favorite girls and he made sure to employ all of them to get their attention so he was the perfect person to ask but Michelangelo was a blabber mouth and would rat him out before he could even ask for his help

The thought had crossed his mind to contract Donatello’s help with his new drone that he could fly over their heads, mistletoe dangling from the bottom before she would see his cocky smile; a mix of bashful yet sly as he got his smooch from the beautiful girl

But then there would be the whirring sound of a drone to give her a warning and she would vacate the room if she thought they were messing with her

As much as he hated to think it he wished right then that he could be like his self-righteous asshole of an older brother; Leonardo wouldn’t be sitting somewhere over thinking this shit, he wouldn’t make no explicit or intricate fuss over this, he’d probably just move close to Raven backing her into a wall citing some bullshit like that it was a tradition he dearly loved among the many others he adored as he would pluck some mistletoe from his back pants pocket and hold it over her head, placing his fingers under her chin to tilt her head up so his lips could meet hers in a possessive kiss.

God fucking damnit that was genius… what a prick! Now he would have to outdo that plan just to show his brother up… only because she would fucking see through it

He had this – he had three more hours to come up with something good getting up from his weight bench stepping out into the living area seeing Raven putting a few gifts under the tree listening to her music swaying to the beat before heading into the kitchen where the teenager had spent a good portion of her day cooking and baking for tonight’s events

Maybe he could ask Casey, the human man was a mastermind with the ladies and he could possibly give him something epic, like he could play it cool walking into the room where she was acting normal before getting her attention “Ay kid, catch this!”, lumbering towards her in a slow and determined way as soon as she would unfold her hands to see that she had caught mistletoe, he wouldn’t bother to lift it above her head, stating in the aftermath of the heated kiss he was going to give her that just holding it is good enough for him

It sounded so perfect in his head but he knew he’d find a way to screw it up or Raven would kick his ass for being a dork

He went to wonder the sewers trying his damndest to come up with something awesome that would insure he could get a kiss from Raven but with his mind marveling in the semi good ideas he hadn’t noticed the time until his phone dinged looking down seeing he was late

He immediately rushed back coming through the door to see the teen coming up the steps stopping fast before she slammed into him placing her hands on his plastron to steady herself “Oh good you made it, I put some clean clothes on your bed for after you get a shower”

“I’m fine kid…”

She shook her head placing a hand on his arm trying to find a way to get him to listen to her without starting an argument “Were taking pictures with the family – I’ll hold them off for a bit besides April and Casey ain’t here yet” her sweet smile was breaking his will to fight her on this - he had taken a shower that morning he didn’t need one now

“They’re not? What the hell ‘m over an hour late”

“Yeah I had them stop at the store to grab a few things… don’t worry we won’t start without you” she moved over closer looking over her shoulder before those emerald green orbs were on him getting a bright grin from her “I couldn’t start the party without my favorite turtle after all”

His eyes widened as she leaned in pressing her lips to his cheek seeing a blush cross her face when she realized exactly just what she had said before the thought really crossed his mind. He had been out in the sewers… what if he smelled like the tunnels - If he was going to kiss her he wanted to smell good, he wanted to be close to her so he couldn’t stink – and this might give him more time to come up with a full proof plan to kiss the girl of his dreams “Ya know a shower sounds like a great idea”

She shot him a grin as he bolted upstairs grabbing the stuff she had laid out on the bed hurrying down the stairs into the underground area passing by the lab seeing Donatello messing with one of his inventions wearing a pair of new pants looking spiffy in his new get up seeing Raven had went all out on their stuff this year as he noticed Donnie’s outfit had a shirt that fit around his shell actually looking really cool

He turned as Master Splinter stepped into the den getting on to his younger brother who was jumping around showing off the black and orange pants that clung to the smallest turtles legs before noticing his father was wearing a new kimono that looked like it had been stitched to his exact measurements

He was in the underground area fast before his father could get onto him for being late passing by Leonardo who adjusted his belts as he saw his little brother holding his hands up slightly as if to ask how he looked in the new get up he was wearing

“She made that” he looked down at the blue pants that resembled some of the Japanese garments they had seen online that covered his feet so he could wear his shoes more comfortably while the sash around his waist tied to the side hanging down a few inches “Looks good”

The compliment didn’t go unnoticed by his oldest sibling who looked him over “Somebody’s in  good mood” Raphael shot him a small look before his brother was at his side patting his little brother on the arm heading upstairs without another word as he heard Michelangelo arguing with someone

He enjoyed the time he had in the shower making sure to wash every inch of him clean thinking hard about what he could do to ensure he could kiss the teen but nothing had come to him before stepping out drying himself off

Looking over at the clothes seeing that she had tried to stick to his preference in attire looking the pants over carefully grinning at the red and black colors before slipping them on looking over in the mirror as he worked the black sash around his waist seeing she had gotten him some new wraps looking his reflection over smirking

He had just stepped out of the bathroom when a familiar scent hit him “Hey hothead I washed your mask…” he looked up seeing the teen coming down the stairs fast before she stopped grinning when she saw him standing there in the clothes she had made for him “Wow, they look great Raphie”

“Yeah their nice kid” she giggled as he tried to fix something before she was at his side grinning at him her hands already messing with the sash on his waist “This is just a little long”

“This was something I did with Leo’s and I thought it would look great on you… here let me show you how to do this” he watched as she unwound the sash carefully stepping closer until her body was inches from him pulling it up so the silky item ran under the edge of his carapace over his shoulders, physically held his breath as she crossed them over his chest before wrapping it around his waist tying to the side before grinning as she adjusted it slightly “There… what do you think – if it’s too much I could just cut it-”

