#sure maybe a few people would have died anyways but so many deaths could have been avoided if they had warned people before 8pm

[aroaceofthesea]

I hate hate hate how all newspapers talk about the unpredictable storm that happened in valencia. It was not unpredictable. Meteorologists had been warning about it for a week. 12 hours before it happened they issued a red alert.

It was not unpredictable. It was the politician's fault that it caught people unaware: even having all the information they decided not no warn anyone until the catastrophe was already happening

The storm in valencia this week was many things, but unpredictable is not one of them unless knowing a week in advance can be considered unpredictable

[lost-in-fiction-like-ur-mom]

hii I was wondering if u could write something where daeho and reader are already in a relationship and they find eachother after the first round and maybe they are upset with eachother for going into the games.

anc if it could have a bit of fluff that would be nice!!

tyy🫶🫶🫶

At Least We Have Eachother

KANG DAE-HO X READER

Summary- Dae-ho and you both join the squid games for the benefit of the other. Neither of you know about it, until you find each other after the first game.

Warnings- Squid Games, mentions of blood, murder, and death

A/N- Thank you guys for the overwhelming support with my Daeho fic. I am so motivated right now, it's not even funny. He is such a sweet baby, MY SHAYLAAAA

Word Count- 1,192

Your debt was not something you were proud of. To be honest, it crept up on you. It started with medical bills, then Daeho ran into some Ex-Marines, who dragged him into a bad gamble.

From there it kind of went down hill. Struggling to pay bills, borrowing more money, making the wrong people mad. In other words, the two of you were in an extremely bad position.

When a strange man with a suitcase approached you on your way home, you were hesitant. In any other situation you might have ignored him and walked away. But, you had just had another invoice from a debt collecting company. Not to mention the loan shark that came up and threatened Daeho two days prior. The eviction notice was also putting a hole on your kitchen table.

The idea of following the funny-looking card, winning a bunch of money, clearing your (and Daeho) debts. It was too good to be true, you knew that deep down. At the end of the day, you were at rock bottom. Desperate people do desperate things.

So, while slipping Daeho a simple lie about spending the night with a friend... You took off to the discrete location alone. Where you were picked up by a van. You don't remember much after that.

The regret sunk in deep when you realized what you had gotten yourself into. When you awoke seeing hundreds of people around you, all in the same position, you were noticeably scared. You barely left the bed you woke in. Only to stand with the crowd to listen to the guards and sign the needed contract. It seemed too late to back out now...

The first game was lonely, intimidating, and revealing. The only reason you weren't lying head face in the sand dead, was your fear. It struck you stone-cold still on 'red light'. The ring of your ears pressured you to move forward on 'Green light.' Due to the deadly shots to other players. It pushed you to move so you didn't suffer the same fate.

You were much too nervous to talk to anyone, you saw little point in making friends at first. That was until the realization of any team games.

After the first game was officially over and you had returned to the common room, you'd taken a moment to think. To think how it would be if you were able to walk home now. How it probably wouldn't even matter if you had died, so many people were out for your head anyways. It was all looking dark, but Daeho was your light. He was always so positive, he kept you happy. You owed it to him to keep fighting.

To keep fighting for that adorable, handsome, sweet face. That same face that was currently staring you down....

"Daeho?" You questioned, just in case your mind was playing a trick on you.

"What are you doing here!" He ran over, pulling you further behind the layered beds. His grip was tight on your arm, once the two of you stopped, he seemed to notice. At that he quickly loosened his squeeze.

"W-why are you here! I-I thought you were sleeping over at-" You cut him off, your guilty conscience taking over.

"Daeho, what are you doing here?" You rebutted, frantically pushing your hair back. He knew you were nervous.

"To settle some of our debt, but that doesn't even matter anymore. People are dying, you can't be here!" He stressed over you. He did a few takes over your form, making sure you were not hurt in any way. You thought he was finished until he slowly brought his hand up. He stuck his thumb out and seared a few drops of blood off of your cheek. You hadn't noticed them before...

An argument against him was impossible to think of, but you managed. "Well I can say the same about you! You could get killed also. Where would that leave me!" He threw his head back, pressing both hands over his face. He dragged them down, an annoyed expression on his face.

