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itsbubbleteataro · 1 year ago

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Hehe inspiration is fun

I'm kinda in the mood for some angst so let's get to it! I ended up getting inspired by one of my favorite songs by my favorite band.

Please enjoy!

Pairing; human!Alastor x human!fem!reader

Warning; Alastor being Alastor, death, gore, murder, cannibalism

Six feet under the stars

Summer of 1932 in New Orleans

You and Alastor had been living together for quite some time now. You moved in with him around two years ago and have been engaged for a little over two months now.

Tonight was a rare night where Alastor had gone out again for both a hunt and a surprise for you. Yes, you knew about his hunts and to be honest you didn't mind them. I mean you yourself had been doing something similar.

You were the daughter of a tea salesman and were well versed in the art of tea. Sometimes when dealing with a rather rude customer as you worked at your father's shop, you snuck a little something extra into the teabag, just a pinch of arsenic. Okay well maybe not just a pinch but enough to kill a man.

Anyways you looked at yourself in the mirror checking your appearance once more in the mirror. You wore a simple sundress as it's the summer and summer in the bayou can get quite hot and swampy.

You looked at the paper on the dining room table double checking where it said to meet Alastor. You laced up your boots with the heels before you stepped outside, walking down to Thames street where your lover wait for you.

*******

When you approached your fiancé you saw that he had changed out of his hunting clothes, he must have stopped at home while you were busy getting yourself ready.

With a hum the two of you linked arms and walked towards the outskirts of a different part of the bayou. Don't get me wrong, Alastor still knew this part very well and you trusted him in every way shape and form and in turn he trusted you. Trusted you enough to see him covered in blood, eating human hearts, even his hair in its naturally curly state.

Alastor lead you over to a waiting blanket and picnic basket, taking your hand he brought you to sit down.

"I was hoping we could have a lovely picnic this fair evening baby"

His eyes shown in the low lighting. You swooned. He was always doing sweet things like this for you. You helped him set up the food, your matching engagement rings sparkling in the starlight. He had picked out matching rings himself, the main stone in yours being a ruby with small diamonds around it. A blood red stone, fitting choice for two serial killers.

About halfway through your evening you both had finished the food. It was one of the rare occasions that you too indulged in the taste of human flesh. Your head was against his shoulder as you watched the fireflies dance in the distance, taking in each others peace when you felt Alastor stiffen.

You were pulling your head back to ask what was the matter when you felt it, a scorching, red hot, searing pain in your shoulder. Your hand flies to your shoulder as a scream is ripping from your throat. Alastor's eyes widen and for the first time in a long time he feels terror make its way into his heart.

You, his love, had been shot by a clumsy hunter who had mistaken the two of you for a pair of bobcats out of all things.

You hunched over, eyes full of tears as you even try to process of what happened when a second shot rings out, this one hitting your torso.

Alastor was furious, quickly confronting the hunter who had yet to realize that he had infant shot a person. All you could hear was the hunters scream as Alastor quite literally ripped him apart with his blade.

He first cut the tendons in the hunters legs so he couldn't run, then sliced the ones in his hands so he can't fight back. Then he stabbed and stabbed and stabbed and stabbed, stopping only after he had plunged his blade between the fools eyes and twisted it.

By the time he had finished with the hunter he turned to you. Quickly going down to you he held you in his arms. His hands were shaking and he was covered in both your blood and the hunters blood.

You were losing blood fast and you both knew it.

"I should have known better than to call you out tonight-"

"Oh hush up love"

You cut him off. You didn't want him blaming himself for your death. You knew you were going to die when you felt your fingers starting to tingle from blood loss.

Alastor gripped your face with one of his hands,

"My dear, I fear that if you're gone I won't be able to hold back. I may just tear this place apart."

Alastor choked out, feeling tears well in his eyes. You took a shaking breath, leaning into his touch.

"Then tear the world apart if you so desire. Just as long as you promise to meet me again someday"

Alastor nodded his head, his heart breaking in two as your voice became weaker and weaker.

"I love you Alastor"

You reached a hand up to his cheek, rubbing it gently.

"I love you too (y/n)"

Upon hearing such words you know that your body won't be long for this world. You let a gentle smile rest upon your lips, pulling his cheek weakly in an attempt for him to do the same.

He gets the message and forces himself to smile as tears rundown his cheeks. With one last breath your eyes flutter shut, your hand slipping from his face and your soul plummeting straight down to hell.

He holds your body close and sobs. The smile never leaving his face as he does. He sits back up, packing up the picnic and stuffing it all in the basket, blanket it and all. He pushes his arm through the loop of the basket so he can pick up your lifeless body.

He makes his way back to your shared cabin walking through the bayou as he didn't want anyone thinking he had killed you, his precious lover.

He knew he would have to give you the best burial money could buy, so he did just that. Your tombstone was made of marble, your name engraved as "(y/n) Hartfelt".

The day he buried you was one of the worst days of his life, right up when he had buried his mother. He visited your grave daily, telling you about his day. His never stopped grieving.

Fall of 1933

Alastor had been shot burying a body. He had gotten sloppy after your death, his hunts becoming more erratic as he worked through his loss. A hunter had mistaken him for a deer.

First his love had been mistaken for a bobcat and now him a deer, how fate has a way of working.

He welcomed his death, being found with a smile etched on his face for he knew that he could finally reunite with his lover as his soul plummeted down to hell.

He had a matching tombstone to yours, it being placed in the grave yard next to yours. As his coffin was lowered down into the ground and the dirt piled on, he rest easy.

As the two of you could finally be reunited,

Six feet under the stars

#Spotify #alastor x reader #hazbin alastor #hazbin hotel #x reader #(y/n)#angst #hazbin hotel angst #human alastor

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blueteller · 1 year ago

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TCF Hunter Families

So in order to keep track of all the Hunter branches and what each of them do, I created a comprehensive list with the all the current information we have on them. Enjoy!

[SPOILERS AHEAD]

1) Branch: Black Bloods Name: Huayan Family ("Fayence" in Adar Terra's raw translation) Last Occupied World: Xiaolen Specialty: "White Magic", aka. dead mana based Black Magic which appears white and is more powerful than regular Black Magic Status: Defeated 2) Branch: Blue Bloods Name: Blood Cult Last Occupied World: Central Plains Specialty: Jiangshi, aka. zombies created by injecting special dead mana into a person's heart, can be made even out of living people; which are called "Living Jiangshi" Status: Defeated 3) Branch: Purple Bloods Name: Currently Unknown, but located in the "Holy Empire" Last Occupied World: Aipotu (Adar Terra's raw translation) Specialty: Dragon heritage, including mixing human and dragon blood, and control over powers of nature Status: Soon to be engaged in combat 4) Branch: Transparent Bloods Name: Currently Unknown, but located in "Transparent Co." Last Occupied World: Earth 3 Specialty: Perhaps something to do with virtual reality…? Still very limited information on them. But Anh Roh Man, aka. Taerang's creator, is related to them. (Perhaps "Anh" is their family name? We will see.) Status: Still fully operational 5) Branch: Five Colored Bloods Name: Currently Unknown, but possibly includes Park So Jin and Jung Yi-Rang (aka. the two who tried to kill Cale in the Sloth Test) Last Occupied World: None, as they seem to be dimensional travelers with no permanent residence Specialty: Wanderers, with possibly god level powers Status: Still fully operational

The last two branches are supposed to be "gone", so they no longer really count as the Hunters, but I'm including them anyway:

6) Branch: Red Bloods Name: Thames Last Occupied World: Nameless 1 (and possibly others, depending where Cale's thief of an uncle ran off to) Specialty: Research branch? Kind of unclear. We'll see if there's any developments Status: In hiding 7) Branch: White Bloods Name: Currently Unknown Last Occupied World: Currently Unknown Specialty: Currently Unknown Status: Elimnated

(Now with visual aid)

#tcf #trash of the count's family #lcf #lout of count's family #hunters #tcf hunters #tcf meta

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porcelana-r0ta · 1 year ago

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Almost Saved You With Prayer

Fandom: Trash of the Count's Family

Relationships: Jour Thames/Deruth Henituse, Jour Thames & Original Cale Henituse

Word Count: 1745

Summary: When her son is born, his Rings are strange, and Jour is heartbroken.

Ao3 Link: [Here]

Her son’s birth is a long and painful one, but it is worth it when a bundle of soft fabric is placed gently in her arms, her little baby still crying angry tears. She’s so in love with her child and exhausted from delivering him that she doesn’t immediately notice the Rings of Life that circle around him in concentric, overlapping bands.

“Cale,” she says, her voice hoarse from her own screams. “Cale. His name is Cale.”

“A perfect name for the heir of the Henituse County,” the midwife says kindly. “Shall I send for the Count?”

“Yes.” She’s breathless. Starstruck by the soft red baby hairs on her newborn’s head. He’s still crying, but she doesn’t care. She just loves.

“As you wish, Countess.” With a bow, the midwife leaves, and not even a minute later, her husband comes running in.

“Jour,” he says, panting, his eyes wide and full of wonder. He is quickly at her bedside, his gaze darting from his son to his wife. “The baby?”

“His name is Cale,” she says. “He wants to meet his father.”

Deruth’s hands tremble as he takes Cale from her. One hand under the baby’s body and the other under his head, supporting the weight that Cale can’t hold up yet.

“Hold him closer to your face,” she instructs, “so he can see you.”

Deruth follows her instruction, and something in Cale stalls. His sobbing devolves into sniffles, and then ceases altogether, hazy little eyes blinking imploringly up at his father.

Her husband is suddenly in tears himself.

“Cale,” he says, and his tears fall. “Our son, Cale.”

“Our son.” Jour smiles the words, safe and happy in her mouth. “We’re parents now.”

“We are.” Deruth lifts the baby just a little higher and lowers his forehead to Cale’s. “Gods, Cale. Mommy and Daddy will always be there for you.”

Her smile goes a little smaller at that.

“Yes, we will.”

xxXxx

The next day, when Jour’s brain is no longer flooded with endorphins and exhaustion, her closest maid, Amelia, hands her Cale, and Jour finally notices the Rings around her baby boy.

They start from the chest, as everyone’s Rings do, and then expand outwards, one for every year of life the person will experience. Cale’s Rings are healthy and bright silver, normally reassuring, if not for the fact that there are three sets of Rings. One is the healthy and bright set, another is a dim set of flickering gold, and the last is a rusting brown, sick in its life.

Her breath catches in her throat, and if she were not in bed, she would have surely collapsed.

