#so it started with this dolphin in a top hat... [crack]

[youarethespecial-archive]

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[thelittleredheadedmusician]

five phones on the table

DCU, Titans Rating: Gen 1,077 words AO3 A look at the fab five by looking at their phones. Sometimes you want to try something weird with your writing style so you get an idea and call it a character study. This is what comes of that.

The long table with its numerous chairs was, by proximity to the kitchen, a dining table but due to the nature of the building it occupied doubled as a meeting and strategy table. The small net, paddles, and light plastic balls stored in an innocuous box in the kitchen meant it tripled as a ping pong table.

Currently, its occupants were not any number of the young heroes who were welcome in the halls. No one sat eating breakfast, though a ring of coffee and stray bit of egg would need to be cleaned off, or tinkering with anything from weaponry or gadgets to video game controllers or motorcycle parts. No drops of blood from emergency triage covered the top or powdery strings from aerosol cans thanks to prank wars.

Instead, five cell phones lay abandoned in the otherwise empty rooms. As useful as they can be, even just to stave off boredom on a stakeout, their owners weren’t in the habit of grabbing them when danger called and they rushed to face it. While their owners had grown in time with the rapid developments of cellular phones — and regularly used and fought the cutting edge of technology — these were not like the phones they started off with. They were much more fragile. Their first cell phones had survived punches, drops, outer space, and arguably a bullet from Deathstroke the Terminator. Even the ones built by WayneTech now had a tendency to shatter when slipping off the kitchen counter. 

The first of the phones was indeed a WayneTech phone, one that technically speaking was still in the design phases of development and wouldn’t even have a prototype for another two years. Yet, on the table it sat in a sturdy black case that was nicked and worn. A once bright red and blue S in a shield sticker was on the back, though it had faded and begun to fray with age. The screen flickered to life every few seconds with a notification coming in. The small rectangles showed only the app the messages came from and the name of the sender, nothing more. Small bat: Little Bro. Small bat: Little Bro. Yellow ghost: Babs. Green speech bubble: Amy. Green speech bubble: Alfred. Small bat: Boss Man. The picture that was barely visible through the notifications was of an elephant dressed in finery, a big top circus tent blurry in the background.

The next phone was older and more beat up than the first. It was made by a company that used a fruit for its name and image. The owner had been given it and it had been gotten for free, part of a family cellular plan years ago. The red case it called home was just as worn as the phone itself with its cracked screen. Though it was slim and light with a chipped yellow lightning bolt painted on the back. The spiderwebbing lightning bolt in the glass showed a young woman’s sly grin as she stared down the camera with her arms crossed. “Linda Calling” framed her. When no one answered, the image changed to a picture of three people with their arms loose on each other’s shoulders. A man with bright, tangled red hair and sparks of freckles, the same dark haired young woman with almost perfect teeth, and another man with long, pale orange hair and a wry, almost annoyed expression. Their faces were covered quickly by the “Missed Call: Linda” notification.

The third was newer than the last and though made by the same manufacturer as the first it was older than that one. In a hopeful optimism of its owner, there was no case. Which was odd as the camera was one of the best found in a mobile phone and many with the same model took great pains to protect it. Which isn’t to say that the owner wasn’t careful and didn’t go through great pains to care for it. The layers of metallic colored stars that stuck to the back helped to prove this as one fell into wear, another bright shine took its place. The photo on the screen of the other side had been taken using that excellent camera by the owner. A large group of people, all carefully posed yet laughing and antsy at the experience, at a picnic or a party. The people all called this building home and the people who moved through it family. A single text message came through from a “Diana” that began with “Dear Sister,” and then was cut off.

The fourth phone was bulkier, chunkier, than the others. It was carefully custom made to withstand the pressure and depths of the deepest seas. One of just a few in the world. It lived in an airtight waterproof case and was kept charged due to what some could only describe as magic. Despite the practicality of the case, it still managed to impart some individuality. A deep, almost royal blue, it was covered in a swirling pattern that some might think of as waves, and others flowers. Its screen stayed dark, though there was a message from much earlier. A small note of encouragement from a “Dolphin” overlaid on a serene image of crystal blue water shining in a lake surrounded by verdant trees.

The fifth and final phone was in as bad of shape as the second. An almost out of date model by Queen Industries, a company that no longer existed or at least not in that capacity. Though the owner would regularly take the small device apart, tinkering and updating the small wires and computer chips within. A thick, almost violently pink case had taken the actual brunt of the wear. Most of the back was covered by a sticker that was the image of a tweet with the immortal phrase “Help me obi Juan whoever the fuck you are.... You're my only ho.” The image on the screen was a young girl in a princess dress and a yellow Robin Hood hat grinning and waving at the camera. It was easy to assume her name was Lian as the text from an “Oliver” could be read saying “Daddy it’s Lian. Love you. Stay safe.”

It might be a few hours and a few battery percentages later, but eventually the owners would come and collect them. Would respond to the notifications. Maybe clean up the bit of egg and the coffee ring on the table.

[brelione]

The Surfer And The Siren

Chapter Four:The Hook,The Line,and The Sea Monster On The Other End

1 2 3

You pushed the paper bag under your shirt,holding it there as you swam through the cool water.Getting back to your cave from Richard’s was muscle memory,you could do it with your eyes closed if you wanted.You went slow today,fins swishing slowly as you swam only a few feet below the surfing,knowing damn well that it was way too early for anyone to be out on boats.

This was one of the areas without sharks,those pests knew better than to come around your grounds.Well,they knew better than to come around your waters.You ducked deep as you got to the large mount of deep tan rocks that formed an island a couple of hundred feet away from the shore.It was bumpy and slippery so it was pretty shit for parties or whatever but made it perfect for you.There were patches of grass and wildflowers coming through the cracked rocks.The one large patch covered the entrance to your cave in particular but no drunk teen out for a joy ride could ever find it.

You dived down to wear the rock met the sand,swimming through the large opening and up into the inside of the cave.When you came out of the water you were inside the large pool that was sheltered by the rocks walls,lifting yourself onto one of the smooth rocks that your loose scales usually fell onto.You pulled the bag out from under your shirt,tossing it onto the semi dry sand.You pulled off the string bag that had become wet,tossing it next to the paper one.The clothes inside had become wet but they would be dry by the time you had to wear them next.Sunlight was coming through the grass patch,the sun rays hitting your head and back.The day after being on land was always a long one.

You could always sleep in the warm,cushion like sand at the bottom of the pool but something about the way the current was moving and the sun was drying your blue curls gave you the urge to go for a swim.You sighed,wiping the saltwater from around your eyes even though it wouldnt matter when you went back in the water.You slid off the walk,smacking your fin off the side of it to give yourself a headstart.

You let the water drag you along,seeing seals and dolphins start their morning routines.You could feel a whale far out in the ocean,how strong its fluke was as the large creature moved through the water.You could feel the sharks cockiness and how afraid the little crabs were.Waves crashed at the surface,creating walls of microscopic white bubbles that fizzed across your skin and scales when you went through them.You body brought you to the marsh,the older dolphins swimming slowly and practically begging to be raced.You spun through the water,a blue curl getting caught in splintered wood.

You frowned,releasing it.You were far under the surface,probably twenty feet.You went to the top,hiding behind the wooden pillar as you observed your surroundings.There was a boy leaning over the railing of the dock,face staring down into the water tiredly with a red hat backwards on his head.You felt the water go cold,realising who it was.It was JJ motherfucking Maybank,fishing at the dock in the marsh.This would definitely be a fun morning.You sank back into the water,tail grazing the sand lightly as you saw the shiner swimming around,trying to break free of its torturous device.You grinned,tugging at the line.

It began moving rapidly but you held onto the hook tightly between your fingers,releasing the poor shiner before letter go of the hook.You heard a shout of frustration as he realized that the creature that had been holding onto his hook had gotten away with his shiner.He tossed in the line again,casting it out around ten feet in front of you.You smiled,swishing your tail through the water and getting a good grip of the hook,swimming around the dock with it and letting yet another shiner go.

He tried to rail it in,running to keep up with the fish that he thought was on his line.You let go of the hook,watching as it dangled at the surface. “DAMMIT!”The boy shouted in defeat,pulling off his shirt and jumping into the water.Somehow he thought that was a clever idea,blowing out air bubbles until his feet hit the bottom,squinting his eyes so he could see a bit in the salty water.Knowing he couldnt see properly you let your fin graze his calve,making a large bubble come from his mouth as he kicked his legs a couple of times,trying to find the scaly thing again.You let a giggle slip past your lips,the sound echoing through the water as bubbles escaped your mouth.

JJ’s mouth opened,going to inhale water as his eyes flashed back and forth.You mentally cursed,grabbing him by his belt loop and pushing him up towards the surface.He reached it,coughing and looking around in the water.Mermaids didn't have this problem.They didn't have to worry about accidentally killing someone every time they opened their mouth or accidentally sinking a ship while trying to sing their favorite movies soundtrack.It wasnt fair.You swam just beneath JJ,his toe feeling hundreds of scales just under him.He let out a nervous shout,making Pope come outside to see what was going on.JJ tried to explain that there was some sort of dinosaur shark in the water,telling the boy that the sea monster was real and that it was here.

Pope rolled his eyes,coming to the edge of the dock and looking around for anything that resembled what JJ was rambling about.JJ lifted himself out of the water,running inside to grab binoculars while you hid under the dock,trying not to laugh.You heard two more sets of footsteps walking down the dock.Kiara and the other boy,the one that you had rescued. “Oh,shut up.Dont tell me John.B got you believing that bull shit too.”She sighed,hopping into the boat that was tied to the side of the dock,only a few feet away from you.You wanted nothing more than to have legs now,jump in the boat with them and be their friend.

You listened as the four of them got into the boat,JJ still talking.You knew all of their names now which made you just the tiniest bit closer to being their friend.The motor started up,the boat moving quickly through the water.You followed close behind,wanting to observe them.They stopped about a mile away from the dock,floating in the marsh.You heard the crack of beer cans opening,excited shouts as Pope launched himself off the side with a loud splash.You watched as he sunk to the bottom,kicking off the sand and going back up to the surface as Kiara dove in,hands going into the sand and scattering it as she felt for shells or something.Her fingers latched onto something,going back up to the surface.

You squinted,trying to get a good look at it from where you were.It was a baby conch,pink and purple and filled with tiny holes that your voice could come through.You watched in delight as she handed it to John.B,asking him to put it in her bag for her.He was the next to jump in,cannon balling and getting water up his nose.JJ was hesitant,probably because of the earlier encounter but jumped in none the less.He blew out air so that he was sitting on the bottom,struggling to stay there with his eyes closed like he was trying to meditate underwater.It wasnt an uncommon thing to see,you had seen statues of it that had been eroded by water and forgotten.He sat,blowing out bubble rings.

The other three were at the surface,moving their feet slowly to keep still.You felt the urge to reach forward,come out of your hiding spot and touch the blonde hair that was flowing in the blue water.You resisted the urge,watching as he launched himself like a rocket back to the surface.JJ and Pope had been trying to see who could stay at the bottom longest and you had watched closer,studying the way the blonde boy looked when he was concentrated.His eyes weren't clenched shut but his eyebrows were knit together slightly,his hands were stilled and he was careful not to move a lot.He had definitely done this before,maybe as a breathing exercise for surfing.

You wished you had a watch so you could keep exact track of how long he had stayed there but you had estimated it to be about a minute and a half before he was gasping for air at the surface again.They had eventually got out of the water,sitting in their boat which meant you had to close your eyes and focus,listening for anything they said.You could hear the faint tune of music,it sounded like a tune by The Beatles or maybe Queen but it was too quiet to tell.The sound of fingernails hitting tin,making you wonder if someone was flicking a beer can.You left it to your imagination,imagining the expressions they wore on their faces and what JJ looked like when he laughed.What got your full attention was your name falling from someones mouth.

“So I met (Y/N) last night.”Kiara sighed,the boys falling silent.You closed your eyes,listening very carefully to what they were saying. “What?”JJ asked,putting his beer down. “I met her last night when we were getting fire wood.”She repeated herself.JJ glanced over at Pope,an unreadable expression on his face. “And you didn't think to tell us last night?”He asked,seeming disappointed by his friends choice.Kiara shrugged. “I mean she was just walking her dog and taking him for a piss,I didn't even know it was her until she was just about to leave.”Kiara defended herself.JJ huffed,sipping his beer. “But you agree,though?You agree that shes gorgeous and that she has a pretty voice?”JJ asked.Kiara laughed,John.B rolling his eyes.

 “I mean it was dark out,I couldn't see her,but she has a really nice voice.But I don't believe that shes from around here,she has like,an accent.I don't know what accent but its just...different.”She answered.JJ nodded,agreeing. “Yeah,yeah she does but I think it makes her prettier.Right,Pope?”He asked.Pope nodded. “Yeah,(Y/N) is pretty.”He agreed.JJ rolled his eyes. “No,no Selena Gomez is pretty,(Y/N) is like….shes just wow,you know?”He asked. “No,JJ,I don't know.You guys are making such a big deal out of her and I don't get it.”The brunette shrugged.

JJ scoffed,looking over at his best friend. “Of course you don't,idiot,you haven't even seen her!”JJ exclaimed,annoyed with the brunette.You grinned,listening to them speak. “Ok,so what if she is wow?She could be a bitch.”John.B argued.JJ bit his lip,his eyebrows casting shadows over his blue irises in a glare. “She’s not a bich,John.B.She’s cute and shes...shes kind and shes smart and shes just...shes different.”The blonde sighed,scratching at the back of his scalp. “She’s different because she’s 100 years old and saves people from ship wrecks!”John.B exclaimed,setting his can of beer down with a loud clink.JJ shrugged. “Yeah,Okay,maybe but that’s good for her.”The blonde sighed,closing his eyes and feeling the sun on his face.

 A larger wave came along,causing you to lose your ability to hear over the surface and making you miss a good two minutes of their conversation. “So then ask her on a date!”John.B exclaimed,sounding frustrated.Your eyebrows furrowed,trying to focus on the conversation again when a school of fish came along,having their own conversations.You swam under the boat,now on the other side and closer to JJ. “How?”You heard JJ ask. “Old Richard,figure something out.”Kiara answered him.You felt your heart beat quicken,not fully understanding this conversation.

The boat engine started up again,making you dart back down so you wouldnt get caught up in the propellers.You tried your best to keep up with the boat without getting too close to it,memorizing the path to John.B’s dock.You went to the bottom,following the pillar of the dock and searching a conch shell,or any shell that you could use.The one you could find was a simple baby of a shell,covered in scratches and some barnacles.You quickly grabbed it,tossing it up to the surface and listening as it hit the wood of the dock. “What the actual fuck?”

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[petaldancing]

fic: this’ll do for now

fandom: spy x family characters: anya, loid and yor summary: Four times Anya receives a toy, and one time she asks for something else. 4k words. read: on AO3 or below

notes: written for yuletide 2019 for penguinzero! i was inspired by a fan observation that Anya has quite a number of toys that appear throughout the different chapters (from a post by batneko on tumblr!) the toys referenced here all appear in the manga, but there are only overt references made to Chapter 8.5 (Extra Mission!) if you're wary of spoilers.

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1. 

“What are you doing, Anya?”

Papa’s using that tone again, the one where he’s trying to understand what she’s thinking. Too bad he’s not a mind reader. Heh.

Anya lets go of his hand to run up to the storefront and press her face to the wide window. Her gaze is fixed on the toys splayed across the polished shelves. There are puppets, and porcelain dolls, and even toy cars, but she won’t be distracted. She points a decisive finger to the glass and shouts: “I want that!”

Her chosen subject is a round, yellow chicken-looking doll that’s half-hidden behind a big teddy bear. It’s ugly and she already loves it.

Papa stands next to her and leans forward to get a better look at it. “You already have a doll, don’t you? Why would you need another one?” This question is accompanied by a clear and crisp thought, ‘What did those parenting books say? If you give into your children’s demands easily, they may come to disregard your authority and lose respect.’

“I respect you, Papa," Anya responds immediately, nodding so as to reassure him. “If you buy me that toy, I’ll respect you even more and listen to what you say.”

Papa raises an eyebrow, not in surprise, but in doubt.

Anya's finger remains glued to the window even though her feet are starting to hurt from tip toeing to peek through the storefront. She's determined to make a good case for ownership of the ugly chicken: "I need it to protect me when I get scared at night. It looks tough, it’ll be able to fight off any assa- assassi...”

“Assassins?” Papa corrects her. “You’ve been watching too much of your spy cartoon. People like assassins and hitmen don’t exist. You don’t have anything to be worried about.”

Papa’s being a bad liar again.

Before Anya can tell him he’s wrong, she notices him reaching into his pocket to pull out his wallet and her eyes widen with hope.

“I suppose I could get it for you. You’ve been working hard to prepare for the academy’s entrance exams, after all,” he explains as he enters the toy store, the old wooden door creaking.

While Papa pays at the counter, Anya bounces over to Chicky (yes, she’s just given it a name) and pulls it into her arms, snuggling into the sweet-smelling fabric of its body. She starts to sing the Bondman theme song, already imagining the life-threatening missions she’ll have with Chicky as her sidekick.

As they walk out the store and down the street leading back home, Anya’s singing fades into the sound of the city bustling around them. She picks up the worry in Papa’s thoughts and goes quiet to listen.

‘I mustn’t make this a habit. If Anya keeps getting what she wants, she’ll end up taking these things for granted.’ It is sharp and pointed and makes her flinch.  

Anya stops just then, standing in the middle of the sidewalk. It's late in the day and there aren't many people walking about, but those that do walk pass look between her and Papa with curiosity and concern.

"What is it now, Anya?"

She hugs Chicky close to herself. It’s all soft and smooth and new, and smells like fresh flowers. She doesn’t remember having anything like this in the orphanage. It makes her happy yet lonely.

“This is Papa’s first gift for me. I’ll always treasure it!”

She waits, and when Papa doesn't say anything, she screws her eyes shut and tries to hear the words inside his brain.

Nothing—it's blank for once.

When she opens her eyes, she sees that he's stretched out his empty hand to her.

“Alright, Anya. Come now, Yor is probably waiting for us to have dinner,” he says as she takes his hand. They resume their journey down the familiar street, passing the baker’s and the tailor’s and the post office, all the places she's come to recognise as part of her new home.

As they cross the road and catch the orange sun setting behind the town hall, she hears Papa’s thoughts stir. Faintly , she catches his mind echoing: ‘Mustn’t make this a habit.’

It is a warm and soft thing now, like the feeling of her hand curled in his.

2.

Anya doesn’t remember what happened. Now, she’s crying and crying in the middle of the living room as Chimera droops in her hands, the beans inside it spilling out onto the floor around her. She’d been playing spy and villain with Chimera (she was obviously playing the part of the world’s Top Spy) and spun her around and now there was a torn hole in her side!  

“Anya has blood on her hands now,” she hisses through hot tears, remembering that this is what the person on TV said in a similar situation.

Mama runs over from the balcony where she was hanging out the clothes to dry. “Anya, you’re not hurt are you?” She squats down to put a gentle hand against Anya’s wet cheek.

"I want a new Chimera!" Anya wails, letting go of the toy to bury her face into Mama’s blouse and rub her snot against her. Chimera is old and tattered from getting thrown around by other kids in the orphanage, but it was also there, buried under a pile of trash, that Anya found her. She knows Chimera is special, that she can’t just go to the toy store and buy a new one, but what else is she going to do now?

As Mama wraps her arms around her and pats her head, Anya begins to calm down. Her tears subside into controlled sniffs.

"Now, now, Anya. There's no need for a new friend. We just need to mend her and she'll be as good as new,” Mama says as she stands, hoisting Anya into her arms.

Anya rubs her puffy eyes. "You can fix her?"

“Of course! Needlework is something I can proudly say I’m an expert at.” Mama smiles. ‘I have a lot of experience stitching myself up. Stitching a doll shouldn’t be much different. Perhaps it’ll be easier.’

Anya thinks that Mama can be just as cool as Papa sometimes.

And so, they carefully pick up Chimera’s insides from the floor and collect them in a rice bowl. When this is done, Mama goes into her room looking for needles and thread. As Anya sits on the sofa, she can hear Mama rummaging through her weapons in her closet, and through the wall, her thoughts: ‘Needles… needles… Ah, there we go. Have I sterilised these yet? I’ll just make sure Anya doesn’t touch them, just in case.’

Anya does not offer to help Mama when she comes back out, holding a short needle in her hand along with a spool of thread, and a bag of cotton wool.

Mama takes the rice bowl and what’s left of Chimera to the dining table, where she sits and begins work. Anya hovers next to her and watches as she threads the needle with skill and quickly sows up the huge hole. When the hole becomes a small tear, she pours the beads back into Chimera’s body with Anya’s help. Anya holds onto Chimera while Mama does the finishing touches, including stuffing her with more cotton wool so that she stands taller now.