“It’s perfect kid, I love it” the smile on her face grew wider by the second until she was blushing as her fingers touched the fabric looking him over slowly moving closer until she was barely touching him

He shifted on his feet seeing how nervous she looked as her hands drifted up his chest leaning in as something pulled him down before a crash from upstairs broke the spell between them; both of their eyes popped open fast as she jumped back from him looking back over her shoulder with a disappointed glare

“I should probably get back up there and see what’s going on… I’m glad you liked them” she stepped back giving him a smile before she was gone leaving him standing there alone still in shock before it hit him – if he was ever going to kiss her that had been it

He had let the opportunity slip by him

It took him two seconds to start berating himself realizing the teen had run off with his bandanna as he climbed the stairs to the living area taking a deep breath as he took the last few steps seeing his family all having fun while they waited on him finally catching sight of Casey who for once was dressed nice instead of his casual attire messing with Mikey and Vern who looked over at the massive turtle when he appeared, the youngest had his arms wrapped around his mates waist playing with the silky fabric of her sweater dress as the massive turtle stepped into the room looking around for the small girl who had just left him downstairs “Ay where’d the kid go?”

His brother looked him over carefully before nudging the human man who had his arm around April whistling at how their friend cleaned up as Mikey smirked “Hey Raphie looking good”

A small growl pulled from his throat as his brothers laughed at the old childhood nickname they had all given him “Mike don’t call me that” the youngest turtle grinned mischievously at his older brother before Leo was waving for Mikey to knock it off “Where the hell did Rave go? She has my bandanna”

Leonardo was standing off to the side holding tight to the woman who was playing with his mask her bright blue dress matching the leaders mask perfectly before Donnie moved from his seat smiling as he headed towards the door meeting the short female that came through the door lifting her up to press a loving kiss to her lips before helping her with her coat whistling at the beautiful purple dress that clung to her body his eyes landing on the swollen stomach in front of her knowing she was due any day now “She ran to get ready since you were coming– oh wow” they all froze looking up when Raphael looked at Leonardo whose mouth dropped as a small voice filled the lair along with the alluring scent he would never get tired of

“Mikey stop teasing Raph. You promised not to aggravate him tonight” Raphael spun around looking up as the teenager descended the stairs making the turtles mouth drop when he saw her, she looked magnificent

“Woah baby girl”

She was wearing a short red dress that brushed over her thighs with a pair black of legging with her new black heels that were making her calves look even more toned and her legs and rear more defined to his eyes, as she got closer he could see the sleeves were made of delicate lace that shoved off her skin beautifully under the fabric, her long black hair had been brushed to the side and the curls fixed perfectly 

And by damn when she looked up at him he lost his breath

The teen had put on a small amount of eye make-up causing those stunning emerald orbs to stand out beautifully against her naturally flawless pale skin “Danm-” 

She spun around with a nervous grin looking up at him as he stood there only one word echoing in his mind to describe the stunning woman that now stood before him “What do you think? April helped me pick it out but if it looks bad-”

“Ya look beautiful kid”

The words left his mouth without him ever realizing it hearing the others in the room fall silent as she blushed in shock before smiling up at him “T-Thanks Raphie” he wanted to die right there but the look on her face once the others started complimenting her seemed to help ease her which calmed him as she stepped back to his side holding out his mask with a small smile “Sorry I ran off with this… but you know – I think you look great without it big guy”

“Ya’d be the only one kid – but thanks” she patted his arm her touch lingering for a moment longer as she was stepping past him before he spun around opening his mouth to say something more but by that time Mikey had her in a tight hug nuzzling up against the teen who giggled hugging each one of the ladies as she headed into the kitchen finishing up dinner

The rest of the evening slipped by uneventful; they had dinner which had turned out wonderful, mingled, and even danced a bit up until they had all sat down to start unwrapping presents

Master Splinter had gotten several new boxes of incense and a few decorative candles for his room flourished in Japanese writing and art

Leo grinned flipping through a few new books to add to his collection along with the few handmade things from his younger brother’s and little sister kissing his mates cheek when she gave him a decorative knife set with Japanese looking dragons carved into the smooth cherry wood sheaths after he had helped her put on the necklace he had given her

He opened a second gift that she had placed in his lap asking her what it was before his face dropped in confusion looking around to his family as if it was meant as a prank pulling out a little case in the shape of an oven opening it to see a tiny sweet bun “Akachan - this is adorable but what-” he suddenly stopped looking over as she laughed nodding before he got what she was doing whispering under his breath as his face cracked into a huge smile looking her over before pulling her closer pressing a kiss to her full lips hugging his mate tightly “We got a bun in the oven guys!” everyone cheered and congratulated the two who were still holding tight to one another Leo keeping his head down as his shoulders shook laughing through the happy tears dripping down his cheeks 

Raphael was loving his new leather jacket and the knitting supplies Casey had gotten him as a joke, his eyes lighting up when he had opened a box to find a Gibson guitar everyone had gone in on together playing it with a happy smile on his face 

Donnie was already in the process of enjoying his new hand held tablet with the gorilla glass April had ordered him joking it should hold up if Raph ever got a hold of it making the room burst into laughter before he pulled his girl into his lap his hand coming to rest on her waist kissing her neck before rubbing over her belly as the babies kicked around

Mikey was already planning all the neat art projects he was going to do with the brand new basket of art supplies ranging from pencils and a sketch pad to a few new cans of spray paint he could tag the tunnels with, he had waited for everything to be moved before kneeling down slipping a small ring on his loves finger grinning widely as she admired it before realizing just what he was doing tearing up as she gave him a shaky yes hugging him tightly to her when he picked her up