"Ohhh, this can not be happening.. I-it doesn't matter, because you're here, where you were not supposed to be!" He started to fidget with his fingers, a sign he was distressed.

"Dae...I'm also here because... I got fired yesterday..." You looked down, picking at your nails. His head snapped to look at yours. "What?"

"They were... overstaffed and, apparently a younger employee could do the same amount of work for minimum wage... So, they just got rid of me..." He looked sympathetic, but still mad.

"You should have told me. We would have figured it out. You didn't have to lie."

You thought for a second, "Its not like I wanted to lie! I was trying to help us!"

"How reckless!" He said. It was almost comical!

A laugh pushed its way out, "Oh my gosh, don't act like you aren't here too!" You started to raise your voice, frustrated.

He took a single step back, hands on his hips. "You're supposed to be the smart one! I'm fun, loving, a burst of fricken light!" He said, his words contradicting his tone, not joyfully at all.

"Whatever! What matters now is that we were stuck in a death trap! The money is not even our first problem. We might not even be alive before the day is over! Or worse, you'll be dead and I'll be left to suffer!"

He gave another sigh, stepping forward and embracing you. It was exactly what both of you needed. His arms wrapped impossibly tight around you. You could only reciprocate the squeeze. His head fell on top of yours, he nestled in.

"I don't want to argue, I just want you safe... We will be fine." He said, keeping you in his grasp.

"I know, but I just wanted to help... The man seemed so promising, that we could have a normal life again." You wanted to let your tears flow, but you couldn't risk looking weak. You had to remind yourself that there were still a couple hundred other players in the large room.

He shook his head on top of yours, "I would live in a tent as long as I was with you.... I can manage anywhere, as long as you are by my side..."

You pulled back to look at him. Your arms still wrapping around each other. "I just, I know you're not happy... I wanted to clear everything up, one day own our own house. One that we can never get evicted from." He pushed a stray hair behind your ear.

"Oh Dae, I don't care about that. I just want you." You shoved your head into his chest.

"I love you.."

"I love you too."

"What the hell are we going to do here." You questioned, peaking up from his chest slightly.

"Were going to stick together. We're going to get out of this alive." He pulled back and down to press a firm and reassuring kiss on your lips. Maybe things would be so bad after all.

Oh, how naive you both were...

A/N- Honestly, I like my first Daeho fic better. But that's probably because I am a SUCKER for emotional hurt/comfort. Anyways, I hope y'all enjoyed this one. Pls lmk how I can improve!!!

[lafiola]

The Recruiter x Fem!Reader [PART 1]

cw: gun play, blood kink, forced oral (f receiving), forced kissing, non-consensual touching, sadism, dead dove: do not eat, non-consensual masturbation, stalking

!!: the tags correspond to the second part, but I'm leaving them here just in case

I'm going to die tomorrow, and if you find this, it's probably too late. It's embarrassing that I don't know you, and you don't know me, but I hope you can have some empathy for my fate; and maybe somewhere where I can be happy, that will help me have some compassion for my next life.

.

.

.

.

The tiny letter you had left as a pitiful legacy had been left behind; on one of those stone benches in the enclosed park, where the tramps used to go to sleep. You thought that many of them would pay no attention to it, and lost sighs during each word would be of no use, but you did it anyway: you leaned the paper in a corner, pressed by a stone so that the wind would not blow it away. Your letter was going to be read; at least the first few words. That was enough.

Your death was going to be disastrous, that was certain. You had chosen one of the highest bridges, the one over one of the busiest avenues. When it was three or four o'clock in the morning you were going to jump off it; your body would crash to the asphalt, interrupting traffic, and your brains would paint the pedestrian crossing where a group of police and assigned professionals would soon come to inspect your remains. Quite dramatic, to be sure, but memorable.

You were still a bit sad to die like that; with so many people watching. That was what you wanted most of all: to die. It was as simple as that. But who could assure you that no one would record you? Who would forget you at the end of the year? People really die when they are forgotten, because what is man but the result of a social construction; and if at least one human being could have a fragment of you in their memory, engraved like your flesh against the rough ground at the dry impact of the fall, something so simple and brutal, how could you really disappear? You were to be the icon of an ephemeral internet star; some pitiful soul representative of the underdogs, those unable to do what you would do in a couple of hours.