“Tadah!” Mama grins when the operation is over. “She’s as good as new now.”

Anya receives Chimera with a big hug. “Thank you Mama!”

“Chimera is one of a kind, so we’ll take good care of her. If she gets hurt again, just bring her to me and I’ll fix her up,” Mama says as she packs up her first aid kit for dolls. “And Anya, don’t think about throwing away things even if they may be a bit broken. Sometimes, all they need is a little love.”

‘This is what Loid would do, right? Try to make life lessons out of everyday incidents,’ Mama’s thought bubbles in the air.    

Anya blinks twice before asking: “Are you trying to teach me good values like Papa?”

“Ah…. you'r always so sharp,” Mama concedes with a laugh. At this moment, the front door opens and in steps Papa, holding that briefcase he carries just for show.  

“What’s all this? I heard Anya talking about me,” he asks as he closes the door behind him and removes his hat.

“Chimera had a little accident, but I’ve fixed her and even added a little extra stuffing.” Mama holds up the needle and cotton to show him.  

“Ah,” Papa hums. ‘Hm. The cotton she’s using it’s the sort that’s particularly good at absorbing blood. Do they sell this high quality stuff at the pharmacy now?’  

“What is it, Loid?”

A practiced smile appears on Papa’s face. “I was thinking how great it is that you could help solve Anya’s problem.”

“Yes, I want to be someone Anya can rely on too, you know.” Mama pulls at her fingers nervously. “I’m always worried about whether I’m playing my part well enough.”

Before Papa can open his mouth, Anya interrupts by holding Chimera up to her face and cheering in a squeaky voice: “Mama is strong and fast and good with needles! I feel safe when she’s around!”

“There you have it.” The corner of Papa’s lips crooks up slightly.

“There you have it,” Mama repeats, and her hands, which she’d been gripping tightly, loosen just so.

3.

For some reason, there are always bad guys to fight whenever Anya goes out with Mama and Papa. Today, they went to the aquarium and stopped a villain from stealing an important penguin. Even on day-offs, Papa has to work.

Then again, bringing her out to the aquarium to look at fishies and talk to the neighbours—that’s work too, isn’t it? It’s his job to make sure they’re an ordinary family, so even Sundays are work days. Mama and her had lots of fun today watching the dolphin show and petting the stingrays and looking how sharp and pointy the shark’s teeth were (Mama really liked that), but all Anya could hear was Papa thinking about his next mission.

It’s the end of the day now, and she should be in bed, but Anya wriggles out from under her covers and pokes her head out of her room. The hallway is really dark and only from the far, far end, can she see a small crack of light coming from underneath Papa’s door. She decides to bring new recruit Penguin along with her, just in case she gets ambushed.

She tries to stealthily creep up to Papa’s door, but it’s a bit hard since Penguin is much less graceful. Before she can even peek into Papa’s room, he notices.

“Anya? It’s always polite to knock before entering someone’s room.”

She puffs up her cheeks and does as she’s told.

“Yes, come in.”

She pushes the door open and steps into Papa’s room, tugging Penguin in behind her. It’s a very normal-looking room. She frowns at this. Where are all the fancy spy gadgets? He must have hidden them somewhere.

“Did you have a bad dream?” Papa puts his book aside and straightens his posture in his armchair, resting a hand on his knee.

“No… I couldn’t sleep because I was thinking.” Anya twiddles her thumbs. “Papa, are you tired from work?”

“What are you talking about? I had a day off today with you and Yor, didn’t I?” he says with hesitation.

“Well, you were tired from work and you still said to go out with us,” Anya tries a different approach.

Papa thinks, ‘Which was also part of Operation Strix to begin with, and ended up crossing with another mission. Work never does end,’ but says, “Which was a good way for me to take a break from work.”

Anya sways on the spot, trying to process the same voice speaking two different things.

“You don’t need to be worried about me, Anya. I’m an adult. I can take care of myself.” Papa stands up and opens his room door, gesturing for her to follow him back to her room. She pulls Penguin along as they walk back, and the distance feels much shorter now with Papa now walking beside her.

“Would… would you quit your job if it gets too tiring?” Anya finally works up the courage to ask as he lifts her back into bed and tucks her in. Penguin gets the same treatment shortly after.

“You know, Anya, just because something is tiring doesn’t mean it isn’t worth doing,” Papa answers. He’s sitting on the edge of her bed, chin tucked and eyes looking down. ‘I chose to do this. I’ll see it through till the end, so good people like Yor and Anya can live in a peaceful society. As for what happens after...’

Papa suddenly turns to look at her. “Is this about your homework? You need to stop lazing around or you’ll get another Tonitrus. I’ll help you with it tomorrow.”

Anya nods slowly, feeling better to know that Papa will be around, at least, until he completes his mission. “I’ll do my best, Papa. Just like you.”

Instead of thinking about how lonely it’ll be when Papa finally completes his mission, Anya focuses on how cool he is.

He stays with her, not saying anything else, until she finally drifts off to sleep.

4.

“Anya, are you getting tired?”

Mama extends an open hand down, offering to take the shopping bag Anya is dragging against the pavement. They’ve just finished a shopping trips at the market and Anya had volunteered to help carry some of the groceries home. Mainly a big bag of peanuts. Mama’s getting better at buying stuff now. She’s been observing what Papa cooks for dinner and memorising how the packaging looks like.

“My feet and arms are tired,” Anya says, her knees wobbling a bit. The sun is especially hot today.

“It must be from all the punching training we did today, huh?” Mama remarks cheerfully. She points to a bus stop up ahead where a couple of people are standing. “Let’s take a bus back home then.”

As they walk under the shelter hand-in-hand, Anya thinks back to their training session this morning. Mama’s trying to teach her how to block punches and dodge attacks now. She could only do it for fifteen minutes and had to take a nap after that, only to wake up just in time to accompany Mama out.

Anya stares at her hands and makes them shake for dramatic effect. “Am I a weakling, Mama?”

“Of course not!” Mama pauses to think. ‘Though I don’t remember it being so difficult to learn self defense when I was her age. Maybe it’s because I had to pick it up under different circumstances.’

“But I’m not getting stronger,” Anya mumbles.

“You’re getting good scores for your tests and quizzes, aren’t you? It’s not just about brute strength. Being smart is a strength too.”

Well, that’s because she’s figured out which students in class are good at what subjects. And because Papa’s new rule is that she can only watch TV after she does a bit of studying on weekends.

Mama raises an arm to flag the approaching bus. As it rumbles to a halt at the bus stop, Anya catches the colourful advertisement painted on the side. It’s for a new toy that she’s never seen before. A robot! And it looks exactly like the ones that appear in Bondman.

“Look! Look at that!” She grabs a fistful of Mama’s skirt to get her attention.

Mama tilts her head to the side, staring at it as they line up to board the bus. “Do you want that toy?”

“Yeah. What do I need to do to get it?” Anya asks as she hops onto the metal steps of the bus door and rushes to get a seat next to the bus window. She’s learned, from when she used to be stuck in the lab, how she always got a reward for doing something the grown-ups wanted. The outside world didn’t seem that much different from the lab in some way.

Mama sits down next to her after paying for the bus fare. “What do you mean, Anya?”

“Can I get Mr Robot if I get a Stella?”

‘Wouldn’t that be a long ways off?’ Mama doesn’t say this aloud, but Anya narrows her eyes and frowns when she hears this complete lack of belief.

Mama doesn’t notice. She adjusts the groceries in her lap and cranes her neck to look out the window, checking where they are on the bus route. “Well, we could get off near the toy store now and see if they have Mr Robot there already.”

Anya opens her mouth in surprise. “But I didn’t do anything to get it!”

“Well, I don’t think I need a reason to make you happy,” Mama answers simply, a kind smile touching her lips.

"R-really?" Anya asks again, just to make sure.

Mama pauses and think: ‘Loid might nag at me for spoiling Anya. But if it’s something that can cheer her up, I’m sure he’ll understand. She's been less energetic these days, and he's noticed too.’

"Your Papa likes to give you rewards for working hard, but I don't want you to feel as though you need to do something in order to get what you want. Or do something just because you think that's what someone else wants." At this, Mama's expression shifts. She continues to look outside, but her eyes seem far off, like she's thinking about deeply about something. But just like that one time with Papa, Anya can't read anything from her mind. It's a quiet stillness. All Anya can hear are the thoughts of the old granny at the back of the bus, worrying about whether she left the stove on.

It's after two zebra crossings and one traffic light before Mama turns to her. "I want you to be able to be who you are,  not what others want you to be," she whispers as she brushes Anya's hair back, taking care to avoid her horns. And when Anya works up the courage to listen out for Mama's thoughts, she hears her say: 'I didn't have that choice, but at least, this is a role that I've grown to like more than I thought I would.'

“Mama… I think having a good heart is a strength too. Maybe that’s what I should try to be good at,” Anya says in soft realisation.

Mama gives her a smile just then, and she looks radiant under the rays of the sun shining into the bus.

“You’re absolutely right.”

5.

"Chimera, Chicky, Penguin and Mr Robot all reporting for duty!"

Anya throws them all onto her bed and salutes them. Outside, the evening rain is falling hard and the only thing she can see from her window are the raindrops splattering against it.

"Listen up agents, we're up against a diabo.. diablo.. diabolic enemy today. It's—"

A flash of lightning suddenly appears in the window, followed by a deafening crash of thunder that rocks the air. Anya dives under her covers with a loud yelp. The movement causes Chimera to roll off the bed. Anya is too busy shivering under her blanket to pick her up.

She hears the door of her room slam open, and two pairs of footsteps rushing in. When she pokes her head out from beneath her hiding spot, Papa and Mama are standing next to her bed. Mama’s hands are crossed behind her back and her eyebrows her knotted in concern. Papa scans the room with a quick snap of his head.

“Are you okay, Anya? It sounded like…” Papa begins. ‘No, I was overreacting. Anya is safe. Probably just scared from the thunder.’  

“Like something bad happened,” Mama completes his sentence. ‘Oh thank goodness, now I just need to keep my knives without Loid or Anya noticing.’ Her arms remain glued to her sides, twitching slightly as she tries to adjust the hidden weapons behind her nightgown.

Anya pulls the blanket off her head and raises an accusing finger to the window. “Yes! It’s that!” She casts a glance at all her toys on the bed and clears her throat to say, “They’re all… they’re all scared.”

“They’re scared?” Papa asks, raising an eyebrow.

“Yeah, they’re not used to dangerous situations.” Anya folds her arms across herself and nods sagely.

“Well, then they could come and stay with me for the night,” Mama offers, which makes Anya’s eyes widen. Her mouth gapes as she thinks of what to say next, without making it obvious that she’d be jealous if Penguin got to sleep next to Mama instead of her.

Another lightning strike appears in the window and Anya’s shout is one second faster than the ensuing thunder. Her body immediately jumps off the bed and flies into Papa and Mama, hugging them around their knees.

"I'm scared,” Anya reluctantly admits, her cheeks squished between their legs.

“Rain and thunder and lightning are all normal, torrential weather conditions, Anya,” Papa explains. “You’ll be safe as long as you stay indoors, I promise.” As he pauses, he thinks, ���I definitely won’t let her go out on her own in such weather. Even if she doesn’t get struck by lightning, there’s a high chance a tree could and if that were to fall on Anya...’

“I don’t want to be shocked or squished!!” Anya wails out and clutches onto them even tighter.

“That won’t ever happen,” Mama says in a calming voice. ‘I’d redirect that lightning strike in a jiffy. It shouldn’t be too hard.’

As awesome as that sounds, Anya jumps as she hears another boom of thunder outside and she continues crying. “But I’m scared!”

“Okay, okay. What can we do to make you less scared?” Papa lowers himself onto his knees and holds out his handkerchief for Anya to blow her nose into.

As soon as she's done wiping her face against the cloth, she comes up with a great idea. She raises her eyes to look at both of them. “I want Papa and Mama to stay with me tonight."

It’s Papa and Mama’s turn to widen their eyes. They exchange shocked looks with each other.

“Wouldn’t it be alright if it was just me?” Mama points at herself.

Anya holds her right palm up to Mama’s face. “No.”

“Alright, Yor. You can head to bed. I’ll stay with Anya,” Papa sighs.

Anya holds up her left palm up to Papa’s face. “No.”

While their faces balk with insult and confusion, Anya stands up on her bed and claps her hands together. “I won’t be able to go to sleep without both Mama and Papa!” she declares.

‘The last time I slept next to someone was with Yuri when we were still children. I miss those times,’ Mama thinks fondly. ‘Oh, but Loid is different from Yuri, he’s…’ Her face goes a little red.

‘This is still part of Operation Strix, isn’t it? Keeping Anya happy and safe so that she’ll continue to do well in school. Come on, Twilight. It’s not a difficult request. Yor is...’  

Anya pats the empty space on both sides of her bed, looking at both Mama and Papa expectantly. Mama steps forward first, even as Papa raises a hand to stop her.

“I’m fine, Loid. To tell you the truth, I’ve always found it comforting to sleep with family. I’m sure that’s all Anya needs right now.” Mama uses her hands to flatten the material of her nightgown before lying down next to Anya. Anya doesn’t know where Mama's weapons have disappeared to. She tries not to think so much about it.

‘Comforting?’ Papa thinks. ‘Twilight never experienced anything like that growing up.'

Anya stares at him, and her shoulders begin to droop when he doesn't move.

Sometimes, Papa is too cool.

She turns away from him to lie on her side and close her eyes.

'But... Loid Forger must know what that’s like. He's supposed to be the perfect family man. He is.'

The next moment, Anya feels the mattress sink as Papa sits down on the bed. He doesn't relax quite as much as Mama, but allows his back to lean into one of Anya’s fluffy pillows.

When the next thunderclap rolls around, Anya hunches into Papa’s side and feels Mama’s hand soothing her back. She breathes in the smell of Papa’s shampoo and Mama’s handsoap. The last thing she hears before she falls asleep is a soft song humming in her ear. It makes the thunder seem like a small noise in comparison.

----

When Anya wakes up the next day, she knows that she is safe, like she's been wrapped up warm and toasty and no one can hurt her ever again. She cracks her eyes open to see Mama and Papa's arms curled over her, barely touching.

‘This’ll do for now,’ she thinks before falling back asleep.

[kmomof4]

Ch7 Time and Again

We’re back y’all!!! Thank you so much for your love and support of me and this fic! I hope you enjoy the new chapter!!

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All the love and thanks to my besties and beta/encouraged team of @hollyethecurious and @winterbaby89!!! Love you ladies to the moon and back again!!! *mwah*

Also big shoutout to the CSSNS discord ladies for all their encouragement and help over the last few months!!!

Tagging my peeps: @hollyethecurious @winterbaby89 @snowbellewells @stahlop @resident-of-storybrooke @jennjenn615 @kingofmyheart14 @profdanglaisstuff @branlovestowrite @thisonesatellite @ultraluckycatnd @flslp87 @whimsicallyenchantedrose @let-it-raines @shireness-says @kymbersmith-90 @darkcolinodonorgasm @bethacaciakay @searchingwardrobes @ilovemesomekillianjones @teamhook @aprilqueen84 @qualitycoffeethings @superchocovian @artistic-writer @donteattheappleshook @doodlelolly0910 @seriouslyhooked @tiganasummertree

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Under the cut unless Tumblr ate it.

A/N I am aware that in some places it is illegal to swim with dolphins in the wild. But this is fan fiction y'all. Just go with it.

Killian cracked the door open to Emma’s bedroom to see the blonde siren still in dreamland. She was on her tummy facing the door with her sunlit hair spread over the pillow and her face. The little whistle she released on her exhale caused the corner of his mouth to lift in an affectionate smile. He crept into the room and made his way to the windows and opened the blinds so the morning light flooded the room. “Rise and shine, sleepy head!” His exuberance obviously didn’t even register with her as all she did was snuggle her head deeper into the pillow and pull the comforter more firmly around her.

He laid down on the bed facing her, tenderly brushing her hair away from her face. “Oh Swan,” he singsonged. She finally cracked an eye open.

“Who’re you?” she slurred, still mostly asleep.

He broke into a full grin. “I’m a new day,” he exclaimed. “New opportunities. New experiences.”

“You’re insane,” she grumbled, turning away from him.

“No, I’m not,” he insisted, getting up from the bed. “Come on Swan, daylight’s a wastin’. Breakfast is ready and we need to get moving.”

“Why?” she questioned, turning back to him. She sent him a side eye as she pushed her hair out of her face and sat up. “Am I making you late for an appointment?”

“Ahh, not an appointment, per se,” he admitted, scratching behind his ear. “More of a rendezvous. Between us. With a specific activity in mind.” His eyes widened along with hers as her mouth fell open when he realized exactly what he just said. Holding his hand out and shaking his head vigorously he nearly shouted, “No, no, no, Swan! That’s not what I meant,” he justified himself, feeling his face flush. “I mean,” he stammered, looking down again, “I had an idea of how we could spend the day.” He looked up and met her skeptical gaze head on. “Deep sea fishing.”

“Deep sea fishing?” she parroted, the incredulous look on her face making him break into a grin.

“Deep sea fishing,” he reiterated. “Have you ever been? Oh, never mind,” he murmured, scratching behind his ear again. “I forgot. You’ve never been to the gulf. And I assume, no other beach as well?”

She sent him another side eye and a smirk. “You assumed correctly.” She climbed off the bed and stood before him. “What is it? A charter? What time is our reservation?”

“Nope, not a charter,” he informed her. “Right behind the pool, on the other side of all that green, is the dock.” He smiled down at her. “The Jolly Roger will be at that dock in,” he checked his watch, “less than an hour.”

Her eyes were nearly comically wide now. “The Jolly Roger?” she choked out, “Are you kidding me? What is it with you and pirates?” She shook her head.

He laughed at her dubious expression. “No, I’m not kidding you, Swan,” he said, shaking his head and waggling his eyebrows at her with a delighted twinkle in his eye. “And, I mean, you were the one who watched Black Sails. I think the name of the ship in the dream, must have been from me.” His gaze turned sheepish. “I’m sorry again for last night, Swan. I…”

“Nope,” she said. “We’re not talking about that. You have a wonderful day planned. Let’s focus on that.”

"You’re right, Swan.” He turned away and retreated to the door of her room. “Like I said, breakfast is ready, so get a move on. I’ll see you up there.” He shut the door gently behind him.

~*~*~

Killian was sitting at the table finishing his coffee when Emma finally made an appearance about thirty minutes later looking much more awake than when he had left her. She wore a red crocheted top with three-quarter sleeves over patterned shorts. Her hair was pulled into a messy braid that lay over her shoulder. The sheepish look she sent him was all kinds of adorable and caused his lips to pull into a smile as he brought his coffee cup up to his lips.

“Uhh,” she worried, “I wasn’t sure what appropriate attire was for deep sea fishing,” she finished, waving her hand vaguely over her body.

“Honestly, Swan,” he began, “your bathing suit and a t-shirt cover-up will be fine. Sunscreen and a sunhat are actually more important. Keep you from getting burned. Do you have rubber soled shoes?”

She nodded as she made her way to the coffee pot. “I brought my tennis shoes.”

“They’ll be fine,” he assured her. “There’s homemade French toast and bacon in the oven. I’ve already eaten. What do you like on it? Powdered sugar? Syrup?” he asked getting up from his chair and coming into the kitchen area.

“Syrup please,” she murmured. He got the syrup out for her and sat it down on the table. She dug in to breakfast with a gusto that surprised him.

“It’s not going anywhere, Swan,” he chuckled. “There’s plenty, and I promise to feed you again at lunch. Speaking of, what would you like me to make for us?”

She grinned around her full mouth. The unintelligible, but entirely adorable mumble that came from her pulled a full laugh out of him. After swallowing, she tried again. “French toast is my favorite. I can’t help digging into it like there’s no tomorrow. What kind of jam is there?”

He made his way to the fridge to search for jam. “We have grape, strawberry, and apple butter.” He straightened back up again. “What did you have in mind?”

“Can we make peanut butter and jelly? With the strawberry jam?” she asked. The almost guilty look on her face made his gut tighten in indignation and made him wonder what or who in her past would make her so hesitant to ask for something as simple as a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

He couldn’t let her know that though, so he smiled at her instead. “Of course we can. Do you like crunchy or smooth peanut butter?”

Her eyes lit up. “Oh smooth, please,” she enthused. Her eagerness waned slightly as she cleared her throat. “I’m sorry. I’m not used to people really caring what I think when it comes to things like that. I mean, Ingrid, my mom, does, but…” she trailed off.

“Wounds made when we’re young tend to linger,” he conceded, nodding. “And I’d imagine that in the foster system, there wasn’t much catering to simple desires and wants. I understand,” he murmured, coming over to her, sitting down next to her, and taking her hand. His eyes met hers and he forced all the sincerity he was feeling into his eyes for her to see. “When it comes to me, Swan,” he continued, “get used to it.”

