#snippets timeline

[e17omm]

Snippets of Sirin Schariac's life timeline

Up to date to chapter 101!

Some trivia/funfacts:

I switched to dark mode!

I condensed the larger arcs into one note on the timeline and put all their chapters below the timeline. They take up too much space otherwise.

At the time of posting, chapter 100 and chapter 101 isn't actually out yet.

Pocket Room (ch88) is the first chapter in 2007.

2009 is still lacking any chapters.

2000 is the year I have to move around the chapters the most in. Its also the trickiest year to place the chapters in the right place.

2000 is the most spread out year, having chapters between chapter 4 and chapter 92.

Chapter 100 (Pawn takes Queen) is the first chapter intentionally put of order in the major arcs.

"A new Ice Age" tehcnically isnt completed, as the logistics for the start of the Eruption was too much work and largely uninteresting. I originally cut most of it except for Sirin's perspective, but I later managed to write Kiana's perspective of it and the defeat of the Herrscher of Ice.

In previous timeline updates, I incorrectly placed "End of an Age (Sirin)" before "End of an Age (Kiana)"

Even though chapter 97 isn't titled "In the Shadow of Dominance" it does take place in the middle of the arc.

In the Shadow of Dominance takes place over the longest period of time out of any of the arcs, going up to around 2 months. The second longest arc is Return to Nagazora, taking place over a week, while Thunders over Nagazora and A new Ice Age takes a day or two.

My current prediction is that In the Shadow of Dominance will have at least 4 more chapters not shown on the timeline as of yet, which would mark it the longest arc in chapter amount as well, even when excluding chapters not titled as being in the arc (like chapter 97)

The events of the final arc is set in stone, but the amount of chapters and their titles aren't.

[flamingpudding]

Little Snippets #4

Danny knew he had screwed up and that he was going to be in so much trouble as he flew hurriedly through the streets of Gotham.

"Old man is going to be so pissed...." he muttered as he zigzagged through the buildings. He had just gotten back from a side mission with Clockwork when he learned that one of their villains had gotten their hands on portal technology. Not his parents mind you, no one could read their chicken scratch besides Danny or Jazz. No but Vlad's, who was supposed to be a redeemed man but apparently some of his inventions still managed to get onto the black market.

Danny hat been in the Ghost Zone when they had that found out and the old man pinged him to get back sooner. And oh boy was Danny in for a portal mess when he got back to Gotham. He instantly went out to help the old man. Batman was out on his own and Danny had been trying to give him support when he got tangled up and ended up thrown through a portal.

Yeah, he knew his the old man would give him a good lecture, like the day he had gotten taken under the other mans wing. So now after Danny finally made his way back to Gotham he flew through the streets in search of the old man, it looked like the portal problem had resolved while he was trying to find his way back but still Danny had a weird feeling about Gotham now.

"OLD MAN!" He yelled as he spied Batman on top of a building. Grinning brightly he came to an stop directly in front of the other waving happily. "Sorry it took so long but I am back and in one piece! No injuries! See!"

Danny grinned brightly despite not getting an instant answer or lecture back. Though he paused when he noticed the kid in colourful clothing and others like one with a red face covering helmet, one themed in blue and one in black and red. "Did you get help from others? And I thought you didn't like kid playing hero?"

He tilted his head confused as he studied Batman before his eyes widened. "Hey, since when is your insignia not red...?"

It was in that moment that Danny realized he messed up big time somehow and slipped up as he uttered his next words. "You're not old man Thomas...?"

[hemlock-dreams]

Does Peter ever tell Wade about where he's really from and what he did? Does he talk about his old life with him?

He does! All that’s left is for Wade to believe him!

(He does eventually tell him in a more serious setting tho. Post reveal)

[unproduciblesmackdown]

Lackadaisy Enrichment

[varpusvaras]

If someone ever asked Roy what Jason reminded him of, he would've said a cat.

A big, black, fluffy cat that would pretend to not even notice you for half a day, but would then proceed to flop right on top of you when you least expected it and leave you coated in fur.

A very cute, big, black, fluffy cat, of course, if Roy was being precise.

Yeah, that was his boyfriend.

His boyfriend, who was currently curled up on the bed like he truly was the cat he so reminded Roy about, his face pressed against Roy's thigh. Combined with the dimness of the room, it was almost enough to hide the fact that there was a large, nasty bruise covering half of Jason's face at the moment.

Almost.

"How did you even manage to get this?" Roy asked. It was mostly a rhetorical question at that point, just whispered out loud, because it was in the middle of the night and Jason was definitely ninety percent asleep already and was not going to give Roy a coherent answer. That was what one got after finishing up a two-days long mission and then deciding to instantly drive to the other side of the country, instead of staying put and resting after said two-days mission.

To be fair, if Roy was being completely honest, he did like Jason being home sooner than later. It wasn't a particularly big secret that Roy didn't hold much love for Gotham, after all, even if Jason still called the city home as much as he called their house home. He just...felt better when Jason was with him, especially after more grueling missions, and he was pretty sure that Jason knew it, even if they had never outright discussed it out loud.

Jason made a noise under his breath that quite honestly sounded like a kitten whining, and Roy had to bite his lip a little to not laugh at it. It would've been an affectionate laugh, of course, but better not risk it.

"Yeah, yeah." Roy ran his fingers through Jason's hair. "Mister always wearing a helmet. I'm gonna fix it up for you."

Jason made another noise, a softer one this time, and he settled further into the mattress as Roy continued to stroke his hair. Roy waited for a moment, then two, and when he was positive that Jason had fallen asleep, he slowly got up and made his way to the garage.

Despite being probably already bone-tired by arrival, Jason had still meticulously gone through their agreed homecoming routine. Lian knew about their identities, of course, and she was a smart girl, but all of the gear still belonged outside the main house. It had been Jason making most of the rules when it came to his own gear. He hated the thought of others touching it without his permission, and he especially hated even the idea of Lian touching it and somehow getting hurt. Sometimes it was like Jason was convinced that even looking towards any part of his gear would hurt Lian, which was something Roy felt like needed a licenced therapist to fully unpack. He did appreciate the care Jason displayed towards Lian, though, so he wasn't going to complain about it to Jason's face.

Thinking about Lian and Jason's face made Roy grimace. Jason didn't like letting Lian see him hurt, no matter how big or small. A bruise that was covering half of Jason's face was going to be hard to hide, though Roy knew that Jason would somehow be able to manage it. Painfully and by gritting his teeth, but he would.

Roy knew what it was all about. He wasn't stupid.

Roy flicked the lights on in the garage, before making his way to the cabinet Jason had claimed for himself. By this point, Roy had an open invitation to Jason's armor and weapons, as he was the only other person who knew how everything worked precisely. Roy was also pretty sure that Jason knew that Roy liked fixing things up for him, and he let him do it because it was an easier way to accept a display of affection than having to listen someone promise him everything, once again, while holding all the power to take their words back without a warning.

Roy went through the plan of action in his head while he unlocked the cabinet. He would need to fire up the workbench and get the electrical tools out in order to get the helmet fixed. Maybe he could draw up some plans how to make the front more durable while keeping it absorbant enough that it would still be the helmet taking the brunt of the hits and not Jason's head underneath it. It would take some time to figure out, but Jason would probably let him make him a new one if Roy just managed it. It would mean that the times of Jason having hard to hide-injuries would be lessened, after all.