When he had looked up from his phone after taking a picture of Casey with a few bows on his chest he noticed the teenager searching the tree for something looking over at him before he saw her look towards Leonardo who was silently reading a few pages of his first book with an arm around the woman at his side who was glancing over something in his book “Hey guys there’s a gift missing… it’s Raph’s anyone seen it”

“I think you took it over towards the kitchen little sister” she nodded before looking over towards the table heading over quickly looking around for a while before Raphael jumped up moving to help her

“Whatcha looking for kid?” she looked back as he stepped closer looking back over her shoulder seeming confused

“I got you something else but – for the life of me I can’t find it” she looked over as Mikey chuckled seeing the others trying to hold back their laughter when something hit the roof above their heads

“Would – that be what you’re looking for Baby girl” Mikey burst out laughing as she looked up with a small grin shooting a glare at Leonardo who looked away with a smug grin acting innocent before she was giggling

“Yeah that’s it…” he looked down as she waved him closer before grabbing the tails of his mask pulling him down pressing her lips to his in a soft kiss that caught him off guard in the moment before she pulled away looking him over when his eyes opened. He looked up slowly when her eyes drifted seeing a sprig of mistletoe hanging from the ceiling by a string attached to one of their kunai before he looked back down at the teen seeing a small smile

“Hey he’s supposed to kiss you not the other way around”

He rolled his eyes looking over at his brothers before looking back up at the plant “Sorry Raphie – had that planned for weeks, guess big brother wanted to help” he grabbed her arm pulling her closer to him looking her over carefully

“Ya planned this?” she slowly nodded meeting his eyes before he was pulling her against him until her chest was against his plastron pressing his lips to hers firmly as she went stiff before wrapping her arms around his neck as he lifted her up off the ground tilting her head to the side making the kiss so much deeper when her eyes closed returning his affections without hesitation 

He didn’t care if his family was staring at them or the fact that she had planned this when he had been killing his brain all day trying to come up with something to make this moment happen but the moment those soft pink lips were under his he was focused on her completely feeling how her arms clung to his neck and her hands cupped the back of his head keeping their mouths pressed together as his tongue shoved her lips open hearing her groaning softly

He finally pulled away grinning as she went limp in his arms still holding tight to him “W-Wow” he grinned as she opened her eyes looking up at him dazed, her face flushed and lips swollen as he held tight to her “That was so much better than I had pictured”

He didn’t say it but he had to agree… that was way better anything he could have done

She smiled as he nuzzled his face against hers before finding her lips again

He didn’t have to tell her he had feelings for her cause by the way they were clinging to one another it was clear they both had the same thing in mind ignoring their family’s wolf calls and cheers as they pulled away sharing a small smile

This moment was perfect all on its own as Raven wrapped her arms around him tightly hugging him as he buried his nose in her neck “Best Christmas gift ever kid”

I know a lot is going on in this but Had to kick off the Fanfictions right for you guys

[briangroth27]

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2012) Season 5 Review

This was a great show! I discovered the series on Hulu just before Season 5 aired and was immediately drawn to its fun, exciting, off-kilter personality. Though I grew up on the 1980s animated series and movies of the 90s, it’s an extremely close toss-up between this version and the current IDW comic for my favorite version of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles; I think the brilliant mix of science and the supernatural in the Turtles’ comic made for their best origin story, but this show’s characters and overall storylines probably put it slightly ahead. I loved that it fully explored the scope of the Turtles mythology and had several ongoing, engaging plots while taking the time to do some really fun and/or bizarre one-off adventures. The action was always riveting and the cast was perfect. However, I think the final season was a bit uneven.

I was really impressed that they took the risk of killing off both Splinter (Hoon Lee) and Shredder (Kevin Michael Richardson) at the end of Season 4 and I was excited to see what the Turtles would be like on their own, particularly how Leonardo (Seth Green) would handle leading since this show has been so good about putting him through his paces in that area. Season 5’s first arc didn’t disappoint, even though I was wary about immediately trying to bring back Shredder (and Splinter) so soon; this arc would've been at home in midseason or as a series finale too, after we’d had some time to breathe without each side’s leaders. Tiger Claw’s (Eric Bauza) use of a demodragon named Kavaxas (Mark Hamill) to resurrect the Foot’s late leader worked as a compelling plot despite my misgivings and I was thrilled when it didn’t go the way Tiger Claw wanted. Zombie Shredder naming Kavaxas his new second in command instead of Tiger Claw was a perfect, fun twist. Kavaxas later turning on everyone to rule both the living realm and the Netherworld himself was foreshadowed pretty clearly, but his ghost/zombie apocalypse was a lot of fun and became a great excuse to get our heroic terrapins into a Ghostbusters riff (they even included Ray’s Occult Shop and Vigo’s lines from Ghostbusters 2!). This arc was a cool way to showcase the supernatural side of the series, with a great (if brief) demonic villain in Kavaxas, brought to life with an awesome performance from Mark Hamill. Kavaxas was so powerful and ruthless—like when he pulled the soul out of Tatsu (Michael Hagiwara) without thinking twice—that he could’ve worked as a season-long enemy. 

Regardless, this arc was a great, exciting, and touching kick off to the season. I do think it would’ve been a bit stronger to have Tiger Claw summon Kavaxas for his own purposes instead of to resurrect Shredder though; what ideas for leadership does Tiger Claw have? That would've been something entirely different for the Turtles to face. He was always a major threat to the guys and could’ve at least tried to lead the Foot rebels himself before resorting to summoning demons and bringing back Shredder. Given the release of souls in the arc, Shredder and Splinter could've come back as a side effect of summoning Kavaxas anyway, still allowing the Turtles to briefly reunite with Splinter and Karai (Kelly Hu) with Shredder. However, it still worked as it played out. That the guys got to say a real goodbye to Splinter was touching and a great use of his ghost, while zombie Shredder ultimately dragging Kavaxas back to the Netherworld was a nice touch. I’m very glad the writers resisted the impulse to permanently bring back either Shredder or Splinter: we’d seen enough of both of them and their return would've hampered the progress of the Turtles. I also don’t know how any plot with Shredder could’ve topped the epic final battle at the end of Season 4.