She nodded slowly, their gaze never breaking. He saw a hesitancy in her eyes that made him want to gather her in his arms and promise that nothing would ever hurt her again. But he knew that love and trust were earned and making rash and ultimately impossible to keep promises would do nothing to move him closer to that goal. So he settled for pouring everything he was thinking and feeling into his eyes and hoping that she would read it. He stood up and went back to the kitchen to prepare their lunch while his Swan finished her breakfast.

~*~*~

“I didn’t even notice this yesterday when we were touring the house,” she enthused, nearly skipping down the dock. Her obvious delight at their excursion thrilled him as well, as he tried, unsuccessfully, to smother his grin and a small chuckle.

She stopped in front of the luxury boat at the end of the dock. The grin she sent him made his heart soar. “Behold! The Jolly Roger! She’s a World Cat Glacier Bay Edition Catamaran. We could run from here to the Bahamas if we wanted to.” He passed her and climbed on holding his hand out to her to help her aboard. “And this is her Captain, Nemo Dakkar.” He indicated the tall, bald man to the side.

He bowed low as he took her hand and brought her knuckles to his lips. “Welcome to the Jolly Roger, milady. We will be heading south from the island about forty miles before we weigh anchor and spend a few hours fishing the depths. We also have snorkeling equipment aboard if you’d like to get in the water.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Captain Dakkar,” she replied, with a slight blush.

“Oh please,” he waved away her formality, “call me Nemo. Have to take advantage of a name like that,” he continued, with a twinkle in his eye.

She let out a laugh that completely relaxed the tension that he could see in her shoulders when she met Nemo. He was so good at putting people at ease, Killian was pleased to see him work his charms on his Swan.

Nemo took the small cooler that held their lunch and turned from the couple to head to the cabin. After settling himself and Emma comfortably on the bench seats behind where Nemo was seated, Killian nodded to him to start the engines.

As they pulled away from the dock, Killian watched Emma closely. She had changed clothes as he suggested into her bathing suit with a sleeveless button up top and shorts over it and tennis shoes. The straw hat on her head and sunglasses on her face did nothing to hide the joy in her wide smile. “You didn’t notice the boat yesterday because it wasn’t here, Swan,” he informed her, shouting above the roar of the twin Yamaha engines. “She’s docked on South Padre Island. I called Nemo last night and asked him to be here at ten this morning.”

“I see,” she shouted back laughing, as the wind tried to whip her hat off her head. Watching her smile and laugh as their temporary home got smaller and smaller behind them, Killian hoped that everything they experienced today would make for a day to remember.

~*~*~

“Tell me a favorite memory of you and Liam,” she asked, smiling.

“Oh, are we playing twenty questions again, Swan?” he joked, with a smirk and raised eyebrow. They had finally reached their destination in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico and had set their rods. Now they just had to wait. Emma had taken off her outer clothes and was sunning herself on the seats at the stern of the boat. The bright blue bikini left little to the imagination and Killian was having a lot of trouble keeping his thoughts from straying into uncomfortable territory. Uncomfortable territory with their audience nearby anyway. So he was thankful when Emma asked him the question.

“Hmmmm,” he pondered. “My favorite memory with Liam.” A grin broke out on his face. “You’re gonna think I’m awful for saying this, but you remember asking if I was competitive?” Emma nodded. “So, March 2004, Liam and I were skiing in Aspen. I was on spring break before I graduated.” Emma’s eyes lit up. “A pretty lass had caught Liam’s eye and he was trying to impress her, so he was being entirely too foolhardy in challenging me to a race. He should have known that I wasn’t going to take it easy on him just so he could impress his lovely lady.” He chuckled, looking down. “Once again, I handed his ass to him. And not only did I beat him, but he took a tumble as well breaking his ankle. I mean, he was fine, eventually. No lasting effects, but it certainly makes for a funny memory for a younger brother.” He looked back up with a wide grin on his face.

“March 2004?” she asked, her eyes dancing, “Do you remember exactly when? I was supposed to be on a senior trip during our spring break in Aspen.”

“Really?” he exclaimed, surprised. “I don’t remember exactly when we were there, but there was a big jazz festival going on that week.”

“Yes!” she laughed, “That’s when we were going. For the jazz festival! I didn’t get to go because I sprained my ankle the week before at a softball game.” Her face fell then. “I cried the entire week they were gone. I don’t know why. I wasn’t even that excited for the trip. I mean,” she amended, holding her hand out to him, “I was looking forward to it, don’t get me wrong,” she shrugged, “but not enough to warrant all the crying I did that week. I just couldn’t shake the feeling that I was missing something. Something important.”

Killian could feel the blood draining from his face. He suddenly remembered that week, with perfect clarity, hovering in that in between state between waking and sleeping, hearing a girl cry as if her heart would break. When he would wake up fully, the crying was gone. He had forgotten about it until this very moment.

“Wait a minute,” he speculated, with a frown on his face, “I remember a group of kids there that week with these obnoxious tie dye lime green and turquoise t-shirts and yellow baseball caps. I remember them because they kept singing this NSYNC song, Bye Bye Bye, but with different words.”

“Oh my god,” she exclaimed, “Those were my friends! And I wrote those lyrics! Oh that is hysterical! That you were there the same week I would have been.” She looked over at him as realization dawned. “I should have been there when you were there.”

Before he married Milah. Before losing who, at the time, he thought, was the love of his life. Would he have met her back then? If so, would that have stopped him from marrying Milah? Sparing him that heartache that was to come? He’d never know. But he couldn’t help but think that if he had met her back then, his life would have been different. He sent her a despondent smile before shaking off his melancholy. “Ok, my turn,” he said, determined to take their conversation into a happier direction. “What was the first movie you saw in a theater?”

She laughed. “You may not believe this, but I remember seeing Aladdin in the theater. My first grade class took a field trip to see it before Christmas break. What about you?”

“My first movie was Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. Favorite movie of all time?”

“The Princess Bride.” She looked down with a slight blush to her cheeks.

“What?” he inquired, as she lifted her face towards him again. “There’s no reason to be embarrassed about loving The Princess Bride. It’s one of my favorites, too.”

“Really?” The amazed hope in her eyes made him catch his breath.

“Are you kidding? Fencing, fighting, torture, revenge, giants, monsters, chases, escapes, true love, miracles… how could it not be?”

She sent him a bemused smirk. “Saw what you did there,” she murmured. Now it was his turn to blush and look down. “What about your favorite movie?”

“Star Wars, the original trilogy,” he answered definitively, with no hesitation whatsoever. “Uhhh… favorite book.”

“My book of fairy tales.” The enhanced blush on her cheeks made his heart stutter in his chest. While the blush may have given away her nervousness at revealing something so personal, she held her head high, refusing to back down from the intimacy engendered by such a revelation. “One of the few good families I had growing up gave it to me for Christmas. I was seven.” She looked down then. “All the stories in the book started with hope. Reading them over the years, helped me keep my hope alive that there was a family out there for me. Someone to love me.” She looked up again with a tremulous smile before nodding toward him for his answer. But he couldn’t. Not until he held her in his arms and assured her of his love for her. Without words of course. He rose to cross over to her when a jingle to his left caught his attention.

“I think you may have caught something, Swan,” he informed her, looking towards her rod and reel.

Emma scrambled up from where she was lounging on the padded seat to where her rod was secured on the edge of the boat.

“Oh my god,” she exclaimed. “What do I do, what do I do, what do I do?” Her excitement and trepidation were hilarious and Killian couldn’t hold back his laugh.

“Reel it in, Swan,” he encouraged. She took the rod in her hands and was nearly pulled overboard, unprepared as she was for the weight of her catch, before Killian grabbed her around her middle and pulled her in to him, securing her back to his front so she’d have the leverage to reel it in. He murmured encouragement in her ear as she leaned against him and did battle with whatever was on the other end of her line.

About ten yards from the gunwale of the boat, the fish made a mighty leap into the air, trying to free itself from Emma’s line. “Swan,” he shouted, “That’s a king mackerel! And a good size too!” Nemo had been standing by waiting for the fish to make an appearance. As Emma finished reeling it in, he pulled the fish over into the boat and unhooked it from the line.

Emma turned around and threw herself into Killian’s arms. “I did it, I did it, I did it!” she shouted. The smile that split her face made his heart soar.

He spun with her in his arms, laughing with her. “That you did, Swan. Well done!” He placed her on her feet, but continued to hug her in celebration of her success.

“Oh this is gross, Killian. We’re sticking together,” she mock complained, pulling out of his arms. She looked up into his face as he went very still. “What’s wrong?”

“That’s the first time you’ve called me Killian,” he murmured.

“Is it?” she asked, with a furrowed brow.

“Yes, Emma, it is.” His azure gaze penetrated the confusion that swirled in her jade depths. The only time he had ever called her Emma, was when she’d called him after the last dream. It was always Swan or Miss Swan in their interactions before and since. Just as it had always been Mr. Jones, Jones, or sir. With her use of his first name, he felt the need to use her first name as well. He pulled her closer again, wanting to impress upon her the importance of the moment when he was interrupted by a series of trills, clicks, and whistles off the port side.

Emma turned wide eyes toward the pod of dolphins that were frolicking and chirping in the water only a couple of feet from the boat. “Dolphins,” she exclaimed, delighted. She turned back to him and Nemo, eyes the size of saucers. “Can we get in the water with them?” she asked, a hesitant hope in her eyes.

“Of course you can, my dear,” the captain laughed. “Leave your hat and sunglasses here. I’ll get out the camera and take pictures.” Emma needed no other encouragement. As she took off her shoes and accessories, Killian got out the snorkel equipment for them both. When they were both properly outfitted, they jumped into the water.

There were ten dolphins in the water including a couple of much smaller ones. The mamas were protective of the little ones, not letting the humans get too close, but the others were eager to play. Killian was in awe of the creatures and watching Emma interact with them brought tears to his eyes and laughter to his heart. He thought his heart would burst when Emma placed a kiss to the nose of one of them. They were both taken for a ride, holding on to the dorsal fin of one of the more adventurous creatures. The animals would often look at the boat and seem to pose for Nemo with the camera. Killian was delighted that Nemo not only took pictures of him and Emma swimming and playing with them, but got pictures of just the dolphins when they were jumping out of the water. After about forty-five minutes of frolicking with the animals, the pod moved away from the boat and Killian and Emma made their way back to it.

~*~*~

Nemo helped Emma back into the boat as Killian came up right behind her. The stunned disbelief on her face melted into pure joy as she laughed at the marvelous adventure they’d had that afternoon. “I still can’t believe it,” she sighed, “I’ve never,” she shook her head, “even been that close to a wild animal before, outside the zoo. And to actually touch one…” she trailed away with a sense of wonder that she knew was all over her face.

She looked at Killian as he came up behind her. “Aye, Swan,” he agreed. “It’s something we’ll never forget.” The moment was too poignant and emotional. She stepped into his open arms and let him hold her. She held the tears she could feel gathering at the corners of her eyes back only by sheer force of will. The emotions on a rampage inside of her demanded an outlet and finally found that release in a barking sob.

“It was so beautiful,” she cried into his shoulder, “and perfect. And I’m so happy. And I’m so sad it’s over. And I’ll never forget it. As long as I live.”

“That’s right, Swan,” he murmured, “let it out. Let it all out. I’ve got you.” He continued to hold her, whispering assurances and what comfort he could in their shared experience. When her sobs finally started to taper off, he reluctantly released her and turned to Nemo. “So let’s see those pics, shall we?”

Emma wiped her eyes and hiccuped as the captain strode forward with the camera. “We also have to get a picture of Emma with her mackerel.”

“Yes, we do,” Killian agreed, smiling down at her and taking the camera. “Ready lass?” he asked. Nemo approached again with her catch and a bright smile broke through the tears at last.

“I weighed it, and this bad boy weighs 47lbs,” the captain exclaimed, his eyes lit up in approval. “Well done!”

Emma let out a watery laugh. “Thank you,” she marveled, taking her fish from Nemo. He took the camera back from Killian and took pictures of the fish, Emma holding it up, and then Emma holding it between her and Killian.

“Now, before we head for home,” he informed them, “I’ll clean it and put it in the fridge. And y’all can have king mackerel for dinner tonight.”

While they waited for Nemo to finish the arduous undertaking of cleaning the huge fish, Emma and Killian sat side by side and scrolled through the pictures of their dolphin adventure. There were also pictures of Emma reeling in her catch. She was near tears again as she looked at the images. There was one that Nemo had caught of one of the dolphins fully jumping out of the water.

“Oh, now I’m getting that one made into a canvas and putting it on the wall,” Killian promised. “Now whether it’s in my office or here or at home will remain to be seen.” He smiled widely at her.

Smiling back, she asked him, “Why not all three? I know I wouldn’t mind seeing that picture wherever I was.”

“You know, you’re right,” he agreed. “Why can’t I have that picture at all three places. Thank you Emma,” he breathed, awareness sparking in his gaze. Slowly he lowered his lips to hers. She smiled into the kiss and opened for him when his tongue requested entrance. She struggled to maintain some semblance of awareness of where they were and who was nearby as he deepened the kiss. She moaned as he lit a fire in her blood when one of his hands reached her breast. She clutched his shoulders as he pulled her closer until she was nearly sitting in his lap. Their tongues continued to duel and their hands continued to roam until they heard a loud clearing of a throat just before the engines roared to life. Breaking apart with a guilty glance back at the captain, who only smirked at them in return, they tried to bring their breathing and heart rates back under control. Killian stood up, rather awkwardly in her opinion, and began to reel in his rod. In all the excitement, they had completely forgotten about it. Once he had it stored, he gave the signal to Nemo and they were off.

Once Killian sat back down, Emma settled herself in between his spread legs and leaned back onto his chest with her head resting on his shoulder. Content just to be there and be held by him, she felt herself start to drift off, safe in the arms of the man she loved after one of the best days of her life.

[valkyrieofsmut]

Engel de la Gargouille  Section 1 part 3

Engel de la Gargouille (Gargoyle’s Angel)

Kurt Wagner/ Nightcrawler x Female OC

Types: Smut, Angst, Mutual pining, Pregnancy, Romance, Love, Insecurity, Long as hell…

Overall series warnings: Smut, bit of violence, swearing, German (translations provided, but I have bad grammar… Sorry native speakers…) (Will be added as they come up) Chapter warnings will be added individually as well.

A/n- Most tags connected to child abuse, such as physical abuse, mental abuse, emotional abuse, and grooming for, but not physically sexual abuse. Self hatred. Thoughts about possible forced prostitution.  Self harm as a way of testing powers. Blood / scabbing.

Masterlist       Series Masterlist

Story!

Angeline woke in the middle of the night to sweat coating her and her sheets, her blankets had been kicked from the bed and her pillows were wet.

She rolled over, scratching at her shoulders.

She felt as though someone was poking needles at her from the inside, causing a prickly, tingly, sort of itchy feeling. She scratched and scratched, hurting as she was sure that she was clawing away at least a couple layers of skin.

Her mind was telling her to stop, that her mother was going to punish her for damaging her skin, but she couldn’t; even though it hurt, it was only in the seconds that the scratches were fresh that she had any relief.

“Stop, I have to stop- stop- stop!” She cried softly, trying to convince her hand to leave her back. She managed to switch hands and looked at the one that had been scratching.

Her eyes widened in horror; she was going to be punished, her mother was going to do more than hit her this time.

She’d thought that the wetness she’d felt was just the sweat that coated her, but her fingers were covered in red and were becoming sticky as they dried, and there was something under her nail that was probably skin.

Her other hand shot to where she could see it, and a sob pushed at her throat.

She had to hide this. She couldn’t let her mother know- maybe it would go away- maybe it wasn't that bad! she hoped desperately. She climbed from her bed and went to the mirror, pulling her shirt off.

Of course, she couldn’t see in the dark and turned her light on, going back to the mirror, looking over her shoulder.

Her back was covered in lines of blood and scratches, and panic was filling her stomach.

She had to hide this! She patted her shirt against her back, trying to get the blood off, running to her night stand and getting her glass of water. She dunked the shirt in it and washed her back, rubbing and rubbing, focused on getting the evidence off of her.

Finally, she thought her back would be clean and looked over her shoulder at the mirror.

She couldn’t see any marks, and her heart leapt with hope. Maybe it wasn’t as bad as she thought.

She felt over her skin, and really couldn’t feel any cuts, so she focused on the next pressing matter; the rest of the evidence. She looked over her sheets carefully, looking for even the most miniscule drop of red. She didn’t see any, even though she went over it multiple times, and the mattress and pillows, then the area in front of the mirror and the mirror as well.

She pulled on different pajamas and stared at the stained ones. What could she do with them?

They were obviously covered in blood; obvious evidence that something had happened…

And if she got rid of them, her mother might notice…

She cracked open her door and looked out into the hall to make sure that no one was there before creeping out and down the hall to the bathroom.

She spent hours trying to wash the blood from the shirt, but no matter how hard she tried, there was still a pinkish red wash stain that she could see through the tears in her eyes.

She hurried into her room and stuffed them under her mattress, then tried to go to sleep, only able to drift off into fitful, disturbed rest due to stress and worry.

The itchiness that had woken her up and panicked her spread down her back, and lasted for two weeks, making her go crazy and use anything around her that wouldn’t hurt her to scratch it, the back scrubber's bristles, her hairbrush, a spoon.

.

One morning a couple if days later, Angeline woke up to strange bumps growing on her shoulders.

She had no idea what was happening, and she was afraid, not only of what was happening, but what her mother would do.

Angeline had to rely on the training she had received from her mother to keep her behaviour natural, because, while it was true that her mother didn’t care much about how she was feeling, or what she thought, she couldn’t start acting strangely all of a sudden.

She started spending most of her free time, what little there was of it, in her room instead of stretching and doing self study in the barre room, not wanting anyone to see the strange things going on with her, and deathly afraid that they would if she spent too much time around them. She went down for meals wearing a jacket over her small shirts, just telling her mother that she was chilly when she commented.

The bumps grew larger and larger, and she started to realize that she could move them, which helped as she tried more and more elaborate ways to hide them, but was soon able to hold them at certain angles as she put her bra on so it would hold them.

Throughout that week, panic attacks threatened to overtake her when her mother got close to her, but she managed to deflect her judging gaze by positioning her body so that the changes were less conspicuous, and keeping deep, even breaths moving through her lungs, as well as somehow managing to keep up with her responsibilities. All of which were mostly done in her room anyway, since her mother was becoming more busy with some things that she wasn’t privy to, as her mother never thought it important to involve her in anything that she didn’t actively need to be a part of.

.

As the week had gone by; after the first two days, she noticed that the bumps had feathers starting to grow on them, and a goose egg like bump had started growing at the base of her spine. By day five, they were no longer bumps, but long, jointed flaps, almost like a whale or dolphin's flippers, and the goose egg had turned into a growing tail, leanly muscled and getting longer daily. As her flippers finished developing, they filled out, spreading down and wide, becoming feathered wings, her tail, on the other hand, looked very much the same; longer, but still flesh colored and leanly muscled. It didn't do much, she had to almost focus on what she wanted it to do to move it.

By the end of the week, Angeline had a fully formed set of white feathered wings, and a very strong tail that was just a few inches over three feet long, which made it long enough to drag on the floor if she didn’t hold it up, or wrap it around her ankle. The wings were very articulate, able to lay the long first few joints close against her back and wrap the rest around her in a tight hug.

She pulled one of her tight shirts on, expecting it to tear, however, it seemed that her mother had wanted her clothing as tight as possible, and had gotten mostly spandex blend tops that stretched around her extra three inches or so of girth. Over that, she put her jacket, and, although very warm, her wings were hardly visible!

She smiled as she stared at her back in the mirror, tucking her hair behind her ear, and noticed that her ears had grown longer and pointed, almost like the pictures she'd seen of elves. She pulled it back straight and left her hair down, as it covered the tips of her ears so they weren't noticeable.

.

After a nice, hot shower, and blow drying her hair and feathers, Angeline rubbed her shoulders, feeling the soreness to her new wing muscles. She flexed them in front of her full length mirror, admiring them.

Freedom.

She could hold them close, keep them hidden under a longer coat, and her tail fit under her pants or skirt perfectly. Her pointed ears poked out from her hair and her hand touched the mirror, as though to reach her reflection.

Since her "audition", she had been afraid of what would happen when she went to filming in three weeks, but she’d grown these.

She looked like a freak.

She smiled wider as she stared at her hand, pressing her middle fingers together like she’d heard they had been when she was born.

She wouldn’t be able to go to the movie.

She wouldn’t have to be in any movies.

She couldn’t go to producers, or talent scouts, or managers anymore.

She wouldn’t have to listen to her mother telling her to kneel before them and do what she’d been taught so she could get the part. It had been bad enough the three weeks earlier when her mother had tried to make her watch

She looked up to her reflection’s eyes. “Happy birthday,” she told herself.