Maybe he could manage to adjust the color, too, just to make it a little less vibrant. Roy was starting to seriously think that the helmet was beginning to act like the red capes in bullfighting, inviting more and more hits directly towards it simply because it was there. He wouldn't have been surprised if it really was so. Gotham was messed up, and the rogues playing a game of "who manages to break in the Red Hood's helmet and face first" sounded entirely plausible. This wasn't the first time Jason had come back sporting similar injuries, though usually they were either a little smaller, or Jason had had to stay in Gotham for longer and they were already fading by the time he got back.

Jason would most likely say no, though. The red was part of his brand at this point, it was meant to make an impression to anyone seeing it. Just Roy's luck that he had fallen for the theather kid who had not yet left the phase behind.

Not that Roy was ever going to say that to Jason. He was fully aware of the fact that he was the one running around with a bow, after all.

What a pair they made.

Roy smiled. What a pair, indeed, he thought, as he pulled the cabinet door open and proceeded to have Jason's helmet stare right at him from the upper shelf.

The helmet, which was very much not broken.

Roy stared at it for a good while. It was definitely the same helmet Jason had left with to Gotham. There was a small scratch on the paint, just unde the left lense, that Jason had meant to paint over but had not had the time yet. Roy had watched him pack it up with his own two eyes.

If Roy was anyone else, he would've been able to convince himself that there was probably a perfectly simple and harmless explanation. But Roy wasn't anyone else. Roy was who he was, and that was someone who had been fighting increasingly dangerous fights since he was a teenager, and who had seen harm being inflected over and over again and the marks it would leave behind.

Roy stared at the helmet. The helmet seemed to stare back at him, silently daring him to say it out loud.

Roy didn't say it. He closed the door and locked it back up, while something cold settled firmly at the bottom of his stomach.

He stood there for just a little longer, gathering himself, before he silently made his way out of the garage the exact same path he had walked in mere moments ago.

Lian was still asleep when Roy checked on her, and so was Jason when he slipped back into the bedroom. He stirred a bit when Roy laid down as well, not enough to wake up, but enough to turn towards Roy. Roy could see the bruise now in all of its glory, stretching across Jason's skin like a shadow.

Jason's hand was laying between them on the bed, and Roy laced their fingers together, gently and carefully.

Jason's hand was warm. It was enough to chase away some of the cold inside Roy, and he held onto it tightly.

[bostoncreamdonut]

Mentally, I’m still here— the contentment and happiness in the atmosphere, the look in Silco’s eyes, the way they’re leaning into each other.

Torn down the middle, names crossed out, scratchy lettering spelling out ‘FATHER’ next to each man.

No more— but in another universe, they really are the best fathers. They never stayed bitter; the Last Drop is doing better than ever. Dead kids stayed alive, and sisters never fought on opposite sides.

It’s what could’ve been. :,)

[kouraissant]

The Sun is dead and love is an unbearable thing (On Yudrein Aile & Grief)

(Above) KOURAISSANT / (Aeschylus: The Oresteia, Aeschylus & The Oresteia: Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, The Eumenides, Anne Carson) / Things Haunt, Joshua Jennifer Espinoza / Chapter 514, Turning, 쿠유 / Morning in the Burned House, Margaret Atwood / The opposite of a haunting is something very lonely, heavensghost / A Rosario Castellanos Reader:  ‘Memorandum on Tlatelolco’, tr. Maureen Ahern / Sue Zhao / The Song of Achilles, Madeline Miller / The Empress Yamato Hime, tr. Kenneth Rexroth / Spring and All, Cathy Park Hong / UNDER A STAR CALLED SUN / there is no absolution for the fallen, only the dying, p.d / Chapter 1, Turning, 쿠유 / Lesbos (From Ariel), Sylvia Plath

(Below) The Haunting of Bly Manor (2020), dir. Mike Flanagan / 6CHO1

[magenta-somethings]

trick or treat!

treat! (aka a snippet fic i ended up writing on the bus about tim asking yj for advice re: the huntress/nightwing/oracle situation)

“So, wait, Nightwing is dating Huntress?” asks Cassie.

“I don’t know what they’re doing!” Tim replies. “That’s half the problem.”

“And do we like Huntress?” asks Cissie.

“Yes—no—it’s complicated,” Tim replies. He’s doing a lot of replying and he doesn’t entirely like it—more out of an instinctual avoidance of being on the interrogatee side of an interrogation than anything else—but he had been the one to ask for advice. Which, in hindsight, may have been a mistake, but it’s one he’s now committed to. “I do like her. But she struggles with following Batman’s rules. I mean, we all do, but she struggles with the no killing aspect of it specifically.”

“But has she, like, actually killed anyone?” Kon asks. He’s floating in the air, cross-legged, with one of Cassie’s pillows hugged to his chest. It’s kind of cute—especially with his oversized Superman t-shirt, because, thankfully, he doesn’t actually sleep in his costume.

Not that Tim would ever say it’s cute out loud. 

“No, not since we started working together properly.”

Kon shrugs. “Then I don’t see the problem? Yeah, it’s majorly screwed that she’s killed but it also sounds like she’s changed." Tim might be imagining it, but he almost sounds wistful? "And being able to stand up to the bat seems like a point in her favour more than anything.” He pauses. “Plus, based on the picture you have of her, she’s a total babe.”

Tim just knew visual aids would be a mistake. This is on him for not being able to resist a corkboard. Cassie, acting on behalf of the team, throws a pillow at Kon. It does smack him in the face—he still needs to practice his catches—but before it can fall to the ground his TTK catches it and now he’s hugging two pillows and maybe that backfired slightly. 

Tim puts his corkboard face-down on principle. Huntress probably doesn’t even know he has the photo—her foot in the middle of kicking a bad guy’s face, her fist breaking the jaw of another. He doesn’t have much time for photography anymore, but sometimes he just itches to go out and capture Gotham and its heroes.  The photo of Nightwing, meanwhile, is him shoving his face full of pizza, a hand reaching out to try, in vain, to block the camera lens. 

Oracle, of course, is represented by her icon. He still hasn’t started thinking of her as Barbara.

“It’s not all about looks,” says Cassie. “Even if she is really hot.” She pauses. “Like, really hot.”

“Okay!” interrupts Tim. “That’s enough of that.” He did not need his friends calling his co-worker hot.

“Yeah, it really doesn’t matter,” agrees Cissie, and of course he can count on her to have his back. “Especially since Nightwing is way hotter than her.”

A part of Tim dies inside. Just shrivels up and expires, there and then.

“Okay, but Nightwing is hotter than, like, everyone,” points out Kon. That part of Tim is currently being cremated. “And cooler, and more badass. Or whatever.” 

“Most documentaries on 20th-21st century heroes talk about Nightwing’s attractiveness at least once,” says Bart offhandedly from the corner where he’s playing Polyp-mon. It’s one of his first contributions to the conversation. The part of Tim that died earlier is now having a funeral held in its honour. Suzie, at least, is still absorbed in the game. She’s spent the conversation peering over Bart’s shoulder, occasionally asking him to catch a specific polyp-mon. Though he doubts her additions would be worse than what is currently passing for advice.