The character development and side stories that came out of the Kavaxas arc were good too. I liked Leo looking to Splinter’s shrine in a moment of doubt about his leadership skills. Donnie’s (Rob Paulson) grudge against Don Vizioso (Brian Bloom) was a great bit of character development, especially as it briefly made him the “Raph” of the team, running off on a vendetta that screwed up things for his brothers. Karai vs. her old, blind teacher Hattori Tatsu was a great look at a different part of her past. I really wish we’d learned more about what she wanted to do with the reformed Foot and this battle for the rightful ownership of Shredder’s Kuro Kabato would’ve been the perfect time to explore that. Does she want them to be a force for good in the city; a network of ninja vigilantes fighting crime? Or does she have other plans? Either way, Tiger Claw calling a ceasefire between the Hamato and Foot clans because of their team-up against Kavaxas was a nice touch and an unexpected way to end the threat of the rebel Foot for good. With no more Foot to lead, I suppose he returned home after that. Likewise, Fishface (Christian Lanz) bailing on the Foot to return to his old life of low-stakes crime after giving the Turtles a heads up about Shredder was perfect. Rahzar (Clancy Brown) was always a lot of fun, so even though his brief resurrection didn't make much of an impact on the show or characters, it was good to see him again one last time. Falling into the Netherworld was a solid way to undo that resurrection. It was also nice to get a brief return of Ho Chan (James Hong) and closure for even minor villains like Don Vizioso and Hammer (Eric Bauza). They must’ve pushed the censors to their limit by giving Vizioso Shredder’s actual heart! Yikes. Tiger Claw’s mutate underlings having been mutated by Super Shredder’s mutagen leftovers, thereby giving them all a sliver of his mind/personality, was a cool (if brief) new wrinkle to the Foot. I also liked the introduction of the latest 2D animated parody show, Space Heroes: The Next Generation. That was a nice full-circle choice.

I liked that Mona Lisa (Zelda Williams) and Sal Commander (Keith David) got to return—along with the Newtralizer (Danny Trejo) and Lord Dregg (Jeffrey Combs)—to wrap up the outer space segment of the series. I love how dense the universe this show built for the Turtles is and the fact that this season revisited every part of it was a smart decision. Raphael’s (Sean Astin) reunion with Mona Lisa was great and I really liked that they subverted expectations of their courtship with him being completely dumbfounded by her and bashful in her presence. Given his role in the space segment of the series, it felt like Casey (Josh Peck) should’ve played a big role in this mini-arc. Still, this arc maintained the epic scope of the space segment of the series. Dregg’s invasion and plan to use humans as larval pods for the Vreen was exactly as long as it needed to be, with the exception of one plot point. That stumbling block was Mikey’s (Greg Cipes) “death,” which was a total shocker (pun absolutely intended). I had no idea how they were going to write themselves out of that, so to have him just…be OK, just briefly electrical-powered all of a sudden was a letdown. Even so, I liked that this was a fast-paced wrap-up of the space stuff and it was cool that they found a way to even close off Lord Dregg and Newtralizer this season.

The Turtles’ journey to Miyamoto Usagi’s (Yuki Matsuaki) anthropomorphic alternate world was a solid adventure, but I would’ve liked to see more development within the Turtles along the way. Specifically, I would’ve liked something about the guys looking at this world and thinking they could make a real life out in the open here. They wouldn’t have to hide ever again and this doesn’t really cross their minds as something they might like? Their inability to live without pizza or TV would be a totally acceptable argument for them going home, but it could’ve at least been a discussion. I was expecting Kintaro’s (Evan Kishiyama) supremely annoying nature (they did a great job at making him a brat) to bounce off Mikey’s shenanigans more than they did too; how does Mikey handle suddenly being the more mature one? Kintaro’s brattiness could’ve been a wake-up call that he might need to grow up a little bit. Also, did any of the Turtles look at Usagi and see Splinter or a future version of themselves? Leo bolstering Kintaro’s confidence was a good moment for his development as a leader, though. I also really liked the world-building that went into these episodes: they did a great job of establishing Usagi’s world and making it feel lived-in and old. The opening scene of Usagi’s first battle with Jei (Keone Young) and his story about the death of his master General Mifune went a long way to give it a sense of history. I liked the use of the mischievous Japanese spirits and the spiders were super creepy; even though it took place on an alternate world, this mini-arc gave the Turtles a brief exposure to the culture Splinter instilled in them (though I wish at least one of them had come away wanting to actively practice and live it more). Starting the episode from Usagi’s point of view, introducing the Turtles as pawns of Jei, and making the focus Kintaro’s growth rather than the Turtles’ (even if it would’ve been stronger to have them also changed by their adventure), was a cool way to make this mini-arc distinctive and to change up the episode formula.

The flashback to the earliest days of Splinter raising his turtle sons was a nice one-off adventure, but didn’t seem to fit with the rest of the arcs that wrapped up plots or just went big this year. Maybe it’s because I know the Turtles’ origin so well, but I didn’t need to see this show’s variation on how they came to live in the sewers or get their weapons/names. This flashback to the early days didn’t shed much if any new light on the Kraang (Nolan North), but did serve its function as a nice way to touch base with where the show started in the midst of arcs about everywhere it went. Splinter’s realization that the Turtles have given him a second chance at fatherhood (he still believed Karai was dead at this point) was the biggest and best moment of the episode. While a solid episode that would’ve been fine in an earlier season, I felt like this slot could’ve been put to better use as part of a bigger story.