“My Lady?” inquires Amelia, her tone cautious. “Is everything alright?”

“Oh, yes,” she says. “I was… I was just struck by the wonder that is my baby.”

“He is lovely,” Amelia says happily. “The County is surely blessed to have him.”

“Yes,” Jour agrees. “Amelia, please give me a few moments alone with my son.”

“Yes, my Lady.” And Amelia bows out, leaving Jour to stare at the two sets of Rings, and how the first set cuts off so abruptly and violently in slivers of silver.

“Oh, my baby boy,” she whispers in the loneliness of her bedroom. “What happens to you?”

She reaches out, her hand shaking, and she latches onto that broken Ring, the fortieth band. Her fingernails dig into the noncorporeal form.

Show me, she commands her Ancient Power. Show me everything.

She sees blood and fire and agony and regret. The tear of flesh and bone. A figure kneeling in blood. And she hears weeping and screams and the clash of blades against blades and armor alike.

And then she hears it:

“Do we have a deal?”

“...We do.”

She comes out of the vision crying for her son. She can’t see through her tears.

“Cale, my baby.” She places her hand over her mouth to muffle the sobs. With her other hand, she pulls Cale to her chest, as if to bury him there forever and protect him from that wretched future. “No! No, please, no, not my baby....”

xxXxx

When Jour was a child, she had a brother fourteen years her senior. His name was Ashur, and by the time she was capable of storing memories, he was married with a son of his own,

“Jour,” he said once when she was sighing over a boy at age fifteen. “Don’t be too excited. We are Thames.”

“I know,” she replied, annoyed. Little sisters were always annoyed at older brothers, no matter the age difference. “I can still like them.”

He gave a sad little smile, “Yes, you can. Perhaps I was too harsh. You won’t always be able to enjoy this time, after all.”

She wrinkled her nose, “You sound all old, Orabeoni.”

“I’m decently old, for a Thames.”

“Our parents are older.”

“You and I both know that Mother and Father are the exception, not the rule.”

Her chest became heavy, and Ashur continued, “Time gives the Thames enough mercy to live on.”

“I know,” she whispered, and she pretends not to see the way Ashur’s thirtieth Ring breaks into red sparks of nothingness.

xxXxx

The maids think she has postpartum depression, and she doesn’t know how to explain herself, so she doesn’t correct them. She just continues to pour herself over her old Thames texts, searching for any way possible to spare her son from his pain.

By the time he’s a year old and Deruth tearfully begs her to take care of herself, she has to start looking for a different path.

She pulls aside Head Butler Ron Molan, who’d been hired a year and a half ago.

“Ron,” she says. She bounces her son on her hip to keep him from being fussy. “I’m sure you’re aware that Henituses don’t hire just anyone.”

“Of course, my Lady. This Ron is pleased to have a job here so that his son might be raised well.”

“That’s good.” Jour plays with her son’s red hair that matches her own. “Ron. I know what the Molans used to do on the Eastern Continent.”

“Ho?” His voice is suddenly dangerous and quiet, but Jour knows him, knows his Rings and his son’s Rings, and she thus knows she will be fine.

“I want you to protect Cale,” she says. She looks up from her son’s hair to meet Ron’s eyes. “Protect my son, Ron, and you and your son will never have to run again.”

He relaxes just a bit, but it’s enough.

“This Ron would never do otherwise, my Lady.”

“Good.” She sighs, presses a kiss into Cale’s hair, and says, “Thank you. Thank you, Ron.”

xxXxx

There’s not much else to do after ensuring her boy will live as long as possible, somehow until age forty and eighteen and seventy-three all in one. The Thames studied time, not space, but there are still enough cross-referenced texts in her library that she knows it’s not regression but transmigration.

Her baby will be leaving his family, not just like her, but it will be enough.

When he’s four years old, she runs her index finger around his fifteenth silver ring, the future flashing across her mind’s eye, and thinks, Well, not much of a family. Not much of a father.

She asks Deruth to always be there for her child, to say no when he needs it, and Deruth just laughs.

“Well, he’ll have everything he’ll ever need!” he says. “He’s a Henituse, and your son, at that. How can I say no to your visage?”

She gives a wan, watery smile. That might have been nice to hear before Cale was born, before she saw his future.

“We can’t let him be too spoiled, dear.”

Deruth embraces her from behind, wrapping his hands around her waist and pulling her into his chest. He buries his face in her red hair, “Well, no. But he deserves it.”

“It would be a disservice to our son.”

He sighs out a laugh, “You’re right. You always are. No, we won’t spoil him.”

“You’ll say no when he needs it? When it’s best for him?”

“Yes, of course. Especially if it’s best for him.”

“Good,” she smiles brighter.

Later that night, she creeps into her son’s room. At four, he sleeps soundly, no longer a colicky newborn or a toddler in pain of teething. She rests her finger on his fifteenth silver ring, and weeps.

Nothing has changed. Her husband is a liar.

Jour doesn’t know what to fucking do.

xxXxx

Jour runs her fingers around Cale’s fifteenth and eighteenth silver rings and tries not to feel betrayed whenever she looks at her husband or the Molans.

It’s not their fault her son is so purely Thames that they believe his act without any training.

xxXxx

Jour’s son is eight and she is on her last Ring. She’s done everything she can for him and still she’s done nothing. There’s only one thing left to do.

One night, while Deruth is out on business in the city nearby, she cries herself to sleep.

When she awakes, she writes a letter.

“To the person who will be living in my son’s body…” She accepts what must be done. The man—White Star—in her son’s future cannot be allowed to acquire her full Ancient Power.

xxXxx

Next week, when Jour leaves for her trip to Harris Village, she kisses her husband. Then, she hugs her son, tiny and small and so full of love that he would destroy himself for children sprung on him with no notice, and she only barely holds back her tears.

“Goodbye, Mama. I love you!”

“And I love you, Cale.” She holds his face, rubbing her thumbs under his brown eyes, and he smiles trustingly up at her, believing that she’s coming home healthy.

Her heart breaks. She hugs him again.

Deruth reaches out to hold her hand while she hugs Cale, and she takes it, giving his hand a gentle squeeze before letting it drop.

She loves him, too, and she would choose him in every lifetime. But she doesn’t want to touch him when she knows what he will do to her son.

Long after the carriage has left Rain City’s limits, she weeps.

She is leaving her son with people who will let Cale rot alone in alcoholism and self-hatred, the joke and scorn of noble and common society alike.

Maybe that makes her worse than all of them.

#tcf #lcf #trash of the count's family #lout of the count’s family #fanfic #ao3 #jour thames #deruth henituse #og cale henituse #original cale henituse #one shot #complete fic

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therewasatale · 8 months ago

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bridge

On Ao3.

"What are you doing up there?"

Near to the docks, at the top of the bridge he found Geoffrey - sitting beside two full bottles, working on to emptying the third one in his hand.

The hunter flinched, then hiccupped before glancing up at him. "Regrettin' some of my more recent life decisions and hiding from my responsibilities. If you'd like to join me, there's plenty of room for two." He waved the bottle towards his left; he was sitting on the railing.

"You shouldn't be this close of the edge, McCullum."

"Didn't ask about your opinion, leech." The answer almost sounded like a burp. "Sit or leave."

"Very well." Jonathan sat next to him; his legs hanging over the edge of the bridge. Years ago, he himself experienced the feeling that people experience on higher places, the call of the void. Those feelings didn't appear anymore, he knew too well he would survive the fall anyway, or instinctively use his powers to get into safety in the last seconds. The only thing that ever tempted him now to do reckless things was the blood of the living.

"You knew I was up here?" Geoffrey had the Ekon's full attention.

"No, I've just arrived back to the city, and I saw someone sitting at the edge of the bridge so I wanted check on whoever may it be."

"Doctor-leech."

"Something like that, yes. A living paradox."

Deep below them, the Thames was surging, they couldn't see it in the darkness, but they could hear the floating ice crashing into the shore.

As Geoffrey sighed, a puff of warm fog left his lips. "Where were you? My men told me they couldn't find you anywhere for weeks?"

"Scottland." Jonathan's voice became low, heavy with thoughts and feelings.

Geoffrey glanced at his way briefly, but took a big swing from the whiskey. He enjoyed as the heavy alcohol warmed his insides, and dulled his own thoughts. "Wasn't a vacation I suppose."

"No. I'm afraid, it wasn't."

Another big gulp from the whiskey – he used it as a remedy quiet often, ease him up after hunts, or losing one of his men. "You sound sad, leech."

Jonathan didn't look at him, his eyes were focused on something else – he was able to feel the warmth of the flames, heard the cracking of the fire. "I lost a friend, of sort. She -- I couldn't save her; I was too late." The irony that the only people he felt like could talk to was the hunter who almost killed him.

"Sorry. It happens." Geoffrey raised the bottle to his lips; his eyes stared at the gray clouds above him. "You can't save everyone."

"Yes, a lesson I had to learn early a in my profession - and then in the war too."

They sat silently next to each other, just two men who had a lot to think about, and lot to dealt with in regards of the past. After losing, and fighting and bleeding in a war they didn't not choose.

"You let me live."

Jonathan glanced at the hunter's way.

"You could have killed me, or turn me, but you didn't."

"I was hoping maybe you would try to understand us in the future, not just continue slaughtering my kind."

"Naivety."

Jonathan couldn't help but smile - it was true of course. "Maybe, but right now you are sitting next to an Ekon and not attacking it blindly."

The only answer he got was a prideful scoff.

"I'd like to think that naivety might help the world to be a bit better."

The hunter rolled his eyes, and swallowed the last drop from his brother. Then he leaned forward a little, above the yawning darkness over the edge of the bridge.

"Listen." He mumbled and let go of the neck of the bottle.

They sat in silence, waiting, and seconds later they heard the crack as the ice broke and the bottle splashed in the icy water. Both of them let out a small chuckle. Two men, who just had some childish fun.

Jonathan let out a gentle huff. "And why are you here, McCullum?"

"No, I'm not drunk enough to answer." Geoffrey opened up the second bottle. "You talk instead, what did that thing look like?"

"Thing?"

"Red Queen."

And everything turned back into reality. As if focused by the lens of memory. The Ekon saw the godlike apparition before his eyes, he could never forget her. "Scary."

"What? Really?"

"Her body was made out of blood; she was stronger and faster than anything else. It was something different. I can still hear the echo of her voice inside my head, and feel the pain where she was able to wound me." Jonathan's hands trembled. "An apparition that I knew was not of this world and that would never care about the existence of such tiny creatures as mine or yours. I felt insignificant, nothing even - but I had to fight this battle to stop the Disaster."