Sixteen was apparently the perfect age, just like she’d been told, although for a different reason.

She stretched her wings and tried to flap them as if to fly. They were powerful, and she nearly knocked herself over.

She had to try this out.

She flapped and fluttered, but really just made very large jumps using only her wings, as her room didn't have enough space to actually fly.

When she’d worn herself out, she realized that she was very excited and wished she had someone to talk to about this as she stood gasping for breath and smiling.

She looked in the mirror to admire her wings again, and realized that she’d been jumping around in her underwear for the last few hours.

She was so giddy that she just laughed.

...    ...    ...    

Angeline dug through her closet until she found her page boy hat, pulling it on and tugging it down over the tips of her ears.

She was going to have to go to school today.

She'd chosen a little fluffier of a skirt so that the outline of her tail wasn't visible, and her off the shoulder shirt hung low enough that it covered the bottom of her wings, and when she pulled on her jacket, it covered her shoulders.

She left her room, hoping that her mother wouldn't notice her perhaps strange outfit choices, and trying to act as normal as possible.

After she returned from her classes that day, and did her line practice, as well as the script practice for the movie, which she didn't want to give up all of a sudden in case her mother suspected something, she pulled her jacket off and tugged at her shirt until her wings could struggle out of the fabric.

That made it so that the shirt was choking her, though, so she quickly fixed it and found a tank top that she could pull on over her legs, since it would be hard to get it on correctly over her head with her wings either in the way, or trapped under it, and was glad to feel that the tank top ended under her new wing joints. She adjusted her shirts, finding the most comfortable way to wear them that would still let her use her wings.

She went over to her window and opened it, looking back into the room and running to lock the door before going back to the window.

With a glance outside, though, she turned back to the room, thinking that she needed to hide her identity; she couldn't let someone see her who might tell her mother, and of course the worry was so great that she didn't even realize that there was actually a very low chance that anyone she would see would recognize her, but in the end, it's better safe than sorry, and she grabbed a mask that covered half of her face, thinking this would be enough of a disguise, and went to the window again.

Pulling the mask securely over her face, she climbed onto the window sill and leapt out, flapping hard to gather the altitude she needed to get away from her house undetected. She flapped her wings, surprised by how natural it felt to have them, and how easily she was flying, despite having never done it before, or ever hearing of anyone else doing it before.

As she glided above the city buildings, she saw a bus speeding through the street, nothing out of the ordinary, except that she had also seen a flash of a boy chasing a ball into the street.

She'd seen enough movies to know that this is when the camera cut away to the ball bouncing away and tires screeched in the background.

The thought that she should do something popped into her mind with an urgency, and her wings automatically moved, tilting and angling so that she was shooting down toward the boy, crashing into him and grabbing blindly, her arms managing to wrap around him, as they careened into an alleyway.

Angeline sat up, sorting herself out quickly, and made sure that the boy was ok, pushing him to the edge of the alley before flapping her wings and taking off.

.

After a couple more days sneaking out to fly around the town, and stopping a man from kidnapping a teenager, she decided that she needed a bigger coat; her jacket did cover her wings, but it wasn't the most comfortable thing to wear, and wearing it out here was getting it dirtier than she expected, which was going to make her mother notice.

She snuck down to the hall closet, closing the door behind her to stay hidden, since there was a light and enough room to stand inside of it.

She looked through the coats, sure that there would be one that would work, especially since her stepfather was six feet tall, and she was only about five foot.

She found an older duster and knew that it would for sure cover her wings, as it fell all the way to the ground when she put it on, dragging just the edge on the floor as she turned around. She smiled and nodded in decision, but froze as she heard footsteps coming closer to her.

"Yeah, I know. It is depress- oh-"

Angeline threw herself between coats, turning so that the duster hid her from the view of the closet door as it opened.

"No, I agree with you, someone just left the closet light on," her stepfather assured, stepping into the closet and pausing, standing there as he continued his conversation. "I understand what you're saying; this new one is making it hard to spread the word about mutants when what it's doing is making them look good."

Angeline's brows met. Mutant? She had heard that word before, him saying it at the dinner table as he spoke about work, and maybe on a few of his work phone calls, she thought.

What was a mutant? Memory filled her mind; she'd asked that same question, and he'd told her that a mutant was a dangerous animal that looked like a human, and sometimes they didn't look human at all.

"No, for sure, I know that we will be able to make them see the truth, I mean, mutants are popping up more and more, and whatever that lunatic with the helmet does proves our point more; mutants need to be registered, and monitored." He turned off the light and closed the door behind him, still paused outside the door as he finished his conversation. "I really think that if we do that, if we can sterilize them to stop them from breeding, they'll die out naturally, and we still look good, like our only concern is for the public. Then we won't have to worry about those- animal rights groups,” he paused and made a sound like he was trying to get the taste out of his mouth, “protesting and causing a scene."

Angeline listened at the door for a few moments before opening it and hurrying upstairs.

She was glad that she wasn't a mutant; they sounded like bloodthirsty monsters, the way he spoke about them. She paused as she closed her bedroom door, pondering for a moment.

Was she a mutant? But she was a human, and had started out that way, not as an animal.

She shook her head in dismissal.

Besides, she was doing good things; saving that kid from getting hit by a car, stopping that man from kidnapping that teenager, if anyone was a bad guy, and therefore maybe a mutant, it would be the guy who was trying to kidnap people.

She was different, sure, but not a bloodthirsty animal monster.

After spending an afternoon going through her closet, Angeline found the best outfit for her excursions; a pair of older jeans that were tight, as nearly all of her clothes were, with her tail down one leg you couldn't see it, and with a tank top under her wings, and a looser, low cut, shirt over them, she could look completely normal if she had to take off her coat, but no one would be able to see her bare skin when she had to pull the bottom of the top shirt up so her wings could move freely, and the duster she'd borrowed from her stepfather not only made it so she didn't have to hold her wings so tight, it disguised the bulk from them when she just had them folded behind her, she had her hat to hide her ears, and the mask on her face to hide her identity.

For school she had nearly the same style, but with her regular jacket instead of her stepfather's duster, which her mother would never approve of.

Her mother had gotten angry at her over the week because she was eating more; she felt like she was always starving! Apparently, flying took a lot of energy.

Angeline had been afraid that her mother would hit her, or more, but she had glared at her and told her that she was lucky that her body had to be pretty for the movie and that she was too busy getting things ready for it.

Her mother's way to deal with her had turned to checking her weight daily, and looking to make sure she was appropriately dressed as she dropped her off at the school, but otherwise ignoring her so that she didn't get angry enough to hit her and leave marks where her skin would be showing for the movie.

.

Soon after getting her clothing situation sorted out, Angeline was flying across the city, watching the flow of traffic and the people wander along as she enjoyed the air against her skin.

She rolled in the air, laughing in amazement at how her wings seemed to know what to do; all she had to do was think of what she wanted to do, be it a dive, a roll, a flip, anything, and all she had to do was think of doing it for her wings to make it reality.

She looked down at the street, another laugh escaping her lips, but cut off as she saw a man pointing a gun at a woman. Her wings turned her to them without her even thinking it.

She landed on the roof and looked down, troubled and unsure of what to do.

The woman needed help, she wanted to help, but the man had a gun. He was dirty, and large, wearing clothing that covered him and made it hard to see his face.

“Just give me the money!”

The woman was shaking so badly that she couldn’t, and the man waved the gun at her.

Angeline felt her insides twisting, but- she was sure that the poor woman was going to get shot if she didn’t comply, and she could hardly control her shaking legs enough to not fall down.

Angeline took a breath and steeled herself, deciding to sneakily land at the back of the alley.

She could help the woman comply, at least, and that should help her survive.

Her wings let her land nearly silently on the street behind a dumpster, and she slowly left its shelter. “Please,” she said softly, and the man spun to look at her, the gun still pointed at the woman.

“Who the hell are you?! Where did you come from?!”

“I just want to help- I’ll get it for you, so please don’t hurt her…” The woman’s eyes left the gun and moved to her. “Just give him the purse and we’ll walk out of here,” she told her. The woman shook her head. “It’s the best way out of the situation,” Angeline told her. She moved closer, and the man watched her.

“Stop, don’t get any closer to her!”

Angeline stopped and looked at the man. “I’m only trying to help.”

The man was starting to react in a strange way, and Angeline didn’t know what to do to put him at ease. If she had wanted him to come closer so she could seduce him, or buy something for her, it would have been no problem, but this, calming him, she had no idea.

He waved the gun at the two of them, and neither moved. “F-fine, get the bag, give it to me!”

Angeline moved toward the woman, holding her hand out for the purse. The woman shook her head again, but Angeline stepped next to her. “Money and cards can be replaced, but not your life,” she told her.

The woman finally relented and jerkily let the purse strap slide down her arm so she could hold it out to the man. He reached out, and Angeline turned to keep her eyes on him.

The woman suddenly threw the purse at the man and ran.

Angeline and the man both jumped in surprise, and a bang echoed through the alley.

The man stared at her as she looked down to her shoulder, where it felt like she'd been punched.

Blood was starting to run down down her shoulder and chest.

The man turned and ran as fast as he could out of the space. Panic started building in Angeline’s stomach and thoughts started firing rapidly through her mind.

She had gotten shot- she had damaged her body; her shoulder was probably broken, defiantly bloody- she was getting blood all over her clothes- her mother was going to kill her!

“Oh no,” she whimpered as tears started building in her eyes.

She wasn't supposed to be out of the house without permission, which her mother only gave for school, and she was injured, had damaged her body.

Even if her mother didn't beat her to death, she would very seriously turn to renting her out to make the money back for all the trouble she'd been…

She didn't want that!

Maybe- maybe if she could get back to her room- if she could just get back to her room, her mother might never know she had left it! She would take her to the hospital and have them fix her shoulder, and everything would be ok. Even if she died, at least she’d be in her room and her mother wouldn’t find out that she’d left.

“I'm sorry, mama,” she whimpered as pain filled her shoulder.

It was different from the pain she'd felt before; that was all external pain, but this, it was a little like when her wings had started growing, pushing from the inside, feeling like it was deep in her bones.

She managed to gather herself enough to let her wings do their thing, flying her back home as she panicked.

‘Please, if mama never finds out, if everything is ok, I'll be a good girl, I won't go out anymore, I'll do what she says, I'll kneel down when she says,’ she started bargaining with an unknown force in the universe, anyone, anything, as long as it would stop the doom she felt awaited her if her mother found out what had been happening.

She made it to her house, flying high to the roof so no one would see her, then lowering herself to her window and climbing in.

The pain in her shoulder was less, now, like when her body became accustomed to her mother hitting her and stopped paying attention to it.

She hurried to the large mirror and stood in front of it, looking at her shoulder to see how bad it was.

Flying through the air had made a lot of the blood dry, and she was coated in a lot of half congealed and crusted blood.

She managed to shrug off her coat, letting the duster fall to the floor as she pulled the collar of her shirt out of the way.

She couldn’t see clearly what had happened, so she went to where she had left a bottle of water, and pulled out the ruined bloody pajama shirt she had left under her mattress, unsure of what to do with it.

She wet the shirt and started wiping at the outsides of the blood, expecting it to hurt the closer she got to the wound.

She had washed the whole outside, and couldn’t see anything wrong, or feel any pain. With slow, soft strokes, she started cleaning over where the shot had hit her.

She still couldn’t see anything…

With her face twisted in confusion, Angeline cleaned her entire shoulder, but saw only a red welt.

She blinked in confusion and poked the spot. It hurt, but only as much as she did after getting hit with a belt, maybe.

Had she made it all up in her mind? She looked down to her clothes, and saw that her shirt was still soaked with blood in the area around her shoulder and down her chest.

She poked it again, very confused.

She went over to her dresser where a vase holding a few roses was sitting, and pulled one of the thorns off, turning it and pushing it against the soft skin near where the bullet had hit.

It caught after a moment and sank into her skin, making her gasp. She pulled it out and wiped over the blood drop that had started welling out, revealing a puncture mark.

After a moment, she wiped again, and the small hole had disappeared.

She blinked in surprise. Had she healed? Did it really go that fast?

She stabbed herself with the thorn again, and had the same result.

After thinking for a moment, she changed and snuck to the room with her mother’s wardrobe in it, finding the drawer with the alteration things in it and taking a needle and the large, heavy cutting shears and quickly went back to her room, closing and locking the door again.

She held the needle up and looked at it, taking a breath to steady herself before doing what she was about to.

Angeline clenched her jaw, pushing the needle against her arm, closing her eyes so that she didn’t have to watch it sinking into her skin.

After feeling like she had pushed enough to make it in a short way, enough to be able to tell anyway, she opened her eyes and they widened in shock.

Without realizing it, she had pushed the needle halfway into her arm.

When she just left it there, she felt a strange tugging against the skin where the needle was, and watched as it was pushed out of her arm to tumble to the carpet.

Angeline blinked at it, wondering how it had happened.

She opened the scissors, and carefully cut her ribs under her breast, probably the only place her mother would never find the cut if it didn’t heal, and watched in the mirror as it healed.

She stood and went to the door of her closet.

It was a heavy, good quality door, like the rest in the house, and she braced herself, putting her fingers in the open space between the hinges, gritting her jaw and throwing the door closed with her other hand.

Angeline could hear the light, but solid snapping of the bones of her fingers breaking as the door bounced off of them and opened back up.

Angeline whimpered as she fell to her knees, holding her crooked and deformed looking hand to her, staring at how her fingers pointed in strange, unnatural angles.

It hurt so bad, she was nearly sobbing as she watching in amazement, seeing her fingers snapping and popping as, movement by movement, joint by joint, they put themselves back into order.

Angeline moved back over to where the shears were on the floor.

She held out the hand she’d just watch repair itself and managed to get the tip of her finger into the scissors, holding one side while the other rested on the floor.

She quickly pushed them closed, and a chunk of flesh fell. She took the shirt and held it under her hand to catch the blood running down her wrist as she watched her finger bleed.

Slowly, it got longer and reformed.

She rinsed her hand off the best she could and stared at her finger.

It looked perfectly normal.

She hurried to the bathroom and washed her hand, drying it to see that it was perfectly normal.

She looked up at herself in the mirror with wide eyes. “I’m indestructible…”

Tag List!

@racheo91 @a-book-pressed-rose @tephi101 @keldachick @Randomfandompenguin @Avacadobutthole @mannls @screeching-student-unknown @lilypalmer1987 @pingu89 @gifsbysimplysonia​ @omnomsauruswrites​ @Mybloodtypeiscoffee  

[curious-minx]

The Art Patron (SHORT STORY)

Somewhere in between purchasing a full set of decorative Simpsons plates, a perfectly cromulent companion to my custard yellow walls, and generating writing prompts for aspiring writers to never do, I made a discovery that will change my life forever. 

My love language is tinsel wrapped gifts of the highest and personal order. I wanted my lady love to have a very special Kansas Day. She wasn’t from Kansas, nor did she care much for the Simpsons. She liked them just fine. Oh! A fellow is offering the artistic service of turning “ME!” into a Simpson! My walls could use all of the soggy rubber ducky yellow art it can get and seeing as the only pictures I have of myself are in the womb I think this would be one step closer to adulthood. Click, yes, sir please Turn Me into a Simpson button. Huh…$500. That’s really steep. I close the laptop and pace  around my small, growing increasingly smaller bedroom, and  I trip over a foam dumb bell. I am black and bruised. I have even made myself start bleeding. Dammit I guess I have no choice but to turn myself into a Simpson now. How else will I remember how I looked before I broke my face, but I don’t own any pictures of myself!

I have been grocery shopping recently at Sal’s Little Big Sega Bodega! She’s surely got me on camera. I huff down the thirty six flights of my storied building and tip my doorman handsomely. Listen to the heels click and clatter, Big City Blues are calling me. Sal’s Little Big Sega Bodega is one of the only approachable monuments to commerce on this fiscally icy block. I waltzed right in through the copyright infringing doors and blast a salutations to Sal herself. Sal puffs on a waterlogged stodgy and turns a page in a dirty magazine about Russian propaganda. There is a man dressed up in a Sonic the Hedgehog suit cleaning up a bloody mess pooling around the cramped store.

The man dressed as Sonic tells me,“Surf’s up, homie.” The gory puddle ripples and soaks. I step around armed with an armful of Clickers, a steady Shenmue stress ball and a  pre-wrapped Alex Kidd Enchanted Castle hoagie, I will have to pick out the pickled capers but it’s still a nice mayo dense sammie.

“Sal, fair clerkess I am hoping you are having a good day.” I am going to crack into the Sal safe one chit at a chat.

“Nope. Keep it moving, kid. Take your change.” She slides my change across the counter and even though I typically despise when people refuse to make hand to hand contact with lending of money I can accept Sal when she does this. She has clearly lived a life.

“I understand, the ToeJam and Earl flavored condoms don’t stock themselves.”

Sal snaps back, “Look-I know you appreciate all of this geeky shit, but this is my livelihood.”

“Sal, I really think you should take an improv class. You would learn not to start all of these customer interactions marinated in sea salt brine saltier than Ecco the Dolphin’s home...I will see myself out.” Damn I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t ask for a simple favor. An old woman with a brawny  pale tattooed man on leash has entered the store just as I am leaving. The old woman takes off her wig, revealing a bald shiny head and a pistol. She begins shoving the pistol at Sal. Sonic turns on the Jet Set Radio to full blast and slips in the bloody puddle.

I don’t want to call the police, but I call the police.

“Hello, I don’t like you.”

“911, what is your emergency.” The tone of the pig operator is harsh and accusatory. I try to swallow, but I am choking on my enchanted hoagie.

“Bang! Bang! Cops and robbers! 72nd and Pacific Ave! Be here or be square!” I hang up the phone and in my burst of adrenaline have to remind myself to not smash my own phone. I go around the corner and wait for the cops who show up. Hours go by and the Sega bodega burns, robbed and pillage. What a world. The cops finally show up when they finally feel like it and are asking Sal the typical useless questions.

“An old woman and her lackey robbed me blind and you’re just going to file some paperwork?!”

“Listen, sweetheart, this is a big bad world. Shit happens. Buck up.” Office Doomsdairy tips his cardboard hat at Sal and takes a Chocolate Milk that has one of the Super Monkey Ball Monkeys winking on the carton. The cop chugs the whole milk carton and slides Sal a twenty.

“Buy yourself something happy, you look like a miserable bitch. Also, I grew up in a Nintendo household you’re lucky I don’t arrest you for being on the wrong side of the console wars! God dammit! I hate all of these sexual harassment protocols! I used to have a partner I could wisecrack to! Thank you for calling 911, have a nice day.” The cop is leaving and I puff my chest like a mighty Maine puffin and say to the officer, “Wait!”

The cop responds, “Dude, I’m on break. Buzz off.”

“No officer, you should take a look at the security camera footage. You will see that Sal isn’t lying!”

“Yeah, sure whatever.” The filthy cop and I go back inside and now with the Wrong side of the Law by my side I can finally get my security camera footage.

“Why don’t you just take a picture of yourself? You have a phone don’t you?” Asks a nagging insipid voice that sounds rough and grainy against my thoughts. I shove the voice away and continue standing by the dirty Lawman’s side.

“So uh I think I need to see the security livestream. You do have a security camera right?”

“Yes, officer, I have security.”  Sal makes a throat cutting motion over to the Sonic man behind her who sadly puts away his Golden Axe. Sal lifts open her gate for the officer to step through and he immediately turns on the bathroom security footage and begins fast tracking and rewinding the footage stopping at every womanly shape. He does this for a while and clutches at his foam padded pants.

“Hey kid, this technology bewilders me. Maybe you should find the crime.” The cop stretches and scrolls through his phone while I fumble with this alien technology hoping to click the right video feed. I eventually stumble, click onto a feed of the main entryway and rewind to the robbery. I look over and notice that the cop is injecting himself with a violent red powder and kicking at Sal’s managerial locker. I rewind further and find a good headshot of myself prior to my accident. Seeing as I stop in every day it doesn’t take long for me to find yesterday’s beautiful face. I cringe and take out my own phone and take a picture of my image on the security camera display monitor. I fast forward back over to the unfolding of the crime. Another cop appears, Officer Wrathsberg.

“Fuckin hurry up Doom! What’s the hold up? You jerking off to potty pics again? And who the hell is this civilian? Get out of here!” I take my leave and hurry back home with a visage of myself in tow. I tip my doorman again and rush back up my thirty six flights of stairs. Back home. My plants are still wilting, my cat still isn’t back from her shopping trip, and my walls are still the color of Big Bird’s sperm. I upload a picture of a picture of myself and take another $500 out of my savings. I am going to be turned into a Simpsons.