“Raphael: Mutant Apocalypse” was my least favorite arc this season. It was a fun and definitely original idea—I never would’ve thought of putting the Turtles into Mad Max’s world—but it overstayed its welcome and if it’s meant to be the canon future of this world, why? Why kill April (Mae Whitman), Casey, and nearly everyone else we know for this depressing apocalypse? My head-canon is that this is just one of the ten dimensions (and every synopsis I’ve read states that it’s an alternate future, but it would’ve been nice to confirm that onscreen). Mira the Meerkat (Jessica DiCicco) was a fine character, but it felt like she was there more to introduce the map plot than anything else. Still, it was nice to see Chompy (Dee Bradley Baker) continue to grow and that Ice Cream Kitty (Kevin Eastman) had survived. The Honey Badgers were threatening enough to be legitimate obstacles, but not really distinctive from the villains the Turtles faced on a daily basis. 

I felt like “Mutant Apocalypse” went on for an episode too long and despite the fresh setting, didn’t really do much interesting with the characters. Raph becoming a hardened, grizzled scavenger, Donnie Metalhead, and Mikey a new age desert sage certainly made sense as outcomes for those characters, but they also felt like the most obvious directions for each of them to go. What if instead, Donnie rebuilt Raph as Metalhead to keep his brother going, replacing him piece by piece as his brother was continually worn down in fights? Losing parts of his body to mechanics and being unable to depend on himself to fight would affect Raph far more than tech-obsessed Donnie. What if Donnie was losing his mind in the desert and the only thing keeping him focused and lucid was tinkering; keeping himself going by keeping Raph and their van going? Losing his memory like Ralph was also would’ve been a greater tragedy for Donnie, since his best weapon is his mind. What if Mikey were the one that became the serious, hardened road warrior in the absence of Leo? The death of his brother (and the world) could’ve been a wake-up call that this wasn’t a game and the loss of his innocence would’ve been a tragedy in itself. If you’re going to flip the whole world upside down, why not take the characters to unexpected extremes as well? Leo turning out to be Maximus Kong was the only real surprise (I bought that he was dead at first)—and a nice connection to the parallel universe Space Heroes: TNG episode that revealed the hero characters we’d been watching were the bad guys—but “hero driven mad” doesn’t really resonate when Leo never gets a chance to truly reflect on what he’s done. Will Leo ever have to answer for the horrors he and his army inflicted on the world? It doesn’t seem so. Instead, as daring a development as it was, the lack of consequences made it feel like nothing more than a way to make the mysterious enemy important. If there had been any indication in the normal timeline that Leo could go bad, Maximus Kong would make more sense, because it’d be something inside him brought to the surface by the mutagen bomb. However, making him just angry/confused and accidentally evil pulled the rug out from everything he’d done. I did like the reversal of Leo and Raph’s relationship, though, where Leo was the one overcome by anger and instinct and Raph had the more level head. There’s also a good moment of the surviving brothers mourning Leo before they find out he’s still alive.

It was cool that they also took the time to wrap up Renet (Ashley Johnson) and Savanti Romero (Graham McTavish), and taking a mini-arc to revisit the time travel aspect of the Turtle universe was another inspired way to make this season a true exploration of everything this series was. I love the classic Universal monsters, so to see so many of them translated here (right down to the episode title cards!) was awesome! I liked the Halloween invasion by the legion of monsters, and while I wish Casey and April had been given more to do, making them vampires was definitely creepy. I was impressed they made Dracula (Chris Sarandon) so evil and loved every second of it. They also did a great job giving the Mummy (Grant Moninger) some real power. Frankenstein and his Monster (both played by Grant Moninger as well) fit into the story perfectly, and the fight throughout Frankenstein’s lab was a particular standout. The Turtles’ disguises and excuses for what they were (trolls, goblins, etc.) throughout Europe in the various time periods were a lot of fun, and Leo’s Van Helsing dig was especially funny. Vampire Raph was another really fun use of the monster storyline and I was surprised by how long they let him remain a bloodsucker. Mikey’s bond with Frankenstein’s Monster was great and Mary Shelley’s classic creation was a cool connection to our similarly misunderstood heroes.

I enjoyed the final arc, but it also left me a little disappointed since it was the series finale. The 80s Shredder and Krang (Pat Fraley) showing up was an OK idea—I especially loved Krang sitting in a booster seat at a diner: that was brilliant!—but it felt wrong to give this show’s finale to a retread of a team-up we already saw earlier in the series. It felt like they went for nostalgia instead of making a final statement about this show, and that was a shame: the characters and world of this show are exceptionally strong and should’ve been honored with their own finale. As big and classic as Shredder and Krang are as Turtle villains, going back to that well at this point was underwhelming (particularly when you’re dealing with intentionally less-dangerous versions). I was also disappointed Mona Lisa wasn’t with the Mutanimals in the finale. They set her up to join them in her return this year, but then didn’t even mention her absence here. That said, there were some great moments in these episodes. It was cool to see our Turtles train and toughen up the 80s guys; I was surprised at how far they took the original show’s Turtles not using their weapons for actual combat (“Someone could get hurt!”). Our April’s “Do reporters in your world wear jumpsuits?” was another fun line. Shredder and Krang being so surprised at how efficient our Bebop (J.B. Smoove) & Rocksteady (Fred Tatasciore) were was also fun. Karai meeting an alternate version of her “father” was cool, but I feel like they could’ve done more with it. Our Bebop and Rocksteady reforming is such a fun idea that I wish they’d given it more time to breathe. Would the Turtles help mentor them? Get tired of their antics and accidentally drive them back to crime? What if Bebop & Rocksteady accidentally became wildly successful as public heroes, maybe even getting paid for their services? How jealous would the Turtles be that these fools found a way to come out of hiding and be celebrated for their heroics? I wish this arc had been the opening storyline of the season, allowing Bebop & Rocksteady’s evolution to continue over the course of the year.