“Guys, please,” Tim says, desperately trying to course-correct the conversation. God, it’s so much worse having them talk about how hot this co-worker is. “Stay focused on the problem.”

“Is that you like Oracle more?” asks Cissie.

Tim hesitates. Oracle is one of the most impressive people he knows, and getting to actually spend time with her—especially when it’s her teaching him about tech—is awesome, and she’s saved his life more times than he count or probably even knows about. But he’s only known her face-to-face for a short time, while he’s been fighting side-by-side with Huntress almost as long as he’s been acting properly as Robin. 

“That’s not what’s important,” he deflects. “What’s important is what’s best for Nightwing.”

“Right,” says Cissie. 

“What if they all just dated each other?” asks Bart

“You can do that?” asks Kon, at the same time as Tim says, “I’m pretty sure that wouldn’t fix it. In fact, I’m pretty sure that would make it worse.”

The silence stretches. 

“Well, good luck with that!” declares Cassie. “Now, who wants to watch Xena?”

Tim sighs, but let’s the hang-out move on. What’s happening with Nightwing, Huntress and Oracle is such a mess that there’s no way a bunch of teenagers are going to be able to untangle it, especially when most of them don’t have much experience in romance or life or both. Tim certainly doesn’t have a leg to stand on when it comes to having non-messy relationships. He’s sure Dick will figure it out. Eventually.

Kon floats down next to him as Cassie and Cissie go looking for the VHS, with that grin on his face that Tim just knows means he’s come up with some terrible joke. “Look on the brightside! When the divorce happens, you’ll have not one, not two, but three Christmases. Not four, because I’m pretty sure Batman doesn’t celebrate, but three is still pretty good.” 

“Yay,” says Tim, voice as flat as he can make it.

[padfootastic]

snippets! more snippets! snippets for days!

“So, first major event was Halloween. Somehow, a troll got loose in the school, intent on causing mischief and mayhem.

“A troll?” Sirius paled. “Please tell me that’s a—a euphemism for something.”

“Siri, ew, oh my god,” Harry gagged, turning his face away from his unrepentant godfather and his ‘it’s still better than an honest-to-Merlin troll, Harry James’

“Suddenly, I’m very glad that there troll was not a—was just a troll. It was during the Halloween feast—“

“I do wonder about that day, you know. It feels so cursed.”

“You have no idea,” Harry muttered bitterly before continuing. “Anyway, so, it was the middle of the feast, Quirrell comes to warn us about the mountain troll in the dungeons before doing a dramatic faint right there, in front of everyone, and Dumbledore sends us all off to our dormitories.”

There’s a beat of silence before—

“The dormitories?”

Harry looked up to see Sirius staring at him, aghast. A small smile tilted his lips on one end. “Mhm.”

His godfather takes a deep breath. “Let me get this straight. You have a mountain troll in your school, which is supposed to be warded to high heaven and back, and your Headmaster tells you to wander through the hallways, where said troll could be lurking, to get to your dormitories??”

Harry nodded. “Yes.”

“What about the damn Slytherins? Their dorms are literally in the dungeons. They might be annoying but they don’t deserve to be killed by a thirty feet tall idiot with bad breath.”

“You know,” Harry mused, head tilting in thought, “you might just be the first, and only, adult to consider that. I’m not sure it ever even hit me until now.”

“What.”

“No one cares about the Slytherins, Sirius.”

“What—“

“I mean, I’m not saying they shouldn’t, just that they don’t. Don’t look at me like that, c’mon.”

“Harry, I have no idea what’s going on right now. It feels like I went on a weekend bender and never woke up, you’re literally two minutes in and there’s a mountain troll, a weird professor, a latently homicidal Headmaster, and still no Voldemort. How do I even react to this?” Sirius’ hands moved around frantically as he spoke, getting daste and more erratic with each word.

[setmeatopthepyre]

Probie

[@118dailydrabble day 19] [part of the dead probie saga / tommy begins snippets]

Gerrard should not have sent the probie in. They'd all heard dispatch; they knew how bad it was. So when they'd arrived on scene and he barked out,“Kinard, extraction. Take the probie,” Tommy couldn't help the shocked “Captain--” that escaped from his mouth.

“This is the goddamn job,” Gerrard had spat back against the startled chorus of complaints from his men. He stared them down before directing his bristling mustache towards Tommy again. “Better hope your little student has been paying attention. Go. Now.”

-

Now, Tommy's struggling to keep his grip on the man fighting him. “Emmerson,” he bites out. When that doesn't work: “Brian!”

The probie's hazel eyes, shocked wide with terror, finally meet his.

[forwhump]

a/n; in case you wanted some batshit story advancement 😛 & point pov !!

tw/cw: rape, noncon, transphobia, misgendering, dehumanization, beheading, skinning, repeated major character death, captivity, guns, attempted forced impregnation, humiliation, kidnapping, graphic depictions of violence, mentions of medical torture, mentions of beastiality

creepy whumper, really emotionally unwell whumper, living weapon whumpee

Point urges the girl beneath his desk to keep moving with a hand to the back of her head and watches, irritated, as the freak experiment turns itself sideways to fit through the wreckage of his office doorway.

Fuck, it’s big. His men had talked about it, to him and amongst themselves — the district’s new prized possession, the meat Weaver’s oh so proud of, big and deadly. Point is a good fuckin’ soldier and a great fuckin’ captain, without the help of steroids and fuckin’ mad scientists. He didn’t care about the freak and he didn’t care to marvel about it. He didn’t flock to the gallows to watch its field tests the way some of them did; he didn’t watch them from behind the safety of the security cameras like some of the others.

They’re all afraid of it. Point has thought, until now, that it was weakness, and he’d been embarrassed for them. But he’d only only met it once, and it had been on its knees, bound and prone. Even on its knees, it had been taller than him, but Point still hadn’t grasped how big the thing was, not truly.

Not until now. Not until he has to look up, up, up at it, head angled almost all the way back. It isn’t weakness that have his men so afraid of it; it’s loathsome. It looks like the maniac from an old slasher movie, dripping red, hair plastered to its face and the sides of its throat. Nobody had raised an alarm, which means they hadn’t had the time. It hadn’t given them the time.

“What?” Point asks. He keeps his voice flat and his eyes hooded.

It cracks its neck and says, “you have something that belongs to me.”

Beneath his desk, the girl tenses. Point can feel the warmth of her breath as she exhales, “Silas?”

Something folds in the freak’s face, something that Point would never admit makes the back of his neck start to prickle with cold. It looks at him like he’s prey, and it’s convincing. Point almost believes it.

He threads his fingers through the girl’s hair, pushes his dick into her throat to keep her quiet, and raises both his eyebrows. “The girl?” He asks, skeptical, because her mouth is so warm it pulls focus from the cold at the nape of his neck. It’s such nonsense that he rumbles with laughter and the girl chokes in his lap. “Fuck you, you’ve got a thing for the girl.”

Like she would be worth all this fuckin’ trouble — like she would be worth any trouble at all. Really. He laughs and it’s in good humour.