The Simpsonfy me fill out form is of a considerable depth. They want to know a lot of personal information that I am frankly insulted no one has ever asked me about before. Some questions make me reconsider my entire worldview. I am going to be one terrific Simpson. I finish the survey and look for a way to tip the artist, but their cryptic Paypal does not offer a tip button so I add on an extra $25 to the $500. I wait. In the amount of time it takes for someone to open and close an app I get a response.

“Thanks. I will see you tonight.”

“Wait, what?” I say out loud and really wish I hadn’t. Going to take hours to get this kind of negative energy out of my house. I type up, “No thanks, please find attached the photograph of my visual likeness to assist you on what I am sure to be a lovely portrait. Thanks again and I hope you have a nice Kansas day!”

I close my laptop and masturbate because I am grateful for being an artistic patron. I feel what Walt Disney must have felt every time he flexed and brought a new animated confection to the world. The wait for the portrait will be excruciating.

My lady love, who is totally not my sister, Franchesca has returned home! I rush to the front door like a toddler puppy hybrid too cute for his own good embracing the warm glow of the Feminine return, and she grunts out a hello. She peels off every article of clothing off from her body and leaves it behind like a scorned Pompei cast away and excuses herself to the shower. I bend down and sweep up her sticky and sweet bundle of clothes and fold them into the clothing hamper. I wait for her shower and she joins me in the rhomboid rumpus (and rumble) room clad in nothing but her Parisian robe.

“So, how was your day?” asks Franchesca, and I look into the depths of her expansive molasses colored eyes.

“Pretty good! I got you a Kansas Day gift! Do you want to open it now or later?” I hand her the wrapped stack of decorative Simpsons plates.

“Um sure? Kansas Day? Is this because I told  you about that anime convention orgy I attended in Kansas? Either way, it is appreciated.” She unravels my gift which is wrapped in such a way to provide a user-friendly experience. She stares  at the top plate on the stack, Lisa and Bleeding Gums Murphy saxing together in the moonlight. The best plate. Franchesca puts it down, not even considering the other four plates in the set.  

“Thanks so much! I am sure one of these will look great hanging up on her walls the color of sick lemon. The purples will work real nicely. Now if you don’t mind me I think I will have a nice lie down for awhile. Wake me if you need anything.” Franchesca retires to her separate bed chambers leaving the pile of decorative plates and wrapping paper. I don’t bother picking them up. I don’t know what sort of reaction I was expecting, but this one left me cold. At the very least she could have dramatically smashed one against my head if she hated them so much. I slink away to the liquor cabinet.

I bend down to the  liquor cabinets’ sleepy filigree doors and whisper into them, “I will take one big and brown, please.” I take out a mostly full bottle of pre-made Whiskey Sour. Too many times I have gotten super sloshed making my own cocktails and making a huge mess in the kitchen, and as anyone who has ever met me always leaves with one and only one impression: “I can tell that he’s not the biggest fan of messes.” I messily chug straight from the bottle until I sputter out the synthetic 65% concoction. I pour another glass in a frosted novelty glass of a franchise I don’t even like and sink into my chaise beanbag lounge. At least when I wake up I will finally be a Simpson.

////

My throat is too dry to swallow. My eyes, too blurry and caked over to blink. My arms were too roped and bound to move. I try to speak but only weakness comes out. Every inch of my body feels like it is experiencing a tingly chemical burn. I produce a groan! That’s progress. The room isn’t spinning, but it’s not a stable clear image for me either.

“Congratulations Mister Branche, you’ve officially been made into a Simpson.”

“Dooough.” I am trying to ask what the hell is going on, but my mouth is also too heavily caked over in a rubbery mask to move. My vision is starting to reappear and I am not too sure I want to keep seeing what I am seeing.

“Hush, now do you want an official Simpson name? I was thinking Albert Sacksworth, but I am always open to my clients suggestions. No rush, but I will need a decision in less than twenty four hours if we are going to sign your official Simpsons birth certificate.

“Dooough.” I am trying to say that this is an outrage and as a fellow literalist I am sickened by this criminal negligence, untie me you scoundrel!

I am released into the world as a Simpson character. I only have eight fingers now. I will use all eight of these fingers to climb my way back into my lady loves’ arms.

The End.

[nickelbackfanfiction]

Part II

The sun sets on an empty stretch of forgotten highway.  There, amidst the downed sycamores and overturned cars, stands the silhouette of a man outlined in the red fury of evening sun.  

From his back he pulls a guitar, void black and etched in the shimmering gold characters of a language long since forgotten by modern man.  

His arm raises high into the dying light, pausing for a moment as a white moth chances to land upon his outstretched fingertips.  He strikes the guitar with a force strong enough to send shockwaves rippling down the road, debris and detritus sent bouncing toward the heavens before crashing back down in a heap.  

A lightning bolt cracks the sky and slams into him, sending outward a sparking crazed collective of electric blue tendrils.  

Suddenly the sun shoots violently skyward, growing redder and larger as it reaches a zenith directly above the man’s head.  Birds explode upward from unseen hiding places, threatening to blot out the unnatural daylight.  

A voice tears through the cacophony, holding a commanding tone of total clarity, echoing and building, shattering asphalt, glass and animal alike.  In the moments before overwhelming awe and resonating frequencies collaborate to break the rhythm of beating hearts, creatures large and small alike place the beginnings of the chorus of their oblivion.  

“Look at this photograph,”  

Nickelback has returned.

---

It was crazy to see Nickelback again after all this time.  Especially since I was doing about ninety miles per hour down the highway, and Nickelback was running twenty over the speed limit alongside my car.  

I waved at Nickelback and he waved back at me and then he reached down and when he came back up he was holding up a baby diaper full of PCP and pointing at it and while winking repeatedly and suggestively.  

‘That wiley Nickelback, still up to all his old tomfoolery.’ I thought with faux-exasperation and like a cutesy scrunched up face and head nod at the camera so you know my expression is fake exasperated and not real exasperated.

I knew it was time to hang out with my best friend Nickelback again when my car careened through a barrier and Nickelback and me were flying through the sky over the city and Nickelback pulled out his guitar and super-slammed out the opening chords of Nickelback’s hit famous song Photograph and that’s when I saw it flashing across the sky in the fireworks flying out of Nickelback’s guitar,

‘THE TIME I DID PCP WITH NICKELBACK PART II: THE NICKELBACKENING’

---

Shit was about to get real.  

At least that’s what Nickelback kept shouting in my ear over and over.  

Nickelback was holding me in a reverse bearhug and we were torpedoing toward the dorms of the College School for Adults.  What PCP Nickelback couldn’t cram down my throat he was violently inhaling up his own nose so he didn’t have to stop shouting at me while he did it.  

Me and Nickelback must have crashed through like at least eight floors before we stopped RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE OF THE GIRLS LOCKER ROOM.  

FOR REAL.  

We knew we were in Boob City, USA right away.  

Me and Nickelback immediately got up and started flexing immediately.  We must have high fived like four thousand times.  At least.  All the girls were naked and cheering the entire time.  Nickelback saw so many boobs he went Super Saiyan for a minute.  Somewhere around the third hour of cheering and flexing and comparing boners, the cops came in the locker room to tell Nickelback to play Photograph.  Everyone knew all the lyrics.  It was awesome.

Pretty soon the whole building collapsed because word got around town that Nickelback was in the girls locker room and everyone kept trying to get into the building to hear Nickelback play Photograph.  Nickelback still probably played it like 34 times.  No one got tired of it.  

Most of the people were twitching on the floor in a state of involuntary religious ecstasy from being so close to Nickelback when the building collapsed so it's not a big deal because that’s how most people say that they want to die anyways according to National Polling.  Me and Nickelback were fine though cause of the PCP and also we know you’re supposed to flex hard as fuck in a building collapse to survive and we both flex hard as fuck.  

Me and Nickelback fist bumped back and forth with both hands in the rubble and it looked super cool but after about fifteen minutes of checking to see if anyone was watching we decided to stop.  

Nickelback said he knew about a hard rocking rock and roller rock party happening across town and if anyone knows about a hard rocking rock and roller rock party it's for sure Nickelback the undisputed by anyone number one hard rocking rock and roller rocker on the entire planet.

Nickelback ran in front of a passing city bus and launched himself like a magnificent dolphin-man through the windshield and then out of the back of the bus and then through the windshield of a bus behind it and I guess that somehow kept happening for a minute despite how unrealistic it sounds cause Nickelback pushed off real hard with his legs which are like pythons or a strong animal that’s more leg shaped than a python.  

Eventually Nickelback got slowed down enough and crashed through one more bus windshield and landed next to the driver.  Pretty soon, the bus rolled over to me and the door opened up and fog spilled down the stairs and confetti shot everywhere and when it cleared there was Nickelback.  

Nickelback was covered in glass and when the light hit him just right he looked like disco ball made out of sweaty meat.  I swear on a brutal awful prolonged death to all my closest friends and family that it was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.  

Nickelback threw the driver down at my feet and beckoned me onto the bus, taking the now unoccupied seat behind the wheel.  

Someone started to ask to get off the bus but Nickelback turned around and spit right in her stupid mouth.  

Fuck you Sharon.  

“Come with me if you want to rock and roll.”  Nickelback said to me from the driver’s seat before explaining to everyone that it was a Terminator reference.  The whole bus did Arnold impressions for like an hour and one guy definitely was doing a Tim Allen but it was a good impression so no one minded.  

Nickelback peeled out with the bus and the back end fishtailed it super hard like in The Fast and the Furious Tokyo Drift and this one guy who was in the way got swatted into next week.

It was crazy when we saw him again on another crazy adventure that we had next week.  

---

It wasn’t looking like things were gonna end well for the passengers on the bus.  Most of them were already unconscious or concussed from all the sick ramps that Nickelback was ramping off of rampantly.  Ramps.  But now we were about to hit a Hot Wheelz style loop de loop that the taxpayer bailout essentially paid for when Nickelback told me “Better bail out if you want to live,” and then explained that it was a Terminator reference.  

That’s when I saw that the lousy SOCIALIST HITLER GOVERNMENT still hadn’t finished installing the boost pads that you absolutely need to have on a loop de loop track like this if you ever want to get a bus or a semi or like a dinosaur with race car wheels to fully clear the loop.

We bailed a big one.

And we weren’t going to make it.  

I didn’t know what was going to hurt more, the impact onto the concrete below or the loss of faith in the inner workings of our government I was sure to have later on once I started considering all the bureaucratic red tape that had so clearly failed us and every citizen of this fine nation who wants to wang hard around loop de loops.  

The bus, to it’s credit, was hard working and AMERICAN made before it inevitably exploded into a searing inferno about twenty feet behind where me and Nickelback landed.  It looked pretty cool but I guess me and Nickelback had probably seen bigger explosions.  

Both our legs had sunk to the knee into the concrete when we landed because we were flexing hard as fuck.  We looked at each other, each clearly contemplating the chaotic scene before them.  

Nickelback high fived me so hard he broke my arm in three places.

We set off on foot.  Well, I did.  Nickelback insisted on riding my shoulders.  It was like that Jesus poster with the footprints but maybe the opposite because while I’m not sure that Nickelback is the literal son of God, I know for sure that if he put a gun to my head I’d for sure say that he is.  For sure.

Me and Nickelback decided that it was probably time for Nickelback to go incognito because too many people were always going “Hey that’s Nickelback!” and then trying to follow us and get Nickelback to play Photograph.  

Then we did a montage of Nickelback trying on all sorts of different outfits and the camera would cut to me every time and I’d like shrug or shake my head or something like really exaggerated until one of them I gave a knowing nod to like ‘hey that look that you’re wearing is the look that you should get Nickelback.’  

Walking on Sunshine was playing the whole time.  I don’t know where it was coming from.

Nickelback had picked out one of the potted plants from the front entrance of the mall as his incognito outfit that I helped pick out in the montage I just talked about.  Nickelback put his legs through holes he made in the bottom and the lip of the clay pot came up to just under his nipples.  His face came out through the fern in the pot and he was wearing one of those explorer hats because we both thought that was the fashion look that most suited him and also our needs to be outside as Nickelback without everyone asking you to play Photograph all the time.

Also Nickelback could pull his arms and legs into the pot and it was like he was a turtle and shit fuck if Nickelback doesn’t love turtles I swear to god he is always yelling at the top of his lungs at homeless people about how much he fucking loves turtles.

Nickelback couldn’t believe how normal life was when he was a potted plant instead of Nickelback.  I showed him all the normal guy things that I do and no one bothered us because it wasn’t weird and they didn’t know he was actually Nickelback because his disguise was so good.

Eventually Nickelback said that we needed to find some wheels and shades.  I agreed wholeheartedly with Nickelback because it’s impossible to say no to Nickelback because he’ll just spit in your mouth before you can get the word out.  

We found a bunch of skater punks skating and Nickelback challenged them to a skate off for their skateboards.  They didn’t know he was Nickelback or otherwise they probably would have never accepted.

I’d never even seen half the tricks that Nickelback was doing to shred gnar at the skate off.  

All the skaters had their expectations subverted because before this they all thought that a potted plant couldn’t skateboard but later they realized that they were just prejudiced and Nickelback showed them something ugly inside of themselves.  

They were never mean to potted plants again.  

At one point Nickelback did a kickflip so hard that it broke open a hole in spacetime that we had to staple shut like pretty quick once the screams coming out of it got too annoying for Nickelback to concentrate.  

Nickelback finally locked in his win with a trick called the Nickel Backflip which was so cool that one of the skaters literally pooped their pants and some say is still pooping their pants to this very day.  

One by one all the skaters gave Nickelback their skateboards and Nickelback told them that we needed their shades too and we got the sweetest shades they were like the Blues Brothers ones.

After we shackled all the boards to the bottom of Nickelback’s newly coined Nickelpot we put on our sweet shades and took off to find the biggest hill in town which was right where we were anyway.  We didn’t have to go anywhere or do anything interesting or grow at all as people to achieve our goal.

I asked Nickelback if this was the way to the hard rocking rock and roll party and Nickelback said “Where we’re going we don’t need no stinking party,” and I started to ask if that was a Scarface reference but Nickelback spit in my mouth.

While I was fastening myself hard to the back of the Nickelpot like one of those Garfield window things Nickelback was like “Come with me if you want to rock,” and pushed us off down the biggest hill in town and then explained that he was doing a Terminator reference.  

The biggest hill in town was called 8 Mile Hill after the Eminem movie but was actually only six miles long on a good day.  The city government got real into the real Slim Shady for a minute and was always bleaching their hair and quoting Slim at meetings and stuff.  

It was the best government this city has ever elected.  Over and over and over again.

8 Mile Hill was so steep that when Guinness came to measure how steep it was their steepness measuring machine exploded and they decided to go home and get another one to replace it but then got distracted by the new Nintendo and never came back.  

It was steep as fucking fuck.

We were probably breaking the sound barrier by the time we hit mile three down 8 Mile Hill in the Nickelpot judging by all the car alarms and glass exploding like a hurricane behind us.  A lot of people’s ears were bleeding which was terrible because they’d never be able to listen to Nickelback but also maybe a good thing because Nickelback did it to them.  Also we were leaving those cool flame strips in the ground behind our wheels cause of how fast we were going.  

Nickelback was hard core doing that thing where your cheeks go all wobbly from air hitting them and must have eaten like a hundred bugs accidentally outside of the ones he kept eating on purpose.  

Right when I felt like my grip on the Nickelpot and my own sanity was at it’s limit Nickelback looked back at me and gave me a thumbs up snapping me back to reality right before leaning back and vomiting up a torrent of living flies into the evolving chaos behind the Nickelpot.  I lost count of how many flies there were even though I was definitely trying real hard because Nickelback tends to get irrationally angry and specific about the amounts of things that people remember him doing.

Somewhere around mile four of 8 Mile Hill I saw Nickelback like concentrating real hard and clenching his fists and I was pretty sure he was either pushing out a doo doo brown or trying to go Super Saiyan again.

Imagine my surprise when a pair of moths wings made from pure white light burst from Nickelback’s shoulder blades.

His new Nickelwings kept growing larger and larger until eventually they stretched the entire width of the road.  Pretty soon they were so massive that they were cutting their way through all the buildings on either side of 8 Mile Hill.  When they’d reached about a hundred feet each Nickelback looked back at me and tipped his sunglasses.  Nickelback was like “Come with me if you want to fly,” and then explained that it was a Terminator reference as his Nickelwings started flapping and the Nickelpot took off into the skies above the city gaining supernatural speed and altitude with every passing second.

I clung onto the Nickelpot with my suction cup hands as I looked down on the city below us.  Nickelback had produced an acoustic guitar from somewhere within the Nickelpot.  The night was still, save the lulling sound of Nickelback’s giant gossamer Nickelwings slowly flapping through the sparse cloud cover, of Nickelback methodically tuning his guitar to the tune that Photograph is in.

It was the most at peace I have ever been with myself that moment.  I felt like this was probably what the Buddha felt underneath the tree and then I decided that the Buddha was probably a Nickelback fan because he could see the future and therefore Nickelback and from there it was basically a given.

Slowly, Nickelback looked back at me, his head trimmed by the moonlight streaming in from behind him.  Smiling, he took his glasses and flung them down at the city below.

I watched them tumble for an eternity.  The moon's reflection bouncing its way across their glossy surface.  Growing smaller and smaller still as they fell away from me.

And then they were gone.  

Looking back up at Nickelback I noticed that his pupils had dilated to fill almost the entirety of the visible space behind his eyelids.  I found my breath catch in my throat as I felt some part of myself pulled deep into the dark pools on his face.

Nickelback started speaking to me in every language at once.  

Nickelback’s black hole eyes bore into and past me, past even the me I knew of as myself.  I could feel Nickelback connecting with some form of myself disconnected from time.  

Myself as a child searching a dark room only to find eyes staring back at me from some recessed space.  

A sea of future selves feeling a piercing but unseen glare from some shadowy treeline or darkened alleyway as they succeed or fail in a universe of infinite possibilities.

And I could feel myself start sinking inward toward some primordial core of being, even as somewhere, some me, felt my hands slowly losing their grip on the big Garfield plungers tethering me to the Nickelpot.  

And there, infinitely deep down, I saw it, the essence of existence itself, clear as day.  So simple.

And suddenly I was Buddha, I was Christ, I was a disconnected soul reuniting with the Godhead.  

And all the while Nickelback’s raving in infinite languages became louder and more manic, becoming a frantic shriek, a madman’s rush of words pouring forth, a deafening roar.  

Somewhere inside me I was aware that I was screaming too, my face now barely an inch from Nickelback’s, my vocal cords being driven to the point of snapping.  I could feel my body about to shatter from the pressure as every atom of my being began to vibrate violently.  

I lose my grip and slowly begin falling back away from the ascending Nickelpot.  

Time slows.

Way the fuck down.

Nickelback’s eyes never leave mine as he straps on his guitar.  It’s void black and covered in the an incomprehensible gold lettering.  In slow motion I watch him twist one last tuning peg in place, sending a wave of light cascading down through the gold etchings of the instrument.

Nickelback’s wings are so big, how did they ever get so big?  

Suddenly the torrent of words erupting from Nickelback’s mouth ceases, his pupils shrink back down, revert to normal but continue shrinking to sharp black points before disappearing entirely.  

The night is so still again.  A comet lazily arcs its way down to earth and I fall with it.

“It’s time.”  Nickelback says, smiling down at me as I careen through the wispy cloud cover below him.

As Nickelback brings his hand down on the guitar for the opening part of Photograph his Nickelpot explodes off of him like an improvised explosive device.  And I don’t have time to register the first pressure wave from the blast before the concussive force rockets up through his wings and shatters them into a billion pieces.  

Nickelback rides naked atop eight skateboards in an arc past the moon surrounded by a swarm of iridescent feathers hovering in the abyss like a starfield.  

His guitar echoes out into the expanse above the city, causing the points of light around him to dance in an eerie rhythm as they defy gravity and logic to become a swirling gyre around the man within their mass.  

And suddenly the feathers race inward and coalesce around Nickelback’s naked form, a brilliant sphere of light masking the man underneath.

As I tumble through the clouds I watch that sphere of light explode outward from Nickelback, carried by a wave of the song Photograph emanating from its core, played as if ripped from a realm of platonic ideals.

I watch a flock of passing birds evaporate as the pure unadulterated Nickelbackening overtakes and consumes them.  

I can’t know if it’s the ground or that sphere of destruction that I’ll meet first, but I no longer care.  

Just as it seems I’m about to make contact with mother earth, I’m finally caught by that bubble of rapidly expanding light.  

Photograph resonates deep down into the vibrating pieces that constitute my existence.  I have become Photograph.  I have become a part of Nickelback itself.  I am at peace before annihilation.  

For a brief moment I watch as the city around me is ripped apart by the forces of Nickelback’s power.  

My world is light and a roar of white noise.  

I am gone.  

I am in my car.  

In a ditch.  