The Turtles being bored after defeating all their enemies was a solid idea—and I love that the show had actual endings for their villains, not never-ending back-and-forth struggles—but I would’ve preferred more forward momentum in harnessing their own destinies. Some effort at getting out of the sewers and making a real change to their status quo would’ve been great and totally new. In a season full of mini-arcs about where the guys had been over the course of the series, I would’ve loved an exploration of where they’re going. Will people ever accept them? Will their personalities always bring them to this configuration of the team (Leo leads, Mikey’s a party dude, etc)? Raph made great strides to overcome his rage on this show, but will he ever find real inner peace? What will Leo do when/if the guys don't want to fight anymore? Are their new students for him to train somewhere? Would he lead the Foot with Karai? Might Donnie become a reclusive tech mogul and/or video game designer? What does the future have in store for Mikey? Could he become a X-Games contestant? Party-animal DJ? Chef? All of the above? What about the guys’ love lives? I definitely thought it was past time for Donnie to be over April and I would’ve liked to see her and Casey get together while Donnie moves on to a new love interest. It felt like that triangle had been settled already and to hint that he still had those feelings for her felt like a step backward. In addition to exploring those questions, I really wish we’d seen much more of April, Casey, Karai, and Shinigami (Gwendoline Yeo) this year. All four of them seemed to largely vanish this season and that’s a shame. What do April and Casey want out of their lives beyond helping the guys fight crime? The two of them are major characters and their lack of focus here felt wrong. What are Karai and Shinigami going to do with the reformed Foot? I’m glad that so many villains got wrapped up, but are there new threats on the horizon? Will there be a resolution to the existence of mutants in New York; will they become an accepted part of daily life, get cured somehow, or will something entirely different happen?

I know it seems like I’m being hard on this season, but I still had a lot of fun with it and this show in general. It rekindled my love of the Turtles and I’m really sorry to see it end so soon after discovering it. I’m eager to check out the tie-in comics from this show, but there are TV elements comics can’t replicate. All the actors were perfect for their roles; these are the voices I’m going to hear when I read TMNT comics for a very long time. I loved the character designs, the personalities of the characters (these are also going to be the definitive versions for me for a long time coming), and that the action was always kinetic and exciting. The arcs each character got were great (even if this season stumbled a bit in that department), and this show definitely made the best use of April yet. I loved that the show was willing to go dark when the story called for it (without ever forgetting to be funny or downright silly) and loved even more that it was willing to go WEIRD. “Pizza Face,” man. The homages to sci-fi of the 80s and 90s were right up my alley, so they were very much appreciated. The new theme song incorporating just enough of the 80s theme to feel like the Turtles while still being something new made it instantly catchy and a perfect summation of this series as a whole. It’s probably even better than the classic 80s version and I wish they hadn’t changed it this season (though this lyric-less version wasn’t bad).

I’ll miss this show a lot, but I know I’ll revisit it often down the road. Despite a few missed opportunities for character development and plot progression this year, these Turtles still have it and are definitely worth checking out!

  Check out more of my reviews, opinions, and original short stories here!

[junker-town]

Dennis Rodman’s role in the nWo, explained

Photo by John Parra/Getty Images for Darren Prince Book Release Party

A weird chapter in NBA and wrestling history, all in one.

Depending on your age there was no better era in professional wrestling than the late 1990s, but even if you disagree with that statement it’s undeniable that the nWo (New World Order) was the coolest faction in the business. It transcended wrestling and took over popular culture in a way wrestling hadn’t before, or since.

On Sunday night The Last Dance touched on Dennis Rodman’s involvement in the group, which became so engrossing that he skipped practice during the NBA Finals to ensure he could be ready to perform in the ring in 1998.

What was the nWo?

In the mid-late 1990s a battle was brewing between the incumbent face of professional wrestling the WWF (now WWE) and WCW. Owned by Ted Turner, WCW took its roots from traditional southern wrestling, but largely failed to gain a major foothold in the ratings. In an attempt to make the company successful, Turner and WCW opened its wallet and began giving out absurdly large contracts to some of WWF’s biggest stars to make them jump ship, also making these contracts guaranteed — which was unheard on in the business.

From 1994-98 WCW signed the likes of Hulk Hogan, The Macho Man Randy Savage, Razor Ramon (Scott Hall), Diesel (Kevin Nash), and countless others. This alone wasn’t enough to propel WCW past WWF, but what came next was.

Hall and Nash jumping ship broke down professional wrestling’s venerated fourth wall, trashing their former company in the process. Arriving like a street gang, the nWo used guerrilla tactics and violence to “take over” WCW, and were so convincing fans were left wondering whether the angle was a reflection of real life. For two months Hall and Nash disrupted WCW, all while teasing the near arrival of a “third man,” an architect working behind the scenes to orchestrate the WCW takeover, which was revealed to be none other than Hulk Hogan.

The image of Hogan leg dropping his long-time friend Macho Man Randy Savage is burned in the minds of wrestling fans. The All-American super hero became the biggest villain in the wrestling world, and this was the catalyst for the nWo’s rise to prominence. Hogan, Nash and Hall were the perfect trio, and made it not only okay to like professional wrestling — but cool.