The Ekon swallowed back the words. That through the fight he felt the connection to the Red Queen – like a child, who just faced a never seen relative, but felt the similarity deep inside his bones.

Geoffrey rubbed his face into his hand, suddenly the whisky tasted bitter. "I saw one of them. Skals," He stared at the cloud again. "She was running, hunting down a poor stray cat but couldn't catch it. Not so far from here."

Jonathan sifted next to him; his fingers nervously poked at the metal of the bridge.

"She talked - leech actually pled me to let her live." Geoffrey drunk to get rid of the memory of the Skals' face. "Told me she was just out for food, and didn't hurt any human. She had a bloody ugly scar on her face, and that hand." He shuddered.

The Ekon almost asked the question that burnt inside him, but something made him remain silent.

"But her voice - it was human just like me, her eyes were human " the alcohol made him talk," Just like yours. And like a fool, I let her go. Watched her scurry away in the snow, holding that torn cloth over her deformed body." He exhaled; the mist rose in front of his face, disappearing into the air.

"Would you be angry with me if I told you that I'm really proud of you?"

"Oh, fuck off!" The hunter snarled, but there wasn't really anger in his voice. "I failed to do my duty! I let a monster go and now if she kills someone their blood will be on my hand!"

"Maybe." Jonathan slowly nodded. "Or maybe you gave a chance to someone who was robbed from their future."

"Why didn't you turn me?" The hunter sounded quiet; his voice felt far away. "You could have, I saw it in your eyes you were thinkin' about it."

"And turn you into something like me?" Jonathan glanced down at his own hands. "And curse you with this fate? Yes, I thought about it, for a second."

"Yet you didn't."

"Believe me or not, I was worried that you may would try to do something stupider when everything calms down. Besides that, a lot of people are counting on you. Turning the leader of the guard of the Priwen could have cause a civil war inside of them. And that would have meant more danger to the people. We already have a war and an epidemic - too many good people have died already."

"Can't argue with that." Geoffrey took a hand rolled cigarette from his pocket and lit it. The faint light of the matchstick was quickly extinguished in the air as it fell into the void below. He took a deep inhale, so his lungs could fill up with smoke, tasted the bitterness of the tobacco, then exhaled. "Will you stay?"

Jonathan glanced at his way with unsure questions in his eyes.

"In the city." Added quickly the hunter.

"Yes, I'm planning to work in Pembroke, a lot of people need help, and they're still understaffed. The Spanish-flu is still around, even if the Disaster is not anymore."

"Good." Geoffrey exhaled the word with another puff of smoke.

"Good?" The Ekon raised an eyebrow, of course he heard him.

"Good." The hunter looked into his eyes, held his gaze for seconds that felt longer than he should have, then glanced up at the clouds.

Jonathan felt a warmth flutter in his chest. As he looked up to the grey sky a tiny snowflake fell on the tip of his nose.

#vampyr #vampyr 2018 #vampyr game #geoffrey mccullum #jonathan reid #mcreid #copper

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change-your-car · 2 months ago

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valentine’s day!au // lestappen

Max is used to spending the infamous Valentine's Day in the company of Lando and video games. When Norris snaps for some date, Verstappen has to step out of his comfort zone, only to get hit by the wheels of fate.

Warnings: a little bit of drinking and curse words

Word count: 1,446k

February thickened into a dirty grey palette and settled on the canvas of Foggy Albion with dank, lonely evenings, leaving muddy streaks of longing and fatigue. The shortest, month seemed like an unfinished essay with ink smudges, a ragged story with no confinement, a muted question hanging in the air. Inevitable.

Max often laid on the bed, too spacious for one, and stared at the grey ceiling with unfocused gaze. The exam period had passed, leaving behind circles under his eyes and a scattering of cans of energy drink on his computer desk — lousy reminders.

As luck would have it, the equator of February was Valentine's Day —a cheap vanity fair and a spectacle of relentless hearts tirelessly proving the strength of their feelings. It's not that Verstappen didn't like this masquerade, rather he didn't pay attention to it or looked at it from above sceptically. According to the good old tradition Max spent this day in the company of Norris: an ancient PlayStation, beer, sometimes even board games for two. This year, however…

"Max, I completely forgot to tell you…" Norris crumples awkwardly on the doorstep before leaving. "About tomorrow… I'm kind of going on a date. You don't mind, do you?" The intonation, the look, and the jump in her eyebrows are so naive and disarming that the only thing to do is to shrug.

Actually, he does mind. He minds a lot. And yet he's best mate, and so he smiles awkwardly — it comes out more like an embarrassed grimace — and gives a shrug. It's obvious that Lando is confused, but his legs spring down the stairs with such fervour that Max smirks, this time genuinely. His friend is filled with a stomach-tickling anticipation of romance. One can even leave out the fact that nothing ever works out and Lando is crying on Verstappen's lap afterwards, complaining about another asshole.

His feet took him to The Black Dog near the Thames. From the street the pub seemed a nice, quiet harbour where he could spend this stupid evening. Though Max, of course, favoured cats. Some song from the late eighties, oil glints on the lacquered counter, narrow waists of bottles. Better the hum of voices, the sticky smell of whiskey poured into glasses, and the indifferent stares of random people than the walls of his room.

He didn't often drink anything stronger than beer, but now a glass seemed the surest funnel for blood from the blunt knife of loneliness. Max wasn't looking for anyone in particular. Probably subconsciously he wanted someone to find him on his own. His gaze slid over faces — tired, drunk, lean, absent — and found nothing remarkable. The woman in the red dress is obviously overreacting, trying to get anyone's attention… yet Max doesn't judge her in the slightest. A strained smile with lipstick past the edge of her lips is the cry of a circus jester.

The night air is inexplicably lighter than its daytime sibling, and Max wanders slowly along the night's noisy highway in an unzipped sports jacket, hoping to cool his head and sober up a little. The city spills over with wet tarmac, stringy streetlights, the shadows of people he didn't know and didn't want to know.

Verstappen decides to turn down Cardigan Street, so he won't hear the increasing drumbeat of cars, and carry the body home in greater peace, since….

Flash. The roar of the engine. The scrape of rubber on tar.

A sore wrist. Leg aching. Temples throbbing. Heart is about to jump out of chest.

He's on the pavement, almost down, almost touching the puddle with the back of his head.

"What the…" Max wheezes, rising up on his elbows; the realisation of the situation brings a sharp attack of nausea and a prick in his chest. He almost got run over, dang! Nausea is quickly replaced by anger.

Max almost growls without even looking at the culprit, but stops talking when the motorcyclist is close by and deftly pulls off his impressive helmet, jiggling his head to shake off his silky hair.

"Mon Dieu," the driver nervously takes steps towards him. "I'm sorry, I didn't see you in that black… You ran out into the road like a cat," he said, a silent chuckle, a carefree juxtaposition of self-assurance and guilt, a barely audible emotion mixed with a warm, scratchy accent. Oh, shit. "Everything all right?"

"I'm fine," Verstappen mumbles, slamming his eyes shut twice and rejecting the helping hand. He almost falls on the young man, however, hissing at the pain in his foot. "Shit…"

"Wow," the motorcyclist picks Max up with his strong arms and catches his balance. "Well, well, I guess you're not that fine," he grins again, as if it's not about a possible injury, but about the ice-cream flavour.

"What's your name, black cat?" The stranger helps the Dutchman to lean on the motorbike.

"Max."

"Bene, Max. I'm Charles. Charles Leclerc," the driver introduces, putting his hand on his chest for clarity.

"Char Liquor," Verstappen mumbles in a slurred tongue.

"Well, that will do for now," warm enveloping laughter, wrinkles in the corners of his eyes, dimples on cheeks. Max seems to be drifting off somewhere. "You don't seem to be getting there on your own. I'll give you a lift home as an apology. You good?"

Max is in absolutely no position to object, and is generally not opposed to the idea of being home as soon as possible. Leclerc winks and gives the passenger a separate helmet, putting back on the helmet he'd recently taken off — Max manages to spot the tiny silver horse badge.

The road back blurred like a film shot on a cheap camera. Max remembered the warmth of someone else's hands, which he clutched almost desperately, afraid of falling, the lights of the night city, the sound of wind and engine, the feeling of something unexpectedly right.

"You live alone?" Charles asks, swinging open the door and helping Max in.

"With cats," Verstappen corrects, and Leclerc smiles silently, raising his eyebrows in surprise.

It's hard to trace the moment they were on the bed — Max remembers only that he wanted to sleep. It's nothing like that, both of them in their clothes. Just talking. Just looking at the ceiling. And yet Charles' smile is insanely close, and the bed is suddenly small. And God, how that's been lacking.

"Yeah, on my way back from a bad date," the motorcyclist admits and rubs his face to hide his embarrassment.

"I can't imagine that you ever had a bad date," Max shakes his head and bends his arm at the elbow, making himself comfortable on the palm of his hand, repeating the pose of his interlocutor, getting a little closer.

"Imagine that! It happens even to the best of us," Leclerc smiles conspiratorially, hiding the whiteness of his teeth.

"I'm glad it did. Otherwise you would not have hit me," without filtering his thoughts, Verstappen gives out, than causes genuine surprise and bright overflow of laughter.

"How's your leg?" softly asks Charles, glancing down to where their knees are barely touching. Where the buckle of someone else's belt glistens in the night-light...

"Moaning. I demand to pat her as compensation for moral and physical damage," Verstappen says in all seriousness, forcing Leclerc to hide his face behind a tanned palm with a bunch of rings. Quietly he adds: "You're beautiful."

"Max, you're still drunk."

"Tomorrow I'll be sober. And you'll still be beautiful," Verstappen exhales, admitting defeat and straining to keep his eyes open and not to pass out.

"Well, today is Valentine's Day", Max almost whispers, with a slight resentment and despair.

"Ha, indeed. Valentine's Day," Leclerc agrees, a little embarrassed and thoughtful, and leans closer. "Close your eyes. Sleep well."

It burns. A sip of the strong drink. Spills under the skin. Goosebumps crawl up the back of your neck and the back of the neck. Softly numb, like a lavender haze in the evening. Soft. Delicious. Tea and sugar. Smudgy. Thick. A cloud of candyfloss. Warm. Sunset on the azure coast.

Darkness.

