#she was already very fucked up and pretty evil. she could be super duper fucked up & evil. if we beleive in her :]

[moomeecore]

thinkging about chaos demon god things

[thalassous]

oh i don't know the ship names UH sonya x dolokhov and anatole x mary

OOH LETS GO MY TWO BEST FRIENDS WHO ARE EVIL

SONYAKHOV

why don't you ship it?

I MEAN . i dont think with sonya's people pleasing/dismissal of her own feelings it'd be very fun even in like. an evil way but this is a HEAVY asterisk (i think dolokhov would find out who she was truly and absolutely despise her personally . and the crux of this ship is that dolokhov actually likes someone for once . via canon etc etc)

what would have made you like it?

honestly if dolokhov was more patient and less stuck in his own head, and if sonya ACTUALLY could stand to realize someone out there was willing to care for her without any blood relation (nobody ever ask me how i feel about the rostovs) give both of them time and they would be a good match for each other. my read on sonya is pretty aro as far as it goes and dolokhov DOESN'T have a very nice relationship with romantic love so i think. i think they'd understand each other on a certain level which is nice. (comet canon is soo different and thats a whole nother. thing)

despite not shipping it, do you have anything positive to say about it?

coming back to that asterisk. IF they were fucked up in a romance way. oh how badly would i be down for them. LIKE wap ships are gonna be interesting to me since there's already very few that are nice, healthy relationships. but if you took an obsessive dolokhov and a distrusting sonya and ACTUALLY made it work. grits my teeth together id be so normal about that dynamic .

MARYATOLE

what made you ship it?

I DONT SHIP IT ROMANTICALLY I JUSR HAVE A SOFT SPOT FOR IT PERSONALLY. reading wap itself, marya thinking she can fix anatole and the possibility of that actually playing out is the best to me. i fuckihg love them. the blueprint is right there tolstoy did all of the work im obsessed

what are your favourite things about the ship?

ITS ANOTHER SUPER DUPER FUCKED UP EVIL ONE!!!! in the sense. that. we know for a fact anatole would never treat it seriously for even a second. marya is putting all her energy into this but she's probably aware of how futile it is and yet. she'd definitely end up feeling a little responsible for him and.. ! if that doesn't say anything about either of those two characters. im sorry marya you cant feel responsible for people i know thats what you're used to but :,(( anatole in fact needs people to stop letting him off the hook and taking his damage as their own failings :,((( let this man die marya hes gonna do it anyw—

is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship?

mm. hey. i cant let you all into my brain but here me out. queer platoni[is shot and killed]

[fktonofwhatnow]

ok hold on. acomaf is my fave book out of the whole series (it's mostly out of emotional value, i read it when i was younger and didn't have a real understanding out trauma and abuse only that i saw a character i loved getting out of a bad situation and getting happy) so obviously i didn't mind feysand being endgame and the development all of the characters had. i can accept tamlin turned out like that is realistic due to his trauma, i can accept feyre had to flee because it wasn't right for her, but the thing is after acofs i see no point to feyre leaving tamlin when rhysand ends up doing everything they told us tamlin was evil and unredeemable for. hiding the risks of her pregnancy, putting on shields on her, having feyre need to compromise over it. i honestly felt so betrayed by that. i'm not saying feyre and tamlin were good for each other, but it doesn't feel worth it to dismiss the potential they had for what we got with feysand.

also, sarah learn to treat "ugly" trauma with respect challenge. no they don't need to learn to physically fight to fight it. no they don't need a love interest to overcome it. yes the behaviors acquired from trauma and abuse aren't pretty but that doesn't mean a person is undeserving of kindness and compassion.

i think i had a point somewhere but i can't get to it. so hope you don't mind my rambling. anyway i loved your meta about tamlin i think he deserves better too

HOLY SHIT THIS ONE IS SO GOOD OK IM SO EXCITED

Bro you are so fine, I'm the one who doesn't make any sense and I totally get what you're trying to say. (Acomaf was actually my favorite book in the series too ngl)

BUT FUCK YEAH LETS TALK ABOUT RHYSAND.

I don't think it's a secret that Rhysand is one of my least favorite characters in media, probably ever? (How do I even put this into words) He is a bad character and to me, laughably so. You know how if you've ever written a character, there's that little phase that's like "what if people don't like this character' and then you're sad for a little bit? That's how Rhysand feels to me. He feels like SJM looked at this character and thought "I can't stand the thought of people not liking this character because I love him so much" and then did everything in her power to make sure we know how great he is.

Idk if this is just me screaming into the void, but I get to this place with my characters where like, especially if they are a little more morally gray or their decisions have negative impacts, I understand that I don't need the audience to like my main character. they can stand on their own, they can own up to what they do and they can grow from it. Thats what a good character does. That's how you keep your audience rooting for them. You gotta knock them over sometimes.

SJm doesn't knock Rhysand over. She doesn't push him to make mistakes, apologize, own up and move on. Rhysand has never made a decision that ended poorly for him. Everything goes the way he wants it to, because SJm wants us to know how cool and great he is. People who are cool and great don't make bad decisions! SJm doesn't let Rhysand fail, and she doesn't let him suffer his own decisions. Everyone else suffers his decisions, not him.

Rhysand's reputation as a good person hinges entirely on the audience liking him and/or thinking he's hot. And then what happens when the audience thinks neither of those things? Ya get a rly long post like this by a lil enby who is mad all the time. Rhysand loses all credibility when you look at him through a critical lens. Not a single thing the man does makes any goddamn sense. Here I thought acosf would give us a different perspective on Feysand and I was desperately hoping that Nesta would tell us what she really sees in them and how people around them really feel, I hoped that SjM would throw us for a loop and tell us that hey, she does know that Feysand are fucking toxic as hell and ruin the lives of people around them and she wants to show us that from an outside perspective but noooOoOOOoOoOOOO...

Instead we get Nesta hating herself because Rhysand told her that she shouldn't tell Feyre that Feyre could uh die in childbirth. Hey what the fuck.

Now I don't actually ship feylin, I kinda always sorta knew, even without spoilers, that it wasn't going to work out. Tamlin isn't sjm's idea of a good partner because he's not charming and witty and dark and handsome ya know? We met Rhysand and I knew that I was going to fucking hate this romance. Which sucks because I found Rhysand so intriguing in the first book. Ngl all the time spent in the spring court was kinda boring and every time Rhysand showed up to throw dead faeries at Tamlin I was like "oooooo" and I wanted to know more about why Tamlin, this awkward, blunt and kinda shy dude had beef with this super duper sly and shady man from another court.

I don't know if I've ever said this before, but SJm doesn't let her love interests grow. Rhysand doesn't change over the course of the story because he was already a good guy and his motives were for Feyre's sake I swear, the same goes for Rowan in TOG. SJm doesn't give Rhysand room to change. She needs to get to the part where they fuck make sure everyone knows that Rhysand is a good guy and actually he was good all along so that we like him more than Tamlin. It backtracks on everything bad Rhysand has ever done because you know... He had a good reason! It's fine!

I know it's probably just because SJm doesn't actually know how to write a good character growth arc but... Like can you imagine if Rhysand stayed the bad guy? Or at least remained the bad guy through acotar and acomaf? And then when Rhysand comes to take Feyre for his bargain it really was only to spite Tamlin? What about Rhysand, taking Feyre to the night court with him once a week every month for a long time, if only to see Tamlin's eyes grow darker and emptier every time he goes, and then he really starts to fall in love with Feyre. He's been a monster all this time, angry and cold and cruel and then he actually starts to fall in love. And then to get Feyre to stay he really does try to change, he stops antagonizing Feyre, he stops throwing dead faeries at Tamlin, and he stops harassing the Spring court. He starts spending genuine quality time with Feyre, he starts to learn about her and all the things she likes and he stops trying to get her to come with him just so Tamlin will be mad. He starts asking her to come with him because he wants to be around her and he prays that someday she'll want to be around him too. What if SJm let him grow.

But nahhhhhh instead we have a character who always knows the right answer to things, and he always knows how to fix every issue, and he is always so innovative and outside the box except that he isn't. We get a character who does the same shit as Tamlin but it's ok because he had a good reason not to tell Feyre that she could very well die in childbirth. Uhhhh don't know what that is but uhhh I know he has his reasons because all he has are his reasons.

It would be so easy to hold a mirror up to Rhysand and say "look at this. Look who you are. Do you not look just like Tamlin right now?"

But nooooooooOoOOOo Rhysand doesn't get to be wrong. Rhysand doesn't get to look like Tamlin because Tamlin is evil and Rhysand is definitely NOT I SWEAR.

But yeah I think the point I'm trying to make is that Sarah thinks so highly of Rhysand that he could never do wrong. He could never be like Tamlin, despite the narrative literally telling us the exact opposite.

Like you said, we lost the potential of what feylin could have been if SJm didn't suddenly decide that her audience needs to love Rhysand as much as she does. I think feylin could have been slow and sweet and a story of true healing and learning about one another. I think it would have been kind and steady and lots of "are you ok"s and "I'm sorry"s and "talk to me"s. Everything about Feysand feels rushed and hard and fast and the rest of the world doesn't have time to catch up. It's fucking exhausting to read it ya know what I'm saying.

(also can we talk about Rhysand like dying and Feyre finding the suriel and learning he's her mate and then instead of being like "k let's put a pin in that and fuckin save his life first" she like throws him around and everyone is like "wtf woman" and she's like I neeD tO Be alOnE these people have no idea how to prioritize)

Truly, I think it's innocent to a degree. There is absolutely no harm in wanting people to like your character. The harm comes when you destroy another character with no reason or explanation other than you want people to like a different character. Villain arc? Completely out of left field. You gotta build to that shit or like... Make it so that when you look back you slap your forehead and yell at a wall "OF FUCKING COURSE I SHOULD HAVE SEEN IT"

anyways, SJm treat "ugly" trauma with respect challenge SECONDED.

WELL IM SO SORRY THIS TOOK ME WEEKS YO WRITE IM HAVING A HARD TIME I know it probably doesn't make any sense I can't find my braincells BUT thanks for the ask @xelly

Tell me all your acotar things I love yo hear them !!

[fonulyn]

I need to scream about RE ID bc like. Did I enjoy it? Yeah, I did. Was it. Just wrapped up way too nicely and quickly? Also yeah. I was a little disappointed by it tho, like the length, and the flashback scenes weren't as clear as I think they should have been? Like I understood what was happening, but it took me a little too much brain power to like keep up with what was and wasn't a flashback lmao

Also I wanna say, I get wanting to keep Jun See alive but god, that did not look fun. Just let him die, dude, no one wants to live like that, smh.

Thank god they kept Leon's one liners tho, like thank you for that at least lol also Claire, my GIRL, I love her holy shit. Honestly she was amazing, like, just perfect. Not sure why she has a gun in the promotional poster, bc she just. Never has a gun throughout the entire show, I don't think? Also can we talk about how she took that guy down with that lamp, and then hopped on top of him just fucking ready to continue to beat the shit out of him? Chris would be so proud 🥲

Okay also, I saw what you said with that flirting scene, and I agree that it seemed like Leon was trying to lighten the mood, but it so didn't need to be put in there at all @ the writers. Like this show could have gotten away with no romance, or just that one moment near the end with Claire and Leon (which, I don't ship them much, and that moment at the v end where she was like "are you ever gonna stop treating me like a kid?" And he responded with "probably not" or whatever kind of ruined whatever was shown earlier? Like it feels like she's had that convo with Chris before too, so I'm like hm no don't imply romance and then imply that he treats her like a little kid every time they run into each other, now it's weird lol) and been fine. None of the story was contingent on any kind of romance between anyone.

Now with that said, can I just say Patrick absolutely wanted to suck Leon's dick? Like he was smitten, and I bet you they at least fuck after all this is said and done, if not date for a short period of time. I thought they were gonna kill Patrick off, I'm glad they didn't tho, he was v wholesome lol.

Also I wanna mention that every serious moment (save a small handful) I just. I couldn't take it seriously, it was too over the top. Acid? Really? That's the self destruct measure? Slowly rising acid? I dunno, that doesn't seem quite right to me, I don't think that's how it works lol

Honestly they should have just made this into a new movie, bc making it a series implies more to follow and in general a longer narrative, but these eps were barely 20 minutes each, so there's almost no point splitting it like that. Did I enjoy myself? Yeah, I always do when Leon is involved, but it could have been so much better.

Also the silly little shipper in me is kind of desperate for more interaction between Chris and Leon, bc as far as I'm aware it's just RE6, RE vendetta, and RE ID (and I think the person who told Chris to save Claire in either code x or Veronica was Leon? Not 100% about that tho lol) where they actually interact with each other, and considering that they're the two main characters of the franchise, they should probably meet up more? Idk, that's just my gay ass hoping for more Chreon content lmao but still.

ANYWAYS yeah, I would rate the show like a 7.5/10? It wasn't amazing but it wasn't garbage, either. Probably my least favorite of the four animated movies tbh, but I will take the Leon content, thank you Capcom. Also it was interesting to see Leon around the time following/around RE4 and RE degeneration, I thought, I dunno.

oh boy I agree 100% it was wrapped up way too quickly in the end. like killing Jason? by just dropping him in the acid? it was way too simple and easy if you ask me. and like, why didn't he yeet Leon into the acid when he had him by the throat? him not killing Leon makes zero sense to me??

asdfg yeah I get they weren't ready to let Jun See go, but I bet Jun See really would've preferred to go...

I am so happy that they kept the one liners!! Leon felt very, very in character which I loved so much. I was afraid they'd tone it down or make him super serious or so, and it was such a relief they didn't. he was so eager to help and so goddamn kind to everyone I don't know if my heart can even handle it ;;;;;

also Claire!! so badass!! I loved the part where she attacked the guy with the lamp (yes Chris would be super proud haha) and THE HEADBUTT seriously, one of the top highlights of the entire series :'D

(but honestly this is gonna get long i'mma gonna hit that read more here)

and the flirting scene, I do think they could've left it out entirely and it felt a little strong-armed in. but I'm trying to look at the silver lining? Leon was super goddamn adorable in it, like, so cute it hurts :'D and Shen May didn't seem bothered really, it was more this joking thing between them. so while yes, it was unnecessary, i'm focusing on the joking feel of it and choosing to interpret it as such :'D

also, can I just say, the "romantic moment" with Claire and Leon near the end didn't feel very romantic to me? I know it's a romcom cliché (or at least a fanfic cliché lmao) how they ended up in a pile after the rescue but ...it didn't scream romance to me? although I do kind of like the pairing! (not a top fave but a cute one)

and yes, the whole "when are you gonna stop treating me like a kid?" "probably never" felt SO much like a sibling moment!! such big brother energy from Leon, and I don't know, that made me super duper happy?? I want them to be friends. I neeeed them to be friends gdi. which is why I am unhappy with how mad Claire seemed to be at Leon in the end and how they left it off like they did. I am hoping that it sets things up for a second season? and they for whatever reason need them on kind of the opposing sides at first? because otherwise it makes no sense to me for her to be that disappointed in him. in Degeneration they already establish they work in different ways towards the same goal, and for that to do a 180 now feels... like a disservice to the characters? idk?

lmaooooo but yes Patrick 100% wanted to suck Leon's dick he didn't even try to be subtle about it :'D idk I would've wanted Patrick to have more depth and screentime too, i so wish they would've made it a longer series and given the characters more development. because I liked pretty much all of the new characters they introduced! but it feels none of them reached their actual potential!

then again that is kind of the whole deal with resident evil in general, they set up awesome characters and end up wasting them half of the time :'D guess i shouldn't be surprised.

THE SLOWLY RISING ACID PISSED ME OFF lmaooo c'mon!! it doesn't seem like a good self destruct measure. especially since ...you'd need different acid to dissolve organic matter and to dissolve inorganic matter if we're being nitpicky. and how would it be plausible for them to store enough of it safely to even do this?? they should've just detonated the whole place and blown it to smithereens or something, the acid was. stupid.

i agree, it feels like a movie. but I think @tirsynni is probably right when saying that it was sort of a test run to see if they should make more? which I am so hoping for. because even with the complaints I have of this, I DID enjoy it, a lot!! and I do want more! and maybe this time we get Claire and Leon actually working together for more than fifteen seconds! :'D

also I definitely would not say no to more Chris and Leon interactions. (yes it was Leon who told Chris to save Claire :) at least that) it... in general makes no sense to me how capcom seems to think friendships work? like how Sherry is all "Leon and Claire are my best friends" and then they imply they haven't met in years? if not more? idek it's. weird. it's like their characters go into storage containers in between their missions to be stored away so they can't even accidentally have personal lives or friendships or anything. weird.

(what I said about having amazing characters and ending up wasting their potential? yeah)

for me, personally, it's... well, my score for the show would depend on whether I just focus on the characterizations and what I liked, or if I try to actually take the plot and all into account too :'D but I did like this more than Degeneration! already the fact that Leon has actual facial expressions is enough to put it way above that one. (and for the record, I don't hate Degeneration either, I do like it, but... Leon is such a cardboard cutout with zero personality in it, it's super frustrating)

idk I think I need to still process this a bit to see how I will like it in the end :'D there are things i'm super hyped about in it, and things i'm disappointed in, let's see how they'll weigh in the overall experience eventually.

[miraclesnail]

1000 Ways and I Can Name You One

A thousand ways to tell the Stoll brothers apart and I can name you one. Travis and Connor centric oneshots featuring characters from PJO/HOO.

Chapter 32: Michael - Food 

Plus the whole 9.7k fic under the read more but with funky formatting 

Michael — Food

Michael (14) — Travis (13) — Connor (13)

Early June 2007

Pre Sea of Monsters

[8:07 AM]

The whole drive to Camp, Lee has been saying the weirdest things. 

‘This camp is special.’

‘This camp is for children of Greek gods and goddesses.’

‘This camp helps the said children harness the godly gifts inherited from said gods and goddesses.’

‘This camp is top secret and no matter what, you cannot tell your mother about Camp Half Blood. Not a word. Not a complaint. Not even a compliment. Michael? Are you listening? Ar—are you laughing?! Michael, I’m not joking around. This is not a joke.’

Did Michael take Lee seriously? Not at all. Not even to humor him. What does Lee take him for? An idiot? Like, he doesn’t really have many friends at school (none actually) but even he knows when someone is trying to pull a prank on him. Lee typically goes for jump scares, but it’s good to see him broaden his horizon and try new things. 

Yeah. 

Michael wholeheartedly believes Lee is 100% kidding around. 

It’s kind of a shock when he walks through the camp and sees flowers being grown in someone’s palms, men with hooves and horns trotting around, a goddamn girl rising from the lake like some kind of b-grade horror movie but minus the sunken eyes and gray skin and tattered white dress. 

It’s a big shock. Kinda earth-shattering actually. Very disorientating. It’s taking all his mental capability to process the fact that the Greek gods are real , that the Greek myths are real , that his atheist beliefs are all wrong and holy fuck?? God is real . 

It’s probably why when that SOB Shermie or Sherlock or whatever his name is picked a fight, he welcomed the easy distraction and picked one right back. 

In hindsight, he should have maybe exhibited more self-control. 

“He shoved me.”

The utter stare of incredulity has Michael quickly rephrasing his initial statement, fiddling with a loose string on his t-shirt. 

“He shoved me first. ”

“And so you decided to turn it into a slugfest?” Lee says, arms crossing as they stand on Cabin 11’s porch. 

“To be fair, to be fair,” Michael says, scrambling for excuses as his eyes dart from cabin to cabin, “to be really fair, that Sherm-guy started it.”

Lee didn’t buy it, not that Michael expected him too. 

“You promised me, Michael,” Lee says, disappointed, and Michael looks away with guilt. 

He did promise Lee. Right before they left the apartment complex, Lee explicitly said, “Promise me, Michael, that you’ll be on your best behavior?” And he said he will. 

“Mike, I don’t want any phone calls from the head honcho again, okay?” his mom said, exasperated. He said there wouldn’t be any.

“Mikey, please tell us all the fights you’ll get into!” his four little siblings — Leo, Raphie, Carly, and Sam — screamed together with cheeky, smug, knowing grins as he got into the car with Lee. He said ‘in your dreams.’ 

Not even one full hour and he failed two out of three. Possibly all three if Travis and Connor decide to hand his ass to the director. 

“I’m really sorry, Lee,” Michael says, head lowering, “I promise for real this time. I won’t get into any more fights. I swear.” 

Like clockwork, the frown and crossed arms drop for a bright smile and a hair ruffling, like he actually believed Michael can do it. Lee’s weird like that. He believes in people and their lies despite what their actions are saying, believes in him even with the 14 years of experience that Michael cannot follow through on that promise. 

It’s that same idealistic, stupid belief that has Lee clinging to the hope his birth mom will one day want to actually be a mom. 

Michael slinks back into the cabin as quietly as he can. Miranda catches his eye and waves him over, patting the empty spot next to her. Michael hesitates (still remembers the way she tosses a boy a whole head taller than her like nothing) but thought better of it. 

The promise, he thinks. Remember your promise. 

He sees Sherman sitting on Miranda’s other side. As he slides down to sit cross-legged, he’s mentally preparing himself for a jeer. But Sherman is just staring at Miranda, wide-eyed and star-struck and totally ignoring him which is perfectly fine with Michael. 

Miranda angles her body towards him, a slight smile on her face as she tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. “I just want to warn you that you’re in Connor’s bad book right now.”

“Should I be worried?” Michael says, glancing at the brothers talking on one of the upper bunk beds.

To which Miranda smiles sweetly. “You should keep your head down. I heard he gets a bit prank-crazy with people he doesn’t like.”

A sharp whistle brings his attention upfront. 

“Okay, so hey, everybody! Exciting first day, I know. Welcome to Camp Half Blood,” one of the pair says with a big grin, standing on top of the upper bunk bed. The other sits at the edge, feet swinging over. “We’re already late for breakfast so I’ll make this super-duper quick. My name is Travis Stoll. I am one of your head counselors. This is Connor, my little brother.” 

Connor waves, his smile matching Travis’s.

“I’m also your counselor. Any problems you guys have whether it be life problems, camp problems, prank problems, you can come to us. Lucky for you guys, you have two of us. Most cabins just have one,” Connor says. 

“Where’s Luke?” someone in the back yells. 

“Luke is gone now. If you see him, either in person or in a dream, tell us right away. Please come talk to me after this meeting if you want more details,” Connor answers, still cheerful but Michael kinda feels like his words are too curt. There’s definitely bad blood between this Luke person and them.

“Moving on,” Travis follows after, “the beds are all taken. Any more fighting over them will result in the instigator getting a timeout. For everybody else, sleeping bags are available and we will make room. Your stuff can be placed in the closet or tucked in your sleeping bag. I know this cabin’s patron is the god of thievery, but please show respect and decency towards your fellow cabinmates and don’t steal from each other. Steal from other cabins instead. Apollo’s kids are the easiest to steal from. So are Aphrodite’s if you want to practice before moving onto the big leagues. Athena’s and Hephaestus’s cabins are where the real challenge is.”

“What about the claiming rate? Someone said the gods would claim us more now,” a girl asks, standing from her sitting position with a bounce, hope in her eyes. 

“Uh, um...” Travis falters, looking down at Connor for guidance. It’s hard to notice but Connor bites his cheeks and just barely shakes his head.

“Claiming, yeah. I’m not too sure about that. I’ll talk with Chi — Tantalus about that. Tantalus is the activity director now in case you all don’t know,” Travis answers. 

There’s a chorus of groans. 

Someone grumbles, “It’s been years.”

“What happened to Chiron?” another asks.

“Temporarily relieved of duty due to, uh, an investigation of his effectiveness on the job. Which, if you ask me, Chiron has been doing a fantastic job of and we should all write a very strongly worded letter to Zeus to get him back on his job.”

A boy in front of Michael shoots his hand up. 

“I heard Luke went all ‘Anakin Skywalker’ on us and joined Kr—”

Connor blows an air horn and interrupts the boy before he could finish. Travis’s smile is strained as he says, “Okay, first rule on Camp Half Blood for the foreseeable future! No mentioning any of the bad guys by name. Names have power. Instead we will refer to him by initials. The evil titan guy will be called K.T. K for his first letter and T because he controls time.” 

“Can we change it to K.K. Slider?” the same boy says.

Beside him, a girl socks the boy in the arm. “No! How dare you sully K.K.’s name like this?”

But Travis is already jumping down his bed, landing with grace. “K.K. Slider it is. That’s all for the morning announcements. Now everybody gets in a straight line. We’re going to the pavilion for breakfast and it is the best thing ever. You can literally get whatever you want. All you need is the power of imagination. Well, imagination and common sense. Don't imagine something you won’t eat. It’s not a contest to create the grossest food.” 