But the freak isn’t kidding. The freak is dead fuckin’ serious. It takes a step closer and Point isn’t laughing anymore.

He quickly lifts his other hand. He points his cherished handgun. “Fuck you,” he repeats slowly. “You’ve got a thing for the girl.”

It’s fuckin’ serious. It’s standing here, making a mess of Point’s office, after having massacred Point’s men, and for what? For what? “You’ve gotta be fuckin’ kidding me,” he says, even though he knows it isn’t. “She’s a whore,” he tells it. “We found her on the floor of a crack house”

The thing tilts its head and it looks like a nightmare. “He’s mine.”

There’s something so definitive in its voice that Point forgets all about being cold. It sounds so sure, so smug that it stokes something under his skin that makes his blood boil. “She’s mine,” he snaps, and puts a bullet in the freak’s brain.

The sound is like a crack of thunder and the girl chokes again beneath his desk, panicked. She tries to pull away but Point fists a hand in her hair, keeps her still, and watches the freak wipe blood from the bullet hole between its eyes with the back of one hand.

It stays standing. It stays on its feet. It looks right at Point and it grins with all its teeth. It has dimples, and for some reason that could almost make Point vomit. It’s the most grotesque part of the whole disgusting patchwork. “Gonna have to do better than that,” it says, and it has the low, distorted voice of a monster.

Point roars in frustration. He has to empty his gun into the thing’s face before it finally stops coming for him.

Under his desk, the girl trembles with crying, and Point pushes himself back with a boot to the side of it to look down at her. He almost softens; she really is such a pretty little thing. Her mouth is swollen and her eyelashes are clumped together, sad and scared. It doesn’t cool Point’s blood by any means but it’s a heat he more enjoys. “Don’t tell me you’ve got a thing for the freak,” he warns, and pulls her up by the throat.

He bends her over the desk so she has an unrestricted view of the meat, dead and cooling on the concrete. There’s so much blood the room smells too rich of it. The girl cries, trembling beneath him, pleading, shrieking, fighting, and it almost makes all the commotion worth it.

He forgets about the freak sack of meat. There’s a blissful time, before it’s constantly a problem, that Point is able to forget about the freak. That it doesn’t haunt his every waking moment, or any of the sleeping ones, either. There’s a blissful time that Point can still look at the girl and not think about that fuckin’ thing.

Then they move it formally into his unit. It’s assigned to his care.

He trusts her, too, that’s where he fucks up. She’s usually a good girl; it had taken a lot of time and a lot of discipline, but Point had trained her well. She’s usually on her best behaviour. She screams and she fights still, sometimes, but that’s because she’s such a spirited little thing. It’s been fun trying to break that.

When he’s done with her, he leaves her on the floor of the common room, because he was decent enough to even bring her back. She’s still conscious, but just barely, whimpering and pliant, and it’s one of the ways Point likes her best. It’s hard to let her go.

He shouldn’t’ve. He knew better.

But he had already fuckin’ killed the thing, sprayed the concrete walls of his office with its brains, fucked the girl in a pool of its blood after he’d fucked her over the desk, just to make extra sure they both really learned the lesson they needed to learn.

He gives them both too much credit, that’s where he fucks up. They aren’t smart, not at all, neither of them. They don’t learn. It doesn’t seem like they ever think very critically.

He leaves the girl on the floor of the common room, and he doesn’t think about the freak. Blissfully, he doesn’t think about the freak at all. Doesn’t consider him for a second. Sidles back to the barracks, sated, and lies down on sheets that are still wet, that smell enticingly like the girl. One of her socks had been kicked off in her struggle and Point thumbs over the damp argyle, pleased.

When the alarm is raised, when the lights start flickering red, he still doesn’t think of the freak, not right away. He sighs and pulls himself out of bed again, pulls his kit back on, thinks that one of the other losers in his unit found the girl and panicked. It wouldn’t be the first time.

He’s wrong, though. Still blissfully naive.

The alarm is a resounding panic and the lights all flash red and frantic. The freak is a silhouette from a nightmare, standing at the end of a long, empty corridor. He walks towards Point slowly, unhurried, and Point stands his ground, refuses to be intimidated by this sack of meat and steroids, but it’s a nightmare the way it stalks closer to him, the way it gets bigger the closer it gets, disappearing into the shadows in the half seconds between panicked red light.

What the fuck? Point thinks, and exhales softly.

“What have you got there, big guy?” He asks.

It lifts its right hand, and the whole thing is so surreal that for a second, Point just stares, he doesn’t process.

Heads. It’s heads. The heads of Point’s men, men he had been with just hours ago, not cleanly severed but ripped off their shoulders with inhuman force. It has its fingers twisted in their bloody hair, and when Point looks back up into its face, it grins widely. It has a horrible grin. Too human.

“For Wren,” he says.

“What?” Point repeats. “The girl?”

It lifts its chin at him. “I just need one more.”

Point groans loudly, tipping his head back. “You’ve gotta be fuckin’ kidding me,” he says. “This is about the girl? Come on.”

It raises an eyebrow at him, almost impatient, and for some reason that makes Point start to prickle, heat blooming at the nape of his neck.

“You’re a fuckin’ disgusting eye sore,” Point says. “A real ugly piece of shit, right? But she’s a whore. She’s easy. She’ll fuck you, too. You don’t have to do all this bullshit to try and impress her.”

It tilts his head, and the way it moves is inhuman. Might have to do with the fuckin’ mass of it — how can anything that big move in a way that’s human? Is it even bigger than the last time Point killed it?

“I don’t like the way you talk about him,” it says, and that ignites a rage in Point that almost makes him shriek. What gives this fuckin’ thing the right —

“Boo fuckin’ hoo,” he snaps, and the only reason he doesn’t die in the corridor that day is because responding artillery finally finds the freak, and blows both his kneecaps out from behind.

He drops, roars like a wild animal. Drops the heads when he’s commanded, folds both his hands behind his own head. Doesn’t look away from Point once, and Point has to curl and uncurl his fists to try and burn off some of the simmering fury that stokes in him.

“Better luck next time, big guy,” he sneers.

But the freak grins. Dimples. Lifts his chin at Point. “Next time,” he agrees, and it sounds like a threat.

Point waits until the freak’s nose is to the concrete before he stomps down onto the back of his head with all his weight.

It doesn’t have the effect he wants it to have. He breaks the freak’s nose, but it rumbles with laughter beneath him, mocking.

He barely makes it back to the barracks before he finally shrieks in frustration.

“Please,” she whimpers. She looks especially pathetic. She’s wearing Point’s favourite gingham dress, on her knees, flushed with crying. Normally, this is how he likes her best, but it prickles at a nerve that makes it almost annoying.

His lip curls. “Look at you,” he says, and her shoulders hitch as she sobs. “How can you debase yourself like this for that thing?”

Her wrists are knotted together but in front of her, so she has her fingers twisted desperately into Point’s pants. It leaves a bitter taste in his mouth — normally, he’d love to have her like this. He never gets to have her like this. But it’s ruined, and it’s ruined because of that fuckin’ thing.

“Please,” she sobs. “It’s my fault, it’s my fault! Don’t hurt him.”