In the morning, his hands can't find the warmth that escaped. The ceiling is the same white, the bed is the same empty.

Was it a dream? Fingertips run slowly over my lips, clinging to the ephemeral presence.

Max rises in bed, thievingly, excitedly darting his gaze around the room, trying to pick up on other traces. It doesn't take long to find one.

A black motorbike helmet lies proudly on the computer desk. The badge of a horse quietly silvers in the midday sun.

#lestappen #cl16 #mv1 #mv33 #charles leclerc #max verstappen #alternate universe #f1 fanfic #f1 au

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queenlua · 11 months ago

Note

whats the poem you really like whose author seemingly has not published anything since?

poem is under the cut; author is Mark Blaser; i'm preeeetty sure it was originally published in the Vanderbilt Review sometime in the late 00s? but don't have the original copy on me anymore

also i don't know anything about poetry so uh. grain of salt idk what makes poems Good or Bad or anything like that:

Letter From a Soldier to His Wife Written by Isaac Shelby After the Battle of the Thames, Canada 1813 My Dearest Susannah, We were a storm Of lead rain, darker than our clouds; and now The blood that always coats my walls of sleep Is freshly red and pulsing. I am not The same strong boy whose arms have been your home For forty years. They call me Old Kings Mountain, But I am no more of a mountain than I am the moon, or perfect. I am tired. A soldier's not a class of man, just as Good humor cannot be his constitution. My hands were never born to maim or kill; It was their training, and the fever of The young, like love: for I don't doubt the blood In one man's love be just as hot and red As what I've seen imbrue these fields of war. A soldier's will to shoot through bodies dies As promptly as his will to love his wife, But neither's dead in me because they both Return and are as hard as age to clean For good out of my body. War and love Are a brusque action, learned and forgotten: I did not love you when I pulled men down To death and breathed their bodies' foreign smoke; And presently I do not love to kill, Though yesterday I needed it and soon I may again. But writing now, this first Sleep after bloodshed, the war I've not yet won Is mine with geography. I want home, Where cattle herds are all that wait below The hills, where I can dig my hands in black Kentucky, bloodless earth, where you are small Across my body as I tell you that I love you more than dying loves company.

#something about the last line in particular stuck in my brain for a hundred years idk why #also lmao i thought i uh. posted this already. but i think i flaked and did not #very Me kinda aesthetic to post something like that to tumblr and then just plain forget for a month sorry #poetry

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edosianorchids901 · 1 year ago

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Not Too Late

@flashfictionfridayofficial prompt - "hour of denial"

London, 1664

Aziraphale shifted restlessly, glancing out the window of the coffeehouse. He’d hoped to see Crowley sauntering down the wooden walkway. They were supposed to be meeting here, to discuss and swap their latest assignments.

Was he late? No, perhaps Aziraphale was simply remembered the wrong time. Or misread it in the letter. Crowley’s handwriting was awful, after all.

That must be it. No doubt everything was perfectly fine.

Aziraphale read the newspapers for a bit as he waited. He drank another cup of coffee. He gazed thoughtfully out the window, watching the bustle of London.

Crowley still didn’t arrive.

Swallowing hard, Aziraphale fumbled with the newspapers again. Everything was fine. It hasn’t even been an hour yet. There was no cause for concern.

An hour passed. Crowley did not arrive.

Over the millennia, Aziraphale had cultivated a skill for denial. Sometimes, he was utterly unaware of said denial until someone—usually Crowley—pointed it out. Other times, he was aware, and hid behind it like a shield.

This time, he was aware. But if Crowley might be in danger, an hour of denial was the most than Aziraphale could indulge himself.

He rushed out into the damp, chilly day, and hesitated. Crowley could be anywhere. Causing traffic problems, mingling at the Royal Exchange, dying on the bank of the Thames…

Aziraphale shook off the maudlin thought. He set off for the bookshop he managed first, just in case there had been a miscommunication about where to meet. Then he checked St. James’s Park, which had opened to the public a few decades ago. Perhaps Crowley was feeding the ducks.

Crowley was not feeding the ducks. There was no sign of him.

Perhaps Crowley’s rented rooms? Chest increasingly tight, Aziraphale rushed through London’s crowded streets.

His hand shook as he knocked on the door. “Crowley? Crowley, are you here?”

Nothing. And drying blood smeared on the door.

Aziraphale unlocked it via miracle, charged inside, and immediately tripped over a black-clad huddle on the floor.

The huddle moaned, and Aziraphale dropped to his knees with a gasp. He smoothed red hair out of Crowley’s face, trying to catch his gaze. “Crowley? Crowley, what’s happened?”

“Nnnhmg.” Crowley’s muscles trembled under Aziraphale’s hands, his breaths ragged. “Got… got into trouble. Smuggling job went…”

He drew another rattling breath and lapsed into silence. His skin was ashen, cold, clammy. Was he going into shock?

And oh Lord, what would have happened if Aziraphale had simply kept waiting in the coffeehouse?

Wrenched with guilt, Aziraphale slid a hand under his head and eased him onto his back. Crowley jerked and gave a weak cry, glazed eyes wandering. “N-nuh…”

“Easy, it’s just me.” Aziraphale pushed layers of black fabric out of the way until he found a spreading wet patch on Crowley’s side, fabric blood soaked. “Oh dear. What did this to you?”

Another rattling breath. “Shot. Got shot.”

Alarmed, Aziraphale hovered his hand over the wound, focusing on it, studying it. “Oh, oh. The bullet’s still in your belly. I-I’ll need to get it out before I can heal this.”

He had no idea how to do that. But he and Crowley had pulled arrows out of each other plenty of time. This could hardly be worse.

It was worse, mainly because he couldn’t find the bullet at first. His head spun as he dug around in the wound, as Crowley cried out and jerked, as the blood gushed across his fingers.

“Got it!” Aziraphale finally gasped, tears blurring his vision as he pulled out the little metal ball. “Oh, Crowley, I’m sorry that took so long.”

Crowley collapsed into low, broken sobs, tears rolling down his ashen cheeks. His hands twitched and twisted, clawing at the wooden floor. “Hurts, it hurts…”

“I-I’m so sorry. Just hold on a moment longer.” Aziraphale took a few deep breaths, trying to calm himself. He rested one hand across Crowley’s, and hovered the other across the wound. “That’s it, no torn flesh, no injury, no bullet hole…”

He channeled a careful healing miracle, heart pounding. Crowley had lost so much blood, and was hardly breathing now. Would this be enough to save him?

“There, my dear. That ought to be better.” Trembling, Aziraphale hastily wiped his bloody hands off on his breeches, then cupped Crowley’s cheek. “Crowley? Are you with me?”

Crowley didn’t answer. His eyes had closed, and he didn’t respond when Aziraphale squeezed his hand. He was still breathing, just barely.

Sniffling, Aziraphale scooped Crowley’s limp body off the ground and carried him to the rather excessively large bed. He laid Crowley down, miracled a bowl of water and cloths, then wiped away the blood on his side.

“We’ll get you some nice clean clothes when you wake up, hmm?” It likely wasn’t doing much good to talk right now, but Aziraphale couldn’t help himself. “And perhaps a drink. Would you like a drink? Silly question, really, you always want a drink.”

He babbled as he fussed over Crowley, unable to stop his hands and voice from shaking. Crowley was always so very animated, so alive. Seeing him so still stirred a horror that Aziraphale had rarely felt.

Was he in denial again now? Had he been too late? Was Crowley slipping away?

“And-and-and perhaps we could go to the theatre. It’s nice having them reopened, isn’t it?” Desperate, Aziraphale clutched Crowley’s limp hand. “Crowley? My dear? Wouldn’t it be nice to go to the theatre?”

One golden eye cracked open, glaring at him. “Be nicer if I could get some damn rest.”

“Oh!” Aziraphale squeezed Crowley’s hand, tears of relief rising. “Of course, Crowley. You rest, now.”

He lapsed into silence, holding Crowley’s hand as the poor dear dozed. It looked as if he hadn’t been too late after all. And now, there would be plenty of time for chatting, or going to the theatre, or anything they liked.

#good omens #ineffable husbands #crowley #aziraphale

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alarici · 6 months ago

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matthalle, tbc?? (1,300 words)

(some was already posted) @neallo sorz im late

Nothing happens at an expensive pub in South London. The lights are low, dark wood and frosted glass. Vermouth distilled in the 80s. Loafers and calf leather Oxfords.

Matt’s chilled lager sweats in his hand.

Halle stares out the window. Another odd Tuesday. They’re both three drinks in.

It’s fine company.

—

Thing is, Matt has always been taken by vicious blondes. Call it a character flaw, a rule of his life. Since Mary in the first grade. Linda, Mello. Maybe the Amane chick was a bit of a departure, not so vicious, but just barely. A change of pace but not of theme.

And really, who could blame Matt’s blue balls, six months in a one-room with Mello. Lockdown, for the detox and even more for the mission, for fancying Amane’s pigtails and perky tits.

Halle is another beast altogether. Matt’s learned about her three older brothers. Military father, granddaughter of a minister. All-girl’s finishing school in Massachusetts, Oxford, Cambridge, UN, Interpol. Matt imagines she’s the type to wear vintage La Perla under her pantsuits. He knows her heels have red under soles, and that her perfume is worth more than his two year lease in Covent Garden.

She hasn’t let him verify the panties hunch. But to be fair, he hasn’t tried and hasn’t asked. They get along. Every elephant in the room can be shut out with booze, or blow, or chatting about this case or the weather in Nairobi, the coups in Bolivia, the semiconductor shortages, the latest episode of Doctor Who.

—

Nothing happens at the bar. Amongst the suits and the highballers, they talk. It's difficult to find someone else who's been through the same shit as you, these days. They're all dead.

Halle knew Mello. Matt knew Mello. Halle's beautiful. Matt's got a tender spot for beauty, being a mediocre creature of god surrounded by chosen ones and manmade smiles.

Something does change when Halle offers to take him running. Him. Running.

Asthmatic kid on the playground. Five years out from a coma and a collapsed lung and a bullet dug out of his thigh.

She says she'll go easy. He imagines she just wants to see him in pain.

So be it. His doctor tells him he needs to exercise. He's entered the latter half of his twenties. Things stick out, and his skin folds where it didn't used to. Which is great. But the Ritalin work the same anymore, and he's tired all the time.

Mainly, he just wants to watch Halle run in front of him. What is he without someone like that—running ahead, egging him on, prodding him or leading him until he's blue in the face. Blood on his tongue. Her firm ass far below eye level.