You didn't want your soul locked up in limbo, in the same world where you could no longer find your spouse. You wanted to go with them.

You felt it deep inside you; in that corner so easily mistaken for the heart. You knew that they had died long ago, after they had returned and disappeared again to play those infamous games they talked so much about. Big money, they said; that there was a big prize for whoever could make it to the finish line. Many people in one place, like rats, and prey to some strangers with morbid ideas.

True or not, your spouse had no longer returned home. Dead or missing with the supposed prize. It didn't matter to you; you had spent every last penny to pay off your debts. Debts that were not really yours, but no one else's either. It was just you, the bridge... and the stranger in the suit underneath. 

Someone in the middle of the street.

A car or two honked their horns from time to time as they passed by the man. He kept looking up at you. You couldn't quite make out his features, but you'd bet it could be grief judging by his free hand raised in the air; between his fingers a piece of paper that suddenly reminded you of your letter. You felt ashamed again.

‘’It's not safe to stand on the edge of such a high bridge!‘’ he shouted. You could hear a smile in his voice.

You didn't answer, but as soon as you saw him head for the stairs leading to the bridge, you jumped down to make a dash for the other end. Your plan now was to escape. If the man caught up with you, you were going to have to explain yourself or, worse, face the police or paramedics, as you had sometimes seen with other cases of interrupted suicides. You didn't want to face up to something so overwhelming. Death shouldn't be overwhelming!

Halfway down the stairs you stumbled, and had to grab the handrail with both hands. Your body slammed sideways into the rest of the steps, and your thighs burned with the friction of the icy metal. Wearing shorts had not been a good choice. When you got to your feet as soon as you heard another call, you went back down step by step until you hit the street, and didn't look back before catching your breath and running as fast as you could; your heart in your throat, and your name in the wind, spoken by a stranger's voice with a laugh akin to that of a friend.

The stranger in the suit who seemed to know you, and whom you had never seen before in your life.

Night was already coming to the city. You had to keep your eyes open and gather your courage to cross the emptier streets; you avoided bars, restaurants or crowded areas. Your goal was to escape the pair of hurried footsteps behind you. He seemed to be about to catch up with you.

Said and done, a hand with strong fingers grabbed one of your arms, and made you stumble to the side. Your back hit one of the walls of a closed alley. When you opened your eyes, the pain clouding your vision, it took you some time to notice the imposing figure of the stranger in front of you. He was panting as much as you, but he smiled consistently while arching his eyebrows.

The sound of his briefcase hitting the floor startled you. Seconds later, your letter appeared in his free hand again.

“It’s yours, isn’t it?” he asked in a choked murmur. A few strands of hair fell into his face, accentuating his darkened eyes. His sallow skin glistened under a sheen of sweat. “The letter—it’s yours.”

“How do you know my name?” The only sensible thing you could think of to say was that. Tiredness and nerves interrupted something in your head.

His hand released your arm, caressing your bare skin to soothe the pain. It was an instant. Your letter ended up in your hands; the stranger fixed his hair, jacket and shirt, and then took his distance. You were about to repeat your question, when the name of your spouse came out of his mouth.

Name, age, address and debt. You immediately jumped at the last part.

"I've already paid off that debt!”

"I know," he nodded, "That's not why I've addressed you.”

"And why did you chase me all the way out here then?”

"It has been deemed necessary for you to know of the passing of your spouse. They have left nothing behind; but perhaps this news is more than enough for you to be able to live in peace.”

His eyes fell on the letter in your hands. You shook your head, stretching your arms out to him. The paper trembled over your fingers as a breeze brushed against it.

"I have done everything I had pending so far," you replied. "What remains for me is the solitude of the early dawn, and with it, my impending death.”

“Solitude?” he arched his eyebrows again, dwarfing the smile. “You seek solitude on the busiest avenue to end your life?”

“It's not something you should be interested in.”