I hang stupidly upside down from my seat looking at a small white flower peeking through my broken windshield.  A moth emerges from it’s inner folds.  I watch it flutter out through my passenger window and up toward the moon.

[youarethespecial-archive]

♥ Not in response to any asks, I’m just having too much fun with this generator and thought these were posts Emmet would make jfsh ♥

[childrenofhypnos]

Chapter 29: Snowfall

Stepping into Emery’s own dream did feel unsettlingly like stepping inside her head. As they moved through the window, there was a feeling in her mind like something had just been slotted into her head, not painful, just strange, like something stuck between her teeth.

The dream itself was crisp and well-formed, like Klaus’s had been, and like his, it was night. But unlike his, there was no forest to be seen. They stood on the sweeping lawns of an old palace beside a wide river, and on the other side of the river was Moscow.

The view took the breath from her lungs. Seeing the palace through the window had made her suspicious; it looked far too similar to the Grand Kremlin Palace to be coincidence, but she hadn’t expected to get here and for the city of her childhood to be waiting for her across the river. It sparkled in the night, skyscrapers and onion domes, pastels lit from below and glass reflecting the stars. The Cathedral of Christ the Savior, the Federation Towers. The rounded top of Moscow’s own Hypnos State training center, the Cradle. Though there were no clouds overhead, snow fell on the city, dampening its sound to nothing.

Emery took a step toward it and knew immediately that she would not be allowed to cross the river, no matter how badly she wanted to. Her dream did not take place there; it happened here, in this imitation-palace, on this estate that existed nowhere in the waking world.

“Is that the Kremlin?” Wes asked, looking toward the horizon.

“It’s Moscow,” Emery said. “A little dream-warped, but that’s it.” She tried to keep the longing out of her voice as she tore herself away from the view, but both Jacqueline and Wes became strangely silent.

The lawns dipped down before them, giving them a top-down view of the mazelike hedges that framed the wide stone path to the palace. Ornate wrought-iron lampposts, crafted to look like sinewy arms spearing out of the ground and holding their lanterns aloft, lined the path, which had been cleared of snow. It looked like something more out of War and Peace than modern-day Moscow, and as Emery, Wes, and Jacqueline started down the path, the hedges and the lampposts rose up around them, much taller than they should have been. Thick flakes of snow fell from the cloudless sky, but the drifts on the ground never got any higher. None clung to their clothes or their hair. When Emery held out her hand to catch a flake, it touched her skin and popped like a soap bubble.

Closer to the palace, the hedge walls gave way to hedge sculptures. They were twenty feet tall, covered in snow, and more detailed than any hedge sculpture had a right to be. On their left: a rearing horse not unlike the horses that framed Jacqueline’s gateway. On their right: The symbol of the dreamhunters, a sword thrust upward behind the closed eye of Hypnos. They walked past, and the next set came up. The left: Clint Eastwood in a poncho and a cowboy hat. The right: Fabian Fenhallow waltzing with a dolphin. Jacqueline scowled at that one.

The final set of hedges came up, and these two flanked the staircase to the palace’s entrance like sentinels. One was Grandpa Al, one hand holding his cup of tea, the other hand resting on the pommel of his dreamform sword, the sword’s tip balanced on the ground. The other hedge was Edgar, arms at his sides, hands empty. There was no expression on his face, but as they climbed the steps into the palace, Emery had the distinct impression he was watching her.

Up close, the palace’s walls were eggshell blue, and the windows and doors trimmed in lavish gold. Russian words curled across the large front doors in gold script.

“What does it say?” Jacqueline asked.

“Find home here,” Emery replied, fighting her strongest urge to run back the way they’d come. It had been a mistake to bring others into her dream when she herself didn’t even know what was inside. No one was supposed to see these things but her. No one was supposed to know. Was this how Klaus felt when they’d been sneaking around in his dream? Was this how anyone felt when they thought about dreamhunters stepping into their heads whenever they visited the Dream?

It was too late now, anyway. There was probably a way for her to get them out of her own dream—or Jacqueline could make another gateway—but the only way Emery knew to escape it now was to finish out the dream itself.

Her fingertips brushed the words on the palace’s front doors, and the doors creaked open.

Candles blazed in every corner of the entry hall. The marble floors gleamed; the ceiling arched high overhead, covered in paintings of angels and demons clashing in flight; and like the hedge sculptures outside, large paintings stood guard every few feet on either wall.

Every painting was Emery. In each one, she sat in a wingback chair, wearing a deep purple gown hung with pearls and sapphires and crystal netting. And in each one, she was missing part of herself. Eyes. Nose. Mouth. A hand. An ear. In one she was bald. In another, skinless. Wes and Jacqueline said nothing as they went down the hall, though their expressions said enough: there was something wrong with her. There was something wrong with her if this was how her subconscious manifested.

Emery ignored the paintings, especially the skinless one, and forced herself forward. To find her doppelgänger, she’d have to stay sharp. There were sounds floating from the far end of the entry hall, through a tall set of oak doors; voices and feet and, faintly, music—a small orchestra. Emery pressed on, and just like the front doors before them, the oak doors opened at the slightest touch.

Inside was a ballroom. Fenhallow Manor paled in comparison; it could have fit inside here four times over with room left to spare, and where the Fenhallow ballroom had an old-world America beauty, this was grandeur on a scale of kings. The floor had been polished to a mirror shine, inlaid with designs of claymore swords laid in beds of bursting wildflowers, cannons wrapped with vines. Doors of frosted glass led the way to a dark courtyard outside where the snow still fell. Columns between each window appeared carved from gold, and each one was a woman with curling hair covering her like a dress, a waterfall cascading to her feet. In one upraised hand she held a revolver, and the guns of all the columns pointed to the grand chandelier hanging from the ceiling. The ceiling of the room had been painted to look like the roiling purple clouds of No Man’s Land.

An orchestra played softly, but there was no band in the room, and all the voices and footsteps Emery had heard in the entry hall outside were gone now. There were only two people in the ballroom, turning slowly together in the center of the room, like dancers inside a music box.

“Oh,” Jacqueline said.

It had been a year and a half since the last time Emery had seen her parents, and the punch of it left her breathless. Her father was the taller of the two of them, long and lanky, dull brown hair falling over his forehead and his glasses shining in the light so his eyes disappeared behind them. A sly smile and high cheekbones; thin hands with long fingers that Edgar would one day inherit. Clamped between his lips was the cigarette Emery remembered from her childhood, the end glowing orange but never growing shorter, and every few seconds he puffed out a cloud of purple smoke that flashed with Dream-lightning before disappearing in the air.

Her mother looked like her, only bigger. Stockier. Her hair fixed back in heavy braids instead of let loose. She had an arch to her eyebrows and a coldness to her eyes that Emery aspired to. That look said Challenge me. She always left her collar open to reveal the thick scar across her neck, and it was open now and she held her head high. Emery had once been small enough to hide behind her legs, though she could probably still do so if she curled up tightly enough. The only strange thing about her mother was that her mouth was closed; if she was awake—and she always was—she was talking.

Liam Ashworth and Zoya Volkova danced in their hunting armor. Both wore the long black coats of the dreamkillers, with the fan of swords and Hypnos’s closed eye on their backs.

Emery wanted to step closer to them, but didn’t. Not with Jacqueline and Wes so close. Not when her parents might turn to her and say something straight from her subconscious, something too personal to share, some deep-seated fear or desire. She was lucky enough already they’d gotten through the rest of her dream without some metaphorical representation of her questioning her own sexuality. She didn’t need them both to know how deep the cracks of the Insanity Prime ran.

“Do you have to talk to them to progress the dream?” Wes asked.

“I don’t know. I don’t remember having this dream.” But it did feel like what she had to do. Like in all the other dream-windows they’d gone through, the logic of the dream tugged at her, willing her to follow the path for which it had been made. Her dream wanted her to approach her parents. It wanted her to speak to them.

It wanted her to ask them if they would stay.

“We should look around before we try that,” Jacqueline said. “Doppelgängers live inside their dreamer’s subconscious before they become active. Maybe they leave behind an imprint, or a trail we can follow.”

As she’d torn herself away from the view of Moscow, Emery looked away from her parents and began scanning the room. Both with her eyes and with her sense of the Dream, though it didn’t seem to amount to much here. In the waking world, the Dream was like a thin layer of atmosphere, perceptible but easy to forget. Some places had a higher concentration than others—like Fenhallow Woods—and dreamhunters, dreamkillers, and nightmares gave off auras of it, almost like they were generating it themselves. But here in the Dream it was everywhere, highly concentrated, pressing down on her. She felt it in her temples, in her ears, even in her joints. If it was any thicker she’d be swimming in it.

The three of them split up. Wes walked one direction along the wall, Emery and Jacqueline walked the other. Emery brushed her hand along the hair of one of the columns along the wall and the gold flaked away under her hand, turning white and drifting to the floor.

“It’s made of snow,” Jacqueline said. “Did you know it was going to look like this?”

“No. I don’t remember this at all.” Emery looked up into the face of the long-haired woman. It was herself, again. Peacemaker raised. “I’ve only slept once a month for the past six years, and I don’t remember the dreams I have.”

“Is it strange not to sleep?”

“Haven’t you asked Veronica all of this before?”

Jacqueline shrugged. “We don’t really talk about it.”

“It just makes the days seem long, sometimes. Gives you lots of time to think. Probably too much time.”

“And is it weird to be in here now?”

“Mostly uncomfortable. The Dream feels like a blanket pressed over my face.”

Jacqueline made a noise and glanced out the darkened window into the courtyard. Snow blurred past.

“Do you feel it?” Emery asked.

Jacqueline shook her head. “It feels normal to me. It feels real. I can sense there are boundaries on this place, but it’s not uncomfortable or strange.”

“Do you ever think it’s weird,” Emery said, “that dreamseekers are born and dreamhunters are made, but dreamhunters can do more?”

“No.” Jacqueline reached out at the next window they passed and tapped a pane of glass. It burst into sparkling snow and fluttered inside, but the wind and snow from outside didn’t start coming in. “You can do more, but we don’t have Insanity Primes. We aren’t weak to the Dream. Hopefully I never get attacked by a nightmare, but that’s what you all are around for.”

Emery snorted.

Then something pinged on the edge of her senses. It was like sensing Klaus in the warehouses, where he was a spot of the Dream in the waking world, but this was an empty space in the Dream. Like Jacqueline drawing up her gateway in No Man’s Land, a space where pressure could escape. Had escaped. And Emery had only felt it after Jacqueline popped the window.

She stopped and brushed her hand over the window, popping the other panes of glass until she could look outside. There was nothing there—only a stone patio that stretched out into darkness and snow—but in the darkness the emptiness took a shape in her senses, like a hole cut in a piece of paper. A human-shaped hole.

An Emery-shaped hole.

Her stomach sank to her knees. She swallowed hard.

“Wes,” she called back across the room.

Wes was already at the far end of the ballroom and jogged along the wall until he reached them.

“Do you feel that hole?” she asked both of them.

They both stopped and turned to the window. Wes was the first to nod.

“It’s shaped,” he said.

“Klaus was telling the truth. It’s active. And it’s not here anymore.” Emery’s own voice rang hollowly in her ears. She’d believed Klaus and not believed him; known he was telling the truth but also clung to the hope that he’d been wrong, that he thought he’d seen something that hadn’t really been there.

Emery pushed her hair back, rubbing at her throbbing temple as she went. “We have to find it. I don’t think it’s in here—I would have felt it.”

“Where else do we look then?” Jacqueline asked.

“Klaus said he saw it in No Man’s Land,” said Wes. “But No Man’s Land is everywhere out there. It wouldn’t go far, not if it’s still so weak it can’t leave the Dream. If anything, it’d want to hide until it’s strong enough to leave. It’d want to stay close to you in case it got an opportunity to attack.”

“We might be able to find some clues,” Emery said. “Klaus’s notebook. In his nightmare. He had her drawn in there, it was because he saw her. Maybe he wrote down where he saw her, or under what circumstances. Hell, maybe there’s more in there since the last time we were there. If he can squirrel information away in his dreams like that, he might have put more in since he was captured.”

“Or taken more out,” Wes said, “or put in false information. To throw Ares off.”

“You think Ares was rooting around in his dream?”

Wes’s expression darkened. “I know he was.”

“Do we have a different plan?” Jacqueline asked. “Because if not, I say let’s go there. You both look sick, and we haven’t even been here that long. If we don’t find anything in his dream, we leave and come back another time.”

Wes didn’t look happy about it, but shrugged and said, “Fine.”

“We need to get out, then.” Emery turned to her dream-parents. They still turned slowly in the center of the room, looking unblinkingly at each other. Pulling herself together, she marched across the floor to them.

She had no idea if this was supposed to be a good dream or a nightmare, but she didn’t have the best feeling about it. They always had new scars when they came home, and Emery had grown up with the expectation that one day, one or both of them might not come home at all. Dreamkillers were powerful, but many of them were sent to fight powerful nightmares, and not all of them came back in one piece—or alive.

“Dad,” she said, calling to him first because he was the gentler of the two of them, the one less likely to spring to action just at the sound of her voice. “Mama.”

They separated and turned to her at the same time, like they’d been waiting. Emery stopped and looked at them for a long moment, taking in their faces, their expressions, every wrinkle and scar and freckle. On a good day she could describe in general what they looked like, but she had no idea she’d kept such a detailed memory of them inside her.

“What is it, my sun?” her mother said. It took Emery a moment to realize she’d said it in Russian, and when she did, the Dream slammed into Emery hard, wriggling in through the cracks of her mental armor. She gasped, clutching her head, forcing herself to remember—teacups, sweaters, Edgar firing the Peacemaker, Wes’s eyebrow furrow, the scent of Joel’s pillow—and when she caught her breath, Jacqueline and Wes stood on either side of her.

Wes’s fingertips brushed her shoulder. “Are you okay?”

“Fine.”

“You shouldn’t stand there, biscuit,” her father said.

“What?”

His glasses still impossibly reflected the light, hiding his eyes, but both his eyebrows rose. His finger rose, pointing upward.

“You shouldn’t stand there,” he said.

The room groaned. All around them, the golden women with the cascading hair that formed the columns of the room shifted, stone features scraping, to shift their bodies sideways and extend their arms up, Their revolvers flashed in the light. Their golden fingers curled around the triggers.

Emery grabbed Wes and Jacqueline’s collars. “DOWN!”

The bang echoed in Emery’s ears as all twelve guns went off at once. From their barrels poured the purple clouds of the Dream, and their bullets ripped through the chandelier’s chains. It fell so slow, Emery had a moment to look up and see it dropping, crystals rising upward, the delicate metal singing in the air. Her parents stood exactly underneath it.

“No!” She scrambled forward, reaching for their boots.

A hand grabbed her belt and yanked her back. Wes. With a heave, he dragged her back across the polished floor just as the chandelier crashed, sending metal and crystal in all directions. Emery ducked her face into her arms, and when the chaos had stilled, she looked up again.

Her parents were gone. Not dead beneath the chandelier, but gone, as if they had never been there at all. The dream dissolved into the barren plain of No Man’s Land. Wes pulled her up under one arm, Jacqueline under the other, and though her legs were steady, her chest felt hollow.

She’d never get to see her parents dead. One day they just wouldn’t come home.

She would have preferred dead bodies beneath the chandelier.

(Next time on The Children of Hypnos -------> More Old School Horror)

[tommie-suber]

The Remedy for Hope is Action

The following is the Epilogue from Jeffrey St. Clair’s and Joshua Frank’s new book The Big Heat: Earth on the Brink, available now from CounterPunch Books.

In the spring of 2017, the carbon dioxide readings at the Mauna Loa observatory in Hawai’i cracked 410 parts per million, an all-time record and a frightening one. On Earth Day, climate marches took place in cities across the world. Trump’s policies didn’t drive the spiking CO2 levels, but they did propel tens of thousands onto the streets for a few hours of fun. Where were those people during eight years of Barack Obama, an oil and gas man of some distinction? Where were they during eight years of Bill Clinton, one of the greatest environmental con men of our time?

Has Donald Trump finally shattered our illusions, so that we can see clearly the forces—economic, political and technological—that are plunging the planet toward a man-made heat death? Is he, in fact, a kind of clarifying agent for the real state of things?

One can hope so.

Except one mustn’t hope.

As Kafka, the High Priest of Realism, admonished his readers, “There is hope. But not for us.”

Hope is an illusion, an opiate, an Oxycontin for the masses. Instead of hope, we need a heavy dose of realism. A realism as chilling as reality itself.

Twenty-five hundred years ago, the Buddha instructed us that the world is suffering, and indeed it is. He also advised us that the cure for suffering is empathy, especially for those living beings—among which we would include redwood trees, sea coral and saguaro cacti—which have no defense against the forces that are inflicting that globalized torment.

That’s where we come in. Defenders of the Earth need to abandon all hope before entering the fray. Hope is a paralytic agent. Hope is the enemy.

The antidote is action.

Action, however, is not marching in a parade a couple of times a year, featuring puppets, vagina hats and signs printed up by the Sierra Club©. Action is not taking selfies with a celebrity in the back of a police wagon after a designer arrest. Action is not typing your name on a MoveOn e-petition or voting for a Jill Stein-like candidate in safe states like Oregon or California. Action is standing arm-in-arm before water cannons and government snipers on the frozen plains of North Dakota. Action is hanging from a fragile perch 150-feet up in Douglas fir tree in an ancient forest grove slated for clearcutting, through howling winter storms. Action is chaining yourself to a fracking rig in rural Pennsylvania or camping out in the blast zone at a Mountain Top Removal site in the hills of West Virginia. Action is intervening when police in stormtrooper gear are savagely beating a defenseless woman on the streets of Portland. Action is jumping into the Pacific Ocean with a knife in your teeth to cut the vast trawler nets ensnaring white-sided dolphins and humpback whales. Action is stopping bad shit from going down, or trying to.

The time for protests is over.

Protests will not prick the conscience of the unmasked beast called Donald Trump. Trump has no conscience to arouse, no shame to trigger, no remorse to cultivate. Trump is a full-frontal menace, that dangerous object in the mirror that is closer than it appears. It is the old threat, coming at us faster than before and from all directions at once. An unchained beast that will not be moderated by regulations, social conventions or appeals to common decency.

We are witnessing the wet-dream of Steve Bannon—the Trump Whisperer—made manifest: the dismantling of the regulatory state. This new reality compels us—for those who are willing to look—to confront the shedding of another illusion, an illusion that mainstream environmentalists have been marinating in since the 1970s, when our most progressive president, Richard M. Nixon, cynically created the modern environmental regulatory state in order to split the anti-war movement, pacify the Left and smother a much more radical defense of the natural world.

The green regulatory state—as personified by the EPA, the Fish and Wildlife Service, the Forest Service and the BLM (Bureau of Livestock and Mining), as well as thousands of laws, administrative rules and regulations, the meaning of which can only be divined by lawyers, lobbyists and professional environmentalists—has not slowed the decimation of native forests, the extirpation of wildlife or the poisoning of our air and water. It has simply codified and systematized the destruction, allocating the looting to a coterie of well-connected corporations large enough and shrewd enough to navigate the legal labyrinth for their own bloody profits.

At the same time, the creation of the regulatory state effectively neutered the once potent environmental movement as a real threat to the System. As their budgets swell, often fattened by the largess of grants from foundations linked to the fossil fuel industry, the big DC-oriented conservation groups become more and more complicit with the political fool’s gold of neoliberalism. Try finding a lobbyist from NRDC with callouses on their hands and a trace of mud on their boots.

As Trump begins the demolition of the regulatory state, we start to see how hollow many of Gang Green’s alleged environmental victories of the past—from coal mining and air quality regulations to endangered species protections and new national monuments—really are. They are being wiped out with a slash of the pen.

As the archdruid David Brower used to say: “When we win, it’s only a stay of execution, when they win it’s forever. Thus we must be eternally vigilant.” These days the corporate environmental movement is vigilant about only one thing: claiming fake victories in their sustained barrage of fund-raising appeals.

But the days of the laptop environmentalism are numbered. Trump is creating a battlefield where professional conservationists will fear to tread, a direct, face-to-face confrontation with the machinery of ecocide.

And we know who will rise to the call. The ones who always have in the past: the indigenous, the altruists and the anarchists. Those are the ones who will fight as if their lives depend on the outcome, because, of course, they do.

If we are to believe the sociobiologists, such as E.O. Wilson, the altruistic gene may only be present in three percent of the human population—may their gene pool increase! But, hell, that’s still three times as many people as the one-percenters who are running the show! If you want hope, there’s a microdot to swallow.

Small, scruffy and unruly as it is, we’ve seen the power of our movement in the past. When our backs are—often literally—against the wall, when the battle lines are clear from the immobilizing fog of liberal rhetoric and free from the timid advice of professional compromisers. We’ve seen it emerge from the Lacandon jungle to say enough is enough and overtake the streets of Seattle to shut down the World Trade Organization. We’ve seen grandmothers and housewives expose the toxic crimes of Love Canal and corn farmers shut down nuclear power plants. We’ve taken the international timber industry to its knees on its home turf, blocked strip mines, pipelines and river-killing dams. We’ve thrown monkey-wrenches big and small into the gears of the System. It has been done and it will be done again and again. No grant applications or protest permits needed.