Numbers have never been officially revealed, but it’s been purported that over 16 million nWo shirts were sold in 1997 alone. This phenomenon was bigger than wrestling, and soon everybody, inside of wrestling and out, wanted to be a part of the nWo.

Dennis Rodman’s role.

With momentum on their side, WCW wanted to capitalize on pushing the nWo into the mainstream as quickly as possible. This included enlisting the help of celebrities to promote the brand, and the nWo’s devil-may-care attitude aligned perfectly with Rodman’s off-court personality.

The summer of 1998 was the perfect time for WCW to pull the trigger on a massive WCW/NBA crossover event. Rodman, who was in the middle of the NBA Finals against the Utah Jazz, took his role with the nWo so seriously he flew from Chicago to Detroit to appear on Monday Nitro live, in the middle of the series.

Rodman going to a professional wrestling event in the middle of a NBA Finals series seems absolutely ludicrous, but his Bulls teammates knew that was just part of the give-and-take with having Rodman on the team. Steve Kerr explained on The Last Dance that while it wasn’t uncommon for Rodman, it was a sign the Bulls were falling apart:

“We sort of understood he was his own man. He did so much for the team, but to do it during the Finals, that was another indication this was all coming to an end.

It’s unclear if Rodman’s decision to skip practice led to him coming off the bench in Game 4, but it didn’t make much of a difference. Even entering the game in a rotational role Rodman played 30 minutes and finished with 14 rebounds.

After the NBA Finals (which the Bulls won), WCW hyped up the promise of a Rodman/Malone rematch — this time inside a ring. At the Bash at the Beach pay per view in July the pair would face off in a tag team match that featured Hogan and Rodman teaming up to face Diamond Dallas Page and Karl Malone. The nWo ultimately won in the main event, and Rodman would not appear in a ring for another year, when he returned in 1999 and lost to Macho Man Randy Savage.

While the goal was to make the nWo transcend the world of wrestling and garner more appeal than ever, putting guys like Rodman in the faction is viewed as the moment the nWo “jumped the shark,” and took the luster away from the once-great group.

The downfall of the nWo.

There are numerous factors that led to the demise of the nWo as the premiere wrestling faction, but it ultimately comes down to being crushed until its own weight and mismanagement. WCW used the nWo as a story tool to rotate dozens of stars through to make them popular, eventually splintering the group into multiple rival factions including the red and black of the nWo Wolfpack, and the “Latino World Order,” which was led by legendary wrestler Eddie Guerrero. Eventually fans lost interest, there was too much rapid change and illogical story, with behind the scenes infighting tearing not only the nWo, but WCW as a whole apart.

More bad decisions led to the death of the company, and in 2001 WCW was sold to Vince McMahon and the WWE. Attempts to revive the nWo have been made in the years since, but never managed to capture fans the way the original iteration did. Now a relic of a bygone era, the nWo of 1996-98 remains the most compelling era in professional wrestling, not only in terms of the larger WCW vs. WWF feud — but how it pushed the industry away from the comic book style characters of the 1980s and early 90s, instead putting more “real people” on screens that fans could identify with.

Without the nWo it’s unlikely we ever would have seen the rise of Stone Cold Steve Austin and countless others. Dennis Rodman is a part of that legacy, and deciding to skip out of practicing for the NBA Finals allowed it.

[gwynbleiddyn]

mini prompt fills #1 - @homoryder​ suggested this one earlier and i had to write it like, yesterday

“You’re a remarkable person and it upsets me that people have tried to make you think otherwise.”

--

Two years.

Two years since Landing Day, and things are finally shaping into something bigger than survival instinct would grant them alone. 

They’re building. Growing. Networks are slowly connecting across the cluster, an echo of the maps leading to Meridian in the first place. There’s progress now, and for the first time since he woke up on the Hyperion, Cade finally allows himself to think past tomorrow.

As it is, he almost doesn’t quite believe the sight of Port Meridian sprawling out under an artificial night, hued by soft blue lights that line the slowly growing streets. If he looks closely, he can see the scars of construction, the stretch lines of a city being built to fit a world they’d never quite expected. As much as the Initiative liked to portray Meridian as a haven, Cade knows it isn’t perfect.

Not many things are, in Andromeda. The first few fumbling steps of humanity had left deep enough footprints in the dirt already. There’s no doubt they’ll leave more scars as they grow, but most things do. 

It’s a compromise they’ll have to make.

It’s a compromise they’re working towards. 

Cade lands eyes on a newly finished construction in the sprawling mass below, lit up in bright white and dazzling blue as a statement for the Initiative. It’s the meeting ground for tonight’s event; a cross-species platform for technological innovation and... something else. Cade stopped listening about the same time Scott fell asleep, so neither of them are quite sure what they’ve gotten themselves into. He’s pretty sure Cora’s trying to brief Scott on the situation right now, if his lateness is any indication.

The point is, he’s not walking into this alone. And it’s not in the behind-closed-doors way either. It’s official. Out there. Old news, by this point. The Tempest crew probably have a running tally of how many times they’ve had to answer the question: “So, the Pathfinder and Shepard, huh?” 

It’s nice to see the answer, regardless. Whether that’s in Scott’s bashful grin, or someone else’s exasperated eyeroll, or even his own quiet laugh and sly wink. It’s real. It’s theirs. 

Cade takes some comfort in that, despite how awkward he feels in the get-up he’s been forced into. A suit. They’d found actual, tailored suits. And not just the standard affair you used to find back on the Citadel; it’s the kind of designs he used to see on Earth. He isn’t sure if it’s a blessing or a curse, yet. 

Regardless, once the third wave colonists established themselves, the Nexus had turned from a bare-bones station to a one-stop citadel. Not quite up to the grandiose nature of its predecessor in the Milky Way, but by far the most extravagant piece of construction the Initiative has managed so far.