“I know it’s your fault,” Point sneers. “This is all your fault. Couldn’t keep your fuckin’ legs closed and now you’ve got a rabid guard dog.” Her touch is warm through his clothing and he wishes that was good enough. “And what happens to dogs once they start to bite, baby? What does animal conservation do for rabies? You’re smarter than this.”

Her hands are shaking but that isn’t good enough, either. “Please.”

The freak, her fuckin’ dog, it’s never been worth any of the trouble that follows it, any of the fanfare, the medical marvel, but it’s worth less now, twitching as it bleeds to death on the filthy concrete.

It just doesn’t know when to fuckin’ stop. Most of the skin had been stripped from his chest and his right arm. The left side of his throat had been torn out. A decent chunk of his scalp is hanging loose off his skull, and blood is pooling in every dip and crater of his face, pouring from his mouth as he coughs and sputters and vomits up more and more.

Still, it keeps trying to get up. Still, it keeps moving. It just won’t stay down.

He strikes her harder than he means to, knocks her to the ground in his frustration, and when she cries out, her ugly fuckin’ dog tries to pull its ugly, skinned corpse up from the pool of its blood, almost ankle deep.

“Silas,” she breathes, pushing herself up quickly. “Silas, don’t —“

“No,” Point interrupts, watching with wry amusement. “Let it try.”

She sobs, trying to grab his leg again but he pushes her away with the side of his boot.

“Look at it,” he tells her. “Is it really worth embarrassing yourself like this?”

She sobs again, pulling herself through its pooling blood on her hands and knees, ruining Point’s favourite dress with the remnants of that thing. “Silas,” she breathes quietly. “It’s okay. I’ll be okay. Don’t worry about me.”

Most of the dog’s throat is missing, and it can’t talk beyond low, wet rumbles of sound. Still, it lifts a hand from the concrete, its arm trembling with blood loss. Still, it cradles the girl’s cheek in its hand.

It’s disgusting, really. Point can’t even imagine the way that thing must smell. It smears blood across her soft skin, gets gore in her pretty hair. It trembles, and it’s too big, it’s grotesque, its hand is bigger than her delicate head and still, she leans into its touch. Still, she covers its disgusting hand with both of her own. She cries for it.

“Pathetic,” Point snaps.

She doesn’t look at him, she doesn’t take her hands off of it, and Point is across the floor in a second, wrenching her from its grip with a fist in her hair. She reaches for it, cries out, and it reaches back, stretching a shaking hand out across the concrete. Point crushes its elbow with his boot and all his weight, and the girl screams as it roars in pain.

Point rubs his heel into the broken chips of its bones and says, “any last words, mutt?”

The girl reaches up, tries to grab his hand, gasps, “please, Darren, please, don’t — don’t —“

The dog lifts its other hand from the ground, mostly skinned, flesh hanging from his bones in wet flaps. It lifts its middle finger, and Point roars in frustration. He empties his gun into the freak’s right eye, and only then, finally, does it stop moving.

“You’ve gotta be fuckin’ kidding me,” Point says softly, rubbing his mouth with a hand gloved in leather.

He looks between them, and it’s like seeing for the very first time, so many small details that it’s almost overwhelming, all of them high definition.

How many times have they done this? How many times do they have to do this, still? It swings wildly between moderately inconvenient and a blood bath, a slaughter of Point’s men. His numbers have been dwindling, and every recruit he brings on is too green, too scared of the freak, not quick enough to stop him. They’re dead almost as soon as they’re assigned to Point.

Point isn’t an idiot, but maybe he was too hopeful. Maybe he had too much faith in the girl. Maybe she’s more manipulative than Point ever gave her credit for. The dog is dumb, big and simple, mean and bloodthirsty, and the girl is pretty. Gentle. A whore. It hadn’t been hard to piece that puzzle together. She’s using the dog, taking advantage of it, fucking it into shape as her attack dog and it’s too dumb to know that’s what she’s doing, too dumb not to let itself be used.

Except he looks between them now, and he was wrong. He isn’t stupid, but they’re both so much stupider than he had ever thought they might be. The girl is so much stupider than Point ever would’ve thought. He looks at her, clinging to its corpse, its massive head in her lap. She keeps running her fingers through its hair as its body starts to rot before it’s even cooled and the water from the shower beats down around them both. It almost makes him sick. “You really love that fuckin’ thing.”

It had been sick for a while, a reaction to something the surgeons had given it that had to work its way through its system, eating away all its arteries and organs before they could start again with him, figure out where they went wrong. Point had allowed the girl to look after the thing, given her as much space as he could give her because he thought she was smarter than this. He thought, watching it rot, she’d finally see the freak for what it really is, for how much it doesn’t deserve even a glance from her direction. She might be stupid, but she’s better than this.

It makes his skin crawl. “You’ve gotta be fuckin’ kidding me,” he repeats, a little more acidic. “The dog? You fell in love with your fuckin’ dog?”

She lifts her head to look up at him, her hair plastered against her face with the water, so light in colour it almost looks translucent. “Leave him alone,” she says, and he doesn’t like the way that she speaks to him, unafraid, almost flat. “He’s already dead.”

“It won’t be dead long enough,” Point says.

She doesn’t stop running her fingers through its hair. She cries for it. She mourns it.

Point spends the next three days frantically trying to fuck the apathy out of her, but it doesn’t work. She doesn’t stop mourning the dog until Point finally chokes her into unconsciousness.

“I want you to take her off her birth control,” he says.

Medic’s face doesn’t change. He looks at Point once, up and down, and says, “fuck no.”

Point fuckin’ hates Medic, and he’s constantly reminded why. He’s too belligerent for somebody whose life is in Point’s hands, and Point has never been known for being particularly careful. “I wasn’t asking.”

“Okay?” Medic says, and one of his eyebrows lifts, but just barely. “I said fuck no.”

Point can’t help it if his jaw twitches. He knows what Medic is up to — he knows he’s got a thing for the girl. He does this whole knight in shining armour thing to try and get to her, almost the same way the dog does. Pretend to be her hero, get into her pants. It’s bullshit — Point’s never pretended to be a hero and he’s in her pants more than any of them. They’re all wasting their time, and it fizzles under his skin that any of them think she would be worth all this fuckin’ trouble, that she’d be worth any of their lives at all.

She’s a whore. A legally dead, fuckable cut of meat. He found her on the floor of a crack house. Point saved her, really. Point rallied for her brother’s life — to keep her pliant, but he rallied all the same. He was supposed to have killed her on site — he saved her life. He saved her. She owes him her life and he owns her for it. All this wasted time and pretend chivalry is really starting to piss him off.

“You work for me,” Point reminds him through his teeth.

He kind of turns his mouth down, dismissive. “I work for the team,” he says. “I’m not your GP.”

“I think,” Point says, “maybe it’s time the team was assigned a new doctor.”

“Yeah?” Medic asks. “Just wait till the new guy finds out you’re harbouring biological contraband.” He raises his eyebrows, taunting. “And that you’re trying to get it pregnant.”

Point goes as far as to reach out to him before he manages to catch himself, straightening the collar of Medic’s black coat so he doesn’t strangle him to death on the floor of the medical wing, making eye contact the whole while. “She’s mine,” he says, “and I can do whatever I want to her. I don’t understand what you people aren’t understanding about that.”