As Ed Abbey used to say: there’s no battle more important, no fight more fun waging, no comrades more trustworthy than those in the trenches with us when we rise up together in defense of life on Earth. To crib a line from Leonard Cohen: “we may be ugly, but we’ve got the music.”

So draw a line and take a stand—almost any place will do, since the whole shebang is under threat—and let loose an old battle cry so that others will know where to come join you: Earth First!

[junker-town]

NFL Panic Index 2017, Week 8: The year terrible quarterbacks took over

Your team’s probably starting a bad QB. Sorry.

Bad quarterback play has become pretty much a constant in the NFL this season. Get excited, because we’ll see plenty of it in Week 8.

Joe Flacco has been the opposite of elite this year. He has five touchdowns against eight interceptions, and he’s averaging just 169.9 yards per game. He hasn’t thrown for more than 250 yards in any single game this season, and he’s in interesting company.

These Joe Flacco numbers from @NFLResearch: http://pic.twitter.com/ogOAT4PLwF

— Andrew Siciliano (@AndrewSiciliano) October 23, 2017

Somehow the Ravens have still managed to win three games despite Flacco’s play. The Jaguars are also winning and currently sit on top of the division with a 4-3 record, mainly because of a relentless defense that leads the league in sacks. It’s certainly not because of Blake Bortles, who’s thrown nine touchdowns against five interceptions.

Mitchell Trubisky has led the Bears to two wins since he took over the starting job — or has he? He’s averaging eight completed passes per game, and he has two touchdowns and a pick. The Bears could probably just let Cody Whitehair snap the ball directly to Jordan Howard and not really miss a beat.

A few teams are suffering through poor quarterback play because of injuries to starters. There’s a steep dropoff between Carson Palmer, who is out for the rest of the season with a broken arm, and Drew Stanton. It’s less of a plummet from Jay Cutler to Matt Moore, but the Dolphins are still going to be working with their third option at that position as Cutler’s sidelined with cracked ribs.

Jacoby Brissett is no Andrew Luck, but he wouldn’t be quite so bad for the Colts if his line blocked effectively for him. Trevor Siemian is struggling, but Paxton Lynch and Brock Osweiler are subpar options.

Andy Dalton is out here throwing it away on fourth down, and it’ll be a tall order for the 49ers to even win a game with their quarterback situation. The Browns may turn to Cody Kessler this week, but their revolving door at quarterback is a big part of the reason Cleveland is 0-7. What a mess.

Panic index: We won’t even be subjected to Bortles, Brett Hundley, Stanton, or Eli Manning this week because their teams are on byes. But brace yourself, because there will be plenty of spectacularly bad quarterback play to go around.

If only there was a capable free agent available to help teams in need of better QB play ...

Brett Hundley can’t even give a quote like Aaron Rodgers

Three years ago, Aaron Rodgers famously told Packers fans to "R-E-L-A-X." The team had gotten off to a laggard 1-2 start, and Rodgers looked uncharacteristically rusty. Despite the restlessness in the Lambeau air, Rodgers was right — the Packers went 11-2 the rest of the regular season. Only an overtime loss to the Seahawks in the NFC Championship prevented a trip to the Super Bowl.

Last year following four straight losses in the middle of the season, Rodgers debuted a new saying that would soon be cross-stitched on pillows across Green Bay: "I feel like we can run the table." Some scoffed at the time, but guess what? The Packers reeled off eight wins in a row, and once again, their season didn't end until the NFC Championship.

Things are different this year. The Packers' en fuego 4-1 start was quickly derailed when Rodgers went down with a broken collarbone. After back-to-back losses, and minus the beating heart of team until at least mid-December, nothing anyone says could Packers fans much comfort right now.

Brett Hundley, the third-year passer filling in at quarterback, tried to give his best Rodgers impression after the 26-17 loss to the Saints on Sunday. Unfortunately, like his 87-yard passing game, Hundley failed to live up to his predecessor:

Brett Hundley: "All I can say is don't write us off."

— Tom Pelissero (@TomPelissero) October 22, 2017

We're not going to ding Hundley too much here, even if the quote lacks the impish charm oozing out of Rodgers. He's doing the QB equivalent of following the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show. And it’s not like his handcuffed performance was entirely his fault.

But it’s hard to feel too optimistic about the Packers at the moment.

Panic index: Let's not pretend that a quote from Rodgers was what turned the Packers around in '14 and '16. It was because he's Aaron Freakin' Rodgers. Still, even if Hundley underwhelmed in his first start, the 4-3 Packers aren’t out of this.

The bye week couldn't come at a better time for them. An extra week for Hundley to get more comfortable, and for the supporting cast to get healthy, is what could help get the Packers on the right path again. And if, like always, they’re playing in January, Hundley should be the first to say “I told you so.”

Not even Andrew Luck can save the Colts

Things are bad in Indianapolis. No, actually, they’re horrible.

Chuck Pagano will be the first to tell you:

To fans, Pagano says re: Sunday's game, "They deserve better."

— Stephen Holder (@HolderStephen) October 23, 2017

T.Y. Hilton called out the Colts’ offensive line after their loss to the Jaguars, essentially blaming them for the loss. “It is the offensive line, they need to block,” Hilton said, via Charlie Clifford of WISH-TV. Hilton would later apologize (he wasn’t wrong), but oof, that’s bad.

Malik Hooker was looking like a promising piece on the defense, after having interceptions in three consecutive games. He then tore his ACL against the Jaguars.

The Jaguars really just ended the Colts, who were already in the dumps.

Panic index: There’s no need to panic, because everything is already lost. There’s really no reason to let Andrew Luck come back and play with a bad team like this — enough harm has already been done to his career.

Take this season for what it is, and keep it moving. Pagano probably won’t be a part of that future recipe.

Case Keenum returns to Twickenham, where he threw 4 picks last season

It’s been a year, but Case Keenum’s last game in London has probably stuck with him. Not only did he throw the ball 53 times for the Rams, he was intercepted four times, and sacked three. Somehow, the Rams still only lost that game by a score of 17-10.

He’s been able to shake off last season, and has gone 3-2 in his five starts as Vikings quarterback in place of Sam Bradford. On Sunday, they’ll be going up against the Browns in London, and he’s equipped with a much better team this time around in just about every way.

Oh, and the Browns are the Browns.

Panic index: Keenum should be just fine on Sunday. The Browns appear to be even worse than they were last season, and the Vikings have won three in a row. He might even have a great game!

Saints lead the NFC South, but can they stay on top?

The Saints are on top of the NFC South, but there are plenty of games left to play. Sean Payton doesn’t want his team to get ahead of itself.

Sean Payton on being in first place: "I don't think anyone's paying attention to the horse at the quarter pole."

— Mike Triplett (@MikeTriplett) October 23, 2017

And there’s good reason for that. The Saints have won four in a row, but they’ve got the same number of wins as the Panthers. They’re on top of the division by virtue of having already had their bye week, which gives Carolina one more loss than New Orleans. The Falcons won the division last season, and they’re just one game behind Carolina. So it’s not exactly a commanding lead.

New Orleans has gotten rolling thanks in large part to the success of the run game. Mark Ingram and Alvin Kamara have combined for 121.7 yards per game. But yet another offensive line injury may throw things off. The Saints just got Terron Armstrong back, and Zach Strief is on injured reserve, though he may return this season. Now guard Larry Warford is expected to be out for several weeks after he suffered an abdominal injury.

The Saints’ schedule isn’t a cakewalk. They still have the Bills, Panthers, Rams, and two matchups against the Falcons ahead of them. And while the offense has found its stride, the defense is still giving up 351 yards per game.

Panic index: Don’t order your “NFC South Champions” hats and shirts just yet, Saints fans.

Are the Raiders ever going to get an interception?

The Raiders have a dubious honor foisted on them this season. They’re the only team in NFL history without an interception through the first seven games of the season. That unhappy distinction coincides with a disappointing 3-4 start to the season, a year in which a lot of us believed the Raiders would be Super Bowl contenders.

But interceptions are kind of a funny thing. Every turnover is infected by a degree of randomness, determined as much by bad bounces and dropped opportunities. Last week an Alex Smith deep shot bounced off safety Keith McGill’s hands and into Albert Wilson’s waiting arms for a touchdown.

There's missed opportunities. And then there's this. http://pic.twitter.com/tIvuB75lXd

— Levi Damien (@LeviDamien) October 21, 2017

Last year’s Raiders had 16 picks, tied for the third most in the league. They had an overall turnover ratio of +16, the best in the league and a big reason behind their 12-4 finish ... not to mention our lofty expectations for 2017.

Football Outsiders’ estimated wins formula had last year’s Raiders as a 9-7 team. They over performed thank to all those picks and a perfect 5-0 record in games decided by less than six points. It’s a formulaic script for falling back to the mean.

Panic index: The good thing about the randomness of interceptions means that they’ll come, probably in big bunches. Winning’s easier when the ball bounces your way, and it looks like the Raiders are due for a ... wait for it ... bounce back.

[yahoo-shutdown-corner-blog]

2017 NFL draft: Grading picks from Rounds 2-3

PHILADELPHIA  – The quarterback angst for Cleveland Browns fans came to an end Friday with their selection of Notre Dame’s DeShone Kizer. But was it the right move?

A look at we scored each pick in Rounds 2-3 at the NFL draft.

Round 2

1) Green Bay Packers: CB Kevin King, Washington – The only player who stayed from the Day 1 green room barely got comfortable. King was a standout in a talented Huskies secondary and has the size NFL teams are trending toward. He’s a gifted athlete who has improved stock as much as anyone the past few months, but his tackling issues are legit concerns. This, however, is solid value for a secondary that needs help. Grade: B+

2) Jacksonville Jaguars: OT Cam Robinson, Alabama – The Jags are getting big and bad, and loading up on SEC players. Robinson fills a big need and the cost to move up (a sixth-rounder) was slight to grab a first-round talent. Robinson is penalty prone and doesn’t dominate the way you’d expect, but he is a big, athletic mauler. Could he play left guard? Perhaps. That was the biggest positional need on the O-line coming into Friday. He also could replace Branden Albert at left tackle down the road, or perhaps Jermey Parnell at right tackle. Grade: A-

3) Seattle Seahawks: DT Malik McDowell, Michigan State – You can’t find a better match of talent and personality with team. McDowell’s motor doesn’t always run white hot, and he didn’t endear himself to NFL teams during the pre-draft interviews. But if the Seahawks can get McDowell revved up on that defensive front, which continues to reload, the QB-hunting days could be here to stay for a while. This is a risky pick, however, after trading down three times to this spot. Grade: B-

4) Arizona Cardinals: FS Budda Baker, Washington – The player Baker was most compared to during the pre-draft process is his new teammate with the Cardinals, Tyrann Mathieu. Baker is small but plays with force and can fill a variety of roles. The Cardinals lost a lot on defense this offseason and have added two versatile pieces now, along with Haason Reddick. Is Baker too much of an overlap of Mathieu? We shall see. Baker could be their nickel safety/slot corner. Grade: B-

5) Buffalo Bills: WR Zay Jones, East Carolina – The Bills had to come out of this draft with help at receiver, so they trade up to the Rams’ spot to grab Jones, a Senior Bowl standout who might be most effective in the slot. This is a low-risk move for a highly productive, four-year starter who produced vs. SEC teams. He runs excellent routes and has exceptional hands, which is key for Tyrod Taylor’s occasional inaccuracy. Sammy Watkins needed help and he got it. Grade: B

6) Los Angeles Chargers: OT Forrest Lamp, Western Kentucky – We thought the Chargers might go O-line in Round 1, but they come back and land a player who carried first-round buzz at the top of Round 2. Lamp’s short arms and sawed-off frame likely moves him from left tackle, his college position, inside in the NFL. Lamp has played guard a bit and has practiced snapping this offseason, so he could start at left guard or center, which are both question marks. Grade: B+

7) New York Jets: FS Marcus Maye, Florida – This one is odd. Maye is a very solid all-around player, but back-to-back safety picks for the Jets? His skills and that of Jamal Adams are not vastly different. They both have their most success down close to the box, but they also are versatile enough to line up in the same secondary. This is a clear indication the Jets wants to upgrade over Marcus Gilchrist and Calvin Pryor. Grade: C-

Dalvin Cook joins Latavius Murray in the backfield in Minnesota. (AP)

8) Carolina Panthers: WR/RB Curtis Samuel, Ohio State – Another double up of sorts here. The Panthers can move Christian McCaffrey and Samuel all over the field — backfield, in motion, in the slot, out wide — and force defenses to pick their poison. The Panthers were a slow offense before Thursday — but no longer. Samuel has more straight-line juice but is not quite as natural a receiver as McCaffrey but both can do just about everything. This is fascinating. Grade: B

9) Minnesota Vikings: RB Dalvin Cook, Florida State – The Vikings still needed RB help even with the Latavius Murray signing, and Cook will win the main job in time. He’s too good — that is, if he keeps his nose clean. Off-field issues pushed him down, where the Vikings might have gotten a steal as they attempt to replace Adrian Peterson. Grade: A-

10) New Orleans Saints: FS Marcus Williams, Utah – The Saints’ secondary is getting better. Williams is a quality center fielder with nice instincts for the position, and he has the maturity to step in right away. But the Saints are actually in decent shape here with Vonn Bell (whom they traded up for in Round 2 last year) and Kenny Vaccaro, who was hopeful the team would sign him to an extension this offseason. That’s a bit of an overlap when other needs (pass rusher, e.g.) were more pressing. Grade: C+

11) Philadelphia Eagles: CB Sidney Jones, Washington – This is a pick for the future with Jones, who is a PUP list candidate following the torn Achilles he suffered at his pro day workout. He was trending toward being a first-rounder prior to that with his long, lean frame and ability to play press coverage, which is a must in a Jim Schwartz defense. This is a similar player to Eric Rowe, whom the Eagles traded away for quarters on the dollar last year. Jones might not play a lot this season but he has good upside. Grade: C+

12) Los Angeles Rams: TE Gerald Everett, South Alabama – The Rams drafted a Jordan Reed clone for Sean McVay’s Redskins-style offense. Everett has tiny hands but wide receiver-like skills that can be flexed out and used creatively. This is not a player they would ask to crack back on power defensive ends, similar to the Giants’ pick of Evan Engram. Grade: B

13) Chicago Bears: TE Adam Shaheen, Ashland – The Bears reached for a massive, small-school tight end with receiver-like skills but a player who needs serious development and body toning. He played college basketball and dominated at a very low level of competition. Shaheen might not be best playing at 278 pounds, as he was at the combine, which included a body-fat composition of more than 20 percent. Many teams had him as a top-100 prospect but one in need of time to marinate. Grade: C-

14) Indianapolis Colts: CB Quincy Wilson, Florida – The Colts, who had safety Malik Hooker fall in their laps in the first round, continued to work on the secondary in the second round by taking Wilson. Wilson had a very good 2016 season with the Gators, as he continued his improvement. Wilson has good size and can immediately help Indianapolis as a press-man corner. Grade: B

15) Baltimore Ravens: OLB Tyus Bowser, Houston – Bowser is a raw pass-rush ace who looks like an Ozzie Newsome special. Needing to get stronger and gain confidence in his natural ability, Bowser is not a finished product. But he’s a typical Ravens pick in that he has displayed pass-rush productivity and explosion. They’ll figure out how to use him best. Grade: B-

16) Cincinnati Bengals: RB Joe Mixon, Oklahoma – The Bengals centered in on and signed off on Mixon weeks ago. They believe he is a changed man. The Bengals always have had a certain moral flexibility with taking character risks in the past — i.e. players that other teams wouldn’t pick. As a player, Mixon is a fantastic talent as a runner, receiver and returner. Another dynamic weapon in an offense with A.J. Green, John Ross, Tyler Eifert and others. But that character risk? It’s real. Grade: B-

17) Washington Redskins: OLB Ryan Anderson, Alabama – The Bama-to-D.C. train continues as Anderson joins Jonathan Allen on a pretty good Redskins front seven. Anderson is an undersized and slightly reckless defender, but the energy he will bring to this defense will be tangible. If he doesn’t contribute immediately as a pass rusher, Anderson will bring his hard hat to the special teams units. Grade: C+

18) Tampa Bay Buccaneers: SS Justin Evans, Texas A&M – Evans sometimes is reckless and takes poor angles to the ball, but he’s just so darned productive that it makes up for it. The Bucs were seeking help in the secondary, and Evans and J.J. Wilcox could make a sneaky good pairing in time. Evans was named the Aggies’ co-defensive MVP last season. He shared the award with some cat named Myles Garrett. Grade: B

19) Denver Broncos: DE DeMarcus Walker, Florida State – This one was confusing. Walker was a highly productive pass rusher at a strong program, but how does his game translate to this scheme? And where will they play him? Losing DeMarcus Ware opens a void, but Walker might have to bulk up a bit and play more of a 5-technique role in this system. He has the length to handle that, but this is a projection and a risky one. Grade: C-

This time DeShone Kizer gets to be the next great hope at QB for Cleveland. (AP)

20) Cleveland Browns: QB DeShone Kizer, Notre Dame – The Browns played this one well. Kizer might not have been their first QB choice in a perfect world, but he’s a 21-year-old with a great set of tools who can be molded carefully. The Browns are assembling some weapons in the passing game with Corey Coleman, Josh Gordon (maybe) and David Njoku, and in time — maybe 2018 — Kizer could have a nice situation brewing. Patience is required, but Kizer has a great QB mentor in Hue Jackson. Grade: A-

21) Detroit Lions: CB Teez Tabor, Florida– Tabor has fallen off since the end of the season with some poor athletic testing and a personality that some teams were turned off by. But his tape is fabulous. Tabor wants to cover the opponent’s best receiver — as he often did in the rough-and-tumble SEC — and believes he will one day be the best cornerback in the NFL. Just ask him. There’s a little Josh Norman in him, although it’s unclear if he ever reaches that lofty height. Grade: B

22) Miami Dolphins: ILB Raekwon McMillan, Ohio State – McMillen is a run-stopping two-down linebacker who got better as last season wore on, and he should step in on a unit that was lacking and make an impact. He won’t ever be a special player, but he’s a tackling machine who has a good football IQ and isn’t afraid to get into the muck. Our highest-rated linebacker, Zach Cunningham, remains on the board. Grade: C+

23)  New York Giants: DT Dalvin Tomlinson, Alabama– The Giants are strong up front, but lost Johnathan Hankins in free agency. Not wanting to have a hole on a very good defensive line, New York filled it with 310-pound Tomlinson. He brings medical risk – he has torn both ACLs – but he is a powerful run stopper. Grade: C

24) Oakland Raiders: SS Obi Melifonwu, UConn – Al Davis lives on in spirit. The Raiders selected the most freakishly athletic defensive back we’ve seen in a few years, and NFL teams were ping-ponging between projecting him as a safety or a corner. With the Raiders going Conley in Round 1, perhaps they view Melifonwu as a safety. That’s where he played at UConn and put up some decent — but not eye-popping — tape. He needs to be a little more physical. But this is a prospect on the rise who could have been considered in the top 40 selections. Grade: B+

25) Houston Texans: OLB Zach Cunningham, Vanderbilt – Pure value pick here. Cunningham vacuums up tackles. He’s smart, athletic and long-limbed. He can add a few pounds and bulk up, and be a highly productive inside linebacker in the Texans’ 3-4 system, even with all those other playmakers around him. The Texans loved Cunningham’s interviews at the NFL scouting combine and have tracked him for a while but likely never imagined he’d still be available. Grade: A-

26) Seattle Seahawks: C Ethan Pocic, LSU– The Seahawks have played musical chairs on the offensive line for years now, and the shuffling could continue. Pocic is a rare college center who stands 6-feet-7, but some OL coaches in the NFL believe his best NFL home might be at guard or tackle. That’s the type of player the Seahawks like: smart, versatile and a beast in the run game. The LSU zone run scheme is similar to what the Seahawks run, so the fit feels good. Bit of a reach? Yeah, a tad, but they have roughly a thousand picks remaining. Grade: B-

27) Kansas City Chiefs: DE Tanoh Kpassagnon, Villanova – They don’t build them more body-beautiful than Kpassagnon, who elicited gasps when he walked across the Senior Bowl stage. As a player, he’s still developing but has tremendous potential. The Chiefs had this mold of prospect stashed on their practice squad a few years ago in David Irving, but the Cowboys poached him and turned him into a pretty darned good player. Expect Kpassagnon to be a 5-technique end in the Chiefs’ odd front and in a year or two could be something special. Grade: B