Needless to say, the station’s developments prompted a sharp spike across the commerce sector, sending vendors flooding back to the Nexus from their niche corners of Kadara and Elaaden. Cade’s pretty sure he could find anything there, these days, whether he wanted it or not.

Fiddling with his cufflinks, Cade has to admire the way they catch the light. Sharp gold against the black of his jacket, but not ostentatious. He’s left the collar of his stark white shirt unbuttoned, partly for his own benefit because he knows the venue will be rammed and uncomfortably hot, but he’d be lying if he said it wasn’t for Scott’s benefit too. A little. Maybe.

Okay, definitely for Scott’s benefit, but there’s nothing Cade wouldn’t do for Scott.

He’s pulled from his rambling thoughts by a hand at his waist, and he turns his head to catch bright blue staring back.

“Well, now, this is a sight I could get used to.” Scott says with a smirk, eyes raking over Cade’s sharp attire. Cade almost rolls his eyes, but he doesn’t stop the smile tugging at his lips in response. 

“One night, and one night only.” Cade sighs, and Scott’s smirk turns into a ridiculous pout.

“Nuh-uh. This--” Scott gestures at Cade as he speaks, emphasising his words, “Is not a one-night kind of guy.”

“No?” Cade laughs, the last of his worries ebbing away on the sound as Scott draws it out of him effortlessly. He still wonders how he does it.

“Nope. Definitely a long-term kind of thing.” Scott confirms, and he steps back to look at Cade properly, deliberately making a point of it. Cade takes the moment to do the same to Scott, quietly loving the way the soft grey of his jacket makes his eyes brighter, and the sharp glint of silver cufflinks contrasts the black of his shirt. Not to mention the way it fits him--

Cade could stare all night, but they’re already late. Reluctantly, he tears his eyes away and reaches for Scott’s hand, linking their fingers together in easy, familiar motions.

“Scott, you look incredible. As per.” Cade tells him, interrupting his own words with a sweet, chaste kiss, “And we’re late. As per.” 

Scott chuckles, stealing another kiss before Cade can retaliate, and then he’s pulling them into an easy walk down the equator steps and into the city. They fall into conversation like second nature, words passing without thought, laughter following easily, and every so often, one of them stops to look at the other, either with exasperation, admiration, or plain old adoration. Mostly a mix of the three. 

Cade isn’t talking as much tonight, though, and he knows it. And Scott’s noticed too. Cade feels a gentle tug at his hand, Scott’s fingers squeezing lightly in-between his own, and he can feel those blue eyes on him again.

“What’s up with you tonight?” Scott asks, quiet and certain. Cade knows Scott won’t be fooled by a brush-off excuse. He chews his lip and keeps his gaze ahead, trying to pull some words together.

Scott’s come under fire lately as the Pathfinder, mostly stemming from disputes surrounding Meridian’s political control with regards to the Angara. It’s... a messy issue, but Cade’s seen the side of it that has Scott working until stupid hours, passing out at his desk, barely eating and stressing to the point of sickness. Even now, Cade can see the lingering fatigue sitting in the faint lines at his eyes, the way he stifles a yawn every so often. And it hurts him in a way he doesn’t entirely understand. 

Scott’s worked his ass off for a cause he never really believed in until he had to, from day one. And Cade understands that part well enough -- Commander Shepard was never left with much choice back home -- but it’s the finer workings of these last two years that are catching up to Scott now that the dust has settled. The one life he couldn’t save, in order to save ten more. The information he could’ve traded for, but the price was far too severe to make it reasonable. The bargain he could’ve pulled, but it meant someone else getting hurt, somewhere else.

It’s the simple give and take of life, and Cade’s had far too many reasons to learn that, and Scott... hasn’t. Scott keeps his head level and his eyes set on a target, but he doesn’t forget about the people in between. He works like a machine, some days, just to make one person happy, just to have one less regret about Andromeda. 

Scott does so much that people don’t see, and it’s these people who land the words that hurt. 

Cade feels Scott stop next to him, and it pulls Cade to a halt too, hands still linked between them. Scott’s looking at him, expectant, waiting for the reply. They’re not going anywhere until Cade relents, so he does, with his usual brutal honesty in full force.

“You’re a remarkable person and it upsets me that people have tried to make you think otherwise.”

Scott’s caught off-guard, blinking, trying to come up with grounds for an answer. He turns out a question instead.

“What’s brought this on, Cade?” 

Cade just shrugs loosely, rubbing the back of his neck with his free hand as his nerves catch up with him. He feels Scott’s hand tighten around his own, a thumb brushing over his knuckles, and the tightness in his gut ebbs away for a moment.

“It just pisses me off that you work so hard and people still can’t... get that. You can’t do everything.” Cade says, almost indignant, voice pitching with irritation. Scott just watches, waits for the anger to ebb out, and then he smiles. Slow, certain, drawn with a quiet confidence that Cade has seen grow from strength to strength. 

And now, it’s brighter than any star Heleus has to offer. 

“If I wanted thanks for the job I did, I wouldn’t be here.” Scott says, simple and plain, and Cade still isn’t used to the way his chest fills with a bleeding light at Scott’s words, seeping into every little splinter and crack of bone to fill them with something stronger. It’s almost too much, but Cade can’t quite get enough, and he only manages an embarassed laugh, gaze dropping to the floor as the reality of his admission catches up with him.

He can feel his cheeks burning as Scott’s cool hand finds his face, curling easily at his jaw, thumb at his cheek and pulling Cade’s golden gaze gently back to his own bright blue.

“You know I love you, right?” Scott tells him then, and Cade just manages a crooked smile. 

He knows.