Connor follows down after his brother with a grin and shrugs. “But if it was, I would win.”

Growing up, Michael is what everybody called a ‘problem child.’ Absolutely zero friends not helped by him picking and starting fights for the ‘smallest’ reasons. No remarkable talent except for his athleticism. Mediocre to poor grades due to inability to focus (and it doesn’t help that he’s dyslexic and that his teachers all hate him and that he has a homing device for all the school’s bullies). 

The teachers blamed his mother for his attitude and academic abilities. But they don’t know shit. His mother helps him with his homework after coming back from work. His mother searches for ways to help him manage his ADHD and dyslexia. His mother is raising five kids all by herself with zero help from his deadbeat dad. Going to their extracurricular activities, funding their education, making time to have game and movie nights. His mother is literally Superman for finding time to do all that across five children. No. Make that six. Mom always attends Lee’s band performances and includes him with all their activities and outings and supports him the way Lee’s own mom should be doing. 

Michael’s pretty sure his mom isn't the problem.

Besides his four younger siblings are literal angels. Clearly, the problem is him. Not his mother. 

That’s why going into high school he had every intention of becoming a better son, a better brother, and a better student. Set a better reputation for his family, you know?

Unfortunately, this whole mess with him being half-god kinda put a pause on his plans. 

And put every weird thing Lee ever did into perspective. 

That one time Lee slapped his brand new Nokia cellphone out of his hands and ended his cell’s short life by stomping the hell out of it? Those dozens of times Lee lectured him about not using technology with his stupid excuse of ‘it rots your brain, Michael. Don’t touch it,’ despite Lee himself using a phone and a laptop on a daily basis?? Those hundreds of times Lee excused himself from dinner, movies, and the middle of game nights to ‘use the bathroom’ and coming back with a thin layer of gold dust??? Those weird dreams he gets of standing on top of a broken, tethering bridge and falling thousands of meters to his death in a ravine and Lee saying, ‘it’s just a dream. Don’t worry about it’ with a high-pitched, forced laugh that says he should be worrying????

Now he sees what it was all about. Obviously a metaphor for the earth-shattering revelation of his heritage. 

He’s half- god . A demigod. Some part of him came from an immortal being.

It makes him see his dad in a whole new light. 

Like, Michael always knows his dad is an asshole, leaving his mom and whatnot. 

But now? Knowing his dad is a literal god in the Greek myths he read back in 6th grade? Those freaky assholes with their crazy sex adventures and ego-driven tantrums?

At least the fantasy asshole dad he had in mind didn’t commit mass genocide or is an egotistical, narcissistic jerk or had sex with their siblings, parents, animals, and who knows what else freaky shit the gods like to stick their dick in to. 

And the most bizarre thing is that he’s expected to honor them by throwing the best parts of his meal into the fire. 

Well, he’s not gonna.

“Throw your food into the fire, Mike,” one of his counselors says beside him as he tosses a bag of M&M into the flames. 

“Why should I?”

“So the gods don’t get angry,” says the other counselor, throwing half of his strawberries — Michael stares at the plate. It’s just strawberries. Nothing else. That’s not healthy — into the fire before turning to help the others. 

“They’re gonna threaten us if we don’t worship them? Sounds like a pretty unhealthy parent-child relationship,” Michael says. 

The one that tossed the M&Ms shrugs. “Just toss something in. It can be anything. Even something you ha— don’t care about. That’s what I do. I don’t think Hermes minds.” 

But what Michael hears is that this Hermes fella doesn’t give a shit. 

A small boy with round glasses wedges in between them, frowning, and tosses in a sausage link. “Don’t listen to Connor. You’re never going to be claimed if you listen to him.” 

Connor shrugs again. “Hermes hasn’t disowned me yet.”

“That’s because Hermes is busy with other things. The other gods don’t have a child plotting to usurp—” the kid starts to say but at Connor’s harsh nudging and loud cough and not so subtle nod towards the others in the pavilion and (kind of scary) glare, he shuts up. A second passes before the boy says to him, “Everybody likes to feel appreciated, Michael. Even gods. It’s good to remind them we’re here for them. Now more than ever.”

Michael frowns at the exchange. Child? Usurp? Usurp who? The gods? Yeah. Like that is even possible. 

“What were you trying to say—”

“So I see you got over your embarrassing loss,” Connor interrupts with this infuriating smug grin. “Man, I would have hidden my face for like a year after the way I kicked your ass.” 

And just like that, Michael forgets everything but that day back in March when he met the brothers. It’s an obvious bait and Michael just lunges for it like the dumb fish he is. 

“No, I kicked your ass. Kicked it all the way down the stairs,” Michael huffs at Connor’s heel as they walk to the table. Connor slides into the first open spot he sees and Michael sits down across from him, elbow to elbow to his cabinmates. They need a bigger picnic table. 

“Ass?” Besides Connor, Miranda’s head swivels to face them, her smile innocent but Michael knows better now. Behind that sweet smile is a demon. “Who kicked whose ass? ” 

“We met Michael back in March when we hopped in Lee’s car and we’re not using that language, Mikey,” Travis says, sitting down beside Connor slurping a mouthful of cereal. 

“So? Who won?” Miranda asks, leaning over to slide scrambled eggs onto Travis’s plate and picking off 75% of Travis’s many, many strawberries from his plate. 

Travis stares at the egg with disdain. “Connor won, of course. And I don’t want that. Take it back.” 

“Will said you need something more than just strawberries in the morning. Doctor’s orders. Disobey and you’ll feel his wrath,” Miranda says. 

For half-a-second, Michael thinks Travis is going to fight but he turns back in his seat and just grabs his fork. 

“There’s nothing wrong with just strawberries for breakfast,” Travis grumbles, stabbing his fork into the scrambled eggs. “Right? Nothing wrong with strawberries.”

“I think that depends on the quantity but don’t worry, Travis. I totally got you,” Connor says, pulling out a basket of strawberries and ducking from Miranda’s sudden lunge for it. With ease, Connor holds Miranda back while Travis indulges in his unhealthy obsession with a satisfied, blissed smile. 

Michael thinks of the half Travis threw into the fire and before he knows it, he’s saying, “You really love strawberries, don’t you?” 

Travis nods, mouth full. “Favorite food in the world.”

“Then you must like your—” 

But Travis’s eyes shoot to a girl entering the pavilion, heading straight towards the table with the plant-speaking kid, and Michael knows his words are falling on deaf ears. Travis nudges Connor and whispers into his ear, a shit-eating grin sprouting on Connor’s face as he looks over his shoulder. 

Miranda catches their grins and stands, yelling, “Katie, wait!”

But Katie sits down and Michael hears what is probably the world’s loudest, strongest whoopee cushion rip through the pavilion. Travis and Connor laugh as Katie stands back up, cushion in hand and face flushed tomato red.

“Welcome back, Miss Tattletale!” Travis yells. 

“That was months ago, you pieces of — of — fertilizers! Give me a break!” Katie roars. The ground rumbles as a tree sprouts beside the table, hooking Travis and Connor up by the back of their shirts. They’re way too calm as they’re dangling several feet in the air. In unison, both brothers pull out squirt guns and aim them at Katie. 

And it is definitely not water judging by the smell. 

[9 AM, Sword Fighting]

Lee said he was a demigod. That monsters are real. And that they sometimes must fight off the monsters that come to eat them. 

Michael never really thought about what it entailed. What they’re supposed to fight the monsters with. 

Dimly, he’s aware of his counselors talking. Something about introduction to swordsmanship and the bare basics plus safety today, then tomorrow they will be training with Ares? Apollo? ‘Some god with the letter A’ cabin and learning a few techniques. He isn’t really paying attention to them as he stares at the blade in his hands. 

It’s real. It’s a real, metal blade. And by the looks of it, everyone has one. Even the little 9-year-old. What the fuck? That’s how old the twins, Sam and Carly, are and holy shit. The thought of them with a real sword? The thought of them having to use it to battle some mythical monster? It's enough to make him vomit. 

“Michael? Michael, hey.” Someone is snapping their fingers in front of his eyes and he knocks the hand away, glaring at … at … well, it’s either Travis or Connor, staring at him blankly, but he can’t tell who’s who yet. They should have worn nametags. 

“What?”

“Have you ever used a sword before?”

Michael kinda felt it should have been obvious, but he shakes his head. 

“Okay, well imagine you’re holding a kitchen knife and you’re cutting some veggies for a veggie soup but instead of a broccoli, it’s a monster and instead of small dainty cuts, you’re making big, wide, full power slashes. So nothing like what I told you to imagine. Forget I said that. You want to grip it like this with both hands—” Connor (or Travis?) demonstrates and Michael mimics the action, “—for the most control. You can try one-handed but the strikes tend to be flimsy at best unless you’re gifted like Clarisse or Percy. You want to kill the monsters as fast and in one go as you can while still being safe. Here’s—” he is walked over to a hand-made, hand-stuffed dummy with straws sticking out its seams. A happy face on a yellow sticky note stuck to where it’s head is. “—a practice dummy for you. Give it a few swings and get a feel for the weapon. I’ll be right back with more pointers after helping everyone. You good to be by yourself a bit?”

Then Travis (Connor?) is leaving after Michael hesitates to say ‘no, I’m not good’, taking off with a thumbs up and a crooked grin.

Michael almost called him back, but they’re a big cabin.  Only a quarter of them have been gotten too, the other three-fourths goofing around while waiting their turn. Michael has never been to a summer camp before, nevermind one as strange as this, but he guesses they’re on a tight schedule. 

So he looks down, readjusts his grip, and swings, missing spectacularly, losing his balance, and nearly taking his eye out. 

[10:00 AM, Archery]

Michael didn’t need much help here.

The bow feels right in his hands. His body knows what to do, his arms pull back the bow like it has done this a million times and his first shot lands dead center in the bullseye. 

The next five shots are the same.

“Woah,” his counselor mutters, face scrunched in thought before it lightens up, blue eyes shining with a gleam. “You’re a natural. Hey, you wanna be the archery tutor? I’ve never seen anyone aim so well and had such perfect form. Not even Annabeth.”

Michael lowers the bow and tries to figure out how he did what he just did despite never once using a bow before in his life. 

[11:00 AM, Greek Mythology]

Michael knew Lee was a decent teacher, tutoring him in both English and Math, so it’s no surprise he’s decent at teaching Greek mythology too. All the campers are in the amphitheater with hand made wooden desks courtesy of the girl from breakfast. Lee is in the center with an overhead projector just having the time of his life explaining what each of the 12 Olympians plus Hades represents with a mind map. 

He tries to pay attention. He really did. He gets through listening to Zeus, Poseidon, Hades, and part of Demeter’s history before his attention is pulled away by Travis and Connor. They’re far away from the group, beside the cabins,  hunched over a … birdbath? It looks like they’re arguing to the birdbath, but Michael squints and with his perfect vision sees that there is a person. On the surface of the birdbath. A girl with blonde hair. There’s a girl in the water of the birdbath. 

There’s a girl. In the water. Of a birdbath. 

Maybe he shouldn’t be so surprised. Food pops into existence with a thought. A girl can grow fullass trees without blinking an eye. Miranda can toss a boy almost twice her weight over her shoulder.

So what if the camp has a Moaning Myrtle?

Before he knows it, Lee is done, Michael misses the other 8 Olympian’s tales, and everybody is packing up their notes to head back to their respective cabins.

They’re ending early to have enough time for a tour of the camp. Which is kind of telling where their priorities are when they hold training first over the tour. 

It’s kind of even more telling what the camp’s view of safety is when there’s a climbing wall that spews lava and when asked about why there’s lava, Travis and Connor say cheerfully in unison,  ‘it’s more exciting that way.’

“Hey, Travis,” a kid starts, tugging on one of the brother’s sleeves. 

“I’m Connor, but yeah?” Connor corrects, turning to face the camper.

“Um, I heard from someone in the Ares Cabin that because of us, we’re in war with Kro—K.K. Is that true?”

Connor smiles and shakes his head. “No. We didn’t do anything.”

He didn’t refute the war part though. 

And as if Connor hears his thoughts, he addresses the cabin, “You don’t have to fight if you don’t want to. But monsters are still a thing so you still have to go to the morning training. No way out of those. Sorry.”

[12:30, Lunch]

Michael is starting to think Travis is some kind of strawberry fanatic and that’s putting it lightly. 

There’s another concerning amount of strawberries on his plate coupled with a grilled cheese sandwich and a salad, yes, but that’s way too many strawberries for one day.

“No such thing,” Travis says, scraping half of his ungodly amount into the fire. 

“I think there is a limit though.” Connor shrugs, tossing a bag of M&M right after.

Michael follows them to the table, even more cramped now. Five new campers, unclaimed, arrived late because of road traffic. He tucks himself into the first opening he sees, shoulder to shoulder and elbow to elbow. Many inches too close in his opinion. 

“Travis,” Michael starts, thinking back to breakfast, “You’re claimed, right? You know who your godly parent is?”

“Yup, Hermes. God of Pranksters,” Travis says, stabbing his fork into a lettuce and turning to wave it at Lee’s table which is much more roomier. Lee catches the action and nudges a boy beside him with an elbow, snickering. The boy turns and rolls his eyes at Travis. 

“You like your dad, right?” Michael asks. 

A quarter of the cabin immediately stops talking and not really subtly turns to them. He’s pretty sure he’s breaking some sort of taboo. Not that it bothers Michael all that much. 

“Yeah, of course I do. He’s pretty cool,” Travis responds, rolling a cherry tomato around with a fork and not looking him in the eye. 

“Why?” It feels like everyone in the cabin is staring at them now, but even then Michael can’t stop.

“‘Why?’” Travis repeats, twirling the fork. Michael can’t help but notice Connor gripping his fork tighter and he has a vivid image of the boy stabbing it into him. Connor seems like the type. “He’s my dad. I think I’m supposed to like him.”

“But he never talked with you though, right? He has never been there for you. How could you possibly like him?”

Travis shrugs. “He’s a god. He’s probably busy.”

Michael frowns. His mom is busy too. Granted, busy with normal things like a job but she still finds the time to tuck his siblings to bed. Still finds the time to cook breakfast and dinner for them. Still finds the time to make movie nights. Still tell them every day, without fail, that she loves them. Is still there for him and his siblings. 

“So it doesn’t bother you? The way your relationship is with him right now?” Michael pushes. 

Travis fidgets with his strawberries, muttering something under his breath that sounds suspiciously like French. 

“What was—” Michael starts to say, but Connor glares, hard. Michael thinks he can see the promise of pain and suffering Connor will inflict upon him. Guess he’d just written his name in Connor’s bad book in Sharpie. 

“Look, Michael, it’s the social norm around here to not talk about our godly parents. Especially in ways that demean them.”

Social norm? Like he cares about something as trivial as that. 

“I just want—”

“Drop it, Michael. Travis’s relationship with our dad is none of your business,” Connor snaps. 

Travis is quiet, a hand resting on a cheek as he stabs into a strawberry, red juices spattering over lettuce and grilled cheese. 

“I want his approval. He’s my dad. What kid doesn’t want their parent’s approval?” 

Lee pulls him aside as lunch wraps up, leading them a bit away from the others.

“Michael, can you chill with the public grilling for a bit?”

“I just don’t get the worship around here for them though,” he argues. 

Lee falters, thinking about his words. “Michael, for some of us, our godly parent is the only one that cares.”

“Wait, are you saying your dad talks to you here?” Michael says. He doesn’t really know what the whole deal is going on with Lee and his mom, but he knows enough to know that Ms. Fletcher deserves the worst mom of the century award. 

Lee frowns a bit and shakes his head. “We talked once when I was claimed but other than that, no. Not really. And none of my half-siblings said anything to me about him either. But he’s already doing so much more than the other gods.”

“Really? Like what?” 

And Lee answers without hesitating, “He claims us as his.”

Michael recalls the talk before breakfast and the questions. About claiming. About waiting. About giving up. The bitterness in their voices. The longing. The yearning. And a sinking feeling grows in the pit of his stomach. 

“How long did it take for you to be claimed?” he asks. 

“I was claimed the second I stepped onto Camp. Apollo tends to be rather fast when it comes to claiming his children. The longest he ever went without claiming is one week. Demeter claims fast during the fall and winter months when Persephone is away. Hephaestus takes on average a month or so to claim.”

“And the slowest god at claiming?” 

Lee’s eyes narrow in thought. “Let’s see… Ares, Athena, Aphrodite, and Hermes seem to be the slowest.”

“How slow?”

“Slow as in… months, years.”

“Why?”

Lee looks away in discomfort. “Who knows? We shouldn’t speculate though. That’s just asking for a curse.”

He catches up to his cabin gathering for the next event and when he asks around about the claiming rate, he gets a mixture of answers. 

“Because we’re not their favorites,” Miranda says cheerfully, while arm-wrestling (and clearly winning) with a flushed Sherman. 

“Because we have to prove ourselves first,” the kid with the glasses states, eyes fixed on his shoes.

“Because they forgot we existed,” others say. 

“Because they want something from us.”

“Because they don’t want the responsibilities of a parent.”

“Because they don’t care.”

“Because they don’t think we’re worth it.”

“It’s because they suck ass,” one of the older campers says with dead serious eyes as Travis chokes on his strawberry, tossing the rest of the fruits into the fire, plate and all. 

“Shh! Celise, you’re gonna get cursed! Everybody, no bad-mouthing the gods or you’ll be turned into a snail and as cute as snails are, I like you all as humans.” 

The camper shrugs and whispers, it’s true . 

Trust me, they whisper next as they’re pulled aside by Travis’s frantic tugging.

They don’t care.

All of this is truly making him appreciate the gods more. 

Connor whistles for everybody’s attention, standing on top of a rock with a piece of paper. 

“It’s free choice from now until 3:30. Each counselor is hosting a different event. Travis and I are doing canoeing. Silena will be hosting horseback — that needs to be changed to pegasi — riding. Malcolm, you will take over for Annabeth since she isn’t here yet for the intro to Origami. Katie will be watching over the wall climbing. Lee, intro to guitar and lyres. Beckendorf, intro to welding. Pollux will be taking over Clarisse’s place at the arena for additional sword and archery lessons. And Castor will be teaching DIY soda. Here’s a map for each of you where everything is. Any questions? Yes, you, in the back. Hao, right?”

Michael takes the map, finds Lee’s name, finds the corresponding location, and then crumples the flimsy paper in his hands. 

But before he can walk away, Miranda is there in front of him and tugging him by the arm with a beaming smile. 

“Follow me for a sec? I want to show you something. It will be quick, I promise.” 

 [1:30 PM, Free Choice]

“Everybody gets a celestial weapon,” Miranda explains as they walk to the armory, “It KOs the monster and turns them into gold dust if it nicks them in the flesh just enough.”

Gold dust… like the gold dust Lee comes back sometimes covered in? 

She leads him to an unassuming building beside one of the cabins, opening the door and revealing shelves stocked full of weapons. Miranda strides to the back without a double-take. Like it’s normal for a summer camp with children to have a stockpile meant for war. 

“Do you have a preference?”

“I… uh…”

“Want some help? Based on what I saw in training, I think you’re better suited with something long-range. You looked uncomfortable with a sword. Aha! What about this?“

Then Miranda pulls out a rifle from one of the boxes. 

Michael stares at it for a full second, wondering if he’s imagining it, wondering if Miranda is kidding, wondering if this whole day is just one big funny dream. But, no, Miranda remains standing there with a big ol’ grin and rifle in hand and waiting for them to say something.

“No.”

“What? Why not?”

“First of all, it’s a gun. Second of all, I share a room with two of my siblings who get into my shit all the time. Third, my mom would literally kill me if she sees me holding a rifle. And fourth, it’s a fucking gun .”

”It’s okay. This is a magic rifle. If you engage the safety and remove the magazine clip, it turns into a telescope.” Miranda demonstrates it for him and would you look at that. It actually became a telescope. “See? No problem. Mom won’t find out and plus! It actually works as a telescope! You can go stargazing with this thing and also kick any monster-butt.”

“What happens if it goes off and a bullet hits someone?”

“That’s okay too. The bullets are made of celestial metal. It can’t harm mortals.”

“But it’s a gun. And I don’t have a license.”

Miranda shrugs. “You can’t kill a mortal though. I don’t think you need a license if you seriously can’t hurt anyone. But if you don’t want a gun, then we can get you a bow. Apollo’s cabin is full of them. Come on.”

And as Michael follows Miranda out, he mutters under his breath, “Why are you all like this?”

Miranda laughs, spinning around her heels to face him. 

“And you’re like a completely normal kid. If you didn’t pass the barrier, I would have thought Lee brought someone fully human.” 

[2:20 PM, Free Choice]

“What is that?”

Lee does only a cursory glance at where Michael is pointing before going back to tuning his guitar engraved with his name and last initial on the Big House’s porch. “It’s Thalia’s Pine. Someone poisoned it unfortunately. A couple years ago a girl sacrificed herself to save her friends. Her father turned her dying body into a magic tree that protects all of camp. We’re trying to fix it, but it’s kinda slow-going right now.”

“That’s cool. That’s cool, but I’m talking about that .” 

And Lee really looks at where Michael is pointing at. A … well, he doesn’t want to say robotic because there’s no way a robot can move that fluidly, but fine. A metallic bull the size of an elephant is charging towards them, running full speed but going nowhere. It’s like an invisible wall is holding it back. Just a bit aways are five people in a line in full bronze armor and a variety of weapons with two more people running towards them. A girl with a gruff voice is ordering to get into position. 

“Is this some sort of play?” Michael asks, waiting for Lee’s answers but when there’s none, he turns to face him. “Lee?” 

Lee is pale. His guitar falls out of his hands as he stands. 

Michael tenses, alarmed. “Lee?” 

“Shit,” Lee curses for the first time ever. “Fuck.”

Now Michael is really worried. “What’s wrong? What’s going on?” 

Lee whirs to face him and Michael doesn’t like the fear, the panic he sees in Lee’s usually calm eyes. 

“Michael, Beckendorf is in the forge. Get him first. Tell him there is a Colchis Bull at Half Blood Hill. Then go get Travis and Connor next — Hey? Michael, are you there?”

A second bull crashes into the invisible wall and they break through. They’re breathing fire. People are being set on fire. People are having their armor melted off. People are being burned. People are being trampled on. People are— 

“Michael!” Lee shakes him hard by the shoulder. “Don’t look at it. Just go run and get Beckendorf.”

Then he’s forcibly turned around and pushed away to the sound of terrified screams and dying cries.  

[3:00 PM, Free Choice]

So that’s a monster. 

And he’s expected to fight one of them? 

The guy who took out the first bull —Percy he thinks is the name — Percy did it with a little help with a flame-resistant man and Percy is about the same age as him. And Clarisse took out the second bull all by herself. So it’s definitely possible. With training and maybe a bow instead of a sword, Michael can do it. 

He can do it. 

…

Just because it’s possible, doesn’t mean it’s right. Doesn‘t mean it’s normal and fuck. 

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. 

How can anyone not see how messed up this whole thing is? Monsters exist and they eat twerps like him? They’ll hunt him for as long as he lives? He’s always going to have to watch his back? He’s always going to have a weapon on him? This is what his day will be like every day? This is normal?  This is what being a demigod means? 

From the porch of the Big House, Michael watches Travis and Connor, amongst a few others with just as many beads on their necklaces, triaging the injured. Passing around nectar bottles and ambrosia brownies, helping them stand, checking their wounds all with an air of professionalism.

They were trained for this. They prepared for this. 

Michael doesn’t like that little fact. 

And speaking of little facts he doesn’t like, one just sits down next to him. When he’s not standing around like a dumbass, he goes to get more nectar bottles from the infirmary where a team of two people is running around tending to the patients. One is Lee. The other, and the clear leader, is the boy in blue scrubs and yellow flip flops. The kid barked orders left and right, telling people where to go, where to place the patients, how to treat the minor wounds until he can get there, basically keeping everything orderly and efficient, all with this air of confidence and calmness. It would have been very reassuring if the kid himself wasn’t this little, baby-faced 11-year-old.

And said 11-year-old is now sitting down beside him, downing a bottle of water then downing half a bottle of red Gatorade. 

Michael is starting to see why Lee doesn’t want his mom to know where Camp Half Blood is. If she ever visited and saw how the camp is being run primarily by pre-teens and teens… well… she’ll probably lose it. 

“Hey,” the kid says.

“Hey,” Michael replies, cautiously. 

Then, silence.

The most awkward silence he has ever experienced as they just sit side by side. 

The kid takes another sip from the Gatorade. 

“You’re Michael, right? You’re Lee’s upstairs friend?”