She smiles, and they set the date for Sunday. 9 AM. The devil's hour!

Matt, his beat up trainers, ratty gym shorts from the charity shop, long-sleeved T-shirt, Hyde Park.

Halle, gym shorts, hair in a tight ponytail, sports bra, no tank top.

It is August. It's also London—overcast, sky considering an afternoon shower.

At 9 AM, it's cool enough to bother with a shirt if she’d chosen to.

So Halle's first one-uppance is her abs. Matt hasn't had abs since he was wasting away in a hospital bed in Tokyo, still blissfully unaware that his friend-lover-boss had died. And still, those were coma abs. But Halle has her tanned skin in England. She smiles at him. He studies a freckle on the back of his hand.

"One lap. If you stop, I'm throwing you in the pond, Jeevas."

The case of the month involves a series of bodies washed up on the banks of the Thames. A rare one close to home. Matt's on standby—they don't need tech work for this, and he has a contract that says he doesn't have to do anything in the field. If Near doesn't dare venture out of his tower, why should he? He’s bored. Bodies in the Thames—what else is new?

The momentary crack of sunlight is oppressive. Halle's pace is punishing. The doctors in Japan had done a great job, so his English doctors said, at repairing the muscle in his inner thigh. They'd also told him, he, “wouldn't be running any marathons any time soon."

Halle knows. She's a bit of a cunt, Matt's learned.

He trots along.

If there's one thing two years semi-sober have taught him, it's that pain offers no worthy gain. It just sucks—but the alternative is what? Admitting defeat.

Matt’s been waving a white flag since he was twelve. This is supposed to be his second chance. A life. Standing in the presence of someone undeniably better, but still standing.

Ten meters before the end of the lab, he doubles over and hurls into a flowerbed, turns, and smiles up at her.

"Happy, you fucking übermensch?"

"I don't speak German." As though übermensch isn’t a loan word.

"You went to grade school there." Matt knows the gist of her story—military family. Childhood all over the world, and the dead sister. From an old German family that came to the U.S. at the dawn of World War Two.

"You don't speak Japanese." She counters. She knows he spent some time there. It’s not in his need-to-know file, but most of the group knows the outline of how he ended up working with Near five years after the end of the Kira case.

"I was only there for, like, a month. おはよう."

"Also, I went to grade school in the states."

"You can’t be German and work for the C.I.A," Matt quips. She’s American.

"I had noncitizen coworkers."

"Like, spies and defectors?"

"Yeah. If you can talk, you can run, Jeevas. We're going around again."

—

It happens, inevitably, when Matt’s still weak in the knees. He’s just taken a shower at Halle’s place—a beautiful loft with a waterfront view—and he’s sitting awkwardly on the edge of her bed wearing her—“my old boyfriend’s clothes.”

Her old boyfriend was clearly at least half a foot taller than Matt. His loungewear does not fit, but it’s clothes, and she offered a shower and clean towels.

When she gets out of the shower, she hasn’t changed.

He gives her the once-over.

“Man, you can just ask.”

“Good boys don’t talk back, Jeevas.”

“You didn’t say any—”

She drops the towel and smiles. “Aw, you’re still shaking from our run.”

He offers a lopsided smile, and stares at her breasts. They’re better without the fitted blouse, he decides. Her abs, still damp, are fun, too.

“So, what’s the safeword?” He asks, on the verge of reaching out to touch.

Halle looks about to slap his hand away. Instead, she smiles. Her K-9s are sharp. No surprise.

“My dog is well trained, no?” She reaches for his face, instead. Unchipped French nails gentle at his cheek.

“You decide.”

And that’s that.

—

Through their three month (and no longer) tryst, Matt learns that he likes being choked—of all the things, Mello never choked him. That the post-runner’s jitters—the endorphins—collide with the sex endorphins and leave him just plain happy. Halle makes fun of how much he smiles during scenes. When she’s choking him, when she’s on top of him, setting the pace, giving him nothing.

The best time is in Monaco. Matt tagged along on one of her assignments. Intel—it’s always intel. For a week, they look like the wet dream of a young couple on holiday. She picks out his clothes, dresses him like a fucking douchebag. Sends him to get a haircut.

They don’t go to any races. They only visit one casino, and that’s strictly business. The only place to take a jog in Monaco is the hotel’s luxury sports center. They pick side by side treadmills. She isn’t able to reach over to up his tempo. But she does give him a withering look when he slows. He doesn’t mind.

After dinners at hotel steakhouses or casino bars, they retire to their room. There is no being tied to bedframes or hot candle wax. Halle never uses anything besides her two hands. Long nails. Soft fingers, pressure points. Give and take.

They're both clever enough to know it can never last, but that's the fun part.

#mail jeevas #halle lidner #matthalle #(au where matt like lives a la my old m2 fic)

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gudsouplady · 8 months ago

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Watching Sherlock (S1,E3) The Great Game (Spoilers) (Tw: This show has a lot of showing and mentioning of guns,Dead bodies,Drugs,War etc.If you don’t like that stuff then I advise you to not read this post)

• Minsk,Belarus in a jail

• Sherlock grammatically correcting him

• That wasn’t an accident

• Death penalty ????

• I Love the intro (as always)

• Why is Sherlock shooting a gun at the wall ????????????

• John arrived at the perfect time

• He’s that bored

• the head in the fridge

• Sherlock hates the blog

• The whole rant about the solar system is just so funny

• Sherlock would hate tumblr

• John just couldn’t take it and left

• Mrs Hudson !!!!!!!!!!!!!

• Sherlock watching John leave

• “What have you done to my Bl00DY wall ????? ”

• Baker Street exploded 💥

• John stayed at Sarah’s house 🏠

• John made it to Baker Street

• Sherlock and Mycroft

• Person found dead on train tracks

• Mycroft is kinda creepy

• Sherlock just played Mycroft the door 🎻

• Sherlock has been summoned

• “I’d be lost without my blogger”

• Who wrote the letter ✉️ ?????

• The pink phone has returned

• idk what the Greenwich pips are ?????

• A picture of an empty room

• They all blanked Mrs Hudson :(

• A pair of trainers in the middle of the room 👟👟

• Of course it’s a blocked number

• Is the woman ok

• A bomb vest on her body 💣 !!!!

• why does someone want her dead

• Investigating the trainers 👟

• The way John reached in the Sherlock’s coat whilst Sherlock is wearing it

• Text from Mycroft is obviously going be deleted

• The search was completed

• IT’S ANDREW SCOTT !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

• Molly has a boyfriend called Jim

• Jim is causing havoc

• No wonder Molly ran away after your deduction

• The tension between John and Sherlock Istg

• John only wants to help

• John is sherlock’s best man

• John has been notified about the Westie case

• Sherlock finally figured out Carl Powers

• Back at Scotland Yard

• 4 pips and a picture of a car

• Another mysterious phone call from a different person

• They found the car drenched in blood

• Talking to his wife went unsuccessful

• The car is from Janus cars

• The car Dealer was a liar

• The red Laser on the forehead

• Janus cars help Ian disappear to Columba

• Why are there so many running police officers

• A picture of a woman and 3 pips

• An elderly blind woman :(

• “Sudden death�� of Connie prince

• John has been set to go to the Prince family

• I don’t like Connie’s brother

• John doesn’t like the cat

• Mrs Hudson has some wise words

• John is on to something !!!!

• Sherlock taking terrible photos

• They figured it out

• The old woman….Nooooooooooooo

• Someone got arrested

• A picture of the Thames

• A dead body on the Thames

• Why is the mouth bruised

• A missing portrait

• Link to a serial killer

• He used to be a security guard

• What did the note say and why did he give it to that woman ????

• John is at Alex’s flat

• The gallery managers necklace is ugly

• “Have a nice day”

• John is just interviewing everyone

• I don’t like Joe

• “Vauxhall Arches”

• Sherlock has a homeless network

• why is Alex there ??????

• Is that the professor from the voicemail

• JOHN ALMOST SAVED SHERLOCK

• Golem got away

• Another victim but it’s a child :(

• 10 seconds…

• He figured it out

• Is the gallery manager a part of the calls ???

• It’s been Moriatry all along

• The body was moved

• Joe killed westie

• Joe tried to hurt John but John was prepared

• Why did Westie not put the memory stick somewhere safe and off his person

• He shoved Westie down the stairs and killed him

• “Look at the turn ups on his jeans”

• Sherlock will get the food shopping 🛒

• Who’s going to meet Sherlock at the pool

• John has the vest on !!!!!!!

• Who wants to hurt John !!!!

• It’s Jim Moriarty !!!!!

• He’s a consulting criminal

• “Daddy’s had enough now”

• “THAT’S WHAT PEOPLE DO”

• John is trying to sacrifice himself for Sherlock

• Lasers on the forehead

• Is he really just going to walk out

• *Moriarty’s surprised face*

• “No you won’t”

• He came back

• is he going to shoot The vest ???????

I rate this episode 10/10 because it was surprising and I loved the reveal of Moriarty as he has been spoken about throughout the series and I’m excited to watch season two

#bbc sherlock #benedict cumberbatch #mark gatiss #martin freeman #andrew scott #johnlock #Sherlock

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houyin · 4 days ago

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His homeland was destroyed by the borisin and transformed into one of their weapons nurseries. I knew what that meant. This kid's family will become literal pieces of meat with no dignity, becoming nutrients to those mountainous mechabeasts. - Views of the Universe from a Starskiff: The Xianzhou Zhuming

The Abominations of Abundance, as they are so rightly called, are abominable in ways that go far beyond just their outward, inhuman appearances. By the wiles of their biotechnology cultivated by genetic warlocks of the Bloodwind Pack, the beast ships of the Borisin demand considerable sacrifice in order to breed these monstrosities. Weapon nurseries are the designations of planets chosen by the Borisin for organic matter in the way that Yin Jiao's homeland had been subjugated as a mining colony several Amber Eras ago before it was left derelict.

However, it is said that the sight that comes before the fall is the most ominous, of the parasitic plant germinated by invading beast ships that signals the beginning of the end.

Lycoris Radiata, spider lily, the red weed, the red creeper are all the same name of the exponentially growing plant developed by the Borisin's genetic warlocks that began this macabre harvest. On specialized beast ships typically shaped like cnidarians or nautiluses that are the first to invade, sometimes splintering into smaller tripods with exaggeratedly long, prehensile limbs of mandibles that allow them to hunt down organic beings and gruesomely process them within the ships themselves that metabolize organic matter into this plant and refine it into seedlings that the beast ships spew across a planet and allow it to destroy the environment as it continues to cannibalize all walks of life.