Medic leans back slowly against his desk, folding his arms over his chest. He doesn’t like Point, either, and he’s never pretended otherwise, which Point just doesn’t like. The belligerence, the disrespect — when is enough enough? What does a guy have to do to be given the respect he deserves? That he’s earned? He’s their fuckin’ captain, for fuck’s sake. “Do you want my opinion?” Medic asks. “As a medical professional?”

“No.”

“I think you’re losing it, Point,” Medic tells him evenly. “I think you have been for a long time. I thought you snapped when you cracked his pelvis in half, but that was just the first sign something was wrong. You can’t keep going like this. You can’t keep treating a human being like this. Something’s gonna give. And it’s not gonna be Silas.”

“Silas?” Point repeats, temper spiking. “What the fuck does the dog have to do with any of this?”

“You’ve gone too far,” Medic warns. “They might have to put him down but he won’t go until he takes you with him. It’s up to you to decide how much it’s gonna hurt.”

“Fuck you,” Point snaps. “This has nothing do with the fuckin’ meat. It’s about the girl, and how her piece of shit GP is gonna take her off her birth control if he doesn’t wanna die like a fuckin’ dog.”

Medic exhales softly, shaking his head. “Fuck no,” he says.

Point leans down, gets into her face, and screams, “why?”

She flinches away from him as best she can, bound and gagged. Her eyes are huge, lashes clumped together with crying. Naked except for the argyle socks, pulled up over her knees. She looks especially pathetic and Point wants to enjoy it. He wishes he could enjoy it.

But it’s hard not to look into her and think about her fuckin’ dog. It’s ruined her. Point looks at her and it’s hard not to imagine its disgusting hands on her skin, the way she cries for it, the way she probably moans for it, too.

“WHY?!” He screams again, and it’s hard to even delight in the way she recoils, sobbing through the gag.

It isn’t fuckin’ fair. That disgusting fuckin’ patchwork dog. That failed fuckin’ experiment. That filthy fuckin’ sack of shit. It’s brutish and stupid and there’s always fuckin’ blood on its hands. And the girl happily opens her fuckin’ legs for it? She loves it? She lets it touch her and she touches it in turn, this fuckin’ freak that looks like an old movie monster.

He shouldn’t have to fuckin’ share her with it. It’s fuckin’ ridiculous.

“The fuckin’ dog?!” He shrieks, and he doesn’t mean to hit her, not really, but he can’t help it. He can’t look at her and not imagine the way she looks at that fuckin’ thing. “What does it have that I don’t have?! It’s a fuckin’ dog!”

He grabs her by the shoulders, tries to shake some sense into her. He spits in her face and the way she flinches does nothing for him. “You’re disgusting,” he spits. “You dog fucking whore. You disgust me. The fuckin’ dog,” and he groans so hard he can feel it in his fillings. “What the fuck is wrong with you?!”

She chokes out a sob beneath the gag, muffled, and Point grabs her around the throat to muffle her still. “That was rhetorical,” he spits. “I know what the fuck is wrong with you. You were a whore when I saved you and you’re a whore now. But dogs? You’ll even fuck dogs?”

He spits in her face again and her throat bobs beneath his hand. “I know what I have to do to fix you,” he tells her. “I know. I can make you settle down. You could settle down! You wouldn’t have to be scared all the time! Wouldn’t that be so nice, baby?” He coos at her, but the more he talks the quicker he talks, increasingly frantic, the harder he grips her throat. “Wouldn’t it be so nice not to be so scared? No more violence, no more crying. You wouldn’t have to worry about your creepy male delusions. We could set you up in a nice little room off my office,” he coos. “You’d be safe there. You wouldn’t have to be scared. You could take care of our babies. Don’t you think we’d make such beautiful babies?”

Her shoulders shake as she sobs beneath him, her face flush with Point’s grip around her neck. “But no,” he spits again, fever spiking. “You’d rather fuck dogs, wouldn’t you? What the fuck?!” He leans in closer to scream in frustration. “Stupid bitch. What the fuck? You’d let the dog knock you up, wouldn’t you? Bet you’d give it a fuckin’ litter. Why not me?! What the fuck?!”

He squeezes her around the throat tighter than he means to and screams again once he realizes she lost consciousness.

He turns her over so he doesn’t have to look at her face as he pushes her bare thighs apart. He really fuckin’ hates her sometimes.

He has a vision of her on a farm.

He thinks it’s the accent that brings it out in him, because he’s never dreamed about living on a farm before, but he looks at this girl, soft and sweet, young and blonde, and he wants her barefoot and pregnant on a farm somewhere, and he wants it so bad he dreams of it and his dreams are so vivid he could almost convince himself they’re memories from another life. He wants her in a short, pleated dress with an apron. He wants the little farm girl braids and he wants in her cowboy boots. No panties, because he wants her free use.

They’d be happy. Point knows they would.

The life he’d built with his wife was a lie, because he didn’t know yet what he really wanted, he hadn’t yet met this girl. He’s never been so stupid about a girl before — he’s never yearned. He’s never felt like this.

He thinks about miles of lush grass and big, open sky and looking up at it, framing the girl as she rides him. He thinks about high socks and high ponytails. He thinks about bending her over their big wraparound porch.

It’s these thoughts that carry him as he dumps her unconscious body in his trunk.

Furlough. He never told his wife he’d applied, so she isn’t expecting him. It’ll be a good few weeks before anybody really notices he’s missing, and they’ll be long gone by then. They’ll have moved on to their next life.

His tires squeal as he peels onto the highway and the girl’s body thuds in his trunk. A thrill runs through him, one he hasn’t experienced since that very first day, since she first looked up at him, all pretty and terrified, from the floor of that crack house. He did what the dog failed to do, time and time again — he got her out. He saved her. He gets the happy ending.

He laughs out loud. He has a full tank, an endless stretch of highway, and a pretty, naked girl bound in his trunk.

Point fuckin’ did it.

He won.

That fuckin’ dog can rot for all he has to care anymore. Point won.

[crimeronan]

"It seems like he's good for you," Camila says.

The Luz sitting at the kitchen table is certainly different from the one Camila has gotten to know over the past few months. The hope in her expression is guarded, still, like she's scared to feel anything good - but it's a thousand times better than her usual listless stare.

"He's my best friend," Luz says. Then, more cautiously, "I need him to stay here. With me."

The boy is the reason that Camila's search history has just gotten very peculiar and probably put her on a watch list. Things like Stahl's ear and oculocutaneous albinism next to unsolved missing children 2000s connecticut. That last one pulls up way too many current-day news pieces about Luz for comfort.

"Baby, I know you don't like to talk about it," Camila starts, and Luz tenses. "You don't have to answer me if you don't want to. But have you been missing him this whole time? I would have found him, mija. I know you don't like the police, I don't either. But if I needed to find a way, I'd find a way."

Luz blinks rapidly, pressing her palms to her cheeks.

"Is there anyone else you're looking for?" Camila asks, very gently, very non-judgmentally. "Maybe someone you don't want to get in trouble?"

Luz shakes her head and clears her throat. Then she smiles in the peculiar, diplomatic way that never reaches her eyes.