Michael bristles at the words. “How did you—“

“When the cabins burned down, we stayed at Lee’s apartment for a couple days,” the kid explains, staring at Travis and Connor milling about the battlegrounds. He fidgets with a bandaid on the back of his hand. “This is going to sound really weird, but I thought I heard his voice and your last names match so it might not be my imagination. But do you have a younger brother named Raphael?”

“Yeah, I do. How do you know that?” Michael says, trying and failing to tone back the defensiveness in his voice. God please don’t let Raphie be a demigod like him. 

The kid breaks into a big smile and it really makes him look like the child he is. “We used to be in a class together with Mrs. Rem. How is he by the way? Is he still watching Ninja Turtles? What did he think of the newest episode?”

Distantly, from a dinner chat a long time ago, Raphael mentioned a ‘Will’ who left class because of a stomach ache and was never seen again. He remembered Raphael being really worried. He remembered Raphael even saying that ‘Will doesn’t ever get sick’ and he remembered dismissively saying, “Don’t worry. The kid’s probably fine.” 

There’s no way the kid next to him is that Will. It has to be a coincidence. It got to be. Forget how this kid knows Raphael is a fan of Ninja Turtles. It’s a popular show right now. Somewhere, in this 6.6 billion populated planet, there’s got to be a Will and a Raphael who both go to the same school with a 5th-grade teacher named Mrs. Rem and both watch Ninja Turtles and both love Raphael the sai-welding turtle.

“You went to Hodgkins Elementary School?”

“Yeah.” 

There’s still a chance this is all a coincidence. 

“Your favorite turtle is Raph?”

“Well, it’s Leo now but I used to like Raph.”

Still a coincidence.

“And your name’s Will?”

“It is.”

Just one big coincidence. 

“And you left the classroom—” Michael wracks his brain — when, when did Raphael talked about the kid? — “Because of a stomach ache back in October?” 

For a minute, Will is silent. A minute filled with nothing but the whistle of the wind and commanding yells of campers. Will chuckles, low, as the plastic bottle crinkles in his hands. But when Will speaks, his voice is carefully blank, devoid of emotion. “Not exactly, no. I saw something strange at school that nobody could see and I called my mom, er, my aunt. But she raised me so I considered her my mom. She said to get out, even if I have to lie. So I did. A stomach ache was the easiest to fake. She picked me up from school. I think she was going to take me to camp. But on the drive here… a cyclops showed up and totaled the car. We ran. She told me to go ahead and get help. And I did. Without looking back. I found Lee and he took care of the cyclops but mom… ” 

The kid’s voice is still blank. Emotionless. 

“She died because of me.”

A bitter smile. 

“Because I was too weak. Because I was too scared.”

The bottle bursts in his hand, the red dripping off his hand and staining his scrubs. 

“No one is ever going to die because of me. Not again. Not ever.”

The kid leaves, running back inside when someone screams bloody murder and another voice yells, “Solace!” 

(“Will’s last name was on our vocab lists,” Raphael had said a long time ago. “Solace. It means comfort. That’s so cool. No way can I forget that.”)

Michael continues to sit there, watching the battlefield empty out one camper at a time until everyone injured has been attended to. 

(“She died. Because of me. Weak. Scared.”)

Weak. He understands. Too scared. He understands that too. He experienced all that today with the bulls. 

If it had been at home with his family, at school with his classmates, even at the park with random strangers, what would have happened? He would have fought, right? Adrenaline would have kicked in and he would do something. Or would he have frozen? Just like he did today? Just stood there, watching his family be stomped and kicked and lit on fire until someone kicked him into gear? (“Run, Michael. Don’t look back.”)

No. 

No. Fuck no. Three months. He has three months of this summer camp / orphanage / ‘let’s-all-become-child-soldiers-together!’ hellhole.  He has three months to kick this stupid deer in the headlights reaction. 

(“She died because of me.”)

He’s not going to let anyone die.

[5:00 PM, Free Time]

He finds them in the cabin, one slumped on the bed with an arm over his eyes and the other sitting at the foot with a sketch of the cabin in one hand and a pencil in the other. 

They’re talking about something secret because as soon as Michael slams the cabin door open, their conversation stops. He catches the last sentence though. Are the nightmares getting worse? And god, if these two are okay with everything that just happened today, just handled it all with a face that says this is nothing, then Michael doesn’t want to know what kind of nightmares are troubling them. 

“What’s up?” Connor or Travis, the one on his back, asks, trying and failing to get upright. The arm moves and tired eyes peek at him from underneath. 

“Is it Lee? Does he need us again?” the other asks, tossing the drawing under the bed. 

“You said, whatever problems we have, we can come to you two,” Michael starts. 

They nod together in sync. 

“Then I want you guys to train me until I drop dead. Now until the end of summer.”

[6:00 PM, Dinner]

He barely has his food on the plate when a bright light shines over his head. Flashy. Illuminating. Almost eye-blinding. Michael looks up, squints, and sees the sun with 21 arrows surrounding it, representing the sun’s rays. 

Distantly, he’s aware of a bored voice proclaiming him as a child of Apollo. But all he’s really focused on is his cabin’s, ex-cabin now he guesses, reactions. He can see all their faces down the line. Most are happy. They smile and cheer for him, patting on him on the back and congratulating him. But he can see it, beneath their grins, beneath the genuine elation, is frustration, jealousy, longing. 

(“It's been years.”)

Travis, with his pile of strawberries, bumps him in the shoulder with his own. “Hey, congratulations. Apollo cabin is a lot roomier than ours so you get to actually sleep on a bed.”

Connor nods, tossing an M&M bag into the flames. “Too bad you’re gonna miss the experience of being crammed like sardines on the floor. It’s actually pretty cozy.”

Michael frowns as he conjures up a PB and J sandwich exactly how Mom would make it, cuts it into halves, and toss it in . “Are you guys still going—”

“We’ll still help you,” Travis interrupts, but his smile is impish, borderline devilish.  “But—”

“It comes with a price now.” Connor follows with a just as sordid grin. “Two conditions. One, you have to help us with archery. We’re not bad but we’re not good either and could use a bit more work. Annabeth and I have this sparring contest every week to see who is more proficient in what weapon. She beats me every single time when it comes to archery, but that’s ending this year. And two, you have to be our inside man.”

“Inside man?” Michael asks, already kind of knowing what that means.

“Let us into your cabin. Help us set up pranks in your cabin. Tell us everything we want to know about your cabin. You know. That sort of thing,” Travis says flippantly. 

And before Michael can reject, accept, do literally anything, Travis turns around and walks to the table with this unbearably cheerful hum. “Will is going to regret ever messing with my diet.”

Connor falls in step with a fond smile. “But seriously, Will has a point. You need to balance your meals a bit more.”

For such nice people , Michael thinks as he’s corralled towards the Apollo table by an ecstatic Lee , they can be such dicks. 

[7:00 PM, Volleyball]

“Hey, Lee, when did the monsters start coming for me?” Michael asks as he twirls the volleyball in his hands once, twice and tosses it to Lee. In the background, Michael can hear the yells and cheers of the far more serious, far more competitive match going on. Apparently, there’s a tournament between the cabins and the winner gets bragging rights and no cabin inspection next month. 

Lee isn’t participating. “Our cabin is always clean and orderly,” he had said with pride, though that didn’t stop his half-siblings ( my half-siblings) from making a team and participating. 

“Eh? The monsters? Uh, l-last year,” Lee says, fumbling the ball just like he’s fumbling the lie. 

So it’s been more than a year. 

Michael bites his cheeks as he bends his knees and extends his arms to bounce the ball back.

“And you’ve been taking care of them all this time?” 

“Well, not all of them,” Lee admits, catching the ball with both hands. “A lot of them went away on their own.”

Liar , sings his guts. He’s lying . 

Because Lee is way too nice. Way too selfless. Way too noble to tell the truth that would most definitely hurt. 

“Why? Why didn’t you take me to camp earlier? When the monster started coming? Why now?” he bites out, just barely holding back the snarl. You could have saved yourself years of pain, years of trouble. 

“Because…” Lee looks over to the courts, to where Travis and Connor are arguing with Annabeth (the moaning myrtle girl, Michael realizes). Something about which team Percy should be on. 

(“Your dad is the god of Athletes. Your cabin already have an advantage.”)

(“Okay, but consider this, only Travis and I are claimed. Everyone else on the team could be anyone’s child. And your team is completely made up of god-tier and gifted strategists.”)

(“Your #4 is literally speaking ten languages. He’s got to be a son of Hermes.”)

(“That is a stereotype. Abraham could just be remarkably smart.”)

Lee’s eyes go back to him. “Because I wanted you to have a normal life, to know that there’s more to life than just this. Besides, I’ve been watching you for years. You learn how to do something like it’s nothing after a few minutes. It’s kind of ridiculous and I am lowkey jealous. But if you feel like you’re not ready, I can always—”

“Shut up, idiot. You’re not dropping out of school for me,” Michael grumbles, Lee’s stupid chuckle not at all comforting. 

“I heard you guys are in a war,” Michael says, “Are you fighting in it?”

Lee serves the ball over, high and easy to hit. “Yeah. It feels wrong not to.”

And Michael spikes it back as hard as he can. “But you’re going to college in a few months.”

Lee shrugs, easily leaning forward and kicking it back high into the air for another easy hit. “Julliard is close enough to camp.” 

Michael catches it, tucking it under an arm. “That’s not what I meant. What’s the point of going to college if you might lose an arm or leg fighting in this stupid war? You should just focus on school.”

Lee laughs of all things. “That’s nothing. Will fixed worse.”

Michael bristles at Lee's casualness. “Well, if you’re gonna fight, then I am going too.”

Lee laughs again, tenser this time. “You think your mom is gonna let you?”

“She lets you!”

“Because she doesn’t know what I’m doing. And I’m not the one living with her. Besides, do you even know what we are fighting for?”

“Of course, I do! The enemy is K—” Crap. He never got the full name or title of the bad guy. And somehow he feels like saying Cabin 11’s made up name isn’t going to make Lee take him any more seriously. “I’ll learn more about it. Besides, you’re a great guy. I’m sure you’re fighting for the good guys.”

“Michael, your faith in me is nice but getting involved without knowing the full story is dumb. You’re not fighting.”

“Yes, I am.”

“No, you’re not.”

“Yes, I —”

Lee’s face hardened the way it does when he’s mad or worried or dead serious. Like that one time Leo microwaved a spoon. Like when Raphael tried to jump down a flight of stairs for a dare. Like when Carly and Sam ran onto the streets without looking. And crap. Michael is 14, practically an adult. He shouldn’t be cowing under Lee’s hard stare anymore. But he is and he’s (slightly, only just slightly) scared. 

“No, you’re not,” Lee says, “Because I don’t want you to fight when you have so little experience. Because your mom will literally kill me if something, anything happens to you. Because something bad will happen to you if you do join this fight. So no. You’re not going to fight. You’re not going to participate. You’re only here to train and enjoy camp life.”

“Fine. Fine. I won’t,” Michael grumbles, ducking his head. “Sheesh, you make it sound like if I join, the camp is done for.”

The hard stare melts back into that familiar, soft, (almost) carefree aura with a shrug and small smile. “I just have a feeling. It’s good to trust your instincts.”

And my instincts are telling me right now that you need to quit. But Michael is pretty sure Lee won’t appreciate it and moves the conversation to the climbing wall and why it’s on fire. 

[9:00 PM, Campfire Song]

“Mom,” Michael says, the phone pressed against his ears. He looks out the window, watching the vibrant flame of the bonfire climb high into the starry skies and the circles of cheerful campers surrounding it. 

“Michael, I was wondering when you would call. How’s camp? Do you like it?” 

“Camp is…Camp is great. Lots of activity. Really unique. I—” I like it dies on his tongue. He doesn’t like it. He might have if there was a bit less training. Luckily his mother didn’t catch that pause.  

“That’s great! Made any new — Carly Yew, are those markers I see in your hands? You better not draw on the walls. Get some paper, baby, okay? Made any new friends?”

“A few.”

“You should invite them over! We can have a nice little movie night together.” 

Michael frowns as he recalls someone, somewhere, saying not to gather in more than threes outside the barrier. It attracts the monsters apparently and Michael isn’t about to test that. “They can't. They’re busy. They’re like—um—they’re head counselors, you see, and have a lot of duties.” Like practically running the camp but he doesn’t think Mom would appreciate knowing that. 

“Well, it’s nice to see you make friends even if they’re a bit older.”

Are Travis and Connor older than him? Possibly. They exude confidence that no normal teen has. Or maybe they have just been here for a long time. And that is all kinds of sad. 

His mom asks him about his day, what he did, if he has something he really likes, and for the next hour, Michael goes into a heavily censored, G-rated, parent-safe tale of his first day at Camp Half Blood. It could have been worse. On his way to the Big House to use the phone, he overheard an older boy telling a couple newbies how a kid fought a Minotaur on his first day here and a girl having to sacrifice herself for her friends. 

Wow, it would suck to be them. 

[11:00 PM]

He meets dad in his dreams. 

Michael doesn’t know why, but he thought Apollo to be a refined god. A serious god. A graceful god. 

Instead he sees a teenager sporting pilot shades and leaning on a flaming red sports car in the dingy parking lot of Camp Half Blood with the early morning sun just breaking the horizon. 

“Dad?” Michael says, (who else could it be?) but still not really sure. “Uh, Apollo?”

And the teen waves, flashing a smile that nearly blinds him. “Michael! It’s so good to finally meet you.”

Before Michael could react, the teen — Apollo — dad — pulls him into a crushing hug that knocks all the air out of his lungs.

Apollo is strangely… warm. But not overbearingly warm. Warm like first snuggling into bed under the covers. Plus he smells like laurel leaves, sweet and bright. And Michael has a vivid flashback of his mom — younger, much much younger —  in the hospital bed smiling at a man in his mid-twenties with a bundle of sheets in his arm.

Michael blinks as Apollo pulls away, holding him at arm's length and looking him up and down with a musing stare. 

“You resemble your mom more than me,” Apollo says with a nod, “Most of my children tend to take after my looks, but you’re different, Mike. I have to say, I like it! I can’t stay long. Godly matters I have to attend to, you know? Here, I got you a gift for making it so far in life. Tell Audrey I miss her and think sweetly about the time we spent together.” 

Apollo is pressing a guitar into his hands with his name engraved in the body and stepping back to get into his car. It’s exactly the same as the guitar Lee has except for the engraving. So not unique by any means. But it is a gift. And mom would kill him for rejecting a gift. It’s rude she says, but Michael doesn’t care about Apollo enough yet to give a fuck. Besides if Lee’s experience is anything to go by, this is probably the last time he’ll ever talk to his dad. He needs to make this moment count for something. 

“Wait.”

Apollo pauses just as the engine roars to life, purring sweetly and the window rolled down. 

“I want to ask for something else.”

Apollo blinks and Michael can see the inkling of annoyance in the young face, but Apollo nods and says without a lick of irritation in his voice, “Sure, shoot.” 

“I want you to spend more time with Lee.” Then Michael has a realization. “You know who Lee is, right? The oldest one in the cabin? About to go to Julliard? Want to become a teacher?”

Now Apollo is definitely irked, a telltale wrinkle in his brow. Michael can now add ‘gods’ to the list of people he can make pissed off. “Of course I know Lee, my little music enthusiast child. How could I not? But I’m a God, Michael. There’s only so much free time I have.”

“Then just a few minutes a week, or even a month. So he knows you care.”

Again a slight scowl, but it lingers for a few seconds more. 

“I do care but okay. Okay, I will.” Apollo shifts the car into drive still a little annoyed. Michael thought that was it. Any minute now he’s going to wake up and start the day, but Apollo sighs, leans back in the leather seat, and hangs an elbow out the window. “Michael, you’re so much like your mother. Caring. Gutsy. Compassionate. It’s crazy how much you resemble her. You’re going to do great things. You’re—” The annoyance drops and for a brief second, Apollo looks grief-stricken. And once again, Michael dreams of falling, of a bridge, of a boat wafting through a chasm of fire. But Apollo smiles that blinding smile, fond, and shakes his head. 

“Don’t worry so much about your family. They’re going to be fine. You’re going to be fine.”

Michael wakes up just as the car drives off, his gut itching. 

Apollo is lying to you.

[makeste]

so i’m guessing mr mouse killer, dr child killer and grape pervert are the three characters you hate then

actually, no! well yes for Re-Destro, but not the other two, surprisingly. with Ujiko, even though he’s obviously a terrible, horrible person (possibly the worst person in the entire series; I think he even gives AFO a run for his money) and I hate his guts, as a character he plays a really important role as AFO’s Guy In The Chair and as the architect of all these evil sciencey plot things like the Noumus and the like. and crucially (for me, anyway), Horikoshi makes no attempt whatsoever to try and portray him as likable or sympathetic in any way. he’s an unrepentant creep through and through, which is honestly kind of a relief. I can despise him without feeling any sort of guilt or conflict. so in that respect I think he’s a very satisfying villain character, and I can appreciate that he does a good job of fulfilling his designated role in the series, which is to be Very, Very Evil.

with Mineta, I don’t really hate him so much as I hate Horikoshi’s handling of him. it’s very annoying and frustrating that we’re still dealing with comically perverted tropey characters in 2020, and that it isn’t seen as anything serious, and that people will defend it and be all “oh lighten up” and insist that it’s no big deal. even if Mineta always gets hit with some kind of immediate and deserved retaliation for his attempted gropes and such, it’s still very telling of the culture that it’s portrayed as a nuisance or an unavoidable occupational hazard, rather than sexual fucking harassment. I feel like we ought to be long past the point of this being something to joke about, but yet here we are.

anyway that turned into a rant, but having said all that, I guess it’s kind of weird but I have a tendency to try and separate this phenomenon from Mineta’s actual character nowadays. like, rather than “Mineta did something perverted”, I perceive it more as “Horikoshi wrote Mineta doing something perverted again.” he is a victim of the author treating him as a vessel to pour all of his dumb horny energy into, rather than treating him as an actual character. I guess what I’m trying to say is I don’t hate Mineta because I’m constantly wishing that we would get to see him portrayed as an actual character with a personality beyond just “I really like boobs.” he has an interesting quirk, and the potential is/was there to have him be a character who at first just wanted to become a hero for superficial reasons like money and fame, but over the course of the series gradually grows as a person and becomes someone who genuinely wants to help others. that’s the kind of character I think he could be if Horikoshi wasn’t constantly beating the “guess what, Mineta’s still a perv!! so funny!!” horse, which was in fact dead on arrival and never funny to begin with. anyway so I’m not sure if any of that makes sense but oh well.

so now getting back to the original topic of “characters I dislike”, the other two besides Re-Destro are Overhaul, and Stain. and there are a lot of reasons I dislike them, but I guess probably the biggest one is that in both of their cases, they’re characters who are treated within the story as being super charismatic to the point of inspiring fanatical devotion in a ton of people, and I guess I just don’t really see that at all, myself. like, for Stain, everyone in-canon kept going on about how even if they didn’t agree with his ideas, they all found him super intimidating and compelling. and I kind of got the impression that we the readers were supposed to have this impression of him too, except that I just didn’t. at all, lmao. to me he just came off as very annoying and hypocritical and child-murdery. I felt like it was a total swing and miss as far as the attempt to build him up into a character where we could see where he was coming from and empathize with his ideals even if we didn’t agree with his methods.

basically I dislike him because to me he fails at hitting the marks for either “likable as a character/person”, or “admirable as far as being well-written and serving an important function in the story.” he does serve an important function in the story, mind you, but that’s part of the problem -- that someone who serves as this huge catalyst and is in a way responsible for the creation of the LoV reads to me as such a hollow and disappointing shell of a character, and we’re basically just forced to accept that he’s the type of person capable of attracting this huge cult following. however, pretty much all of this is totally subjective and YMMV and that’s fine! like if you happen to be a big Stain fan or whatever THAT IS FINE lol, this is all just my own dumb opinion.

and with Overhaul it’s pretty similar to Stain I guess. except that with him, you also couple in the fact that almost right from the start we already know that he is torturing a little girl (and I mean like literal torture?!), and has absolutely no problem with that. and the thing is, as soon as that’s revealed, there is basically no coming back from that. this is never going to be a sympathetic character. this is never going to be someone the audience is ever going to look at and be like “okay, but otherwise he’s actually a really nice guy” or even “this sad thing in his past makes me feel sorry for him.” because bro. he is torturing a little girl. and manipulating her and gaslighting her into thinking she deserves it, and keeping her locked in a cell in the basement, and only interacting with her when it’s time to torture her some more. THIS ISN’T A NICE GUY. THIS GUY IS SUPER DUPER EVIL AND BAD.

which would be absolutely fine if, like Ujiko, he was treated as someone we were supposed to find repulsive! but then Horikoshi for some reason started giving us all these flashbacks showing his various lackeys being “saved” by him and them being all “he was the only person who gave my life any meaning even though he clearly treats me like garbage” for whatever reason (I mean, ??? this is still inexplicable to me). and then later on giving us these childhood flashbacks of him trying to explain that in his mind what he was doing made sense, and he had convinced himself it was all for his boss’s sake, and so in a strange and deeply fucked up way it was out of love for him, and so forth. and that just did not gel with me at all. like, I can respect the attempt to try and make him a more fleshed-out character, but at the same time, you showed him torturing a little girl. do you think we’re really going to feel sorry for him?? or that (in the case of the flashback where he was implied to have put his boss into a coma) we really needed to see yet more examples of how terrible of a person he was? anyway so to me his flashbacks felt like just more dragging-out in an already-dragged-out arc, and more or less fell flat in terms of expanding his character. like, yes, he’s a sociopath, we already got that. we figured it out. we’re good.

again though, it’s subjective! others may have found him a more compelling character, and have been more receptive to Horikoshi’s attempt to give him a backstory and provide more context for his actions! and that’s fine. but for me, it was just a big No all around, and I can’t say I was particularly sorry about his ultimate fate at the end of the arc. definitely ranks among my top ten limb amputations in a series which is surprisingly rife with them. anyways! so thus concludes my unnecessarily long post about my disliked BnHA characters. I’m just glad the series is good enough that there are only three, haha.

[yakumtsaki]

I taste just like ice cream, bitch I am so icy, heart cold like an ice queen, that's why they don't like me 🎵

-What the hell was that.

Traditionally I start Union updates with semi-relevant song lyrics.

-Why did you start an update at all.

Because it’s time, Shajar! I took a holy oath in my 2020 simming goals post to update Unions once a month, and I’m already a month late.

-But nothing interesting is happening. 

That’s never stopped me before. Now listen to Rico Nasty, cry some more about Sophie blowing you off, and shut up.

-Ugh please, I couldn’t be more over Sonia if I tried. I hardly ever texted her links to wedding pinterest boards and quizzes to determine if our parenting styles are compatible. 

Did she ever reply? 

-She did once and said ‘who dis’. Of course the letters unscrambled spell out ‘do wish’, meaning she did wish me to keep messaging her. I just don’t know where it all went wrong. 

-Hey there, 17 year old girl, maybe you’ve had enough neat whiskey for the night? We’re actually running out of bottles. 

-Beat it, ponytail, I need to dull my pain. I’ve just been stabbed right in the gut by the love of my life. Just like my style idol and general role model, space opera fascist Kylo Ren.

Shaj I really hate seeing you like this, and not just because the red neon light is super unflattering on your complexion.

-You can fuck right off too, I was perfectly happy with my dads who hate me and my imbecile sister and my brother who might as well not exist, noogie-ing people all day AND night long, but you had to be all ‘OMG IT’S SOPHIE MIGUEL SHAJAR GO TALK TO HER’. Life-ruining-moron. 

But I was totally right about you two hitting it off, I mean look how sad you are now that she dumped- yea never mind, that’s not a good argument.

-Look what I can do even though I’ve had 46 whiskeys!! How you like me now, Sophie???

-You’re paying for all these broken glasses, I’m going to need your name and a credit card.

-Yes, fair enough, my name is Cyneswith Union-

-I LOOK GOOD ENOUGH TO EAT

Yea, you really should eat something to soak up all the alcohol. And not to kick you when you’re down, but you should also disregard all those cliches about ~a smile being the most beautiful thing you can wear~ because MAN. Watch out Joaquin, there’s a new Joker on the prowl. 

-So.. 20 lobsters thermidor and our most expensive appetizers?

-Aha.

-Would you mind settling your bill now?

-Of course not! My name is Cyneswith Union and this is the credit card my parents got me when I was 6 because we’re super duper best friends! I love my parents! They don’t care about their other daughter at all, even when their other daughter is going through a really hard time because she got the emotional equivalent of a lightsaber wound in the gut. You know what, let me also get 20 bottles of your most overpriced champagne to go with the lobsters.