I discovered that it was caused by the tropical exuberance of the red weed. Directly this extraordinary growth encountered water it straightway became gigantic and of unparalleled fecundity. Its seeds were simply poured down into the water of the Wey and Thames, and its swiftly growing and Titanic water fronds speedily choked both those rivers. At Putney, as I afterwards saw, the bridge was almost lost in a tangle of this weed, and at Richmond, too, the Thames water poured in a broad and shallow stream across the meadows of Hampton and Twickenham. As the water spread the weed followed them, until the ruined villas of the Thames valley were for a time lost in this red swamp, whose margin I explored, and much of the desolation the Martians had caused was concealed. […] I drank a great deal of it and, moved by an impulse, gnawed some fronds of red weed; but they were watery, and had a sickly, metallic taste. […] For a time, however, the red weed grew with astonishing vigour and luxuriance. It spread up the sides of the pit by the third or fourth day of our imprisonment, and its cactus-like branches formed a carmine fringe to the edges of our triangular window. And afterwards I found it broadcast throughout the country, and especially wherever there was a stream of water. - The War of the Worlds, H.G. Wells

As these plants grow exponentially, it provides organic, carnivorous fuel for the biotechnology that relies on a sustainable, "meaty" diet in order to even exist. In doing so, this carnivorous plant germinated from the blood, flesh, and bone of the gruesomely colonized populace that is a bloody, invasive hallmark of these weapons nurseries that leave nothing in their wake.

Perhaps the most damning aspect of it all is the fact that the flowers most associated with Ren are the very same that heralded the destruction of his home.

#HEADCANON.#war of the worlds your mans...

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idontknowmyownmind · 1 year ago

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There are a lot more Thames survived. They might be a small family, but many, those greedy for power, want them. It's because they are a family blessed by Gods. Each one of them have abilities that it said to be powerful, some even say that the powers are omniscience and/or omnipotence.

Each member have different ability, some might similar but never the same. In one generation, only one may have certain types of power. Only when they die, others member might be born with that certain power. There are never more than one member have same spesific power in a same generation.

Cale never know his family from his mother side. But, he know one person. It's his distant cousin who work as a maid in his house. No one but him and his mother know that they are related. Thames might be known to have red hair (an AU where someone born with red hair is most likely have Thames blood run in them), but there are cases when they don't. But all of them have same eyes color. Mixed blood Thames are likely to not awaken their power, it's very rare to happens.

Thames' abilities can be used by other people. How? There are two methods. The first method is by consuming the blood of the Thames who has the power you want. But it's only work temporarly depends on the abilities and the amount of blood consumed. The second method is by transplanting a Thames' heart into your body. But this method is very risky because Thames is not your ordinary human.

Cale power has things to do with time. That's why he is able to regressed and transmigrated and it's not a one time thing.

While his cousin's power has something to do with multiverse, where she can jump from one world into another. But only world similar to her birth world. Which mean other version of it. Usually, in one world can't exist two same soul, but with her power it's possible.

And it's possible for her to got all the information of the world she is in (how? Idk, she just do)

She can't jump to other world different than hers unless there is someone tied with her in that world. Meaning she can't jump into any earth or other world not tcf other version but she can jump into earth 1 since Heniroksoo is there.

But, since earth is added into her list because of Heniroksoo, she can jump into another earth but with many limitation such as she can only stay for few days at most

So, team 1 know that KRS (Heniroksoo) doesn't have any blood relative but one day, there is one girl who suddenly appear in their daily life and seems so close with their team leader.

What if, before the current LCF, there are many similar worlds where GoD and Nellan Barrow attempted to help?

They made many guide books from different perspective and picked different helps that started in many different points but it never work out. With the help of Cale's cousin, they attempt to safe the worlds many times

Until it's a succeed in the current LCF with the guide book, The Birth of a Hero, and the help, Kim Rok Soo

Remember that Cale's ability has to do with time? Yes, yes, Cale already regressed amd transmigrated into other bodies many time but he never remember any of it. He only has fragments of those memories he brushed off as dreams and so fast to forget.

Oh! The cousin jump world with only her soul and not her body. The body is being keep safe in one of those worlds and only Cale who know the location. He doesn't know know, but if he truly attempt to find it then he will surely find it somehow

Imagine, Cale who already done with the war and hunter bullshit can't get his slacker life because this damn cults popped out of nowhere and try to kidnapped him multiple times asking where is a body of someone is being keep as if he know it, wtf?!

After many attempts, they finally realized that Cale is not Cale and they need to find out where his original world is so they can bother Heniroksoo (they face this type of situation multiple times already)

Okay, I'm gonna stop here... idk how I should continue this... sorry 🗿

@skyeyeager I know that it's probably very different with what you have in mind, I try.. you may add your thought on it or how you want it to go 😔

#og!cale henituse #cale henituse #trash of the counts family #au

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dross-the-fish · 1 year ago

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What do the rest of the crew think of Alice, or she of them?

They like each other. Alice is pretty chill around unusual characters and isn't going to be put off by people like Adam or Erik.

Most of the crew members think she's nice but a little odd. Alice is very into her mushrooms and will talk for hours about the different strains if allowed to do so, which ones are toxic, the effects of the poison, which ones can be used for eating or medicine, and though she is highly intelligent she can come off as a bit peculiar and sometimes struggles to express herself in a way that is easily understood by people who don't know her.

She does sometimes get overwhelmed and if she gets upset she'll shut down and stop speaking or won't be able to articulate why something is upsetting her. Her husband used to use this to his advantage to paint her as unfit and he'd intentionally try to overwhelm her so she'd fall mute or have a meltdown. The crew in general will be much kinder to her. Members like Watson and Theo will gravitate towards her passionate side. Once she's comfortable Alice is that person who loves things with her whole heart and the things she truly enjoys become her favorite things in the world. She's that person who can make you share her excitement because she's so sincerely joyful about the things she loves that it's contagious.

Of all people Jekyll/Hyde seems to understand her the best, especially as Hyde he tends to just accept that certain logic applies to certain situations and quickly picked up that "This is who Alice is, Alice is a little different from the norm," and was able to befriend her easily. When introduced to Wonderland he also was able to simply accept that this was an odd world where the rules are different and once he'd figured out how the backwards logic of it worked he enjoyed his visit.

He considers her his scientific peer and greatly respects her work. He views her as one of the best minds in her field and when a strange red mold appears in the Thames, making it look like a river of blood Alice is the first person Edward points the crew towards for answers.

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therogerclarkfanclub · 2 years ago

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I normally only try to cover Roger's audiobooks on this platform (with a very questionable degree of success 😕), but apparently Gone Outlaw is a really good western novel, so much so it even earned Rob Wiethoff's seal of approval.

This is not an audiobook nor is Rob part of it. It is a good old-fashioned paperback (and hardcover) novel, though it is also available in e-book format if that's your jam.

So if romance novels, westerns and cowboys are your thing, you may want to give this one a try.

Overview:

She can't forget the past. He can't outrun it. When a gang of bank robbers hides out at her family’s ranch to evade the law, Dinah Hance watches in horror as notorious outlaw Sal Valentin kills her father in cold blood. Dinah vows revenge for his murder and insists on joining the posse pursuing the gang. Fiery and strong-willed, she’s quick to shoot and slow to forgive, but gang member Joseph Gray seems different from the rest. Joseph has been with Sal since he was a boy, looking to him as a father figure after the War of Secession robbed him of his parents. But Sal’s lack of conscience and escalating brutality bring Joseph’s loyalty into question. Torn between the gang and his attraction to Dinah, he’s forced to consider what he really wants in life.

What other people saying about Gone Outlaw:

"Gone Outlaw is AN INCREDIBLE JOURNEY that had me captivated from the very beginning. The descriptive writing stimulated all of my senses, and I really enjoyed being transported into this world from the comfort and safety of my own home. Thank you Madison K. Thames for providing me the opportunity to experience this TRAGIC AND BEAUTIFUL story." — Rob Wiethoff, Red Dead Redemption actor

"A gripping story with a deft and evocative narrative style authentically inhabiting the American frontier. An exciting debut." — Warren Fahy, New York Times bestselling author of Fragment

"Thames was born to write. Her characters live large on the page and the imagination." — Adam Bray, author of Star Wars and Marvel books for DK

"Terrific Western, exciting action, and a torturous romance that keeps you turning pages. Don't miss this!" — C.S. Lakin, award-winning author

"There is lots of action in this one to satisfy the reader who likes shoot 'em ups and enough tender moments to satisfy the romance lover. The characters are well portrayed, the writing good… I recommend it." — Regan Walker, award-winning historical fiction author

Gone Outlaw is available from Amazon in paperback, hardcover and E-book formats for $17.99, $27.99, and $9.99 respectively. You can also read a sample when you click on the link.

#rob wiethoff #madison thames #westerns #Book: Gone Outlaw #paperback novels

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wr1t3w1tm3 · 1 year ago

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Descendent

PotC 5/Modern/Will out of Water AU.

Characters: Will Turner, Calypso, Original Female Character

SFW. Like, completely. Just some curses.

Authors note: I broke a couple rules I think, but I don't care, this is my AU.

Words: 4,737

As the centuries melt together, Captain William Turner of the Flying Dutchman finds himself further inland and farther downstream than he could’ve ever imagined. A multitude of maritime disasters fling him from one corner of the world to the other. The Dutchman serves through wars, accidents, and genocides. As the 18th century spills over, the load only increases. Of course, one would expect that as more men's souls were brought into the world, he would be required to guide an equal portion more from it. Except the sea and all her tributaries have never been truly tame. It seems just as men grow complacent with the waters; he is forced to compensate for their malignity.

The strain nearly ends him. While Elizabeth had been alive, it hadn't been pleasant. But back then, he had a rock, a lighthouse to guide him and remind him what might happen if he forsook such a sacred duty. Even when she passed - to sudden for her to make arrangements to join his crew - he’d had Henry, their son. Henry married a young astronomer named Carina, the daughter of the captain who wed the Captain and the King. Henry had waited, watching dutifully and bringing his children. Then once, he supposes around his 12th land fall, he arrives to find the lodgings of his relations ransacked and in a shoddy state of disrepair, unlived in for some time. There is nothing to indicate where they went. All that he can conjecture from the men he brings aboard and what he knows of recent history is perhaps, he prays perhaps, they faced an uprising and fled. Though whether that be the fledgling America, the southern colonies or bloody England he’s sure he’ll never know.