"I just thought he was dead," she says lightly. "Silly me. I should have remembered humans don't kill people. I got some bad intel."

"Okay," Camila says. "Do you understand why that was a concerning thing to say?"

Luz shrugs.

"He has a lot of scars," Camila adds.

Another shrug.

"Baby," she says, "I need to know at least a little bit. I can't keep guessing forever."

Luz's mouth crumples. "I'm not what you think I am," she whispers.

"That's okay." Camila takes a seat across from her, exhaling softly. "I'm all ears."

[flamingpudding]

Little Snippets #6

(A/N: Vote winner so I did my best to finish this)

"Screw it, i am done..." Danny grumbled as he stepped onto the watchtower through a portal, ignoring the startled heroes around him, or his own rather disheveled state. His green glowing eyes surveyed the room he was in for a brief moment before his eyes zeroed in on the one hero that caused to much work for him.

"YOU!" He pointed an accusing finger at the red clad hero before floating over and grabbing the hero by the front of his hero suit. "Do you have any idea how much work you cause me!"

Danny got one confused blink before he launched into a rather thorough explanation of what he just went through fixing 20 different timelines that got created because of one flashpoint while shaking the Flash like he was a ragdoll, ignoring the other heroes around him.

Clark, who arrived a little late to the meeting, looked around the meeting room confused. He glanced to the side to one of his hero colleagues. "Is there....?"

"A white haired floating teen boy giving Barry the lecture of a lifetime?" Oliver cut in arms crossed as he watched on. "Yes, there is."

Clark blinked, looking back at the scene and then back at Oliver. "And..."

"And Bruce is actually taking notes and enjoying Barry getting lectured to an inch of his speedster life while also getting information on time itself? Yes he is." Oliver added an, his tone slightly frustrated but also happy that he wasn't at the receiving end of the teen boy's rant. The kid had been going on about different time lines and the multiverse theory as well as how Barry apparently created several different timelines any time a new flashpoint happened or the past gets seemingly changed. Oliver wasn't even sure the kid was breathing with the way he had been talking non stop.

"And for the record! Changing the past does not automatically fix your present! You just created an entirely new timeline! Do you know how many times I had to fix these? You left so many unattended timelines! I would be rich now if I had gotten a dollar for every time I or my siblings had to fix the stuff you did! Did you ever hear about the multiverse theory?! Hell you are heroes! Didn't you deal with other universes already!?"

The kid rambled on and Clark was pretty sure he wasn't hearing the kid breath in once, which was worrying in so many different levels. But a little traitor part of his mind was actually finding the situation quiet funny.

"Oh and don't get me started on your spawns!" Clark winced a little as he heard the floating boy breath in for the first time in his entire rant before launching into another rant about how it wasn't just Barry but his entire family. Next to him Oliver chucked finding the moment simply funny end enjoying the show of Barry, aka the Flash getting lectured by a floating teen boy.

Though they partially wondered why Bruce wasn't stepping in but then again, the kids rant was... rather informative if he wasn't cursing at Barry's entire family.

A little earlier that day...

Danny groaned as a green note fluttered onto his desk in the middle of his English exam. His head hit the desk and he was sure he was creating some sort of misunderstanding and appearing like he didn't study enough for this exam. Which for once he did, he actually had managed to get time to study for this exam for once. And that despite all the work that had been piling up lately.

The fun fact was that work didn't pile up because of some ghost king title or something, or his rogues dogpiling on him. No it piled up because of a hero organisation outside of Amity. Now don't get him wrong, he admires these heroes. The ones from outer space are his favorites even. But unknown to them they caused im a lot of work ever since clockwork started to mentor him.

Danny glanced at his English exam and then at the note before his head hit the desk again.

Just one day... was one day to much to ask?

He blames whatever hero was at fault this time as he couldn't concentrate on is exam anymore. He barely remembers finishing it as he hurried out of the classroom, forgetting to give Sam and Tucker an explanation as he went ghost and hurried of to the ghost zone. Danny's eye twitch a little when he noticed Clockworks amused expression.

"What is it this time?" Danny groaned already knowing he wouldn't like what he was going to hear.

"Another flashpoint was created. You know what this means." Clockwork chucked handing him a time medallion and Danny groaned even more.

"Can't Dan or Dani..." He started but Clockwork cut him off with an amused headshake. "No, they are currently busy with another job I gave them."

Reluctantly Danny nodded and stepped through the time portal. While he knew, he would actually only be gone for a minute at most in the present, it still annoyed him that he had to constantly fix time. And most of the time it was because of one specific hero at that. He was not looking forward on how many different timelines he had to fix right now now. this was going to take a while too. Even if only maybe a minute will pass in his timeline.

He still had bruises from the last 20 timelines he fixed. And in all honesty he was getting tired of this kid of work, he was partially sure Clockwork was him now, so he wouldn't have to do this himself. Or the ancient of time was getting a kick out of watching Danny fumble while fixing other timelines.

He yelped as he dodged velocraptors right after coming out of the time portal. "SERIOUSLY?! THE MESOZOIC ERA THIS TIME TOO?! WHAT AM I EVEN SUPOSED TO FIX HERE?!" He yelled at nothing in particular. That was it, this time, this time he decided he would finally go and pay these heroes a visit and make them aware how much work they had been causing him...

[focsle]

The seachest is home with meeee. I carefully sit in the worn and warped spot where he sat for years. I sit across from it and play it little ditties on the concertina. I stick my head in there to smell the camphor that still lingers after 170 odd years. I put an antique fid in the till because I think they both might appreciate the proximity. I hope it’s happy being here with me. It has such an overwhelmingly warm and loving energy that really has surprised me because it’s not the vibes I expect from a seachest tbh. Every time I go near it it feels like a hug. I feel like whoever this belonged to had a family who really loved him, who he loved in return, because that is the strongest emotion I feel attached to this beautiful little box.

[monstrsball]

Iwaizumi doesn't know what to think when he finds his boyfriend in the entry way of their apartment, soaked from head to toe and clutching his jacket to his chest.

"I'm home." Suga says with a sheepish grin while he clumsily tries to get his shoes off without using his hands.

“You’re soaked,” Iwaizumi frowns, pushing his wet bangs back out of his face and eyeing the barely noticeable trembling of his shoulders. “Why aren’t you-”

Suga’s jacket meows.

Suga frowns down at the jacket in his arms. “You were supposed to let me do the talking first.” He says lightheartedly, his words are met with another slightly more indignant meow.

“Koushi, we talked about this.” Iwaizumi says.

“It’s raining, Hajime. The poor thing was soaked, I couldn’t just leave her out there.” Suga says, his tone soft. “Can we just keep her here for tonight? Until it stops raining? And then I’ll take her to the shelter.”

Iwaizumi wants to stand firm but his resolve slowly melts away when he looks at the cat again. She’s shivering just as much as Suga, the now soaked jacket likely not helping her keep warm. She’s nuzzling into his chest in search of warmth and it tugs at Iwaizumi’s heartstrings. 

He glances back at the door to the balcony. Still raining. 

“Okay,” Iwaizumi relents. “She can stay for tonight. Until it stops raining.” 