Feeling better?

-Well it’s hard to feel bad when you’re spending your parents’ money recklessly and with malice aforethought.

It sure is. Alright well, the sun is coming up, maybe we should head home.

-What’s the rush? What is going to happen if I don’t go home, my parents will get worried? LOL

God your life sucks. Ok let’s hit a couple more places.

-Greetings. Welcome to our establishment. I am a human employee from this planet.

Great, nice to meet you.

-I just want there to be no doubt that I am indeed an earthling, born and raised under the earth’s exosphere and not above it.

Leave us alone.

-And I’m the resident community lot sim with that one face template you hate! There must be one of us on every lot you visit!

-And I am here in my revealing outfit to use the dance sphere and make everyone uncomfortable!

You’re actually pretty, I need to keep you in mind for after Don Oates takes a wrecking ball to our genetics, but yea, let’s bounce, Shajar.

Time to visit the happiest place on earth, Deh'Javu Modern Art Museum, home to my favorite piece of art in any medium, The Toilet of Fire. Shove that Fountain up your ass, Duchamp. How we feeling, Shaj?

-This trash can reminds of Sophie :( She used to go around town throwing money she stole from charities in trash cans and then send them riddles for where to find them :(

Enough with Sophie, we’ll find you someone better! Like..

..your aunt! Get the hell out of here Brit Brit, you’re taking up townie space. 

-I won’t be long, Gunther’s amazing close-up portrait of my hair was rejected by the museum so I’m here to set this shithole on fire. 

In other words Gunther just painted a canvas black and called it a day?

-His art doesn’t cater to plebs. Yes, offense.

Our old friend Ugly Teen Townie is here so finally we can have some fun. Shajar had gone almost 12 hours(!) without noogieing someone and I was starting to worry for her health.

-Yes, yes, I’m starting to feel like myself again..

Good for you, Shaj!

-Hope you’ve made peace with your God, Ugly Teen Townie, this water balloon is filled with horse feces! 

-WHERE DID YOU EVEN GET HORSE SHIT

-I ordered it from some guy named Leod McGreggor.

-How about a another joke, MuRRAY?

-What?!

-Now you say, ‘no, I think we’ve had enough of your jokes’. Say it!

-No, I think we’ve had enough of your jokes.

-What do you get when you cross a mentally-ill loner with a society that abandons him and treats him like trash? Now you say ‘call the police, Gene!’

-Call the police, Gene!

-I'll tell you what you get..

-YOU GET WHAT YOU FUCKING DESERVE. HAHA oh man! Good stuff. 

Alright I’m starting to feel bad for Ugly Teen Townie, first he had to come to all the toddler birthday parties during the Victoria/Komei era and now this, he has suffered enough at this family’s hands. Time to go home, Shaj.

-Not so fast!

Wow, the Countess and Mrs. Crumplebottom on the same lot, top 10 anime crossovers.

-I have been sent here by the Limp Dick Vamps United organization to recruit Shajar Union.

Ugh you people are still around? Haven’t heard of you losers since the Count wouldn’t let Victoria bang him, which I’m still annoyed about. 

-Indeed we are, and it’s clear Shajar is ready to join us, dedicating her life to evil deeds without romantic distractions. I have no idea what Crumplebottom is doing here.

-I’m here to recruit Shajar to my own organization, Bitter Sims Worldwide Alliance. We’re always on the lookout for new members who want to spread their misery to their fellow Sim. 

It sounds like it’d be more effective if you guys just merged your organizations.

-I will NEVER merge my organization with someone who displays her bosom like a common whore. 

-Eat a dick, Crumplebottom!

-MAKE ME, FANGTOOTH

-Alright here I am, what the fuck do you want?

-Shajar, it is a pleasure to meet you! Ardent admirer of your work.

-What work, freakshow?

-Torturing everyone around you, what else!

-What? I don’t torture people around me, if anything they torture me.

-Why don’t you talk to me about it?

-I’d rather not, you look like a bejeweled snowman.

-Look deep into my eyes, Shajar..

-And now look deep into my razor sharp teeth..

-Ugh fine, let’s talk. 

-Is that Victoria and Komei’s teen granddaughter hanging out with a vampire?

Yes it is Kennedy, keep it moving.

-God, wtf is wrong with this family. 

Nothing now that you’ve been removed from our social circle, go away! Just kidding, you’re an icon and I’m marrying you in at some point. 

-Hard pass. 

Your loss, hombre. 

-It definitely isn’t.

-If I had known your turn on was vampires I would had set you two up!

STOP SETTING UP TEENS WITH ADULTS, LAKSHMI. And Shajar’s turn ons isn’t vampires, it’s fitness/fatness. Body positive queen. 

-Well, Shajar, you alphabetically listing all the people who have wronged you while I was trying to kill Crumplebottom telepathically has made for a very productive conversation. We’ll be in touch. 

-Thanks, Countess, it’s been real.

Shajar!!! Who cares about Sophie when you might bag a hot, rich vamp??

-Meh.

I’m gonna need you to be more excited about this prospect because a vampire spouse might just be enough of a draw to beat the comedic factor of fucking Don Oates turning us into an unintentional uglacy and I’m doing whatever I can to avoid my fate.

Ugh.

UGH

UGHHHHHHH

LMAOOOOOOOOOOOOO VICTORIA

-GET FUCKED, BROKEN FACED WEIRDO

God I miss you Vic 💔

-Donnie-bear, not to be not-nice, but mopping your pee off my front lawn is not exactly what I pictured doing during this date.

This guy won’t even mop up his own piss, what a catch.

Wow, manipulative much?? You are a piss piece of work, Donaldo.

-Don’t think we forgot about you, you 10-nice-point disgrace!

-VICTOR NO

-GET THAT MOP READY

-Finally, some peace and quiet.. Just me, alone with my broken heart, pondering my hopeless, loveless future..

-💗💗💗OMG SIS THERE YOU ARE. DONNIE AND I MADE OUT!!! 💗💗💗 But then grandma’s ghost scared him into soiling himself. 

-Good for grandma, hopefully next time she gives him a stroke. Now shut up and let’s eat in silence while I ponder my hopeless, loveless future.

-Okie dokie! 💗💗💗

-Um, I think mine has vomit in it.

-Yea I did that, but it’s just whiskey and lobster, if anything it increased in value. 

-Awww thanks sis! 💗💗💗

-Stop patronizing me, you little bitch. God I want to poke your eye out with this chopstick so badly.

-I love you too Shaj! 💗💗💗

And I hate both of you. Where’s your brother, I haven’t paid attention to him in 3 days. 

-He went upstairs, I think he’s pusshurt we forgot his birthday LOL

IT’S HIS BIRTHDAY????

-Don’t feel bad, I forgot it too! 💗💗💗

GODDAMMIT. WULF! WULF WHERE ARE YOU

-I’m here, I just grew up and dare I say it could not have gone better! 

Really?? Finally some good news! Let me look upon you-

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

AHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA

WULF WHAT THE FUCK

-I was Mozart musical genius boy but now I’m a sk8ter boi! Character development!

Ok this is the most iconic birthday look since Gunther grew up in the pirate costume, we’re obviously keeping it. 

-Great! And as if the fact I’m a Wyatt face template with 0 Jojo genes wasn’t enough to make me unelectable, I also rolled family! :D I’m doing everything I can to ensure I live that sweet motherlode spare life! 

Honestly you should had picked another outfit cause now that you’re dressed like this I unironically want you to win. Hoisted with your own petard.

[vore-scientist]

I, Spy [In Which There Are Thieves]

[G/t M/multiple gender ambiguous prey, safe soft vore, mild stuffing, fear.play]

A MINI Tale of the Mystic Woods

Summary: The evil half-giant wizard Yonah gets a little carried away catching a team of thieves. But his aching stomach is the least of his worries.

Warnings: A lot of teasing. As usual super duper unwilling prey, Yonah acts as if he is going to kill his prey, and he is very convincing.

Story features Yonah’s ward the Princess Sophia, and Yonah’s wizard friends Avshi and Eli. 

------ Three thieves today, and Yonah had it handled. Too handled. The Princess Sophia could tell when he was getting carried away and even though he hadn’t even caught them all yet, she knew tonight was one of those nights. He was so in character she even worried that once he ate the last thief he would try to stuff her into his belly with them! Of course once he did eat all three he was bound to start complaining. As if he didn’t do it to himself! The glutton! He could barely eat two humans and yet she’d seen him make the mistake of three on two previous occasions.

What makes this time different? Well. This time she figured it out early. And ran straight for the mirror, whispering for it to call Yonah’s friends, any it could reach. Please! It will be so embarrassing! The mirror obliged without needing a rhyme, finding two, Avshi And Elisheva. Sophia angled the mirror so they could see what was going on but held a finger to her mouth. an instant later they were in the tower, Sophia dragging them behind the mirror.

“Thieves!?” Eli whispered, Sophia nodded.

Yonah was being careful as he prowled his study, he had one human already tucked under his arm. He was grinning from ear to ear, showing off his uncannily large canines, and with each hungry growl he exhaled steam. Each footstep shook the room.

He reached at his bookshelf full of his notes and tossed them aside, revealing the second human who joined their friend in Yonah’s elbow.

“Thought you might want to watch. He’s gonna do something stupid.” She saw their eyes sparkle with mischief. “Just stay hidden.”

“He’s gonna know we’re here, he always does!” Eli pointed out.

“Not this time. Trust me,” Sophia insisted.

As they watched Yonah catch the second thief and without loosing steam, chasing the last around the room, his hair smoking, eyes glowing, they realized she was right. But just in case they both encircled themselves with invisibility.

“What are you going to do?” Sophia hear Avshi from her left side.

“I’m part of the show!” She ran to the edge of the desk. Kneeling she shouted down as Yonah reached behind a shelf.

“Hey Jack! Yoo hoo!!” She whistled at the thief who had crawled out from under the shelf and was stealthily making a beeline for the window.

“Huh!?” They looked up to find the source of the mysterious human woman’s voice.

“HA!” Yonah caught them easily. “Thanks Sophia!” He stood up and held his catches proudly.

“What a bounty!” He declared, a happy kid returning from a sweetshop. Sitting at his desk he pressed his face into them and breathing in through his nose as he growled, lower now, “I cannot wait to get you all in my belly!”

They squealed and redoubled their efforts to get free but to no avail. He chose one of them at random.

“So I’m not going to wait. This was a delightful diversion, but fun time is over. For you at least. ” And he opened his mouth wide, forcing the torso of the humans into it and to the back, as he tipped his head up and swallowed.

Sophia could swear she heard gasps from somewhere behind her, but Yonah didn’t seem to notice as the thieves in his arms screeched. Their friend’s kicking legs were pulled down with each powerful swallow, until the giant could close his mouth and the distensión in his throat receded with a heavy, satisfied sigh, and a hiccup.

“Oof, went a little too fast there!” He informed his victims, hiccuping again, “I should have savored them more, they were scrumptious! No matter, I have two more to go!”

Sophia was so tempted to point out that he was already full. She could see his stomach already pressing against his vest ever so slightly.

He raised up the next human who was shaking as he lowered them feet first into his mouth. Steam rose around them and they tried to hold onto his teeth as he swallowed them, tried to pull themselves back out but he flicked his tongue up and downed the rest of them in a few gulps, uttering hungry growls as he did.

Now he was visibly full. He actually had to unbutton his vest, lest the buttons rip apart. This is why he preferred the traditional robes… but he looked so dapper!!! Ah well, he had a nice shirt on underneath! It wasn’t as stiff as the vest but his stomach still pushed against it.

“Mmmmm even more delicious than the first!” He informed the third thief. And he looked to Sophia. “This one has a lot to live up to, or die for, in this case” he laughed a grand belly laugh, feeling the humans inside him tumble a bit.

“Buuut… I’m pretty full after two,” he said, licking his fingers, the human was still trapped in his arm, pressed against his side. “Maybe I should save this one for desert? Or just let them go?”

“LET ME GO! PLEASE!” they pushed themselves away as best they could. This was their last chance, hoping against hope the giant wasn’t just fucking with them. They could feel their friends dying beneath the skin and fat and muscle. It was too late for them!

“Depends,” Sophia put a hand to her chin, mocking stroking a beard, “Just  

how tasty were the first two?”

She had to keep her cool, if Yonah came to his senses it would all be ruined! He was running on adrenaline and wasn’t yet feeling the pain from stuffing himself. Three would tip that over the edge.

Yonah leaned back in his chair and stroked his stomach with his free hand, drumming it with his fingers. It trembled beneath his touch as his captives thrashed about.

“Some of the best I’ve ever eaten! I couldn’t possibly wait for dessert!”

Yes!!! Sophia cheered to herself as Yonah licked the final thief bodily, Making happy noises, not thinking about anything but how good this one tasted, and how wonderful an addition to his current, but very temporary, collection they would be.

“Awwww, hear that?” He rubbed his stomach with two fingers “You’re friends miss you dearly!” He pressed the thief to his tongue and drew them into his mouth. And leaned back to swallow this one, much slower than the last.  

“A happy reunion” he pronounced and affectionaly pat his now obviously stuffed-full-of living-smallfolk stomach

Then he sat up and Sophia saw his expression instantly change to painful regret as he held his middle.

“Oh dear, that was… way too many…*hic” a bit of drool fell from his mouth and onto his slightly stretched shirt. “Owwww. Stop moving so much,” he poked his stomach which protested loudly with the screams of the thieves and he groaned.

He looked at Sophia with puppy dog eyes. A puppy who broke into the food stores.

“They never listen,” he said deeply unhappy, eyelids drooping. It might be painful but Yonah was still a giant, and such a full stomach made him a bit loopy and sleepy. Only he was in such pain he couldn’t sleep. The only good news for the thieves.

“You did this to yourself, dumbass,” Sophia had no sympathy for him or the thieves, though she smiled in amusement at their collective distress.

clap

clap

clap

Yonah looked up and tried to find the source of the noise but his brain wasn’t his friend right now.

“Yipe!” Sophia jumped as the two wizards stopped being invisible on either side of her. Still clapping.

“Good show Yonah!” Avshi looked into the eyes of a very confused and startled half-giant.

“Terrific!” Eli added, “And I mean that in the original sense!”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you in such glorious form!” Avshi said, “You  never worked up such a fearsome demeanor playing with us!

“Uhhhhh,” the last thing Yonah had expected as his friends to show up. No. Not show up. They had been WATCHING! SPECTATING!

“FUCK!” He stood up and took a step back, still clutching his swollen middle. “What are you two doing here!”

The pair grinned. “We heard you were catching thieves and wanted to see The Great And Terrible Yonah HaEsh at work!” Eli supplied.

“But I- how,” his slow brain finally catching on, “SOPHIA!”

The princess stood proudly but sheepishly as Yonah had to regain his balance. The thieves in his stomach screaming as he nearly fell on his ass. His face was turning a fascinating shade of scarlet.

“How could you! They’ve never seen me like, *hup* this!”

“Like what? Exactly?” Sophia sat on the edge of the desk, feet dangling, head in her hands.

“Like- oo*HIC* a-“ he couldn’t say it.

“Monster?” Avshalom sat next to Sophia and looked kindly at their suffering friend.

“A stupid monster?” Elisheva improved, sitting on Sophia’s other side.

Yonah nodded dumbly. Returning to his seat to massage his aching belly. From the shock his wits were back enough to see his friends glance worried at his stomach full of squirming humans

“He’s gonna let them out,” Sophia told them, and they relaxed considerably. But Yonah narrowed his eyes.

“Oh? I was gonna but I’m having second thoughts,” he crossed his arms over his stomach, pressing down on his still very much alive morsels.

“Yonah!” Sophia snapped at him.

“What! You came here to see a man-eating monster didn’t you! Well that’s what you’re gonna get,” he hiccuped again and his stomach gurgled with agreement. Or was it in opposition? Yonah looked at tad woozy.

“You’re gonna kill them to spite us!?” Sophia crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow.

Yonah pouted for a few seconds. Looking rather silly. His friends didn’t seem phased by his decision, probably because he wasn’t very convincing at this point. Even with a belly full of screaming humans and his apathy fueled by a horrible bloated pain and drowsiness.

“No,” he admitted, but he wasn’t happy about it. He still couldn’t bring himself to kill three random people on a whim. That wasn’t him.

“But don’t think any of you are off the hook! I’m going to be hungry when I spit these fools up”

Great. He said it, and now the three inside him went positively bananas. Confused? Elated?

“Yeah you heard me, you’re getting out alive! Aren’t you lucky! So how about you stop moving so much” They were cheering even though he hadn’t actually spit them up yet. Ugh.. it hurt.

“/Urrg/ I need to lie down for a minute,” he gingerly got out of his chair and lay on the floor, looking up at the ceiling. So cool. It drained the heat of embarrassment from his body. And his stomach relaxed too. Much better. Seemed like they were listening to him too and weren’t squirming, but adjusting.

OOF he let out a yell as did the humans in his stomach as something landed on them! He craned his neck to see the princess sitting atop his sore stomach gleefully rubbing it. Glancing to the side he saw Eli and Avshi leaning against him too.

“How are they doing in there?” Eli asked, pressing a hand to his stomach. Retracting it when she felt one of them move. Hmm she didn’t like that. It was fine when it was one of them in there… this was different.

“They’re- hic- fine. Just very very cramped,” he let his friends continue to massage his belly. Except for Eli. A bit too uncomfortable. She preferred to stay by his face, which he turned to look at her with a pathetic little smile.

“How you can do this I don’t understand it,” she stroked his nose and he closed his eyes.

“Because you’re not a giant,” he said, sticking his tongue out to lick at her, “nor are you evil.”

“Oh yessss the very evil Yonah, who eats folks but won’t kill them,” she kicked at his tongue. He could get a taste AFTER he spit up the thieves.

“Hey! I’m very terrifying! You said so!”

“Terrifying? Yes!” She pet his forehead. “Monstrous? Absolutely! That was quite a performance. But Evil? I’m not so sure,” she explained as she moved on to ruffling his hair. It was so fluffy.

“Hey guys, do you think I’m evil?” He wasn’t asking Sophia or Avshi, but the three thieves, he poked his stomach to make sure they knew.

“YES!” They cried in unison. Then one continued “FOR THE SAKE OF THE GODS LET US OUT!”

Yonah rolled onto his side and Sophia fell off. “It’s about that time, but I’d rather not throw up on my nice clean Workshop floor.”

He picked up his friends and went downstairs to the kitchen to spit up in the sink, which was filling with water. Painfully aware of his two wizard buddies watching with fascination, he quickly regurgitated three thieves. Too quickly! Coughing and panting he slumped over, leaning against the cabinets.

“I never fucking learn,” he said more to himself than anyone else. “Three humans is too many.”

But he had to recover as the thieves cleaned up fast and as Yonah’s friends and Sophia were on the floor with him, they were making their way towards the door.

“Oh no you don’t!” He stood up and snatched the thieves into his arms once again. The blood rushes to his head and his vision blurred with grey and tan fractals. The thieves screamed as he squished them to his chest so he wouldn’t drop them.

“Calm the fuck down I’m not gonna eat you again!”

He noticed that his friends and Sophia had managed to climb up the embroidery of his robes while his head cleared. Sophia and Avshi on the right shoulder and Eli on the left. He proceeded back upstairs to release the thieves onto the windowsill.

They didn’t need any prompting to skedaddle the moment the wizard stepped back. The three wizards and one princess watched them disappear into the woods. Before Yonah also climbed out of the window and dropped into his garden with a earth shaking THUD!

“Hey! Warning next time!” Eli was gripping his collar with white knuckles.

“And why are we outside?” Sophia asked.

“It’s a nice day!” Yonah walked over to his favorite apple tree (the one big enough for him to lean against) and he sat down in the shade. He plucked his friends from his shoulders to cradle them in his arms.

“What am I to do with you three?” He smiled.

Eli crossed her arms “I have no idea what you mean!”

“I think you do,”  he brought her to his face, “it was very rude to spy on me!”

“We didn’t want to throw you off your game!” Avshi said. “It’s not like we can plan ahead of time for thieves!”

“I suppose not,” he looked up at the leaves, apple blossoms peppering the branches. “But it still deserves punishment!”

He licked Eli who was expecting it and had put her hands in front of her face.

“You can’t eat us! We don’t have the supplies for the spell!” She protested being actually shoved into his mouth.

“I can too!”

Eli looked shocked. Would he really risk it!?

“But I’ve had my fill for today.”

She relaxed. Not completely because he basically stated he didn’t have a problem eating them without protection. Avshi pouted, “I’d be willing to get eaten” they said under their breath.

“Yonah HaEsh has had his full? I don’t believe it!” Sophia wrestled herself free of his embrace to lay in the crook of his elbow.

“Ehhh,” he half rolled his eyes, “I don’t feel like swallowing and so quickly spitting up anymore people.” He paused. Eli had lowered her guard and he quickly flicked his tongue at her face and she squealed in frustration. She had washed her hair this morning. All glossy and straight but curled at the ends into sharp points! and now it was ruined!!!

Graciously he put her down in his lap. “Takes a lot out of me, and I did it three times today!”

“Now that I believe,” she smiled and then opened her eyes again “Wait that means you’re gonna eat me!”

With her curse lasting FOUR hours which could be reset while inside him… eating her didn’t have come with the downside of quick regurgitation.

“You’re the one who called Avshi and Eli here,” he pointed out.

“Great,” she didn’t feel like being eaten today but she couldn’t really stop him, and she had thoroughly embarrassed him. It wasn’t like she didn’t expect this. She had hoped he would have been satisfied with the thieves. She should have known better.

“not now!” He grinned from ear to ear. “I think I shall have you for dessert!”

Oh. So he planned to sleep with her in his stomach! Fine. So she wouldn’t have to subject herself to the ordeal for a good many hours. It was only midday.

“Hey! I said I would be fine being eaten!” Avshi said a little louder, standing up unbalanced, hands on their hips.

“Sorry Avshi! Im too tired,” Yonah lifted them to his face, licking his lips, “so it’s just licks.”

“Eli was wrong, you are evil,” they didn’t resist as Yonah shoved them into his mouth but didn’t make any indication of swallowing them.

Eli sat down and closed her eyes. Sitting on Yonah while he… enjoyed a human snack… wasn’t the most pleasant activity, but at least he wasn’t tasting her anymore! She made use of his robe as a hammock and lay down, ignoring the noises from above. Yonah’s gleeful giggles and Avshi’s muffled exclamations were a bit distracting.

Eventually Yonah slid Avshi from His mouth and made sure they cleaned up before joining Eli in his lap.

“How about lunch, in an hour?” He suggested as his friends settled down, yawning as he did. He re-adjusted his position against the tree to be more congruent for proper relaxation.

They all agreed. A nap before lunch was just what they all needed.

And it was a very nice day.

[FIN]

[Thanks for reading! please reblog! for more mystic woods go to vore-scientist.tumblr.com/tagged/mystic+woods+story or search ‘mystic woods story’ on my blog! For thief stories only search “MW Thieves”]

[twilightknight17]

Today on Royal: Pain! :’D

He’s eating the map and I’m getting steadily more weirded out by all of this the longer it goes on.

I’m definitely worried now. Where the fuck is the Velvet Room. How is he powerful enough to override the Velvet Room?

So he wants me to see “his reality”. Which means going out and seeing how happy all of Akira’s friends are. And they are happy! ...but not happy enough that a few well-placed dialogue choices can’t start poking holes in the story they’ve been fed. Maruki’s not perfect at this. And honestly, he’s taken Akira’s friends, not given him anything. We went from everyone wanting to spend time with Akira to everyone having other things to do. Ryuji doesn’t even know why they’re friends. Thinking about how they met is what starts to crack his illusion.

While I was looking for my friends, I ran across this couch outside the furniture store in Kichijoji.

Examining it yields only this:

So now I gotta go back to Kichijoji after it frees me from the plot so I can see what’s up with this conspicuously Velvet blue couch.

(I will say, if I have one complaint about this part, is that it’s six days of the same thing. Wake up, locate Friend, see how they’re doing, return home, spend evening in bed contemplating whether this is a good thing because Friend is happy. You can’t do anything else, see how any of your other confidants are doing... What does Iwai’s ideal world look like? Takemi’s? Hifumi’s?)

I think out of everyone I feel the most bad for Morgana.

I mean, he spends half the game as it is worrying that he’s some sort of monster instead of a human. And now that he’s human and I’ve gone and jabbed a hole in his dream, he’s spending a week growing more and more afraid as he realizes that something isn’t right about himself. That’s just straight-up existential terror.