28) Dallas Cowboys: CB Chidobe Awuzie, Colorado – Love the value of Awuzie falling here, and he’s an excellent blitzer, which could be a hidden benefit that most defensive backs don’t offer. He can play in multiple spots and could be a safety, outside corner or nickel for the Cowboys. Scouts fell in love with his football IQ and toughness when they watched him. The Cowboys landed a bargain. Grade: A-

29) Green Bay Packers: SS Josh Jones, N.C. State – The Packers continue to add size to their secondary with the additions of King and Jones, whom we thought might be a high second-rounder. His tape immediately reminds viewers of Steelers safety Mike Mitchell, who can be reckless at times but is a punishing hitter and highly athletic. Jones could be a great third safety behind Ha Ha Clinton-Dix and Morgan Burnett, and Burnett’s eventual replacement as a starter. Grade: A-

30) Pittsburgh Steelers: WR Juju Smith-Schuster, USC – Is this a Steelers pick or what? The emotional Smith-Schuster was expected to go earlier than this with his physical and fearless style. He will be the perfect complement to Antonio Brown as a No. 2 receiver in the making and will impact the run game immediately with his quality blocking. Mike Tomlin is going to love coaching Smith-Schuster most of the time, but he has been prone to emotional outbursts. Still, this fit looks great. Grade: A-

31) Buffalo Bills: OG Dion Dawkins, Temple – The Bills keep making safe, high-floor picks. Nothing against Dawkins, who could play tackle or guard and is a big, physical, slow-footed blocker for the Bills’ run-heavy style. But at some point GM Doug Whaley should aim higher with his picks. Dawkins is a nice fit but not a player who will be better than a solid starter. That fits in line with the two other picks they made earlier. There’s little offensive about any of them. Grade: C

32) Carolina Panthers: OT Taylor Moton, Western Michigan – Moton flew under the radar for a while for P.J. Fleck’s Broncos but played some good football the past few seasons at guard and tackle. His best NFL home might be inside, but the Panthers could try him first at right tackle, which is a major question now with Michael Oher’s concussion history. Moton is a decent athlete for his size and is a respected, team-first player, so he’ll do whatever Ron Rivera and company ask of him. Grade: C+

Round 3

1) Cleveland Browns: DT Larry Ogunjobi, Charlotte – The Browns are adding layers of talent to a defense that was shorthanded the past few seasons. Ogunjobi — the first pick in the program’s history — is an odd fit for the scheme they might run. But teams can never have too many big bodies to help stop the run and add depth. Ogunjobi is a smart player but one who needs some refinement and likely won’t play a ton right away. This is the first Browns selection this draft we didn’t like a lot. Grade: C

2) San Francisco 49ers: CB Ahkello Witherspoon, Colorado – The 49ers’ biggest need? Talent. They got two potential defensive cornerstones in Round 1 and come back at the top of Round 3 with a long, lean and slick cover man with fascinating dimensions and athleticism who is allergic to tackling. Have you ever heard of a player having as many tackles in a full season — 22 — as he does passes defended? Scouts were confounded by him. Witherspoon can work in this system, but the coaches must make him a more physical presence with his height and explosive skills. Grade: B-

3) New Orleans Saints: RB Alvin Kamara, Tennessee – The Saints traded up to land the free-falling Kamara, a top-40 player on our board. We love his competitiveness, punt-return and receiving ability and his low workload at Tennessee. But Kamara is a fumbler and will miss some big-play chances at times. The value here is good. But the Saints might have given up a lot to land a back who currently sits behind Mark Ingram and Adrian Peterson. And where is the pass rusher? Grade: B

4) Jacksonville Jaguars: DE Dawuane Smoot, Illinois – The theme of the Jaguars’ first three selections? Size and toughness. That’s a Tom Coughlin hallmark, yes? Smoot is not a consistent producer yet, and he likely never will be a huge sack producer. But he could be a nice addition if he returns to his 2015 form after a bit of a down season in 2016. Smoot hits hard but might need to be pushed a little bit by his coaches. Grade: C+

5) Los Angeles Rams: WR Cooper Kupp, Eastern Washington – Kupp might be able to teach Sean McVay’s offense in a week or two. He’s a football junkie and the son of a coach who, oh by the way, also plays receiver. Kupp stood out against better competition — Pac-12 opponents, Senior Bowl, you name it — which reduces the risk of this FCS player taking a big step up. He might never be much more than a very good possession receiver, but that’s fine for a Rams team that needs to give Jared Goff reliable targets. We love the fit. Grade: B+

6) Minnesota Vikings: C Pat Elflein, Ohio State – Elflein is a Mike Zimmer-like player: tough and ornery. Elflein could start Day 1 at center or guard, and though he’s undersized and not superb in pass protection, he’ll be a solid, low-risk addition to the offense, which needs help at both positions. The line was atrocious last season, and Elflein is incredibly smart and hard working to boost the unit quickly. Grade: B-

7) Los Angeles Chargers: OG Dan Feeney, Indiana – Feeney is more gifted than Elflein but might not be as versatile after snapping only in practices and this offseason; never in a game. He has played right tackle out of need, but this fiery competitor is best as an ass-kicking guard. He and Forrest Lamp could give the Chargers two rookie starters at guard. That’s interesting. Grade: B

8) Tennessee Titans: WR Taywan Taylor, Western Kentucky – The Titans are loading up at receiver but have yet to add that much-needed burst of deep speed. Taylor, however, is extremely quick and can work the slot nicely and turn a short pass into a long gain. He needs to work on his consistency catching the ball and has a frame that’s small and in need of strengthening. But it’s a solid pick here, and he has return experience. Grade: C+

9) Cincinnati Bengals: DE Jordan Willis, Kansas State – Willis tested through the roof at the combine but doesn’t show that same bend on tape; in fact, it’s occasionally shocking how wooden he can be trying to run the arc. But there aren’t too many more high-effort, high-character players with his skills this late in the draft. Willis is a team-first player whom Bill Snyder might name the weight room after one day. You can’t say the Bengals haven’t added talent, and Willis’ high character — they hope — can offset the negativity around the Joe Mixon pick. Grade: B+

10) Baltimore Ravens: DT Chris Wormley, Michigan – Wonder where the Ravens got the scoop on Wormley. Yes, there’s a Harbaugh-to-Harbaugh connection here. But if Wormley played at East Carolina, he’d still be an ideal Raven: smart, versatile, strong and built like an ox. His sack production is something the Ravens noted during the draft process, but Wormley should fit in nicely as the next in line of productive and useful D-linemen they’ve been drafting since the day Ozzie Newsome arrived. Grade: B+

11) Atlanta Falcons: OLB Duke Riley, LSU – The Falcons still need a guard, but Riley is a nice pickup here. He’s a high-effort, highly athletic hitter with range and size deficiency. But isn’t that how the Falcons like their ‘backers? Until he’s ready to start, Jones is likely to be a wild man on the special teams units and offer depth. The Super Bowl proved the Falcons need to keep adding layers of talent beyond the first team. For comparison, his skills are very similar to that for Falcons starter Deion Jones. Grade: B

12) New Orleans Saints: OLB, Alex Anzalone, Florida – Anzalone was always hurt at Florida, but when he played he flashed some nice ability. The Senior Bowl was a nice reminder of what he can do when he’s on the field. But his availability was a problem every single season in college. Could be a starting linebacker in this league, and at worst he will be a nice special teams performer, which is something Sean Payton seeks in the draft. This pick, however, is hard to embrace. Grade: C

13) Carolina Panthers: DE Daeshon Hall, Texas A&M – Playing opposite Myles Garrett will open up some chances, but Hall is a good player in his own right. He tested better than expected at the combine and has a nice big frame to help replace the traded Kony Ealy. Think of Hall as similar to Ealy with his length, sneaky burst and upside. The key now is developing more consistency. Hall can develop while Charles Johnson and Julius Peppers remain on the field. Grade: B-

14) Baltimore Ravens: OLB Tim Williams, Alabama – This was predictable. Ozzie Newsome might have been nervous to take him higher in the draft, given Williams’ character concerns and past failed drug tests, but at this point it’s just raw value. He’s a pass-rushing demon but also a bit of a uni-tasker at this point. Williams is not yet a quality run defender and will have to prove he can be a dependable pro. Still, this is a great spot for him. Grade: B+

15) New York Jets: WR ArDarius Stewart, Alabama – You know who Stewart reminds us a little of? Antwaan Randle-El. A former prep option QB, Stewart is still learning the finer points of the WR position but managed to be very productive despite having a freshman QB with shaky accuracy. The Jets can use Stewart in a variety of roles: inside, outside, as a trick-play specialist and perhaps as a Wildcat QB. Don’t worry, he’s not Tebow. Stewart can help this team. Grade: C+

 16) Indianapolis Colts: DE Tarell Basham, Ohio – GM Chris Ballard is 3-for-3 in this draft. Basham needs to find a home in this defensive scheme, which will be interesting to track. Maybe he’s strictly a pass-rush specialist who grows into a role. But he’s an interesting talent who will be someone to watch over the next few seasons. Basham is not ready now but has something worth investing in. Grade: B

17) Washington Redskins: CB Fabian Moreau, UCLA – Moreau was trending toward a second-round landing spot before suffering a torn pectoral in a pre-draft workout. He’s extremely well sculpted and an explosive athlete; we just wish Moreau used his size a little better. His injury could derail him a bit this summer, but he could be ready for training camp. Right now, he’s more of an athlete than a football player, but the Redskins have time to groom him. Grade: B-

18) Denver Bronco: WR Carlos Henderson, Nevada – Few players in college football made people miss the way Henderson did, and he enters a nice situation with the Broncos where he doesn’t have to be in a lead role early but can be sprinkled in as a big-play change-up — as a receiver, runner and returner. Henderson’s route running is raw, but he has upside. His confidence and yards-after-catch potential are enticing. Grade: B+

19) New England Patriots: DE Derek Rivers, Youngstown State – Welcome to the draft, Super Bowl champs! The Patriots slid down 11 spots to land a pretty good pass-rushing prospect, which was a need, but he’s in need of some pushing. Scouts worried about his motor, which ran from hot to cold too often. Rivers has all the tools to join a DE rotation and follow the Trey Flowers path of breaking out in Year 2, but he must be receptive to hard coaching and the Patriots’ mentally taxing environment. Grade: B-

20)  Tampa Bay Buccaneers: WR Chris Godwin, Penn State – Fantasy owners, some advice: Invest in Jameis Winston. He now has been surrounded by some fascinating skill-position talent with the signing of DeSean Jackson, the Round 1 pick of O.J. Howard and this pick. Godwin fills a nice role as the third receiver, and the beauty is that he has the size and speed to possibly factor in at all three WR spots in Dirk Koetter’s offense. As this is a base two-TE team now, Godwin might be a bit of a specialist. But he’s gifted and has been hailed as a high-character player. Grade: B+

21) New England Patriots: OT Antonio Garcia, Troy – We suspected the Patriots wanted to add a developmental third tackle given that they spent a lot of time looking at that position during the scouting process. Garcia is a bit light and could use a year or two in their strength-training program. But he is a feisty, athletic and explosive talent with experience on the left side. He also played in a slide-protection scheme that the Patriots employ. A pet project for noted OL coach Dante Scarnecchia. Grade: C+

22) Kansas City Chiefs: RB Kareem Hunt, Toledo – Hunt has slimmed down a little and looks quicker than he sometimes did on tape. However, that tape was pretty good — turn on the Western Michigan game for a fun watch. That weight fluctuation is a concern, as it has been a theme throughout his career, but if Hunt keeps that in check he could thrive in Andy Reid’s offense. Hunt runs hard and does not put the ball on the ground. Grade: B

23) New York Giants: QB Davis Webb, Cal – The Giants missed out on Patrick Mahomes in Round 1, so they come back with the player Mahomes beat out at Texas Tech. Webb’s career was interrupted there, but he did enough in one year at Cal to open some eyes in scouting circles. Of course, there were some cringe-worthy moments in there, too — far too often to expect him to be great anytime soon. But with Eli Manning entering the twilight of his career, it’s time to develop a backup in the bullpen. Ben McAdoo’s offense might be voluminous, but Webb is smart and cocky about his football IQ and the concepts are not dissimilar to what he ran at Texas Tech and Cal. Grade: B

24) Oakland Raiders: DT Eddie Vanderdoes, UCLA – Poor conditioning has always been a concern for Vanderdoes, who was an elite prep recruit but never developed as expected. He has strong hands and nice size, but he got too big in college and never seemed the same after a knee injury. The Raiders have taken chances on these types of players before and hit now and then, but this feels like a risk. It’s unclear if he’ll commit fully to a weight program and lose some crucial extra heft. Vanderdoes just wears down too easily. Grade: D+

25) Houston Texans: RB D’Onta Foreman, Texas – Bill O’Brien spoke at the scouting combine that the team needs to develop a sidekick to Lamar Miller in an effort to reduce Miller’s workload, which got heavy as last season went on. Foreman still has plenty of tread on his tires despite a big 2016 season and could be that complement in the run game to help tenderize defenses. He has terrific size and production, and his mental toughness is unquestioned. But does Foreman have any special traits? He doesn’t play as fast as his testing times. Grade: B-

26) Seattle Seahawks: CB Shaquill Griffin, UCF – Griffin’s combine workout, combined with his long arms, made him a natural fit to Seattle. He has played consistently well throughout his career and has excellent ball production, as well as the ability to impact all four special teams units right away. This is a good player who had the chance to play at bigger schools but would not go anywhere that didn’t also offer a scholarship to his brother, who lost his hand in a childhood accident. Griffin is a terrific sleeper. Grade: B+

27) Los Angeles Rams: FS John Johnson, Boston College – The Rams finally addressed the defensive side of the ball, and they also get a special teams impact player as a gunner and jammer. Johnson played a little press corner at the Senior Bowl, opening some eyes, but he likely is most natural at safety. He’s tough, smart, hungry and humble — the perfect addition to a secondary that is in flux. Trumaine Johnson, Lamarcus Joyner and Maurice Alexander all are entering the final years of their respective deals, and Johnson figures to replace one of them eventually. Grade: B

28) Dallas Cowboys: CB Jourdan Lewis, Michigan – The Cowboys were gutted in the secondary, so it’s no surprise they would double up in the second and third rounds to aid that. Lewis’ stock fell for his size, his lack of great speed and he faces a domestic violence charge (he pleaded not guilty). If Lewis is cleared, this could be a steal. He has good ball skills, can play the slot and will be an impact player on special teams, potentially in a variety of roles. Good value, but the charges are concerning. Grade: C+

29) Green Bay Packers: DT Montravius Adams, Auburn – Despite his nice quickness and penetration ability, Adams’ short arms and lack of consistent motor is a concern. Perhaps he can be a gap-shooting nose tackle in this Packers odd front. Adams flashed at the Senior Bowl and will pop off the tape with some eye-opening plays. But watch enough of him and his maddening inconsistency shows. He also lacks strength and will fail to locate the ball as it’s moving past him. But put Adams in a wave in passing situations and Green Bay might have something. Grade: C-

30) Pittsburgh Steelers: CB Cameron Sutton, Tennessee – Sutton is a really nice addition to the Steelers. Had he not been hurt and lost part of his final season, Sutton would have gone higher. He’s a good punt returner, profiles to a slot role and will be a high-energy team leader as a rookie. HIs intangibles are outstanding, but Sutton must improve as a tackler to be more than a part-timer. Grade: B+

31) Seattle Seahawks: CB Delano Hill, Michigan – Intriguing size-speed prospect who fits the Seahawks mold of defensive back, Hill can hit and has lined up all over the place. His stock soared after breaking out this past season, and the Seahawks think he still could ascend higher. Be bearish on his potential. But Hill has some fascinating traits to mold. And beyond that, we love the idea of Pete Carroll drafting a Jim Harbaugh player. Grade: C+

32) Detroit Lions: WR Kenny Golladay, Northern Illinois – Golladay is a bit of a reach, but he has terrific length, great strength, the ability to block in the run game and can catch the high-point ball. He’s a raw player but one who will earn his keep as a special-teamer until he can master NFL route running and learn how better to use his physical gifts. There were better options at this point. Grade: C

33) Miami Dolphins: CB Cordrea Tankersley, Clemson – This is a fitting pick for the Dolphins, who now have attacked all three levels of a defense that had to get better. Tankersley might be in the running for least interested tackler in the draft with the 49ers’ third-rounder Ahkello Witherspoon; he just doesn’t care about it. Tankersley has length, looks exactly how you’d draw a corner up and has some ball skills of note. He carries a bust quotient as well. Grade: C+

34) Arizona Cardinals: WR Chad Williams, Grambling – Some legal issues got Williams off track, but he quickly was back in the team’s good graces and finished this process strong with an excellent showing at the Senior Bowl that offset him not being invited to the scouting combine. He has size and speed, and almost singlehandedly beat Arizona with a monster performance in Grambling’s near-upset. Williams has some time to develop in Bruce Arians’ offense but has some fascinating traits. Grade: C

35) Philadelphia Eagles: CB Rasul Douglas, West Virginia – With Douglas, the Eagles add yet another long-limbed corner to help out a secondary that required additional reinforcements. He’s a textbook press corner to handle the Jim Schwartz scheme despite a lack of speed and rarely playing up to his measureables. Douglas will be ready to go right away, so with Sidney Jones rehabbing early in the season this fills an immediate need. Grade: B-

36) Tennessee Titans: WR Jonnu Smith, Florida International – Smith was a favorite of ours through the scouting cycle, as he blocks his tail off (despite great size) and has some pluck in the receiving game too. You might remember Smith was the player who was burned by boiling water by his girlfriend, but he showed toughness by returning quicker than expected from those serious injuries and also facing the expected slew of questions from the media about it. Smith might not be a special player, but he can contribute to this intriguing Titans team. Grade: B

37) Denver Broncos: CB Brendan Langley, Lamar – The Broncos have had a weird draft. Langley looks amazing walking off the bus but less so playing football. He was roasted at the Senior Bowl vs. better competition. He has a lot of work to do to improve as a player despite some incredible physical traits. Maybe he’s a safety? Grade: D+

38) Seattle Seahawks: DT Nazair Jones, North Carolina – Jones has battled a rare syndrome that caused him to lose a lot of weight in his teens but earned a lot of respect for making himself into an NFL prospect. We had him more as a Day 3 player, and the Seahawks are getting very deep up front, which could mean Jones gets lost in the shuffle amid more gifted talents. He doesn’t sack the quarterback and has below-average explosiveness for the position. Grade: D+

39) New Orleans Saints: DE Trey Hendrickson, Florida Atlantic – Hendrickson compares to Rob Ninkovich — short arms, hot motor, underrated athleticism and excellent sack production — who was a Saints late-rounder years ago. Hendrickson is a feisty rusher who tries to win the mental game by getting in opponents’ heads and outworking them. He has some burst but isn’t strong enough and might need to be manipulated a bit to manufacture some pass-rush productivity in the NFL. Grade: B-

40) San Francisco 49ers: QB C.J. Beathard, Iowa – John Lynch couldn’t get all the roses. The 49ers already had Beathard on their roster; his name is Matt Barkley. Is that the profile of a quarterback a team needs to trade back into Round 3 for? Appreciate Beathard’s toughness, great intangibles and short-area accuracy. He might be a QB coach one day. But he’s nothing more than a smart, well-prepared backup. Grade: D

41) Pittsburgh Steelers: RB James Conner, Pittsburgh – Good luck saying a bad word about Conner. Oh, maybe he went a tad higher than expected. Perhaps his lateral quickness is sub-par by NFL standards. But this is a power runner who instantly will be a star playing his NFL games in the college stadium in which he became a hero for his on-field production and beating cancer off it. Conner wants to do anything he can to help a team win; he volunteered for special teams duty, moonlighted as a defensive end and will gladly accept a No. 2 role to Le’Veon Bell. A feel-good pick but also a good pick. Grade: B+

42) Seattle Seahawks: WR Amara Darboh, Michigan – Darboh is a smart, tough, physical receiver who can play a role on this Seahawks team and block his face off in the run game. He’s a good competitor who showed better playmaking ability and playing speed than he previously had and will be a reliable No. 2 or 3 receiver. A nice, solid pick amid some risky ones for the Seahawks. Grade: B

43) Tampa Bay Buccaneers: ILB Kendell Beckwith, LSU – Beckwith’s torn ACL likely makes him a PUP list candidate, but this is a big hitter and a heck of a football player who would have gone a round higher had he not been hurt. He seeks to bury ballcarriers and will help set a tone on a defense, but his lack of great athleticism and limitations against the pass also knocked him down a bit. Still, he could contribute eventually. Grade: B+

More NFL draft coverage from Yahoo Sports: • NFL draft: Day 2 winners and losers • How the Saints had the most heartbreaking draft ever • Dan Wetzel: Has door opened for lie-detector tests in NFL draft process?

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