He has a nagging feeling that ‘for tonight’ is going to turn into indefinitely but the pure joy lighting up Suga’s face distracts him from this fleeting thought. 

“Yeah, yeah. You need to get out of those clothes.” Iwaizumi reaches out to take the cat from Suga’s arms. She's oddly compliant for a stray. “I’ll dry her off and get her some food and water. I think we have some canned tuna in the cabinet.”

“Ooh,” Suga whistles, gently depositing the little tabby into Iwaizumi’s open arms. “You hear that, baby? He’s spoiling you.” He coos. 

“It’s the only thing we have,” Iwaizumi rolls his eyes, readjusting his grip once he has the cat safely in his arms. She nuzzles into the newfound warmth immediately.

[varpusvaras]

Fox had never really interacted with children before.

There had not been any time or opportunities for him to interact with the younger troopers on Kamino. They were all divided into their respective age groups, and then further by their ranks in training, so Fox had been surrounded only by his immediate peers for the first decade of his life. He had seen glimpses of the younger clones, of course, through the windows of the training rooms and passing by him on the hallways every now and then.

There were a lot more children on Coruscant, and Fox had even talked to many by now, but they had been fleeting moments as well. Just a few words here and there. The longest conversation he had ever had before this had been with the younger Jedi, who always greeted him and his troopers enthusiastically whenever they happened to be near the Temple. The young ones were nice enough, and always asked him so many questions, but still, there had always been a very distinct barrier between him and then. Never able to get too close, never able to from anything meaningful, not like some of his brothers with Padawans did.

All in all, Fox had never really thought that kids would in any way be an important part of his life, ever. It wasn't like he was ever going to have his own, after all. Some of his brothers enjoyed that sort of thought, having a family and all of that after the war was over, but Fox had always been a realist. The chances of the majority of them surviving long enough for any of that were slim, and even though they were slightly higher for the clones stationed on Coruscant, Fox wasn't betting on any of them. He was a soldier, and a Commander at that. He always had to be ready to die for the Republic at a moments notice. There was no room for dreaming about the non-existent future.

So, no, Fox had never imagined himself as a father, nor had he ever had any allusions that he would even be any good at it. Children were tiny and fragile in a way that he had never been and expected and needed things Fox had never received while growing up, and he had no delusions about being able to provide something he had no experience on to someone else.

All of this was going through his head as he clicked on yet another hair-braiding tutorial and started watching.

The Twi'lek on the screen made it look absurdly easy for someone who didn't even have hair. Was this some innane ability that all Nat-borns possessed? That didn't seem correct, but Fox wasn't sure what else it would be. He didn't have clumsy hands, quite the opposite, but this all seemed very complicated, and from the way Leia had asked him to do it, Fox had the distinct feeling that there were expectations placed on him about it.

Had his other future self done this too? Stared at one tutorial after another and practiced until it came as a second nature to him? So much so that Leia now held some sort of presumption about Fox's skills on the matter? If so, Fox cursed him to the deepest pits on Coruscant's lowest levels. Fox already had enough expectations placed upon him. He didn't need this as well.

He wasn't complaining out loud, no. This was not on Leia, after all, this was on Fox's dumb other future self who had decided that it was a good idea to play house with people who were absolutely, definitely, irrevocably way out of Fox's league. Well, what Fox had always been was an chronic overachiever, so maybe it all had been inevitable in some sort of twisted way, and had now led to Fox sitting in his office and staring at yet another tutorial. Leia was thankfully still content in playing games on Fox's datapads, as she had been for a better part of two hours by now. Were children supposed to be spending that much time staring at screens? Fox was pretty sure that he had heard one of the Senator's complaining about their children having too much screen time and being all whiny because of it. Fox didn't know. He had spent the majority of his life staring at screens. Well, the other future Fox could only blame himself for it all, since he had been the one who had decided to have a kid and learned to braid hair in the first place.

Fox watched the tutorial to the end, and then rewinded it a couple of times more. This one didn't look too complicated. He could do it. It was just hair.

"Alright", he said. Leia snapped her eyes up from the pad to him. "Come here, let's try it."

He didn't need to tell her twice. Leia hopped down from the couch immediately and ran to him, leaning against the edge of his chair in a very distinctly practised way. Okay. Fox could do this. It's just hair.

Leia had very soft and very long hair. The military-graded soap that Fox had had to give her had not yet scrubbed away all the nice products that she undoubtedly had been using so far, unless she just happened to have very soft hair naturally. Maybe that was just a thing. She was a princess, after all. Fox could imagine a princess just having hair like this.

Right. Divide to two parts. Easier to work with when you have less hair at once in your hands. That was easy. Tie up the half of the hair you aren't braiding yet. Easy as well. Then start from the top of the head, from the right, over, then left, over, bring more hair into it as you go. Right, over, left, over, right, over, left, over. Do not get distracted and mess it up. Right, over, left, over, right, over, left, over. Bring more hair into it as you go. Remember to keep it equally tight all the way. Tie up firmly at the end and fluff it up a little, like so. Then take the other side and try to make it as symmetrical as possible. Start from the top of the head, from the left, over, then right, over, bring more hair into it as you go. Left, over, right, over, left, over, right, over. Tie up, fluff it up a little.

Fox felt like he had held his breath the entire time. To Leia's credit, she had stood completely still the entire time, not complaining about Fox pulling at her hair maybe a bit too tight even once. Fox was sure that he had pulled her hair a bit too tight a few times. Not that he had meant to, but still.

It wasn't like he had been made for this.

"There", he said, as he had finished adjusting the hairtie on the second braid. He did not ask her what she thought. Fox could very much see all the places where he had left the braid a bit too loose and where he had not managed to pull all of the strands properly into it and where they were now sticking out. At least he had made two braids, and he had tried to tie them up tight enough so they would last more than ten minutes.

Leia straightened her back, and very carefully, she ran her hands over the braids, before standing up on her toes to see her reflection on one of the screens on Fox's desk. Fox braced himself a little, almost on reflex. They were just two braids, and not very neat ones at that. He had seen so many ways to braid hair in much more complex and beautiful ways that she probably expected from him, rather than the ones Fox had managed to construct on her head. She was a princess, after all, and princesses were supposed to get all of the best things in the Galaxy.

Not whatever mess Fox was capable of.

He watched as Leia turned her head a bit to see her hair better from the reflection, and then how her face split into a bright, toothy grin.

"Thank you Buir!" She turned around, and before Fox could say anything, she had climbed halfway onto his chair and wrapped her arms around his middle as far as she could reach. "Can I play a little more?"

"Uh", Fox tried to figure out how to speak with his suddenly very uncooperative tongue. "Sure. Just a little more."

"Okay!" Just like that, she was off again, skipping across the room back to the couch, her braids bouncing up and down with every step, and she jumped onto the couch and pulled the datapad back on her lap. She looked up at him one more time, and grinned at him again, before going back to whatever game she had been playing before.

Fox looked at her for a moment longer as she played. She was wiggling her feet happily as she did so, like this was all up to the bar she had come to expect in her life until now. As if Fox had managed to do something correct, just like her actual parents.

Fox swallowed, and turned back to his work. His heart was beating very loudly for something so little.

He didn't hate it.