Goro didn’t really find a lot during his week of investigating. Mostly just that Maruki’s been doing cognitive psience stuff since college, and that Okumura and Wakaba are...actually alive.

Does that mean if we end the dream, we’re murdering them?

Not taking the Misericorde with me feels like a betrayal of my role as heir to the title of Trickster, but I can’t really turn down an extra thirty points of attack. X’‘‘D Especially since Goro and I are going into the Palace alone.

Other than the weird security cameras, this place really is beautiful. And apparently the music that I like so much is called “Gentle Madman”. Stop hitting all these fucking tropes I like, Maruki. It’s not fair.

Oh heck, wait, are we doing this now? This is an actual question? I assumed that was for the endgame. Well, if I’m here... The safe room was right downstairs...

Let me be selfish. Just for one moment. Please.

Please.

.....no, wait, this hurts.

This hurts a lot.

Because they deserve this. They all deserve this happiness. I’ve never heard Goro sound that genuinely happy as he did in this ending. But the only way to give them this is to leave them trapped under the will of a dictator. And they deserve better than that.

From the Den:

They’re looking at you. Judging you for the sin of the choice you made.

I find it interesting that while Akira and Goro are clearly looking at you with full knowledge of what you did, the game itself doesn’t seem particularly judgemental. I got the “view the ending” trophy and the option to save clear data, which to me implies that it’s...obviously the wrong choice, but a valid choice regardless. I never got the “Good” Ending in vanilla P5, so I don’t know if that offered the same level of legitimacy. This was treated as a real ending.

[reloading save data]

Of course we can’t accept this reality, why would he even think we would do that? X’‘D

Sumire is throwing a fit because she still wants to be Kasumi, and is getting ready to fight us. Shit. Still, she’s inexperienced, and both of us are strong enough to han--

Goro: I could deal with this, but I’m assuming you want her to leave here alive, right?

It’s sweet of you to take what I want into consideration, but yeah, I’d really rather not kill her, so just tone it dow-- Aaaaand he’s walking away and leaving me to fight her alone. Thanks, honey.

Shoutout to using the same strategy as the battle arena and just equipping something that repels physical. She took her own swords dance to the face and got knocked out.

......what the fuck are you doing? This just looks like torture.

I know for a fact that that’s not Nyarlathotep because I’m pretty sure I’d have had people beating down my door to point it out already. Because crucifixion pose by itself? Common imagery. Tentacles? ...coincidence, probably. But if this had been Nyar puppeteering Maruki or something? I’m one step away from being Super Duper Valid. I already feel pretty valid anyway.

HELLO, Persona 3! Nice(?) to see an out of control persona again. I wonder how close her persona was to reverting to a shadow? Sumire feels like more of a “dungeon” sort of person. Since she’s suppressing something.

But...what was Maruki’s goal here? Beating us into submission? He’s just letting Sumire’s emotional torment go out of control; hell, he’s literally feeding into it with the Biyarkis. He’s using her to fight us, and that’s...disgusting, honestly. You want everyone to be happy, but you’re going to let her throw herself at us over and over? Really?

Why do I feel like all of this “I want you to understand, we can talk, you’ll see things my way”, all of this asking for consent, is bullshit? Does he really want us to see things his way? Or can he actually not alter our reality without consent?

Thank god for the cavalry because this battle was clearly impossible from the first round. I love that the other Thieves have no idea what the fuck is going on, but their leader is in danger so they’re gonna Fight.

I think there’s not. We don’t want to talk. Fuck off. And also stop swiping tropes I like. You’re not Rubicante; you’re not earning my respect by refusing to fight me when I’m tired.

Goro, I know you’re Done with everything, but that’s really not helping.

The Phantom Thieves are momentarily baffled, because it’s clear that we have to change Maruki’s heart, but they’re getting thrown off by the fact that he’s not “evil”. Yeah, he’s not. He has good intentions. But he’s doing bad things to accomplish those intentions. Doing bad things for good reasons is still bad.

...if he wasn’t like this... maybe it would be okay. If he could make everyone happy, erase their trauma, make the world better...without rewriting memories or being a brainwashing dictator... That might not be wrong. But he’s made it pretty clear that he’s on a power trip and doesn’t want dissent, which is no better than Yaldabaoth.

What we did to Futaba and what he’s doing are vastly different things.

...Morgana calls her “Lady Lavenza” and that’s really cute, actually. I’m realizing I portray Lavenza as more of a child than the game does, but I like both.

Oh so now we can press Morgana for what’s wrong. Learned from your prior mistakes, huh, ‘Kira? XD

.....I love her.

It’s extremely weird to have the whole squad interacting with the Velvet attendant and addressing her by name. That’s so strange in comparison to how it usually is. But these are strange times, and once again, it’s unnerving how much power Maruki has.

He’s strong enough that he’s suppressing the Velvet Room. That’s horrifying. I wonder if he knows they exist; I could see him considering them a threat to his ideal world. Normally I’d be sure that Igor and Lavenza could kick his ass if he tried anything, but... I genuinely don’t know anymore. Igor is still recovering from being imprisoned, and Lavenza is barely able to manifest to talk to us.

Meanwhile, Maruki is using a persona.

Normally I’d be fussed about him summoning in reality, but apparently reality is still half-fused with Mementos, which in the greater scope of Persona lore feels like something similar to what was happening in P1 and P2. The collective unconscious is very close to the surface. I’d be curious whether or not the kids could summon outside of the Palace with a bit of practice, but I’m sure the game won’t go into that.

...although, that doesn’t explain him being able to use his powers in reality before the beginning of the year. Mementos only started fusing with reality in December.

I’m looking directly at you, Atlus. You made a human villain stronger than what I imagined for the strongest persona-user?

......oh, Mona, I’ve got like 3 different notes documents for you to read about why that can be allowed. X’D

*cracks knuckles*  Not to take Goro’s side, but...we already killed one god, didn’t we?

But...this is our fault, and we have to fix it. I don’t completely understand how Maruki granting the Thieves’ wishes transferred the belief of the masses to him, but... This can’t go on. If Mementos completely fuses, this becomes permanent, and there will be no way out. Time to go.

I really do appreciate that Goro was invited as one of the Phantom Thieves. And Ryuji asked for his input on whether we’re going after Maruki.

...you all said it. He’s one of you now. No take-backs.

[killian-whump]

I have never seen an episode of Once upon a time. I want to start by watching the whumpy episodes first.😁 It seems like you're the right person to ask.😂 Which episodes would you recommend?

Oh! Oh! I’m definitely the right person to ask!!! :D

However, I can only really answer for Killian Jones whump, because… Well, you know ;) That’s kinda my forte XD

The very best Killian whump in the entire series occurs in episodes 5x13 and 5x14, when he’s in the Underworld, and has been tortured by Hades. Unfortunately, we don’t get to SEE the torture, but he looks delicious all wounded and covered in blood because of it. And in 5x14, Hades chains him up from the ceiling in a literal “slow dipping mechanism” the likes of Dr. Evil XD He also gets rescued by Emma and is an adorable bloody cinnamon roll.

Actually, Season 5 has a lot of great stuff in it. He straight-up dies in 5x08, and it’s super dramatic and everything, but he also gets chained up and angsts all over the place and everything. 5x10 is full of Dark Hook fun, as well as him getting impaled on a sword (and not giving a fuck, lol) and some super duper angst as he turns into the Dark One at the beginning of the episode. And Dark Hook is just… really dark and angsty and wild-haired and everyone loves him. I mean, all of US love him. The other characters… not so much XD Oh, and Hook dies again in 5x11, because dying is something Hook does best XD Then there’s the tortured!Hook episodes I mentioned above… and some more super duper angst in 5x20, which is simply heartbreaking T_T

Speaking of him dying, he also dies in episode 4x22, where he’s been “rewritten” by the author to be a coward. It’s cute to see him cowering from danger and being a cute little guileless bean. And his death is nice. He also dies in the big finale of the series, 7x22. None of his deaths “stick” of course ;) But each and every one of them is delightful and fun to watch XD

If you like bondage, the final 30 seconds of episode 2x19 are the best 30 seconds of bondage in the entire show. The rest of the episode doesn’t have Hook in it at all, so you could just look at the GIFs here on my blog XD Really, for a lot of the episodes, you can check them out on my blog to see most of the good shots and even some video clips. Check out my Episode Guide :D

Episode 4x08 (might be 4x09, depending on the episode counting of wherever you view the episodes, it’s called “Smash the Mirror Pt. 2″) sees him getting captured by Rumplestiltskin, tied to a fence, taunted, and then getting his heart ripped out by Rumple. Nice stuff :D The episodes immediately after it, have Rumplestiltskin holding onto his heart and controlling his actions through it. Lots of angst and frustration; it’s really a nice story arc :)

Episodes 2x11 and 2x12 are good, too. Hook goes off the rails a bit, and attacks Belle on his ship - and she beans him in the head. Then Rumplestiltskin shows up and beats the ever-loving shit out of him. Then he reappears later, all bloody and hot, and ends up getting hit by a car. 2x12 picks up right after, with him in the hospital, being questioned by Emma.

In 3x20, he gets drowned in a shallow tub, and gets some mouth-to-mouth rescuing from Emma. It’s very nice :D

Hook Centrics (episodes focused on his character and flashbacks pertaining to his past) are always good for some whumps. 3x05 has a LOT of emotional whump, with the death of his beloved brother. 3x17 has lots of pirate shenanigans, like a swordfight (no injuries though) and him getting accosted and threatened with a knife. 4x15 has some emotional whump, some tentacle squeezing, a kidnapping, a near-drowning… and more shenanigans. 5x11 has emotional whump and a gut-wrenching death scene. 6x06 has TWO kidnappings, a kraken attack (kinda legendary around here, lol), and a brief beating - plus lots of angst. 6x17 sees him chased by Lost Boys, captured by Tiger Lily, attacked by Lost Boys again, and almost burned at the stake before a last minute rescue arrives. (The two episodes before 6x17 also have a lot of Hook content, with him getting shanghaied off to another realm and trying desperately to get back to Emma. 7x02 is tons of fun, with TWO versions of Hook whumping each other. And 7x13 is full of a lot of dark angst and whumpiness, when Wish Hook (Hook #2 lol) angsts over his daughter being trapped in a tower, engages in a duel, and gets his heart poisoned - leading to lots of pain and suffering. Whew!

The series closes out with some penultimate Hook whump in episodes 7x19 and 7x20, when Hook gets kidnapped by Mother Gothel and tied up in her underground grotto. Not much detail given to it, but it’s still nice - and the heart poison activates again (pain! yay!) and he ends up on a stretcher by the end of it all.

2x09 sees him getting his heart mangled by Cora, who just really likes hurting hot men, apparently, and that’s something I can totally relate to XD

He doesn’t get whumped himself in episode 4x02 - but Emma gets trapped in an ice wall and is slowly freezing to death and he adorably freaks out the entire episode, angsting all over the place in the cutest possible way. Some very nice emotional whump through the whole episode.

2x08 has him held against a wall with stone loops and threatened with his own hook in a ridiculously sexy way by Cora XD and 2x05 is fun, because he gets tied to a tree and threatened with a knife at his throat by Emma. Neither of them are really “hardcore” or all that long of scenes, but they’re both fun

Hook also gets punched in episode 2x21. This isn’t all that great from a whump standpoint, but I’m pretty sure Colin adds “PLEASE PUNCH ME :D” into all of his contracts, so I should probably mention it XD

There’s also a lot of lesser, smaller whumps throughout the series. I catalog them all in my episode guide, but I don’t want to list them all here, because this post is already hella long, lol XD

I mostly only know/remember the Killian whumps, but I do know there’s some other good stuff in there, too. If you like lady whump, Regina gets whumped really good in episode 2x20. And there’s an episode on Season 1 (the season we don’t acknowledge on this blog, because Killian’s not in it ;)) where Prince Charming (played by Josh Dallas) gets captured and imprisoned by the Evil Queen so he can’t interfere with her plans to kill Snow White - and much angsty “NOOO!” nonsense occurs inside his cell XD

Anyway, I hope that helps!!! :D

[crazyspookies]

S7M1+2

So, i wasn’t planing on going back to making recaps but i had a couple thoughts that im going to leave here somewhere! :)

M1

1) This is such a nice way to start the season. Also, it kinda feels like one of those national holidays in wich you still go to school but you mostly do other activities that are nothing like your usual classes and the whole school is full of kids going aroudn doing activities or going on a little school trip you know what i mean.

2) “the patchwork cushions look cheerful, and the handmade scepter and mace are a delight!” What a nice reporter i like her.

3) Royal Roller Derby, now a tradition :’/

4) “Me and Five are just in the outer hall. It’s so quiet, anyone could hear! “ Are there any other people here? Are we like, officialy escorting janine as representant of Abel Township? I can’t imagine we’re the only source of security here, i mean, this is a peace conference there should be other people from the other major townships and royal security to make sure nothing happens to their representants, right?

6) “ Five, do you hear that? Bikes.”

Me: it begins

7) “She’ll hear you, and beat you with an Abel pennant later! Janine’s intel is never wrong.“ Sam i love you but lmao in what delusional limbo do you live to even think janine’s intel can ever be wrong

8) “[motorcycle engines roar, laughter, glass shatters]”

9)”And there’s a little disturbance, as we all knew there might be" I love it that we all knew that. Peace conference? Obviously someting’s going to go down

10) Ok, Sorry For Party Rocking? Best song choice ever, great party, 10/10 would recommend

11) I am so weirdly charmed by these toe eating chaos viallians. After having to deal with Sigrid, who if we go by evidence, is a generally much higher profile kind of villian, this is a lot of fun. Like, the stakes are still high, because of the whole “we are going ot be bombed to death or killied insome other way thing but. You know, Sigrid was a cold villian. A conqueror, if you will, with her fingers in many important pots, orginized and a high goverment official. The contrast from that kind of angst to suddenly being surrounded by hot blooded chaos and..a bunch of picturesque baddies who cheer and provoque and make very overt threats is pretty fun. Kinda like little guideon and the prison inmates hahaha

12) Operator Rofflenet. Nice, this is cool, this is smart.

13) “ Abel! Abel scum! Look at their uniforms!” BRING IT ON BITCH

14) Me, listening to the biker chaos: am i on the fury road

15)  “ No uniform will save you from the chaos, Abel! [laughs] Come here, little Abel. [kissy noises]” im crying bless your terrible soul you dickhead i can’t believe he’s making kissy noises and giving me classic villian dialogue this is amazing. But also, if i was actually there and someone did this at me id want to smash their face with a rock.

16) "I am getting a very Weinstein vibe from that biker” rock in the face it is

17)” We’re going to kill you slowly. We’re going to eat you piece by piece, starting with the toes “ IM SORRY BUT IM LAUGHING SO HARD COS THERE’S BEEN SO MANY SUCKING TOES MEMES THESE PAST FEW WEEKS, ESPECIALLY WITH THIS PIC AND IM CRYING

18) I’m sorry but, what kind of bad evil cannibals put a burning manequinn on top of a van rather than an actual corpse? Like? I imagine wood takes longer to charr? So what ytou’re saying is that this absolutley was an aesthetic decision

M2

1) On the one hand i’m sad that jody always puts herself down comparing herself to janine. Like, ok, janine might be better at tactics but jody is really good and the truth is, Janine is not there so why compare yourself at all? This applies especially to season 6, because janine very literally LEFT to do a different mission and left the township in our hands. It’s of no use to think “she would do it better”, she’s not here AND she left this work to us, so that means she trusts us enough to get things done without her (and let’s be honest, that’s a great compliment? especially if janine is such a perfectionist?). So, on the one hand i don’t enjoy jody making these comments (especially because?? she’s actually a super good tactician anyway? jody istg) , but on the other i like how they twisted this by showing something jody is good better at than janine, which is diplomacy. I like how they make a note that maybe on this mission it might have been more beneficial for them to have been switched on this mission, and to have played their strengths in a more profitable way.  I feel it could be interesting to expand on this, especially with this thing jody is doing with the uhhh thingamabob to reach other countries

2) Alright, so V types. If V types bit a corpse and it reanimates, does that corpse become a V type too and is it able to reanimate other corpses? From what sam says about the biker who is turned, it seems that it most possibly yes, and if he can infect other corpses this becomes a really really bad situation. It really changes the way we have to deal with zombs AND living people who die in any way or form from now on. Corpses from people who die should probably be incinerated to make sure they cannot reanimated. I believe there’s religions that are not too hot about that (badumtss) so i guess there would have to be a difficult conversation to be had there.

I’ve been curious about how did old timey people made sure to make those V types to go to sleep though. I should look it up but I think to remember that the blue flowers and Loki the sorceress were mentioned in this. The blue flowers calm normal zombies down, and it would be interesting to try that out with the V types, see how that works. I don’t quite remember what the deal with the viking blood was but maybe there’s something to reaserch there too, seeing as it was old as balls and probably more likeley to work with the original virus rather than the new types of zombies created by sigrid.

If we got a way to get them super duper high with blue flower extract or whatever, then it might help getting rid of them. All in all, we really need to get them in big numbers and maybe move them to a location where we can get rid of them. Like, if they can infect corpses it will not take much time until we are overwhelmed by the numbers of immortal zombies yakno?

3) On this very note, peeps being idiots and not believing janine about the new V type is so infuriation lmao what the fuck mate we have already gone through so much you REALLY don’t believe us, because we didn’t do everything you wanted when you needed us to (eventhough we were, ya know, busy trying to debunk a fascist regime and all that)? that is some hard headed petty denial right there. My inmediate idea is: somehow capture a V-type, put it in a cage, and get janine and jody play good cop/ bad cop with the other memers in the house of commons, all super theatrical. Jody talks in an appeasing way, janine delivers hard facts, and then dramatically shoots the zombie in the head. Everyone gasps horrifically at the zombie still being alive and janine makes an iconic metaphorical Mic Drop ™

4) Another thing this whole flodding that district no one lives in reminded me is that i’m really worried about is exacly how much can a zombie infect water itself? I think this Might be one of those plot hole moments because?? I think we have stated that contact with infected blood turns people, but who hasn’t been splattered by killing a zombie with an axe? Or while killing an infected person that has not yet turned? If there’s enough zombies underwater close to the beach, is a certain part of the current infected to? What about lakes or rivers? Too many corpses in general poison the water in normal circumstances so what if those corpses are infected? wont the water carry the infection? (how much water is enough to dillute it?)

[theonetruevincent]

TheOneTrueVincent Reviews: Sonic Underground

Happy very late Christmas/New year, I know I’m late but better late than pregnant, So I decided, totally not last minute and fully planned it, that before the end of the year I would review everyone’s favorite cartoon from the best animation studio DIC Entertainment, Sonic Underground. I mean come on who doesn’t love watching Sonic for Christmas, So let’s get into it.

What’s up with this show?:

Sonic Underground, it’s the third animated show adapting Sega’s mascot Sonic The Hedgehog, the show was created by DIC Entertainment who are famous for shows like The Super Mario Super Show, Inspector Gadget, and Super Duper Sumos, even the original Sonic The Hedgehog cartoon, along with so many other memorable shows (I said memorable, not good).

The show came around when Sega asked DIC to make a new Sonic cartoon, this was at the same time Sega was making the Dreamcast, so it’s assumed they wanted a new cartoon to promote the console. 

They already made the show bible back in March 1997 and was announced in December of the same year, The show wouldn’t actually air until January of 1999 in France, which only lasted for 18 episodes there. The US wouldn’t get it until August of the same year.

This show has a lot of production problems in general as we’re going to see right now because we are going to the creators/crew of the show.

The Crew:

When it came to looking up the crew of the show it was a mess, I’ve read that the production of this show was a mess for the writers, mainly because they were given such little time in general, but JEEZ! When it comes to a director, there were 4 of them, 3 of them only worked on 14 episodes each, while only 1 of them worked 24 episodes.

Of course like said earlier the writers got the worst of it if you check the writers for the show you’ll see that there was almost a different writer for each episode of the show, which watching the show you can really tell, which with that we can go into the actual show now.

The Premise:

*Note: Sonic Underground takes place in a different canon from any other Sonic media 

Queen Aleena (Gail Webster), the former ruler of Mobius, get’s overthrown by the evil Doctor Robotnik (Garry Chalk) and takes over the world and forcing the Queen to go into hiding. To preserve the dynasty, she separated her children Sonic (Sam Vincent), Manic (Tyley Ross), and Sonia (Stevie Vallance) after an oracle told her a prophecy that she and her children would one day reunite with each other and defeat Robotnik. Years later, Sonic and his siblings group up and are given a quest from the oracle to search for their mother and rise against Robotnik once and for all.

The general feel:

Sonic Underground is a DIC Entertainment show, and if you are, in any way, familiar with any other shows from DIC you can already get an idea what this show is about. But in case not let’s discuss it, first, the animation, the animation is average at best and can be pretty terrible at other times. Like a lot of other DIC shows this show has a lot of animation errors that can either be the best or the worst, but regardless if you were alright with the style of SonicSatAM then it’s passable, but otherwise, you might not like it.

As for the actual characters and story, it’s well, alright I guess? It’s not the absolute worst thing in this show, the story is alright for a kid. As for adults, mostly for the people who didn’t grow up with this show, there’s not that much for them. The characters are fine, Sonic and Robotnik are almost the exact same as their SatAM counterparts if you like the characters in SatAM, then Underground is almost the same, only it doesn’t have any of the characters from SatAM, with only a few references maybe but other than that not much. As for Sonia and Manic, the other two leads, they’re meh at best it doesn’t really matter since these two are never coming back to any show.The plot is dumb and too confusing for its own sake, and for most episodes, nothing goes forward, they almost find their mom but not really, and fuck with Robotnik and his henchmen. and even then the show ends on a cliffhanger since the show got canceled before they could.

Also, one more thing I forgot to mention since Sonic and gang has magic instruments weapons and not just being freedom fighters but they’re also an underground band. Because of that, there has to be a song in every episode, to sum them up in one word: TERRIBLE. 

Final thoughts:

I never grew up with SonicSatAM, but I did watch Sonic Underground when I was younger and absolutely loved it, it combined two of my favorite things at the time Sonic and rock (somewhat). But of course, when I grew older I realized “Wow, this is terrible”. After that, I never really watched it up until this review, and it’s still the same opinion for me

In the end, Sonic Underground is not a good show, I would say kids would like it and if you grew up with this show and still like it that’s fine, but if you’re expecting something amazing from this show, don’t. 

Fun Facts:

GamesRadar called the show “The absolute worst Sonic moments”

Patrick Lee of The A.V. Club panned the series, calling it one of the most artistic failures to ever end up on television

The Sonic The Hedgehog comic had featured a story in a special issue in which the Sonic Underground continuity was featured

Thank you for reading this, and if you enjoyed it please like and reblog and if you want to see more of my reviews follow me @theonetruevincent and if you’re interested in my personal life, go to my main social media down below.

Sorry, this came SO LATE, I’ve been very busy for the last couple days, but anyway have a great New Years! My Personal Blog: https://vinniethegbalord.tumblr.com/ My Twitter: https://twitter.com/GbaPlayer967

Thanks again and keep being cool, see ya next time!

[itsbenedict]

No Driver’s License: Session 7

[adventure log- from the beginning]

[session 6]

[omakes 6.1 and 6.2]

Last time on No Driver’s License, the team recuperated from a long day spent fighting monsters and witches and evil girls who summon giant ghost sharks. They sat around the fire and shared tragic backstories, growing closer as a team and earning a few points of Hope.

Also, Tama-chan showed up and gave them the main quest! Specifically, she told them what the main quest was (stopping some very strong badguys), and then informed them that she’d given up on it and that it was a stupid idea to try and give them the quest in the first place, and apologized for trying to get them involved. Predictably, the team’s response was “fuck you, we’re going to do the main quest anyway!”, which I will personally take credit for as a brilliant stroke of GMing prowess, thank you, thank you.

less brilliant was how they ended up totally alienating their helpful guide and driving her off entirely, such that i was left without a mouthpiece character, but HEY THAT’S DRAMA

This time, the party ends up having to contend with...

Bain à la Grenouillère by Claude Monet. Uh... okay??? Sure???

So, first off, after everyone went home, they all took some action based on what they wanted to accomplish.

Sakura started doing some internet research, on top of her primary objective of “read a lot of magical girl manga for helpful tips”. Her search for magic phenomena turned up a couple things- one, a well-documented sighting of an inexplicable Gundam above Tokyo that’s been causing a stir amongst conspiracy theorists; and two, a rash of unexplained mass narcolepsy incidents across the world, probably linked to the appearance of witch barriers.