It almost breaks him, but the images of Jones, his cruelty and the cool steel of the sword that hangs from his hip is just enough to keep him on course.

It is then he begins finding himself in freshwater. Sometimes up river. It happens most often on the Thames in England, the Saint Lawrence in the northern colonies, the Amazon to the south and the American Mississippi. The 19th century bleeds into the 20th, and soon he has a new death chamber with which to contend: the aeroplane.

In that century alone he sails through wars, plane crashes, mass suicides in the East and submarines in the West. Mortal men seem to have contented themselves with finding every manner of deadly metal tube and loading themselves into it for travel. He has never seen the oceans so red with blood. Some nights, in the diming lights and the suns wavering rays, the sea seems to dye itself purple. The quantity nearly pushes him over once again, but all of a sudden, in what he thinks is the last decades of that century, the occurrences requiring his presence drop drastically, though the sheer number of souls he ferries from each local increases exponentially. Now he more often than naught finds himself sailing through a valley of broken stragglers, immigrants and refugees fleeing from the latest conflict at the hands of angry men.

Fewer and fewer sailors pass at sea. Fewer and fewer join his crew, and he is slowly beginning to lose his battle with his duties. It becomes a matter not of if, but rather when he will. Until one particular morning, on which he awakes in the Dutchman’s captain’s quarters, and all is quiet. It is his first clue as to something amiss, but he is grateful for the calm this once. It is hardly ever calm aboard the Dutchman.

He takes to the deck, finding the wheel to determine a heading. It seems already determined for him this day, as the Dutchman has surfaced up a river. In fact, he squints to make out the dots in the distance, he’s far up a river, near what seems to be an inhabited city.

That’s not something he sees everyday. It’s his third strike. He scans the deck, the bow, the crows nest. Theres nary a soul aboard except his own.

“William Turna’”. He near scowls, but turns to his guest. She is not near how he remembers her last. While her clothes are similar, a mix of tropical prints, naturally woven bits and a fur of some kind: and her countenance has not changed, her form most certainly has. It is not flesh and bone that stands before him, but rather water in the form of this woman from many lifetimes ago.

“Calypso,” he says, his voice gruff from disuse. An urge arises to bow, he ignores it. “What is the nature of this… visit?”

Her voice warbles with the waters flow. “T’ere’s been an unfo’seen development in ‘da ways of t’is wo’ld Captain Turna’.” She steps forward, and he slides back. The wheel is in his back. “Da te’ms of yous agreemen’ ‘board da Dutchman are changin’.”

Will’s stomach drops. “What has changed?”

He wants to beg, ask what he’s done. Surely, there hasn’t been anything? He’s faithfully fulfilled his duties over all these centuries. And had he not, the sea would’ve already claimed him.

A cool wind arises, pushing his hair across the nape of his neck. A spray is forced from Calypso’s countenance, only to disappear as soon as it’s caught his eye. “T’ings are changin’ in da wo’ld of da gods, William Turna’. You mo’tals was not built to bear no divine load.”

Anticipation rises in his chest. Had he a heart, he’s sure it would’ve begun to race. It must be racin’, in that blasted metal box he’s since lost track of. Calypso continues, enigmatic and cool “Fa now, the Dutchman’s ta’ remain docked ‘ere. Ya crew’s off ta fiddla’s green or da locka’, judgement dependin’. You, William Turna’, will be allowed ta shore from dawn’s fi’st ligh’ to dusks final gleam. Only in the da’k must ya remain ‘board dis vessel. Every moment da light touches is yours, not jus da one day.”

He’s… he’s stunned. And thrilled! Suddenly he’s been given the opportunity of his lifetime, to visit land more often than once a decade! Of course, the first blasted thing out of his mouth is “And what of the souls I’m supposed to lead? What should become of them?”

“Anoda’ ferry man’ll serve in ya stead.” Calypso’s voice is stern. Perhaps not angry but reaching that cusp none the less. They pause a moment, and he listens. To the birdsongs in the woods against the rivers shore, a faint sound of chugging that must be some new-fangled thing he’s heard of yet never seen. The water of the river rushes along, but the water makin’ up Calypso’s countenance only rustles, barely moving.

“But what should I do? I know no living souls…” what of my heart?

Calypso’s voice rises. She cuts him off.. “Yous not been brought ‘ere fur no reason, William Turna’! One of yur’ heirs is close, and to dem you might go! Tea conditions of yous ‘ternal life remain, you’ll not want for food nor drink nor sleep though they be available to ya’!”

The water of Calypso has grown cloudy, swirling as he’s no doubt raised her ire. Not a swell idea, lad he scolds himself. The form before him flows apart, seeming ‘bout to return to its source. “How will I know that this reprieve has ended?!”

Of course he had to ask. This time, she practically screams “Yous will know when ya know, Turna!” and with a sudden splash, she’s gone. Water slaps against it’s source below his deck, and when he turns to face his port there is a gang plank, extended to the shoreline.

Something in him jumps, though surely not his heart. Clad in warm weather wear, Will hastens to his cabin to change into something more suitable. His boots clump against the wooden beams as he finds a shirt and a coat, as it was rather cool that morning. He sets his sword at his hip, and with care to tie the knot of his bandana tightly, he looks himself over once in the mirror - maroon does look quite nice on him, as Elizabeth had pointed out so many centuries ago - and to the gang plank he’s off.

It’s an odd thing, really. The gang plank had mostly been for his men, to return to shore when the need arose. He’d only used it a few times, when the ropes would not suffice to board a doomed vessel or for the brief day he’d spent on some criminal island a few decades after loosing track of Henry. He’d rarely left the Dutchman since then. As such, he’d never seen anything such as he had now. He slunk down the gang plank, careful of a few raised bars, and set his boots upon dry land for the first time in at least a century.

Even with his more recent escapades into freshwater, Will has never had the luxury of observing the rivers surroundings with much scrutiny. Here, one shore lines the river with a dense forest. The trees are tall though scraggly, their leaves aflame in orange, red, and yellow. A green few are still visible, and the grass beneath his boots remains green as well. On the opposite shore - off his port - is a flat expanse near far as the eye can see, covered in drying fields of some crop he cannot identify. And just as the horizon fades, huge hills, near mountains, jut up from nowhere, dense with much the same foliage as on the shore he walks.

There are birds that he hears on occasion, but it seems his foot falls have scared most of the wildlife from ear shot. He thinks to himself that it’s not my fault there’s so many twigs to snap along this trail. He follows it up from the shore, up a steep hill and to a narrow, more traveled path that winds towards a clearing.

This clearing turns out to be some sort of graveyard, over which watches a large stone cross. Will stops at the edge of the clearing, a moment of silence for those who’re interned there. It’s an odd thing to see now, after so long at sea where there are no graveyards. And if he remembers correctly, there are rarely graveyards this close to the shore. However, as he glances behind and notices the drop off, both the grave yards placement and also the fence at the edge of the little cliff make much more sense.

A light gray path winds true past the small graveyard and towards the back of some grand building. Will follows the path, and finds his footsteps fall heavier, as the path feels not unlike the cobble roads they’d had in Port Royal all those centuries ago. Then again, they did not look much the same. And times have changed, he reminds himself. Surely most things have changed.

When he turns the sharp corner with the path, he takes pause under the yellowing branches of a weeping willow, in awe of the great church that stands tall on the bluff. It was assuredly much taller than the Dutchman’s tallest mast, not accounting for the several much taller spires that broached from its roof. He stands in awe for some unknown amount of time, before a sound he can only describe as crunching draws his attention further down the path, to where it winds between this grand church and some run down and weathered hut, its boards grayed with age. Between the two, though much farther back, rises a large building, it’s walls inset with windows four high, made of a red material Will thinks is brick, and some of the same yellowish stone that the church must also be made of. Beyond the path is a large pool of a black material, which is occupied by a few strange looking carriages, mostly of white and red. Cars, he reminds himself. He’d seen a few of them along the ocean floor in the last century.

There along this black mass is a small hill, which runs straight into a larger hill, on which there seems to be a trodden path. He can just make out around this hill and between what appears to be a fenced sports court is another, longer building. As he moves towards the path, he spots more buildings, most of them the same red brick and yellowed stone, connected by these same gray paths.

As he crests the first hill, he finds it to be some sort of dike, built perhaps when there was more water in the area. Atop the second hill he finds another gated complex, with a wall of red, silver, and gray seats overlooking a green, lined field surrounded by a red path. He goes further up the hill, towards another flat, black section lined with yellow. This one seems to be connected to a few gray paths that run to several of the other building’s he’s noticed, crisscrossing a green, leaf littered campus that appears rather vacant.

He steps into the black lot, where a few more cars have been left. Something like humming drifts towards him, coming closer until around the corner of the long building appears a sandy gold car.

Will is taken aback by how quiet it is. Even the Dutchman, in tip top shape, had creaked and groaned with the wind in her sails, and the floor often moaned when paced. This thing is much, much smaller, and as it grows closer it grows only a bit louder. It truly is a marvel what man has come up with in his absence.

The car begins to slow, then comes to a stop just a few feet before him. The driver - who he can now positively identify as a young woman - looks… bewildered. Spectacles frame her eyes, and her hair is a deep brown, nearly black. Something clinks and the car hums again, this time moving backwards as it’s captain twists to watch over her shoulder.

Will is dumbstruck. Her eyes… he swears they were Elizabeth’s, the very same. Perhaps… he doesn’t want to get his hopes high… but perhaps she is the descendent Calypso had spoken of.

He steps into the grass to his port, striding through the dew towards the girl and her car. It makes a sound like a horn as she leaves it. Will picks up his pace. The girl is halfway to the building, walking along another gray path when he calls to her.

“Miss! Wait!”

She looks to him, her face pale, and she pauses. Will begins to slow, noticing how her feet shift, and he tries to catch her eyes but they are half closed in fear. Her fist clenches around something purple and triangular, and she sprints down the path.

“Wait! Please!” He calls after her, and he's off in pursuit. His sword clatters against his thigh. Something on her jingles, and it grows a little louder as he gains ground.