Makoto just wanted to figure out how to live in the real world- and so she’s been enrolled in school. She’s been placed in remedial classes, and- her player, koholitl, was unable to participate in the session this week due to medical problems, so Makoto’s just going to spend her time in those classes- with her good roll, she’s earned an extra point of Real from her lessons.

Seina also rolled Keep Up With Life, like Makoto- but she got a very very bad roll, and so unfortunately for her, she’s facing the consequences of “suddenly disappearing one night while staying over at Reiko’s, and not telling her parents where she was”. She’s... super grounded! Except for school, but her dad is a teacher at school, so she’s under near-constant supervision now. Whoops!

Ibara, meanwhile, decided to hit the streets looking for info. Specifically, she tracked down her delinquent buddies from school- Nails and Shibu. She asked them if they knew Yamauchi Yoshe, and... turns out they do! Yoshe’s an upperclassman at their high school, and they super duper hate her. Not because they know she’s an evil magic cannibal- it’s just she won a beauty pageant at the school festival and they’re super bitter about it because fuck the popular kids.

Yukari was tagging along with Ibara, but got distracted on the way to the school- she finally found Nishi-chan, and broke off to go chase her. Nishi-chan, though, was apparently headed for the same place- when she finally corners Nishi-chan at the school, it’s in view of Ibara and her delinquent friends.

So that’s where we begin the session!

Yukari doesn’t beat around the bush, and takes Nishi-chan to the rooftop where they can talk without being overheard. She... does this by straight-up jumping up to the roof in plain view of Nails and Shibu, which causes them to freak out and forces Ibara to have to confess that she’s involved in some Weird Magic Shit™. 

Nishi-chan says that she came to the school to try and defuse a crisis- someone in the school is on the verge of witching out, according to her vague senses about this sort of thing. She asks if anyone in the party is in bad shape emotionally, but as far as Yukari knows, everyone’s fine- and Reiko just witched out like yesterday, so it probably wouldn’t be her.

So, Nishi-chan concludes, it must be one of the at-least-five other magical girls in the school. 

WHAT? Yukari asks, and Nishi-chan begins spilling the beans. A lot of magical girls go to this school, apparently! She indicates that three of the girls at this school are the big bads Tama-chan mentioned, confirming that they include Yamauchi Yoshe and Katou Kimiko. She also mentions- without stating their affiliations exactly- Otsuki Orino, an upperclassman in the art club, and Akagi Anzu, a freshman. She’s about to name a third, but...

There’s an earthquake. A very short earthquake. A massive dust cloud rises from the baseball diamond on the school grounds, visible to the entire party save Makoto. Sakura and Seina are in the same chemistry class, and manage to slip away as the classroom empties in a blind panic. Yukari’s on the roof, and has a clear view. Ibara and her friends can also see it- and she instructs them to run like hell.

Yukari rolls for Prophecy and only gets one for this session- and decides to save it rather than check whether they should intervene. Of course they should intervene, and she wants to be able to ask a more useful question once they know what they’re intervening in.

Ibara is the first to arrive on the scene, stepping through the barrier and bucking tradition by succeeding on a Real roll.

The witch-  Ｐａｉｎ à ｌａ Ｇｒｅｎｏｕｉｌｌèｒｅ, which yes I realize technically would be read as Bread a la Grenouillere instead of a badass thing, but shut up- is the tree island thing in the center of the painting. It’s way scribblier than in the painting, though, with unintelligible love letters instead of leaves. The people in the painting are all stick figures wearing better-rendered clothing, and they turn into stick mermaids in the water that attack people- the witch’s familiars. (This witch is a Hive Mother youma, in Magical Burst’s parlance).

It’s not alone, though- apparently someone is already fighting the witch!

The mysterious girl seems to be begging the witch to stop attacking, trying to appeal to it with reason. This, of course, has little effect. On noticing Ibara, she waves, and tries to explain what’s going on.

Seina and Sakura follow into the barrier, with Yukari staying outside to keep watch for any evil megucas who might try to ambush the team while they’re inside. They both roll Real.

They manage to fend off the familiars and climb into a boat- and from there, we roll for our first Skirmish!

Ibara and Seina roll Go on the Offensive! Ibara scores a crit, getting two hits on the witch. Seina... fails her roll, so familiars sneak up and yank her off the boat and underwater. Sakura, then, rolls Protect Someone to ensure Seina doesn’t take a Personal Consequence from the fight- and nails the roll, saving her. (Which... I mean, a valid Personal Consequence is taking Trauma, and Seina has yet to acquire any totally harmless experience points of that sort, so was that really a heroic move???)

With the mystery girl’s additional Hit, the Skirmish ends with Spread+1 (only 2 Spread), and the witch is vanquished handily.

Ibara immediately rolls against the stranger to try and claim the Grief Seed.

Mystery girl gets the seed! She gets it real good! And she...

Whoever she is, she apparently knows about the cannibalism situation, and was worried that Ibara had dark intentions. 

The group tries to convince her that they’re on the same side- that they’re really just there to help, and didn’t want to eat... the girl’s referring to the former witch as “Ori-san”. ??? isn’t totally convinced- partially because the team showed up without an Incubator to revive her.

Wait, without an incubator? Yukari turns around to check where Nishi-chan should be, and... oh, shit.

At the same time, ??? is noticing that her Incubator- “Fumi-chan”- is also not showing up. This gets her a little bit panicked, especially once Yukari reports that Nishi-chan is temporarily dead for like the third fucking time, jesus christ. Everyone’s seriously on edge, ??? thinks they’re cannibals, and suddenly...

What everyone except Seina didn’t notice (good job Seina! +1 Hope for smartness!) is that telepathy was still working, meaning that an Incubator had to still be alive, probably.

This is confirmed when the source of the laughter turns out to be an incubator, who jumps out of the dugout laughing her goddamn head off. 

??? is about to hand the seed over to Fumi-chan, but Ibara interrupts, asking why Fumi-chan has two eyes instead of three. ???, though, doesn’t seem to find this strange- Fumi-chan’s always had two eyes. No reason to be suspicious.

Fumi-chan then spits out the soul gem, and- rather than any sort of horrible trap happening- it regenerates into a girl.

According to ???, this is pretty normal for Ori-san.

Yukari makes a guess. 

The team decides to warn Emiko about the cannibal girls who go to this school. She seems shocked by this information- but hints that maybe Orino, who was being bullied, was being bullied by those cannibal girls specifically so they could make her witch out and eat her.

Then the team asks Emiko to follow them somewhere where they can talk without potentially being ambushed by the cannibals- since it’s pretty suspicious that they haven’t shown up yet, what with the loud explosion sounds and whatnot. Emiko doesn’t immediately trust this- she still has no reason to think the party aren’t cannibals, and following them to a secluded area sounds to her like a bad bad idea.

Yukari comes up with an idea, then. She spends a prophecy on a certain action she’s about to take, and finds that the outcome-goodness stays pretty much neutral if she does it, save for a few significant but unlikely dips. She goes ahead with it.

This is a pretty cool idea, and Emiko is about to trust them! But...

Yeah, this piece of shit doesn’t want them to trust each other, for some reason. Yukari... attempts to bypass Fumi-chan’s objection.

Yukari’s extremely practical and effective idea to which there can be no objections is, unfortunately, sabotaged by Fumi-chan again.

(Behind the curtain for a second here- I typed out “Her body could be concealing traps” as just like, an obvious immediate generic objection to the search plan, and only after typing it realized the horrible offensive double-entendre. And then... kept it in, because Fumi-chan really is just a gigantic piece of shit who would absolutely make a godawful joke like that specifically to make Sakura feel bad. What a fucker!)

Sakura takes a point of Trauma on Fear of Female Failure, and Ibara tries to get things back on track.

This doesn’t entirely work, since Sakura has fled the scene in tears, pursued by Seina, but Yukari and Ibara fill Emiko in on the known identities of the cannibals- including Yamauchi Yoshe.

KOTONO YUKARI, MASTER OF TACT

Emiko is in denial about Yoshe, and starts getting really defensive. Yoshe can’t be a cannibal! She’s- she’s too nice! That’s impossible!!!

fuckin... shut your telepathic mouth, Fumi-chan.

Anyway, Emiko is eager to change the subject, and starts talking about taking care of Orino. They agree to let Emiko take the unconscious Orino to the nurse’s office. “Why’s she asleep, anyway?” someone asks.

They exchange contact information- and Emiko tells them what class she’s in.

So they head off, and Yukari and Ibara try to track down Sakura- who’s shut herself up in a bathroom to try and stave off a mental breakdown.

Seina gets there first.

Sakura’s about to confess something to Seina, but then Yukari, MASTER OF TACT, barges in with Ibara. They try to understand why Sakura is upset, but- since they don’t know Sakura’s trans, they don’t understand what Fumi-chan said to hurt her. 

Eventually, Sakura decides to confess to the entire group.

To the group’s credit, nobody is particularly upset by the revelation. There’s no “WHAT, you’re REALLY a BOY?!?” shit- but also, there’s not a lot in the way of emotional support for Sakura. Yukari’s attitude is essentially “What? Why would that bother you? Who cares? Fighting evil is more important!”, and it takes a while for anyone to interrupt her rant about how Sakura’s emotions don’t matter and she needs to suck it up. Sakura boils over and throws a candy axe at the wall, shattering a mirror.

This finally gets Ibara and Seina to speak up and object to what Yukari’s saying. They get Yukari to back off, and try to reassure Sakura while also clearing up what turned out to be a miscommunication. Yukari, who is about as capable of reading the mood as a cat would be of reading a “do not claw at” sign, had assumed that Sakura was literally scheming to assassinate an incubator rather than asking for emotional support- and changes her tune to “...well, duh, we’ll support you, that’s what friends do, you should have known that”. Which is kind of a really transparent attempt to deflect blame for hurting Sakura’s feelings, but apparently that’s good enough. Hugs for everyone!

They then spend something like fifteen minutes attempting to repair the broken mirror. Sakura’s magic, when used to repair objects, has an irritating tendency to leave them with a cartoon watermark of her face going ;P, completely without her intending to do so. (It’d be fine if she ever rolled an 11-14, but APPARENTLY THAT’S JUST IMPOSSIBLE). Ibara smashes and Sakura repairs the mirror over and over again, to no avail. The last attempt results in...

Screw the mirror! It probably just broke in the earthquake or something! Whatever!!!!

Seina, at this point, goes back to class- but the rest have one last loose end to tie up.

They head back up to the roof, where Nishi-chan’s corpse is still sitting. It is time for CRIME SCENE INVESTIGATION: MAGIC VICTIMS UNIT (ft. guest star Maurice Mousse, Sakura’s magic familiar.)

Yukari takes some photos, and she and Sakura inspect the scene, passing Real rolls to investigate.

Yukari investigates the air conditioners, but doesn’t find anything. Maurice Mousse, Ace Pet Mouse Detective, manages to turn up a few clues.

Unfortunately, they don’t find enough information to determine the culprit. With magic involved, there’s any number of potential causes of death- they’ll just need to ask Nishi-chan next time she respawns.

The real mystery, though... why kill Nishi-chan, but not Yukari, who was right there when Nishi-chan was silently killed? Was she deliberately left alive? Why?

For now, the team’s gone back to what they were doing. Tune in next time, when... well, I won’t say what happens next time.

[octoberwren]

Prompt: Steve x Darcy: Is it too late? (My Dear)

So I have lowkey shipped this couple for years, not because I was ashamed or anything, but because there were so much amazing fanfiction out there for them already, and I was slightly (a lot) intimidated by it. So I didn’t think I’d be able to get their voices right or do it justice. But I decided recently to broaden my horizons as some you who follow me might know already. And the wonderful human who runs @shieldshockfanfic​ gave me some prompts to run with and I decided on this one, it just hit all the right angsty notes with me. So I just wanted to say THANK YOU to @shieldshockfanfic for the heartwarming encouragement to help me be brave. Much Love to you!

Hope you enjoy the read.

You can also read it on Ao3 for your convenience.

Summary:  First there's a kidnapping. Then a bullet. And all Darcy really knows is that she despises portals.

 As far as kidnappings went Darcy's one was pretty creative, she'd have to admit, albeit grudgingly and Tony would have to finally give up the good alcohol, for her to ever reveal that little truth nugget.

 Portals weren't an unusual thing in the science labs, no matter how many times she had threatened the genius/deranged people she called her friends, that portals were a bad time waiting to happen.

 She was right. Darcy was always right, which was why it was super annoying that no one ever, ya' know, listened to her.

 But the portal that had Darcy immediately glaring at, with all of her only-one-cup-of-coffee-today fury didn't actually come from Jane or more shockingly, Tony. It came from some brightly dressed assholes in yellow hazmat suits.

 Joy.

 Of course, she threw her cup at one of the idiots head and of course when they started making grabby hands, she shoved Jane into one of the rooms made for a very specific reason; keeping The Hulk from squishing people. She slammed her hand on the red button that everyone said not to touch, and locked the furious and cussing scientist/future Queen of Asgard inside.

 She never claimed to have superb self-preservation skills, but she's sure someone would be totally proud of how she took a swing at another henchman, knocking him on his ass.

 It's her, she's the one proud of knocking him on his ass. She didn't even have the training for that move! And they said movies can't teach you things.

She's was still grinning manically, even when the blood dripped from her mouth from their retaliation on her.

 The alarms were still going mad and Jane was still cussing a blue streak when they shoved her none too gently inside the portal. Real creative, who knew A.I.M had the balls to even try that.

 And now she's currently tied to a chair in an empty room, which was more clichéd, so they're not exactly batting a thousand in her humble opinion.

 An opinion she voiced much to the displeasure of Squirrely Eyes whose scowl would make small children cry, luckily for Darcy she's witnessed Steve's Disappointed In You patented face, she's been through way worse.

 Just thinking of the man, that she has an adolescence crush from hell for, gives her the backbone to not give up. Because despite her bravado, she is absolutely fucking terrified, the hands behind her back are shaking and she can feel the tremor in her legs.

 But Steve, amazing man that he is, wouldn't back down, he'd fight, even if the whole world was telling him to back off, to move on, he wouldn't. He didn't. He stood up and he fought back with everything he had and then some.

 He helped Tony and Bucky in the best way he could, he made them a team again, it took a lot of time and so much shouting, she had to rush to her room, before she did something stupid, like cry in front of them.

 Or worse, punch them in the face.

 With Steve's pure stubbornness, they mended their relationship, the team started to fight the good fight again. The movie nights returned, and Darcy tried to help in any way she could.

 She made food for when they returned home bloody, she spoke to Bucky when late at night he'd wander the halls. She helped Tony get off his ass and talk to Pepper.

 She mostly avoided Steve, not that she didn't desperately want to talk to him, hug him, feed him hot cocoa. (Watching him beat the crap out of his punching bag was her favorite past time) But when they had first come back before she had even a chance to speak to him, Darcy had overheard Sam tease him about a kiss and then the name Sharon Carter had come up and she got her ass out of dodge.

 Afterward, she tried and spectacularly failed to notice his frown every time she sat on the opposite side of the lounge at movie night or made up some excuse when he entered the room. She was a big girl and Darcy knew that the only way this could possibly hurt this much, was a fact she wanted to bury, that she didn't have a crush on him, it was something, much, much worse.

 She didn't even hate Sharon, the woman was badass, of course Steve had gone for her, he deserved that after all he'd been through, something truly amazing.

 Darcy wasn't a hero, she wasn't a beautiful agent with scary skills.

 She was just Darcy, a woman who swore when she breathed, had sarcasm running through her veins and a scary addiction to caffeine. She was a college dropout turned lab assistant to her best friend, she'd never be good enough for a man like Steve, a war hero, a bonafide superhero and the bravest man she had ever known.

 But right now she was regretting every single step away from him, she was probably going to die by these bumblebees and he'd never know how much she-

 The crack against her cheek snapped her back into painful reality and Darcy groaned then glared when she tasted the metallic taste of blood. "What the actual fuck dude?!"

 Another slap and Darcy was getting real tired of this shit, "You weren't paying attention." He condescendingly told her, with a skeevy smile.

 "To what, your evil monologue?" Darcy took every reserve of anger she had left, which was a lot actually, and spat blood on his shiny black shoes.

 She smiled brightly at his disgust, "In case you haven't noticed, you took the wrong girl, I thought A.I.M was supposed to be the smart villains. I might be brunette, but I'm no Jane Foster."

 She gave him a ‘so there' look which he promptly ignored, the bastard.

 Squirrely Eyes leaned into her personal space and Darcy barely held in the gag at his overwhelming cologne, "And what makes you think you're not the girl we were after Darcy Lewis?"

 "First off, it's woman, thank you very much, I grew these boobs at thirteen and went through enough jackasses teasing me to deserve the title. Also, whaaaat?" she regretted mentioning the word boobs as soon as she said it, because now the only thing the creep was staring at was the girls, which, gross.

 Still talking to her boobs, The Pervert said, "There's someone very important who loves you, oh so much. A moron would be able to see it. And I'd bet he'd be willing to do anything to get you back. Like giving up a sample of his blood."

 Despite the situation, despite everything telling her, lies, lies, lies, her stupid heart was thumping with erratic speed, not in fear, but with something that felt suspiciously like hope. The traitor.

 "Thor?" She squeezed out because come on! He couldn't mean-

 Pervy Mcpervasin laughed in her face and Darcy scrunched up her nose because, hello no personal space, thy name is asshole.

 "I would have thought The Captain would have chosen a smarter woman, someone like Sharon Carter."

 She would have winced at his words, if she hadn't been too busy breaking his nose with her forehead. 

 Wow… where did that hot white anger come from? It's like she blacked out in a rage and woke up to his piggish squealing.

 He was holding his bloody nose with one hand, while she just blinked at him, "That'll teach you to respect personal space, numbnuts."

 "Ooo bish." How he slurred the words was still funny, even as he swung his hand for another strike to her face, only to be interrupted by an explosion that had the building rocking from the force.

 Her captor swung around to stare at the still closed door, Darcy let out a chuckle at his surprised action, "Oooh you're in trouble." She sing songed at his back.

 He turned to glare at her, "Ut up"

 "Seriously," Darcy continued, heedless of his garbled warning, "What kind of dumbass pokes that bear? Don't get me wrong, your plan was super-duper good, if not totally clichéd," She wasn't letting that go, it started off so well, "But… and this is a big, huge, don't-fuck-with-Captain-America kind of mistake. Your plan worked. He's here. So ya' know. Have fun with that, dead man walking."

 He was purple by the time she finished and with all that anger being directed at her, he reached out and grabbed her hair so hard her scalp burned, "I will ki-"

 The door burst in and a seething Steve, in all his Captain America glory, stepped into the room, "Let. Her. Go. Now." He clipped out of clenched teeth, the menace and screaming danger pouring off of him in waves. It would have been terrifying, if it didn't turn her on so much.

 Which was super awkward given the situation.

 "Told you so." Darcy snarked to the idiot still holding onto her head, Steve's gaze connected with her own and her breath snagged against her lungs at the intensity of his eyes.

 Maybe he did care about her? In a non platonic kind of way.

 But when he trailed those eyes over her face, (by the pain she was in, Darcy knew she looked like a bloody mess,) his blue eyes went savage in fury.

 "You have one second to take your filthy tainted hands off of her, before I tell the guy with a gun to put a bullet in you." Steve growled out taking a threatening step forward to reveal Bucky at his back and 0.1 milliseconds later, the -for once smart- man, practically tripped away with his arms up.

 "Smart move." He said before swinging his shield into an arch and knocking the portal hopping jackass unconscious and crumbling to the floor.

 Steve was at her side in a second flipping open a knife to cut the zip ties locking her in place, when her hands were free, she rubbed at the raw skin. That would take a couple days to feel not so crappy.

 She barely had a chance to get up on her own power before Steve was hauling her up and checking her face over, "Are you okay? Of course, you're not okay, stupid question. Tell me where else it hurts, does anything else hurt, Sweetheart?" He was so frantic, that thankfully he missed the blush staining her cheeks and the popping of her eyeballs.

 Sweetheart?

 Darcy looked at Bucky who was still hovering in the doorway, to check if she was as slack-jawed as she felt.

 He only made it worse my smirking and winking at her, the asshole.

 "Doll? Are you hurt anywhere else, we need to get you to medical anyway, but I want to know." She snapped her attention to Steve's stupidly handsome face and those baby blues that screamed concerned and Darcy could feel her broken heart melting.

 "What, this?" She choked out, but when he looked more anxious and on the verge of carrying her out, by just her voice, Darcy made sure her next words were light and teasing, anything to get that look off his face.

 "It was just a love tap. Dude could take some lessons from me, I knocked his buddy out with one hit." She was still proud of that damnit, and it seemed so was Steve as the first smile she had seen from him yet graced his soft lips.

 "I know," He whispered, while stroking her cheekbone with his thumb, "I saw, you have one hell of a right hook, Sweetheart."

 Her breath hitched for the second time in a matter of minutes, not just because of the pet name (seriously? Did the man forget she had a name?) but by the tender (almost adoring?) way he was looking at her.

 She opened her mouth to say, something, she had no idea, but a cough from Bucky had Steve snatching his hands away from her face. Darcy ducked her head down, her hair falling like a curtain to cut off her hurt from him.

 What did she expect really?

 "We should head back." The former assassin said, she caught Steve's terse nod as she looked up, he motioned for her to go in front of him, presumably so she'd be safe between the both of them.

 Darcy, for life of her, would never know what exactly made her turn before the super soldiers, it might have been a shift in the air, an out of place noise, a feeling maybe. The obvious point is, she did turn before them so she was the first to notice, the not so unconscious man lift a gun to Steve's back.

 Probably the second more obvious soul wrecking point, was the split second she tried to push Steve out of the way, he noticed as well and turned back to shove her behind him, so Darcy got a wall of muscle for protection and Steve...

 God Steve, no, not him, not him.  

 The first bullet ripped through his chest, the second came from Bucky as he put one square between that fuckers eyes. But Darcy didn't care about that, all she cared about was that the love of her life was falling to his knees, with blood spreading over his beloved uniform.

 "Nonononononono," Darcy hit the ground hard as she crawled over to him, but she didn't care about her pain, "Steve, come on, open those baby blues I adore. Open them, Steve. Please?"

 But he wasn't opening them, and with a trembling hand she felt his pulse and gasped out an agonized sob.

 Bucky was white noise behind her, something about Tony and medic, but Darcy was ripping off her top, scrunching it up and and and,

 Her hands were red. Blood red. Steve's blood, oh fuck this wasn't happening.

 "I tried to move on just to see you happy, you can't be happy if you're dead Steve. You're not dead. You're not. Open your fucking eyes, Steve. I need you to be happy," She was rambling, she thinks this is what people like Jane would call hysteria or was it going into shock?

 His face was pale, snow like, he was…she wouldn't be able to survive this, she knew her limits, her capabilities and this was not one of them.

 Darcy could already feel the black void of nothingness stretching open her heart and it was frightening and cold and so very lonely without him.

 His chest wasn't moving, even as she tried to pump air into lungs with her hands and breathe life into his red stained lips. This was not the kiss she always dreamt of and gave up on, this tasted like death and desolation.

 "Steve, Steve, I love you, okay, I love you. So, S-so come on, don't l-leave me, I need you, I need your smile, and your old timey speak and your optimism to brighten my day. A-and I-I don't care if you don't love me b-back. I just need you to be alive. Please, please, Steve. Please be alive." Her head was over his heart, and she heard nothing, nothing.

 Nothing but her hyperventilation. There was no air, none. Oh, God.

 "I'll stop avoiding you."She whispered into his chest and clutched the material of both their clothing, "Please come back to me."

 "Kid!" It was a disjointed voice, like something you'd hear from the bottom of deep water, she ignored it.

 Because if she stayed right here, if she kept talking, if she kept her head right here, over the heart she always wanted to keep safe, he'd wake up.

 He'd wake up.

 He had too.

 Steve was invincible, larger than life, the man with a plan.

 He had a plan right? Did anyone? Did she?

 "Please."

 "Kid you have to let go, we have to-"

 "Get the fuck off me! No, don't leave him! He has a plan! Let go!"

 "Sorry, Darcy."Such soft words and a small needle.

 "Don't leave me, Steve." a whimper, then Darcy went limp like a rag doll, "It should have been me."

   Darcy gasped in oxygen and shot upright from a deep sleep. 

 Waking up was never a joyous occasion for her, she'd beg and plead to the Gods above to shut off her alarm and bargain with her soul just to have a few more minutes.

 But this was different.

 Darcy blinked trying to figure out just what was-

 Oh.

 She really had been hysterical if Bucky had to inject something to make her go to dreamland.

 Steve.

 Steve was dead, wasn't he? It wasn't an awful nightmare if the blood under her fingernails were any kind of morbid proof enough.