Unfortunately for him, this girl knows the place. She sprints straight through an enclave in the building. Then across the green, past what appears to be two courts made of sand, spanned by a net about twice as tall as himself. He dodges around the edge as she did, but she isn’t looking back. She’s hurrying forward, breathing hard. He’s breathing hard. He hasn’t had to run for anything really since… it must’ve been at least a few decades. As they run, they cut across several more gray paths, and for a second the crunch of grass gives way to loud, dull foot falls before they fly over grass once more. Only once they’ve started down another smaller hill does he realize how far she’s brought him. He’s been running for at least a couple of minutes, and looming before them is a building, with five sets of windows running up its height, separated from them by some black road made of the same material as the lot he had started after her in.

He stomps across the hard surface, and jumps over the yellow raised edge onto another gray path. The girl has reached what appears to be a door, and holds something black with yellow spots against the wall next to it. It emits a sharp squeal and clicks, and the girl throws the door open.

She glances at him, her face seizes when she realizes he’s followed her all this way and isn’t stopping and she sprints inside.

“Wait!” Will is forced to slow and grab the door as it’s nearly closed. Once inside he hears someone thunder up a set of stairs across the room. He launches himself up, taking them two at a time. They’re solid wood and turn once, 180 degrees. He uses the handy railing to keep himself from slamming into the stone wall. At the top are two doors, one on his starboard which leads outside and one into a hallway at his port. He chooses the port one, forcing himself past a young blonde woman who barely reaches his shoulders.

The girl slips behind a sort of pillar, and he sprints towards it. There, however, he is greeted with a loud slam as a solid wood door is slammed in his face, nearly impacting it.

He gets his arms up in time to keep his face from taking any damage. The girl inside screams, and he suddenly realizes why she might’ve run. “I… I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.” He steps back, heaving in the musky, humid air.

“Leave right the fuck now or I’m calling the cops!”

He doesn’t know what the cops are, but that surely can’t be good. “No! Please! Just let me explain!”

“I’m calling them!” She practically sings her shout.

“Please! Wait!” He slams his fist into the door, and a muffled ‘Jesus’ slips under the door. He seethes, shouting: “My name is William Turner! I believe - though somewhat distantly - we are related!”

“Yeah right, bitch ass!” The door rattles a bit as she continues, “I’m lookin’ at’cha, and you ain’t look nothin’ like nun’a my relatives.”

“Please, I promise I can explain! Just… come out! Look me in the eye. You’ll see it, I know.”

“Fuck that, you’re packin’ heat man! Even I ain’t that stupid!”

She must be related, judging solely from her abilities to curse worse than even the saltiest sailors Will had known in all his centuries. He glances at the handle, which hangs limp over a keyhole. A lock. A lock he can pick.

From his hair, Will withdraws a thin, silver pin. The tension against his skull lessens when he does, and he inserts the pin into the lock, making quick work of it. The door swings into the room and he burst in. The girl screams. Will swings around, slams the door, then swings back to her. She’s frozen against a thin sliver of a wall separating two open doors, each of which leads into another room.

She starts towards the farther of the two, only to stop as Will’s sword slides from its scabbard. He practically has it in her back. Her hands are half raised, level about with her shoulders, which she hunches in.

Her voice wavers. “Don’t… don’t kill me, please.”

Will snorts, pulling the sword away from her back. “And why would I do such a thing?”

She doesn’t even pause, “Because you’re a maniac cosplaying as a pirate and running around with a sword and telling people you’re related to them when you aren’t.”

He stops, and for the first time since he’s lain eyes on her, Will takes a proper look at just what she’s been wearing. Trousers, gray trousers with miniscule vertical lines running the length of them. Her shoes are black and appear to be made of something between leather and cloth. They are laced with dirty white laces and set upon dirty white soles. Her top is a gray sweater, perhaps the only item of clothing he can recognize from memory. Comparing that to his own garb… and he begins to realize another reason she might have chosen to run from him when he first approached.

“I…” he swallows, sliding his sword back into its scabbard. “I wish to apologize for my… rashness.”

The girl doesn’t move, nor does she speak, so Will takes a step closer and continues. “However, if you would allow me merely a moment to explain our relation…”

She groans. “Dude! We are not related!”

He flails for something, anything. “But you have her eyes!”

“Whose eyes!?!”

“Elizabeth’s.” He says softly.

The girl turns to him, brows furrowed, and her lips pulled into a half frown. “Who the hell is Elizabeth?”

Will shuts his eyes, the memories flooding back. He’s plenty of them from their late childhood and adolescence, even their early adulthood, but from there they grow in increments of ten, and she is rarely the same in each successive image. But her eyes… the same brown that shifted hazel in the sun and near muddy in the dark. The girl has her eyes.

“My… my wife.”

The girl cocks a brow, leaning against the wall with her arms crossed over her chest. “Dude, you can’t be any older than I am. There’s no way we’re related, even if it’s through your wife or whoever.”

A thread of panic swims across the scar in his chest. The scar where his heart should be, that was carved out when he became the captain…

That’s it! “I… I haven’t a heart.”

The girl looks disgusted. “And that’s relevant to this conversation how?”

Will swallows. It’s a crazy, bull-headed plan, but it could work. “I… I have no heart.” He repeats, a smile beginning to creep across his lips. “If I had no heart, I wouldn’t be standing before you, correct?”

“Right…?” She shrugs. “I mean, you look a little young for a pacemaker, but okay.”

Will has no idea what she’s talking about, so he continues, “And what if I told you that it had been carved out when I stabbed the heart of the previous captain of my ship, which is anchored in the river just over this bluff? That bound by its curse I was immortal, and had been sailing the seas, guiding lost souls to the Locker and Fiddler’s Green since the eve of my wedding?” Her lips curl into a snarl, “And that same heart lies in another chest, which I have not been able to find in the two centuries since it’s loss.”

“I’d say you’re fuckin’ crazy, yur talkin’ crazy, an’ I’m callin’ the cops.” She straightens, backing towards the open door just behind her.

“Listen to my heart!” The girl stops, cowering. He’d allowed his desperation to overtake him, dammit, but he needed her to believe him. “And if you don’t find one within my breast, then you will know that I am telling the truth.” She cocks a brow again, and Will realizes he must concede something on the off-chance Calypso has returned his cursed heart to his chest (though thus far all evidence has pointed to the contrary). “And if you should find it’s beat, you may call these cops.”

“Fine,” she steps into the room and shuts the door. A burst of air pushes past him, rusting his hair. Will returns the pin he’d used to pick the lock to his bandana, and the girl emerges as he brings his hands to his side. She comes bearing a box, which she sets on a sort of tabletop Will had not noticed, nestled ‘tween two walls. It is blue and surrounds a water basin over which some sort of spout sits. The girl lifts the top from the box, and setting it aside, draws out a long cord, with two prongs on one end and a single, circular something on the other.

“What is that?” he asks. The girl sets it around her neck and steps towards him.

“A stethoscope. To listen to your heart.” Will now cocks a brow. “What, I'm prenursing, I'm gonna need it eventually.” She takes it from her neck, sticking the two prongs into her ears, and slides the wider of the two circular sides down her shirt. She frowns, pulls it out, turns it so that the shorter side faces her, and tries again. After a moment, her face unscrunches, and she steps towards Will. “Open your shirt.”

Will opens his coat, revealing his shirt, of which the ties are undone. His scar is partially visible, and the girl cocks her brow again. If all she’s going to do is a cock a brow at anything that even remotely piques her interest, she is going to be very hard to read. “You cool if I touch you?”

“Yes, of course,” Will mutters, taken aback. He glances around the room, then back to her. Carefully, she sets the smaller circular head against his chest, right along his scar, near the bottom of his sternum.

Her eyes go wide, and her mouth pops open a bit. She pulls the thing back and flips it once again. “Come on,” she sets it against his chest, but her eyes grow only wider. “No. That’s impossible.”

Will smirks, setting his hands on his hips. “There is no heartbeat, is there?”

“Mother fucker...” She taps the part of the thing she’d held against his chest, and instantly her face curls in pain. She pulls the prongs from her ear and sets it back on the counter. “You… you have to have a heartbeat; you’d be dead otherwise.”

“But I don’t, do I?” Will lets it sink in, and the girl’s eyebrows furrow. “Q.E.D, what I’ve just told you must be true.”

“Thats scientifically impossible.” She mutters.

Will groans through a smile. “You sound like Carina.”

“Who’s Carina?”

Will takes a breath. The simplest way to describe Carina? What would that be? “She is… my son’s wife. Another very distant relative of yours.”

“This makes even less sense,” she leans against the other wall, though she’s careful to keep her legs from touching what appears to be a white waste basket below her. “I must’ve crashed on the highway or some shit.”

“If you would allow me to explain, I believe I could begin to clear things up.” Will offers a hand to shake. “Do we have an accord?”

The girl starts to offer her hand, but stops, eyeing his hip. “Leave the sword here, and we talk in a public place. Then we have a deal.”

“Agreed.” Will shakes her hand, and as soon as it’s free begins removing his weapons belt. “Now, where should we continue this conversation, miss…”

“Mary Jones. There’s a coffee shop on campus that’s open today, and I’ve got dining dollars to burn.”

“Then I’ll follow you, Ms. Jones.”

“First, give me the sword,” she opens her hands rather expectantly. Will surrenders the scabbard, the girl grabs her stethoscope box, and enters the room she’d retrieved it from. “I can’t have a knife with a blade longer than three inches in here, so this is definitely gonna get me fined, and I’m too broke to afford it.” She sets the stethoscope box on a desk then climbs to the top of two bunk beds as she continues “Second, if my roommates find this, I’m fucked.”

She slides it beneath a mass of blankets and coats fit for the Queen of England, then crawling across the bed, drops to the window ledge on the outer wall, and jumps from that to the ground with a loud thump.

The bunk bed jimmies just a bit. Mary squeezes past Will, calling over her shoulder “Come on, you were the one who wanted to talk,” she stops in the doorway, hand resting on the knob “and loose the bandanna.”

“Well, I rather like it.”

“Loose it, or no talkie”.

Will concedes, untying the cloth which holds back his hair. It tumbles to his shoulders, and he slips the folded cloth and his silver hair pin into the breast pocket of his coat. “Better?”

“Yeees,” Mary opens the door. “After you.”

“No, after you.”

A slight smile piques her lips “Gallant. Don't see that much anymore.”

She still insists he exit before her, though she thanks him for the hospitality as they walk.

#pirates of the caribbean #pirates of the caribbean au #at worlds end #dead men tell no tales #dead men tell no tales au #will turner #the flying dutchman #calypso #original female character #will turners very distant relative #davy jones curse #curse conditions #change in curse conditions #Will out of Water AU #I really like that one #enjoy #elizabeth turner #mentioned

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