 Before she knew it her hands were under the tap and her skin was raw from scrubbing, ripping off her pants, where was her other shirt? Right, she basically gave Bucky a free showing when she tore it off her body.

 An amused chuckle left her, that slowly turned into a full blown belly laugh until tears streamed down her face, just picturing his face as she basically straddled Steve in only her bra, had her in hysterical giggles.

 Or maybe it was just hysteria, because she wasn't laughing anymore, the tears were streaming down her face when she opened the shower door and put the water to just the point of boiling, over her clammy skin.

 Maybe she should go find The Winter Soldier and ask for the really good stuff, because she had a feeling she wouldn't be sleeping or stopping the bone crushing sobs anytime soon.

 She was numb and in agonizing pain all at once, Darcy had never ever felt this lost and broken before, she felt fragile, like porcelain as she slid down the tiles and hugged her knees to her chest, the water beating against her skin.

  She tried to focus on one spot and not think of him, or how he always made her coffee when she was feeling down, or once ran in the rain to save her from a bad date, how he managed to make her a little less cynical by just being him.

 She tried to forget how stupidly in love with him she was, how she knew that she'd always be in love with him.

 Even now that he was gone.

 He was gone.

 Her head fell against her kneecaps, and long after the water had gone cold, she still couldn't stop thinking about him.

 How Steve died because of her, because of her stupidity. How could she let herself get captured? He always wanted her to get some training, but Darcy blew it off, no one was coming to get her after all.

 "Oh, Darcy." the soft whimsical voice of her best friend floated to her from inside the shower.

 She was wrapped up in Jane's arms before she could blink, her whispers of, "It's okay, it's okay." the only noise besides the streaming water.

 "It's not Jane, Steve's-" She couldn't even say it, saying it made it real and Darcy was far from ready to face her new reality.

 "Hey, it's alright," Jane, sweet Jane, swept away her wet hair and tucked it behind Darcy's ear, "He's alive."

 Her words were spoken in English, but Jane might as well been talking a language from another planet, for all the good it did Darcy’s sluggish mind.

 "...What?"

 "He's alive."

 Darcy shoved up to standing and turned off the shower, while Jane stepped outside and grabbed a towel to hand to her, Darcy robotically took it with numb hands and wrapped it around her shivering body.

 She shook her head slowly, not comprehending, "No, Jane. I saw him, he didn't have a pulse."

 She would have felt that? Wouldn't she have?

 Jane shrugged, "Apparently it's a super soldier thing, his heart rate slowed, just like when he was frozen for years, it allowed Helen Cho to work her magic. She explained it to me but I'm not that kind of doctor. He's only now regained consciousness. I was checking up on him for you, seeing as you were so…out of it when you got here."

 Darcy sucked in a breath, the relief hitting her in full force that her knees almost buckled under her,  Jane quickly led her back to her bed, where she collapsed against the mattress.

 "He's alive." she breathed, testing the words in her mouth, trying to make it tangible.

 "He is, I thought maybe you'd want to go get dressed and see him?" Jane had always known about her feelings towards Steve and she had always wanted Darcy to tell him outright, she thought Steve felt the same.

 But nothing had really changed had it? He was still dating Sharon, and now Darcy had almost killed him.

 Aside from her love confession to him while he was bleeding out, everything was back to normal, except now Bucky knew, which was disturbing to think about actually.

 "Darcy?"

 "No, not today, I can't today Jane." She was liable to do something stupid, like spill her guts again.

 Her friend opened her mouth, probably to go on a rant but the look in her eyes made Jane snap it shut, and nod tightly. "Fine, you get today but tomorrow you're seeing him."

 Yep, tomorrow she’ll say thanks for saving my life man, and sorry I almost ended yours. But that could wait.

 She just needed today.

Okay, so it had already been two days, fine three. But who was counting?

 Apparently, Bucky was, because every time she ran from Steve, his best pal was waiting in the shadows, lifting up a digit on his finger to show the exact amount of days, she had been sneaking around the tower.

 Fine, avoidance was her name and avoiding was her game, it didn't help that Tony, Natasha, and Clint kept giving her the damn side eye as well. Apparently, Bucky wasn't the only one to witness her breakdown.

 And now because the team was all honesty, all the time, she was forced to deal with all of the disappointment in their faces.

 Not Coolio dudes.

 Even Tony. Tony. Mr-conceal-don't-feel himself, gave a shake of his head.

 Well fuck that noise, by the time the fourth day came around and one more soft (but not that soft Bucky!) whispered ‘idiot' and she locked herself in her room with wine and ice cream.

 The perfect break up combo. Except she hadn't broken up with him. She scoffed in derision at herself, yep, she needed this.

 The knock on her door had her slamming down her- just poured- glass of wine, and stomping to the door in agitation. She swung open the door to give Tom, Dick or Harry a verbal beat down.

 Only it was Steve, and he was mighty pissed by the dark frown plastered to his face.

 Her knee jerk reaction was to slam the door in his face, only Steve was one step ahead of her, as he gripped the side of the door so hard his knuckles turned white and she feared for the metals safety.

 "Don't." He gritted out, while pushing himself through the door and effectively making her take a couple of steps back.

 The slam of the closing door made her jump and Darcy cursed at herself, she wasn't afraid of Steve, she would never be afraid of him.

 But nervous? Yeah, she could be that, especially since that too tight t-shirt and jeans made her want to climb him like a tree.

 And he smelled so delicious that she wanted to lick and bite at the skin that tease of a shirt gave away…wait when did he get so close?

 "You said you wouldn't avoid me anymore" Steve moved closer, his lips pulled into a thin line, "You're a lot of things Darce, but I never took you for a liar."

 "Huh?" She was beyond confused, not because he knew she was avoiding him, Steve was intelligent, Darcy figured he would put two and two together, sooner or later. She just thought she would have screwed up her courage by then.

 No, she was confused because he said she told him that, which was impossible because she never said anything about…oh, shity, shit, shit.

 It was like the proverbial light switch clicked on; He heard her.

 Which also meant he heard… "Oh, fuck." She breathed out, her anxiousness racked up to about a thousand and she was backing away so fast and looking for the damn exit sign.

 "So what is it Doll?" Her heart skipped at that, and at the intense way he was tracking her with his blue eyes "You have the courage to tell me while I'm bleeding under your hands, but not when I'm standing right here in front of you?"

 "Uhm…" Darcy's back hit the wall and Steve was suddenly right in front of her, so very, very close.

 Between a rock and hard place, she had the insane urge to giggle but stopped at the blaze in his eyes.

 "You love me." There might have been a fire in his eyes, but his words were so gentle, whispered like an intimacy they only shared.

 Those three quietly spoken words were about as subtle as a bomb going off in her silent apartment, loud, deafening and the inevitable wreckage would be irreparable.

 "You're dating Sharon." Darcy gasped out as his hand landed on her shoulder, his calloused palm making her shiver.

 "I'm not." He said but when Darcy arched an-are you shitting me-eyebrow, Steve shook his head. "I'm not, it was never like that between her and I."

 "But Sam said you kissed her." Why did she sound like a whiny teenager?

 "Was that why you refused to even look me in the eye, when I came back?" When Darcy said nothing, he let out a deep sigh of frustration, "It didn't mean anything, I tried to make it mean something at first, but I knew as soon as it happened that it was a mistake. I was going through a lot and well, I'm not proud of it, but I-"

 "Wanted to have something, just in case?" Darcy asked because she honestly got it, with Peggy and then Bucky, and to top it all off, the catastrophe that ended with Tony.

 Fighting against his teammates, it was a shitty time for him and he thought he might not make it back, she couldn't blame him, she never did.

 He didn't owe her anything, they weren't together, they were friends who occasionally binge-watched shows and sat talking for hours together.

 Even though she tried to hide it, he must have seen the pain flicker on her face because he was cupping her face in his large hands, "It was something like that, but I did come home, and when everything settled, I couldn't stop thinking of a mouthy brunette."

 "Tony?" She said just to sass him, he huffed out a laugh, staring at her with something that looked a lot like adoration.

 "No, babydoll, I couldn't stop thinking about you." Darcy couldn't look away now, even if she wanted to, " and when I realized that, I spoke to Sharon and she agreed that we were better off as friends. It was better that way. So that’s when I came to the tower hoping to talk to you, but you were doing everything in your power to be in the exact opposite place that I was."

 "Steve…"

 "So I thought, ‘She must not feel the same way I do' and it tore at me Darcy, but If you wanted space, I'd give it to you. I'd give you anything you wanted or needed." Steve pushed the hair out of her eyes, and tilted her chin so she was staring right into his deep and tender gaze. 

 He gave a sad sort of smile to her, "Even if that meant what you wanted wasn't me."

 Darcy knew she had to put it all on the line now and yes, she was scared shitless but, if this brave man could trust her with all of his feelings, then she could grow some balls and tell him some home truths as well.

 "I know I'm awesome. I know that." She had to be clear on that, because she knew she was kickass but, "You just always seemed so far out of my league, another dimension really."

 Steve got that look of anger again, the one she saw just as she opened the door, "What the hell are you talking about Babydoll?"

 "Look, just listen alright?" The nicknames weren't helping either, they were very distracting, in the best kind of way.

 Steve nodded once, tightly, so she rushed to continue before he could rant, which looked like he was on the verge of doing.

 "I'm not talking about the Superhero thing, although that's some of it, I'll never be an agent or a hero. I don't think I'll ever be able to really know about The Captain's world, because I don't go out and fight like you guys do. And that's fine, I can live with that, I help in the ways that I can. I accepted that a long time ago, what I really struggle with is this," Darcy reached over to lay her hand over his beating heart.

 The very thing she thought had died days ago, and just feeling it thump against her palm was memorizing.

 "This is Steve Rogers, the man that makes Captain America who he is. This heart has always been so pure and so good, that I don't think mine will ever measure up. I swear more than I breathe, I don't like a lot of people and I get pissy when the coffee machine breaks. I'm just Darcy and because of me this wonderful heart almost stopped beating."

 The absolute quiet when she stopped talking was tense and suffocating so much so, that she wished Jane would walk in to drag her to work, just so she would be saved from herself.

 Steve's arms slammed against the wall beside her head caging her in and she let out a gasp at the several emotions mixing in his tortured eyes, "Just Darcy,? You say that like that hasn't always been perfection to me. Just Darcy, always made me feel like I wasn't alone in this world when everything else had been taken from me. Just Darcy, spoke to Bucky like a human being instead of the monster he thought he was. Just Darcy, drank with a broken Tony when he needed it at sent him after Pepper when he thought he didn't deserve it."

 "She threw Jane out of danger, made sure her best friend was safe before slugging an asshole who should never have put his hands on her, then faced a dozen armed men with a grin on her face." Steve wiped the tears that were falling from her eyes and then leant down to rest his forehead against her own,

 "You scared the living hell out of me when I found out that they had taken you, all I could think was that I was too late, I'd never see you again and that I wouldn't be able to tell you...then when I got there, you were taunting that son of a bitch, and I didn't know whether I wanted to strangle you or kiss you until you were too dazed to do anything else."

 For once in her life, Darcy was speechless, she had no witty reply or inappropriate response, she was stunned that Steve, gorgeous, wonderful Steve felt that strongly for her, she wanted to do a dance, she wanted to cry, she really wanted that kiss he brought up because it sounded…it actually sounded like…

 "Also, don't for one second blame yourself for that bullet," And there went her happy glow, her stomach plummeted and she felt nauseous just remembering that mess of a day.

 "Hey," Steve whispered trying to get her to look at him, when that didn't work he cupped her face again, which was becoming a habit of his, not that she was complaining. "I would do it again in a second. That might not be what you want to hear, but you'll always come first to me Darcy. You'll always be my top priority, so maybe it's a good thing you don't fight with us because I wouldn't be able to do my job otherwise. And yes it was touch and go there for a bit, but do you know what brought me back?"

 She had a feeling but you know what they say about assuming, so she shook her head, and prayed that the hope that was spreading through her body like liquid sun, bright and dazzling, wouldn't be crushed with his next words.

 "It was you, I heard your voice Darce, I heard you say ‘I love you' and I knew I had to fight my way back so I could tell you something as well," He leant down to kiss her jaw then her cheek, and finally her forehead.

 Only to lean back again to stare into her eyes, his lips breaking into a dazzling smile that set her heart on fire, "I love you, Just Darcy, I have for a very long time now and I'm hoping you'll say you love me too, because I'm wide awake now and I desperately want you to be my girl."

 When she stared wide eyed at him, because yes, this is exactly what she wanted but she didn't actually think it would happen, Steve for the first time that night, got a nervous look in his eyes as he searched her face.

 "Unless you're afraid of something else or?"

 She looked up at him and now that he mentioned it, "You're way too tall, and I'm super short Steve, things like that could be deal breakers." Her shit eating grin was instantly wiped off her face and she let out an embarrassed squeaking sound, when he very suddenly dropped his hands to her thighs and hauled her up against his firm body.

 Darcy wrapped her legs around his hips on reflex, her hands curling around his neck wasn't that, but it was on her bucket list, so.

 "There are ways around it." Steve growled out in his deep voice and holy shit if he didn't kiss her like right the fuck no-

 Oh that was much better.. His lips were smooth against her own, but his tongue was scorching hot as he licked his way into her mouth, and Darcy was surprised she hadn't spontaneously combusted yet, it was a kiss made for the silver screen. Or a porno. Especially when he moved his hips and she got hit with some mind blowing friction, enough to let out a wanton moan at the contact.

 Steve nipped at her lip in response to that moan and tangled his hand through Darcy’s hair, sending the best shiver racing up her spine, "Say it." He groaned against her mouth, his other hand grabbing a handful of her ass and squeezing it possessively, pushing her closer to him, like he wanted absolutely no space between them.  

 "God, you're beautiful Darcy. Made for me, Doll." Steve moved to her neck, licking a spot that made her legs tighten and instinctively thrust up against him, which made him groan and push her harder up against the wall.

 "Darcy," His voice was wrecked, a breathless growl, "say it."

 "Uhnmmg." That honestly was the best she could come up with, as his very talented mouth continued its assault on her neck and turned her brain into mush.

 But when he leant back, her whine of displeasure followed him. She blinked up at him, opening her eyes to his, only to wish she kept them closed because she was sure she was going to melt into a puddle just staring at him.

 Steve's hair was disheveled, his chest was heaving in breaths, but it was his eyes that had her almost undone. They looked almost feral, his pupils were blown wide in lust, Darcy's hand clenched his hair in response to that look, if this was only from a kiss, then how the hell would they survive the sex?

 "Darcy, I need you to say it, I need to hear it. Please." The hoarse way he asked made her finally pay attention to the question.

 Oh. Whoops. Well he couldn't blame her, she had been thinking about this moment for years,

 "Steve," She made sure she looked straight into his eyes, she carded her her hands through his hair and whispered, "I'm in love with you, I loved you when it almost killed us both, and I'll love you forever if you let me."

 "Always." He said instantaneously, kissing her nose, "So, does this mean you'll be my girl?"

 "Well, I don't know," She knew the way she said it was dripping in tease and trouble, he knew it too by the arch of his eyebrow, "You know how they say to always test drive the car before making a lifetime commitment?"

 Darcy couldn't help waggling her eyebrows, even when he snorted in amusement at her, "I wanted to take you on date first, Babydoll."

 Him nipping at her ear kind of ruined the absolute sweetness of his words, "Screw the date Steve, I want to start living our lives together, now."

 "Yeah," He said already walking to the bedroom with her in his arms, "Now sounds good Darce, real good."

 And it was good, amazing, perfect; their lives together. The sex was pretty fan-fucking-tastic as well.

That’s it my Darlings, thank you so much for reading! You have no idea how much I appreciate that ; ) Much Love.

[dreaming-of-seth-blog]

Meant for a Life With You

Chapter 3: How Far Will She Take It?

______________________________

Seth’s point of view:

           The bag of ice was now completely melted but my face still hurt. It was about 4:00 am and I was dozing in and out of sleep. I decide it’s time to go get coffee from the little kiosk they had, but before I can make my way over to the cart, a doctor I hadn’t seen yet walks up to me. He's an older gentleman in his 60’s, with completely gray hair. He had to be at least 6’5” because he towered over me. His lab coat says ‘Dr. Jeremy Thompson M.D.’ over his pocket.

          I look at him hoping for some kind of an update, some good news, anything  “Are you the man that hit the woman with his car?”

        My face falls, this can’t be good. “Yes” I reply with a small voice.

        “Don’t look glum son, miss Harris is awake and in very good condition.” He smiles.

         My knees almost give out I'm so glad to hear the news, I almost don’t believe him. “Really? She's going to be ok? That's amazing! Thank you for tell me, you're the first to update me since I got here!” I smile and hold my composure while trying to hug the man. A weight is off my shoulders. I didn't end her life.

        “She is also asking for you.” He says raising an eyebrow.

         And my heart drops. “I would love to see her. I'll be saying sorry to her for the rest of my life.” I run my hands through my hair because of the nerves. He walks me to her room.

_________________________________________

Nikki’s point of view:

Dr. Thompson, comes in and tells me that, “There is someone here to see you Ms. Harris.” I hear him warn Seth that I just woke up so the drugs are still in my system and strong.

He walks in. There he is. I’m furious. I’m so ready to scream at the top of my lungs at this moment but I know that I can’t.

“Look who it is, Nikki.” Aurora says from her chair next to my bed. She is sitting to my left.

He makes his way over to my bedside on my right slowly, unsure of what will happen next he says to me sheeply, “Uh, hi there.” he pauses. “I just wanted to say how very sorry I am for what happened. And I hope you'll let me pay for all of the hospital bills.”

“Well hello to you too handsome.” I smile as if I were highly intoxicated and grab his hand. I think to myself ‘Fuck, fuck, fuck, I'm holding his hand. The very hands that I worship and think naughty things about. Also he smells good as hell.’

“Look you guys… it’s my very yummy husband.” I say putting extra emphasis on the yummy. This statement causes Seth’s eyes to turn bigger than his entire face. He looks back to doctor Thompson, then back to me. His mouth hanging wide open. He tries to produce words but he’s in such shock.

“Tell him what you just told me Nicole.” the doctor asks of me while standing by the door and smirking.

I slur my words to be extra convincing. I fakely giggle. “OH baby, I was just telling my new friend Dr. T. here about how you just surprised me by buying a house for us.” I put my pointer finger up in the air and smile with my eyes barely open “And also I was bragging to him about… um….” I pause and blink slowly, “ oh yes, that we just got off our honeymoon in… uh wh--where was it?”

Lisa answers for me from the foot of the bed “Paris remember?”.

I raise my eyebrows in realization and giggle again, “Oh yes thank you Elle,” I smile. I take a long pause again, “You sir spoil me you know that. Taking me to Paris.” I reach out for Seth’s hand again. “And oh my god I can’t forget the best part! Damn was the sex great.” This causes Aurora to choke on the water she was drinking . She starts coughing uncontrollably. I look at the Lisa, “This man, I tell you,” I poke Seth in the chest while still holding his hand, “is great in the sack. ”. I throw my good arm up in the air, “I’m sooooooo lucky to have him for the rest of my life.” I extend the ‘so’ out for just to be a little extra. I close my eyes and grab his arm again pulling him closer, hugging it like a pillow. Keeping my face rested on his arm “Baby?” I tug on his arm like a child. “When can we go? You know how much I hate hospitals…” I release his arm and scratch my nose, “You wouldn’t believe me when I tell you how uncomfortable this bed is compared to that new one we just bought.” I pause. “No offense Doctor!” I say unnecessarily loud

“It’s fine hun, don’t worry not my choice.” Doctor Thompson replies.

I turn to Seth and tug on his arm. “Plus I want to go see the new house. I haven't seen it yet. We were on our way there ya know.” I look to Aurora now that she's stopped coughing. “But then some idiot decided to hit me with his car.” I huff and blow upward causing my baby hairs to out of my eyes.

“Um…. uh I uh…. I don’t know.... I uh, I have to talk to the… uh doctor first. ” he releases from my grip and stumbles backwards. “I’ll just be one second.” He grabs Dr. Thompson by the lab coat and pulls him out in the hallway. All I can hear is muffle voices after one of them closes the door. I lay back and smirk as everything was going so well so far.

______________________________

Seth’s point of view:

I pull the doctor by the collar of his lab coat out to the hallway, “What the hell is going on here?” I basically whisper scream at this man.

“Well, Nicole has suffered memory loss from the amnesia she came down with because of the blow to the head. This was most likely when her head hit the ground. ” the doctor says to me. He continues, “And I believe her brain, in shock from the blow, was trying to process remembering everything the amnesia made her forget. And her mind must have made up fake memories to replace the real ones lost from the trauma.”

“What does this mean? She’s not even my wife. She’s a total stranger! What are we-- what am I--- supposed to do?” I ask extremely panicked.

The doctor sighs. “Well right now her brain is very sensitive, we don’t want to confuse her or stress her out. This can have detrimental affects on her mind long term, so it’s critical that we just go along with whatever she says.” He starts reading his clip board.

I can barely process his words. “So… you’re telling me… that I now have to pretend that a complete stranger is my wife until her memories comes back?”

He nods “That’s it.” He looks  back up at me from the clipboard and smiles. “It could be worse. She seems like a lovely girl who really enjoys your company.” He smirks and raises and an eyebrow. He pats me on the shoulder while chuckling and walks back into her room.

I squeeze my fists and shake them at the sky and groan. After composing myself, I walk back into the room with a fake smile, I try to prepare for what is about to happen next.

______________________________

Nikki’s point of view: After the two men leave the room.

Aurora finally recovered completely from her coughing episode “Damn bitch and the Academy Award goes to…”.

Lisa follows up with “You’re pure evil you know that? I’m having such a proud mom moment for sure.” she fakes wiping away tears, causing me to roll my eyes.

“Thank you ladies, all those acting classes I had to take for ballet finally came into good use.” I smile extra evil.

“Now the real question is, what are you going to do? How long do you plan on keeping this up?” Aurora asks.

“I’m not sure yet. I don’t want to be too mean, it was an accident after all, and he does seem genuinely sorry.” I start to really think about it. “So I’ll just try to get at least one overpriced  meal out of it.”

“There ya go baby,” they both chuckle, “Thinking economically, good job.” Lisa jokes and gives me a thumbs up and winks.

Just then Dr.Thompson walks in, he gives me a nod just as we planned to do when he convinced Seth what was happening was a real medical condition. This made me chuckle lightly. Seth follows behind him and comes into the room smiling. “Theres my handsome husband,” I hold my hand out indicating for his. He seemed slightly hesitant, but gave in.

______________________________

Seth’s point of view:

I take her hand after pulling up a chair to her bedside. This was it, after hours of waiting in agony to know if she was alright, I finally get to talk to her. “How are you feeling?”, I finally get a chance to look her into the eyes.

“I...uh feel super sore, and uh there’s a super duper bad pain on this side when I move,” She points with her hand still in mine, “it feels like I’m getting stabbed a gagillion times by little baby knives or something. It kinda sucks.” I sound like a drunk child at this point

“Is there anything I can do to make you feel better?” he asks. His eyes show all of his regret.

I look around the room like I’m checking to see if the coast is clear. I wave for him to come towards me and whisper, “Come closer.” he leans in, and I ask quietly, “Can you get me some more of these drugs? They’re pretty damn great.” I smile and chuckle as we both pull away.

“ Ms. Harris I already told you...” the doctor starts.

“I already used my allotted amount for the hour. Yes, yes I know.” I look back at Seth “There’s way too many rules in this place.” I roll my eyes.

“How about something to eat or read? I can go raid the gift shop for whatever you’re in the mood for.” He smiles while looking at me in the eyes and my heart drops into my toes.

“Uh-- um “ I stumble with my words because of how gorgeous he is, “I’m craving uh lemonade. No, no, no, baby…” I brace his arm, “strawberry lemonade,” I smile still slurring some words. “And I would love for you to surprise me with ever cookies they have baby.”

He looks at me and smiles at me with that smile. That one that melts my goddamn heart.  He stands up and says, “Ok, I will see what I can find.” he releases my hand and walks out of the room.

Dr. T turns to me “I’ll be back in a few hours to check up on you my dear. Get some sleep ladies.” he winks at me and heads out.

“You two should go home and get some sleep. My prince charming will take care of me.” I smirk. I look back and forth between the two of them. Their faces were full of worry. “I will be fine, the apartment is like three seconds from here, it will be ok. I’ll text you if there’s any news or change. I promise.”

“Child...”, Lisa slowly shakes her head and continues, “you don’t really expect me to just go home and leave you like this.” She crosses her arms being stubborn like always.

“Lisa… She’s right, ” Aurora starts, “We should get some sleep and come back tomorrow so we’re not exhausted. It will just be better if we go home, this room is too small for all us, plus the nurses and doctors.”

“Fine. But I will be here the second the visiting hours start.” she says sternly while standing up. Aurora follows her lead and we say our goodbyes.

The second they leave, I close my eyes and try to fall asleep. Within minutes I pass out.

______________________________

Seth’s point of view:

After I leave Nikki’s room, I search for her food. After about thirty minutes I finally find her strawberry lemonade and cookies. I buy something’s to keep myself busy in the room while I wait for either her memory to come back, or her recovery to be stable enough to come home. As I’m leaving the gift shop I see Nikki’s friends walking toward the exit. I smile and awkwardly wave as we past. The smaller girl with long black hair turns around and I hear her say, “Hey!” I bite my lip hoping she’s not about to yell at me, but I brace for whatever is about to happen and turn to face her . “She really likes those trashy celebrity magazines, they’re her kryptonite.” she point to the rack in the gift shop.

“Wow uh, thanks, I appreciate the tip.” I look at her and smile sincerely and realize something, “I didn’t get your name.”

“I’m Aurora, Mike Tyson over there is Lisa or Elle,” she points to the one responsible for my aching jaw. She's standing about ten feet away from us with her arms crossed. “But it’s whatever you prefer.” She smiles “We’re going to head to our place, we’ll be back during visiting hours in the morning with some of her stuff. We’ll try to make the room look more homey when she comes out of all those drugs.” She smiles again

“Ok, I’ll see you guys then.” I wave again.

“Oh and Seth...”

“Yeah?” I raise and eyebrow.

“Carnations are her favorite flowers.” before I can reply she turns around and is out the door.

I walk back into the shop and buy everything Aurora told me to. As I walk back into the room I see that Nikki is asleep, I sigh in relief. I walk up to her bed and lay everything out for her just in case she wakes up. I aggressively slump down in the recliner chair on the side of her bed. I push the button and it lays almost completely flat. My face ends up right next to hers, I yawn  while I admire her face like the work of art it is. I can’t help but to stare. My breath calms and I mutter, “God damn.” just completely taken aback by her beauty. At least my new ‘wife’  is the most gorgeous women I’ve ever seen. I can’t wait to meet her not on all those pain killers and other drugs.

And with that thought I fall deep into sleep finally giving my body what it wants.

[badcharacterization]

A Court of Mist and Fury

This book has appeared on so many “Best of 2016″ lists, and after reading it I wonder how many 2016 releases these people actually read... Strap yourselves in, kiddos, this is like 8 pages of rage in the original Word document. Unpopular opinions under the cut.

Note: I originally took these down as notes on my phone, I’ve edited for clarity and punctuation and stuff, but not everything is properly capitalized because this book has taken enough of my precious time already. I did something similar with ACOTAR, and will probably post that one later (it is on goodreads though). I should have cited page numbers but that would have taken forever so you’re just going to have to guess from context clues.

-time skip time skip

-the mating bond sounds super yucky

-is this foreshadowing, is Ianthe going to steal Feyre’s shitty man?

-look at them sweet gender roles

-“inherent female magic.” no thank you bro

-Feyre is straight up depressed…and it’s actually depicted well…whoa

-I’m already tired of male this and female that though. We gotta make sure that everyone knows that the Fae are “primal” and “animalistic”

-and everyone is super duper straight apparently?

-so basically Amarantha was faerie Hitler? Just in case you didn’t already think she was super evil. There’s still no explanation of why she was so twisted, and I don’t expect the author will ever give one.

-I smell some vaguely Middle Eastern cultural appropriation

-also Feyre hasn’t learned to read after months in the spring court?

-Amarantha banned holidays, like the White Witch. How original.

-Rhysand suddenly has Feyre’s best interests at heart. He must have an identical, nicer twin.

-I’m still not over him drugging her and forcing her into skimpy outfits. That will never be okay to me, no matter how nice to her he is

-let’s have some more foreshadowing about Ianthe. It’s a little not subtle and barely qualifies as foreshadowing

-I know Feyre is depressed but she is passive in an out-of-character way. She used to disobey Tamlin pretty much reflexively.

-what did Feyre think Tamlin did for income? Of course it’s egregious taxes on all his subjects

-it’s almost like the author realized that ACOTAR had problems at some point and is trying to correct them all. She apparently doesn’t really plan or outline any of her books

-it feels like Tamlin has even less self control in this book than the last one, though it was always pretty bad. The author/narrator acts like this is a significant change and a sign of how what happened has traumatized him but it…isn’t? He was always physically intimidating her and manipulating her.

-I appreciate the author acknowledging that Tamlin is an abusive overprotective jerk, but Rhysand has issues too and he hasn’t really apologized or made amends at this point

-I didn’t expect Tamlin to want a domestic wifey but I guess this is a fae thing or an “omg look how evil he is now” thing

-have some awkward writing

-it is kind of a relief when she leaves the Spring Court, mostly because nothing interesting seems to happen there and it’s all a lot of foreshadowing about Ianthe, and Feyre being surrounded by courtiers with no bearing on what happens

-the introduction of Azriel, Cassian, and Amren is kind of…fanfiction-y. There’s something about the dialogue and how you can tell them all apart in an instant that feels like it was once part of a fanfiction.

-if Velaris is so famous for art and has so many artists and its location is supposedly secret…then who’s buying the shit?

-also where are the farms

-if a girl notices a guy’s scent, it’s done.

-have some more pretty fae dudes, as if there weren’t enough already

-I don’t think the Illyrians were supposed to be POC but their portrayal as warlike, women-abusing brutes is still kinda not nuanced. The name also refers to a historical region and people in the real world so…that’s not great

-Also the mating bond seems to be purely sexual, judging by the case of Rhysand’s parents. It’s actually kind of horrifying, the idea of becoming magically bound to someone you’ve just met and may come to hate in time. Why is it so desirable? Does it usually work out fine? What happens when one partner is already married or spoken for?

-Also it’s creepy as per the usual

-Also obvious foreshadowing lol

-Also a great excuse not to properly develop a relationship

-Time to bash Feyre’s disabled father again

-Ellipses everywhere

-“You needed not to be alone.” How about you quit telling her what she needs mmmkay?

-This sentence made me gag a bit, so I’m sharing it: “the voice was at once the night and the dawn and the stars and the earth, and every inch of my body calmed at the primal dominance in it.”

-And she’s using her pet word, primal, again

-There are flushing toilets in what seemed to be a medieval shit-land…okay

-At least this relationship is being built up better, but I still can’t get over the forced drugged striptease shit

-Amren’s back story is cool

-“Deadly bit of flirtation” Feyre needs to stop being so melodramatic, he was just flirting

-The Weaver is exactly the kind of weird, creepy faerie I’ve wanted to see in this series.

-Barbecue is an odd choice of words

-Rhysand feels more like her tough life coach than a potential love interest right now.

-Why is Feyre acting like Ianthe approaching Rhysand for sex was some unforgivable assault, when he had the power to make it stop immediately? It’s not even comparable to Amarantha.

-And how could Ianthe theoretically force herself on Lucien when males seem to hold more power than females in the Spring Court? Are priestesses an exception? Are there rules about turning them down? Does she enjoy some kind of special status?

-Foreshadowing about Ianthe and Tamlin again

-It’s almost like…Ianthe was behaving like literally every male character in this goddamn series. “The ownership and arrogance in that gesture” hmmmmmm…that sounds familiar

-Double standard time: Sexually aggressive men are just alpha males, sexually aggressive women are eeeeeevil

-Feyre complains that being rich and a woman in the human world is restricting but it seemed like she had a lot of freedoms when she went back and her father had his fortune back. Also, when she was poor. Someone had to know she was sleeping with that Isaac guy. Nesta certainly did.

-Almost forgot about the female mercenary, too

-Also apparently there are queens who are in charge in the human lands, though it was only mentioned in this book?

-The whole  humans not having holidays thing is still dumb. They would have created new ones after disavowing fae ones. Whenever people abandon an ideology en masse, something usually crops up to fill the psychological void.

-time to reminisce about how shitty Feyre’s human life was

-It’s not like Feyre’s sisters were also kids when they lost their mother and their fortunes fell or anything

-Cassian and Nesta’s hate thing is a little exaggerated; the ship is almost too obvious. “Look, they’re acting like they hate each other” is a sloppy shortcut to “they have sexual tension and they’re going to end up in a relationship.” Because the author doesn’t want to spend too much time fleshing out any of the other relationships in this damn book

-If Amren ends up being a villain, too, I’m gonna lose my shit.

-Feyre’s human life sucked guys, remember? REMEMBER??? ISN’T SHE SO MUCH BETTER OFF IN DOUCHEY MISOGYNIST FAERIELAND???

-There’s an unnamed brown faerie…such diversity. Much wow

-The food is so good and spicy and shit it’s somehow curing her depression a bit…okay

-Feyre pays a lot of attention to Azriel. Begins to feel weird after the first couple of times

-“Yeah, Rhys, thanks for making me dance like a stripper, but the magical disembodied music was great”

-I almost like Cassian now. Almost

-Unless Ianthe is secretly super powerful I think Lucien doesn’t have to worry about her “preying” on him. Chill.

-So Rhysand and Feyre are basically texting…okay

-Rhysand is petty as shit about Tarquin: “I know we’re not in an actual relationship or anything…but I’m mad because you smiled at him.” All the men in this series need to chill

-Varian and Amren makes no sense. It just crops up out of the blue…and is…a thing

-The language around attraction is interesting and gendered. Men are “predatory” when they’re interested in a woman. He gets “lethal focus” on her. Which leaves me wondering…does he want to fuck her or eat her? I honestly can’t tell.

-What does “tattooed panes of his chest” even mean? His chest is a window?

-Have a very vague description of Rhysand’s room

-SJM always writes romances where the characters instantly click or feel attraction, and the only thing keeping them apart is stubbornness

-This part feels like a draft, it’s a summary of Feyre’s training and interactions with Mor, and I actually want to see what that’s like. Mor was supposed to be a less manipulative replacement for Ianthe, but we hardly get to see her interactions with Feyre

-The way Feyre is dressed, she’s basically being presented as Rhys’s partner and she doesn’t seem to mind? Unless Mor gets a crown, too, and the author just neglected to mention it

-So two of the queens are married to each other? Yay! Background token LGBT characters

-How do the mortal lands even work, politically? Two of the queens can be married to one another and not have to worry about producing heirs? Why so many queens? Do they rule together or each govern different kingdoms?

-Most of the queens get a sentence or two of description, but then SJM goes on and on about the beautiful one and treats her as the most important woman in the group

-Also all beautiful women hate each other at first sight y’all

-I thought she only picked Mor’s name because she thought it sounded cool but she’s actually (clumsily) referencing Irish mythology

-So humans and fae can interbreed, like in the Throne of Glass series

-“The Black Land” seems like the author gave up on names. It also resembles the name for Ancient Egypt, and the description of its history confirms that

-Also what is with all the evil faerie queens running around? How can someone be much worse than Ms. Tortures-Everyone, Amarantha?

-If the queens know of the Veritas but have never actually laid eyes on it, how would they know it shows the truth?

-Okay, let’s have entire pages all about the sex lives of Illyrians. Thanks, Sarah, I really needed to know that

-Of course sex stuff is more thought out than anything with the politics, magic system…or like anything else

-Okay, obviously Rhysand is someone she likes now, why is flirting with him still “lethal” and “dangerous”? Is she afraid of Tamlin’s reaction?

-…how would wings make for interesting sex positions? Maybe my imagination is just lacking but…why

-the description of the court of nightmares is super vague

-It feels like YA female protagonists always have to have a female friend or servant who’s more into clothes and makeup to dress them. It’s almost like a main character can’t actually be invested in girly things

-I think this scene is meant to show how much things have changed since Rhysand forced Feyre to dance like a stripper and drink drugged wine Under the Mountain, because now he asked her permission before including her in his schemes…but it rings hollow for me. This romance doesn’t work unless you ignore everything from book 1

-“That primal, male rage” you just gotta gender everything

-also really convenient that the author gets to attribute everything awful Rhysand has ever done to his “mask” or persona as a high lord

-Yeah let’s keep woobifying him and brining up how awful Amarantha was. It makes him look better…if you don’t think about it too hard

-The Starfall scene is kinda vague and doesn’t do much narratively, just like the solstice scene in book 1.

-LOOK LADIES RHYSAD IS A FEMINIST!!! DOESN’T THAT CANCEL OUT EVERYTHING BAD HE’S EVER DONE?!??!?!?

-So the Illyrian blood rite is basically faerie Hunger Games.

-So Rhysand is not only the most powerful high lord alive, but he’s also the most powerful of all time?

-Feyre’s description of him fingering her is ridiculous. “Every point in my body, my mind, my soul, narrowed to the feeling of his fingers…”

-Why does it seem like SJM has a thing for whipping? Also why are they whipping him? Torture for information? Just to show that they’re a bunch of irredeemably evil dicks?

-This isn’t a YA novel. It just isn’t.

-I sense some drama over the whole “you knew we were mates all along” thing

-Yep

-How is this the most important thing in a fae’s life though?

-Feyre has every right to be mad at him, and confused and shit. Jeesh.

-So the mating bond involves the female offering food to the male…gender roles galore

-If he felt the mating bond when she was human, does that mean that high fae can bond with humans, or that she was meant to change?

-So the faeries who tried to assault Feyre on Calanmai are called “Picts”…that’s an actual historical people, just like Illyrians. Kinda icky, even if no one really identifies with those names anymore

-Her descriptions of orgasms are always ridiculous

-“A slow, satisfied male smile” WE GET IT SARAH HE’S MALE JESUS CHRIST

-They sexed so hard they caused an avalanche? The fuck?

-What’s with all the roaring

-Another “male” smile. This is my least favorite phrase

-Post mating bond behavior is not cute. He wants to fight any “male” who looks at or comments on Feyre, including Cassian, who’s just a little shit

-“Feral” returns

-The mating bond makes them act like animals in heat and FEYRE CAN’T SO MUCH AS GLANCE AT ANOTHER MALE WITHOUT RHYS REACTING? HOW IS THIS DESIRABLE?

-And, sure, he’s fighting it, but this is still being presented as a model relationship?

-“Purr” has returned

-oh no the human queens are such awful bitches for not trusting the people who historically screwed humans over a bunch.

-The description of what happens and what Mor looks like when she holds the Veritas is kind of vague

-It’s understandable and logical for the queens to suspect manipulation, the only really bad thing about them is that they’re willing to abandon the humans on Prythian

-Lemme guess, Nesta and Cassian are mates, too? Isn’t it supposed to be super rare?

-So the beautiful young queen is nice after all. Beauty=goodness, kiddos

-How does Feyre know that the other queens betrayed them? The info could have been tortured out of them and they could be dumping the other bodies all over the city for all she knows? It seems like she’s leaping to conclusions [note: she ends up being right, of course]

-How can Feyre see Amren? Are they that close to each other? Cassian and Azriel are airborne but it sounds like city streets are between Feyre and Amren and buildings should be obstructing the view

-Sometimes SJM tries too hard to be a serious writer

-The fight is pretty cool, it just feels a little too effortless and efficient. It’s also frustrating that Feyre has had this vast power and hasn’t really used it much in combat until now

-her skill is made a little more believable by the fact that she doesn’t have a lot of precision, just raw power.

-Rhys is respecting her autonomy! Let’s just forget about book 1 completely

-So…the ring retrieval was a test to determine if she was strong enough to be his mate, too…not a douche move at all

-So convenient that all of the Hybern soldiers/underlings are sadistic creeps, it means the mains don’t have to regret killing them

-Jurian is described as tan, like many of the other characters in the book. But it just makes me think they’re meant to be white people with tans.

-The King of Hybern has no name and is also described as “blandly handsome” like a man in his 40s…wait I thought all fae are super beautiful and look young?

-So…literally all the faeries in Hybern’s court are dead-eyed and evil and there’s no art or furniture. That sounds fake…but okay.

-Just in case you didn’t understand that Tamlin isn’t just a bad person, now he’s super evil and possessive…oh wait he always was

-He actually has a point about Rhysand, how can you ever fully trust someone who could possibly mess with your mind?

-Also kind of messed up how two of the evil humans queens are like the only queer characters in the goddamn books so far

-why would the queens buy the idea that the king of Hybern is on their side? He wants to bring down the wall, unless he somehow hid that part from them

-it’s baaaaad for women to want power and eternal life. They can only have it if men give it to them

-Speaking of which, IANTHE IS EVIL GUYS! WHO SAW THIS COMING???

-So Hybern and Ianthe’s plan is to overthrow the high lords and let the priestesses rule. I know they’re supposed to be corrupt or whatever, even though there’s not any concrete evidence of this, but how is overthrowing the high lords a bad thing?

-While the twist with Nesta and Elain has interesting potential, Nesta and Cassian being mates is boring

-And super obvious

-Weird that Feyre suddenly thinks of her father, out of the blue, after weeks of not giving a fuck about him, when Elain is changed. Also prioritizing men’s feelings…again

-King of Hybern made a creepy comment about Mor and then forgot her, very cartoonish

-THIS SCENE IS DRAMATIC ENOUGH!!! Why add the Elain/Lucien mates reveal? Jeesh

-Gotta demonize that young ambitious queen for looking at fae men

-Sudden convenient powers

-And now a sudden chapter from Rhysand’s POV

-So Amren says mating bonds can’t be broken, but I’d be more interested in the story if it was in fact breakable and if Feyre and Rhysand would have to decide to live and love without it. This book treats it like the end-all-be-all though

-Awww Amren cares about Feyre after all

-Rhysand’s narrative voice sounds like Feyre’s, where I would expect him to sound very different

-GUYS RHYSAND MADE FEYRE HIS HIGH LADY DOESN’T THAT MAKE HIM THE BEST FEMSINIST EVER?!?!? WOMEN CAN STILL ONLY DERIVE POWER FROM MEN IN THIS UNIVERSE…BUT RHYSAND IS A SEXY FEMININST

-this is treated like a plot twist and I wish the scene had actually been shown…although that would only make this godforsaken book even longer.

-Aaaaand it’s totally confirmed after like two pages that the mating bond isn’t broken…just kill the drama and tension…just murder it

-Lucien is obviously suspicious of Feyre

Final thoughts

-Tamlin allying with Hybern comes off as stupid, not evil. Granted, he did not seem all that intelligent in ACOTAR, but you would expect someone who’s lived for centuries to be a bit savvier. He had to have heard of what Hybern was all about

-Women are constantly defined by their relationships with men. Like apparently the mating bond existed when Feyre was still human and Rhysand sent her visions of the night sky to comfort her and she painted it on her dresser drawer. It’s a minor thing but it just keeps coming up

-Feyre just kinda lacks agency in general. It’s supposed to be this cool, “she’s learning how to fight and defend herself” plot in the middle of the book, but Rhysand determines her goals, and his wants and needs drive the plot more than hers. It gets worse after the mating bond sets in.

-Also Ianthe is the only female character who does not have a devoted relationship with one man and she is demonized for keeping herself independent and sleeping around. Mor also isn’t in an established relationship, but it’s obvious that the author is hinting at her and Azriel being a potential couple.

-I would like to see Cassian cope with a disability, one that makes him worthless in the eyes of his culture…but I know that shit is getting cured ASAP, of course after milking it for a bit of melodrama and man feels. Like, there is no way he’ll actually have to go without his wings

-Ianthe’s betrayal of Feyre’s sisters lacks a real punch. Even when Feyre implicitly trusted her, she obviously didn’t like Ianthe much and her sinister intentions were heavily foreshadowed. If that relationship had actually been established as a strong friendship, the betrayal would seem like much more of a betrayal. Instead, it’s kind of like “Oh no, I knew there was a reason I didn’t like her all along.”

-This book seems to call into question the idea that the high fae are superior to and different from lesser faeries, especially if Illyrians can interbreed with high fae. This still doesn’t indicate where things like the Suriel and the Weaver fit in the hierarchy. It’s implied that both are more powerful than individual high fae, though it seems that the Suriel is pretty easily deceived and captured. The world building doesn’t make any sense if you question it too much

-The whole “lesser faeries deserve better” message that crops up once or twice, in between all the feels and sex, also rings hollow because pretty much all lesser fae so far have been demonized or portrayed in a negative light. The Picts, the Naga, the Attor and his dudes, etc.

-If Rhys is so awesome, why let the Court of Nightmares keep existing in its current state? Especially if he supposedly cares about Mor so much?

-In that scene where Feyre is watching her sisters get dunked into the cauldron, it all feels very detached. She’s watching Cassian and Lucien’s reactions, when I feel like she should be very narrowly focused on her sisters and what’s happening to them. The author doesn’t fully commit to the first person POV, because she wants to make it very, very super obvious to the audience that Cassian is Nesta’s mate and Lucien is Elain’s, but it makes the scene lack something emotionally. First person gives you the ability to make the narration emotional and immediate, but that comes at certain costs. One character can’t see or notice everything you want them to.

-Also she’s just always got to prioritize male feels over female suffering. OH LOOK SOMETHING HORRIBLE IS HAPPENING TO A WOMAN AND OH NO A MAN IS REALLY REALLY SAD AND ANGSTY ABOUT IT LET’S FOCUS ON HIM INSTEAD

-The author just seems to care more about men than women, in all honesty, and this is part of the reason I can’t just escape into this world or consider this book even a guilty pleasure. The Throne of Glass books were starting to get this way, too, especially because she keeps killing off the girls of color in that series.

-And basically any woman who’s greedy or doesn’t derive her power from a man is demonized. Especially if they’re sexually active or aggressive in their pursuit of the men they want. Rhysand’s behavior in ACOTAR was even worse than Ianthe’s, it’s such a double standard and it’s laughable that anyone would call these books feminist. There is nothing in Ianthe’s actions to imply that she is violating any of the men she’s pursued. She’s pushy, shady, and needs to learn when to back off, sure, but it’s not like she’s assaulting anyone. Especially when the men she’s gone after are obviously way more powerful than her (Lucien, too, is obviously the heir of the Autumn Court, even if he enjoys lower status in the Spring Court).

-I’m still not over the idea that getting rid of the High Lords would not be bad. Like, Rhysand and Feyre both agreed that the current social system is stultified and deeply unfair to “females” and “lesser faeries”? How is the idea itself so bad and repulsive to them? They react with disgust and shock when Hybern brings it up

-I feel like pretty much every character is more interesting than Rhysand, with the possible exception of Tamlin. This may be mostly because I feel that they have potential and that the author hasn’t written enough about any of them and hasn’t had the chance to ruin them or waste their potential (like Manon in Throne of Glass). She just tries way too hard to make Rhysand seem sympathetic and loveable after all of the questionable things he did in book 1. And it shows.

-Come to think of it, it’s super strange that the Night Court lands are so neatly divided into “sadistic shitty assholes” in the Court of Nightmares and “peaceful artsy people” in Velaris. Like, what nation has ever been like that? People aren’t either irredeemable dicks or good people, every place has a mix of people.

-Amren feels like the kind of character I would love with a different author, but is barely developed. Same with the rest of the inner circle: Azriel is too much of a cipher to really make me care, Cassian is kinda all over the place, and Mor is built up as this amazing female role model who’s been through so much and has great inner strength…but then the author barely pays attention to her. Basically, the author cares about her self insert and her perfect love interest, and everyone else is just set dressing.

-The King of Hybern is so boring, and is just like the King of Adarlan in Throne of Glass. The comparison is even more obvious because neither of them ever receives an actual name.

-There were some moments where ACOTAR was well written/compelling, however fleeting. There were also spots that showed some potential. There are more of those in this book, but as more of the world is revealed, it becomes clear that it’s all built on heteronormativity and a rigid view of gender and gender roles. The magic system is poorly developed, the politics and geography is poorly established, and the plot limps. Instead of tightening these things up, the author chooses to focus on romance and sex, pausing frequently to allow the main characters to have sexual tension, going on for pages about the sex lives of her winged fetish-boys, and demonizing anyone who stands in the protagonists’ way. This story isn’t really about the looming war, it’s about two people falling in love and having a bunch of sex. All of the other stuff is just stuff she needs to put down on the page so she can get back to describing male abs and sex scenes. That’s not to say that this is a bad thing, but I expect more plot, world building, and character development out of something that’s labeled as “fantasy” and about 600 pages long. And the romance just doesn’t work for me. Too much brooding and woobifying, the bond is just boring and too convenient.

-There were a few times I almost quit this book, but about midway through I started hearing about what a shitfest ACOWAR is and that motivated me to finish, because I love a good shitfest, if I’m in the right mood.