“It seems to me that you're afraid of dying alone,” he snorted. “In fact, I think you were waiting for someone like me to show up to save your life. If this is distressing, it's because of your lack of ability to make a good decision.”

You choked on your saliva. “Excuse me? What was that all about?”

Your name, your age and your address hung in the air after leaving between his lips. Lips that you didn't stop seeing until his voice faded into the night.

“How do you know so much about me?" you whispered. "What have you done to my partner?”

“What you would have done to yourself had you not been responsible enough for your own problems,” he replied. “Congratulations on paying off your debt.”

.

.

.

.

A weirdo, that's what you thought of the stranger when you saw him leave. He was heading to the bridge again; possibly to recruit more people desperate for some money. Something like that was what you imagined all the time when you thought of your spouse. Had they suffered a lot in the process? Where had they been taken? Were they coming for you, or did the stranger really show up to announce your loss?

For a week you continued to ponder the idea of suicide, while living with paranoid scenarios at every suspicious sound or face. Sometimes you would turn around as you walked, looking for the same eyes in the crowd, and you would even look for a job to cover the cost of rent a little far from where you lived. Until you could sell that house you were going to keep hiding from a ghost.

You went back to the torturous routine; you fed when memories did not punish your mind, and slept when your heart no longer ached. No way did you ever cross the bridge again, let alone the adjacent avenues. You struggled to regain your composure until nothing helped: The Recruiter had returned at the three-month mark.

You found him on a platform, casually sitting in complete solitude. At least until you ran down the stairs. The train had already left, the stranger's eyes were on you, and there was nothing you could do when you had your body on the same surface. You didn't even look him in the face; you feigned ignorance, barely trembling when you heard him sigh very close to you.

“I haven't seen you again in a long time,” he said. “Was the suicide plan finally scrapped?”

You snorted to keep from letting out a dry, unfunny laugh. “I didn't want to run into you, and right now I realize I did the right thing.”

“Until now.”

When you turned to see him, he had his eyes on you again. It was an intense, opaque gaze, with a feeling akin to desire; something that made your skin crawl, and made you swallow dry. His smile didn't even feel polite anymore.

“You're really not going to take me?” you asked. “You're not going to do to me what you do to all those people?”

“What do you think I do to people?”

“They told me,” you continued in a broken voice. He arched his eyebrows, intrigued. “They told me about a ridiculous game with red and blue papers, and about the money and the slapping, too. Then they went home, and some time later disappeared again.”

“Well,” he shrugged, “it's not my fault. I never forced them into anything.”

“You killed them.”

“Oh, please,” he laughed. “I am a simple messenger. I bring the good news, and they decide. Nothing that happens next is up to me.”

“I don't believe you.” You let out a sigh, clasping your hands together over your lap. You kept your gaze on them. “What are you doing here, at the train station? What business is waiting for you?”

“Are you suddenly interested in me? How wonderful; I feel my cheeks burning.”

“You're ridiculous.”

The Recruiter's laughter broke the silence like an invasive melody. That made you nervous.

“Don't get any weird ideas about me!” you added.

“I've gotten a lot of ideas about you, but none really terrible,” he replies. “You're different from them; you're better. A lovely version.”

When you raised your head to look into his eyes, you found a slight smile on his face and a much warmer glow in his gaze. The Recruiter had leaned back, resting his back against the wall. Both legs slightly apart, and his hands on his thighs; his suitcase rested on the floor, brushing against one of his shoes.

The closeness of his right leg to your left leg did not make you uncomfortable at all, which might have generated some sort of embarrassment if not for the realization of his recent confession.

“You talk about me as if you know me,” you said. “Should I take that as a warning that I've been being investigated by a man in a suit?”

“You think that's sexy?” His smile widened as if fueled by the grace of a demon. That glint in his gaze returned to the same as before: dark and hungry.

"I think you are sick, and if you don't stop now, then I will go to the police.”

“Good luck with that,” he snorted. In one neat motion he rose from his place, and bent to pick up his suitcase before giving you one last look. “May the night be brief for you; I hope so with all my heart. I know you have not been sleeping well.”

“Because of you,” you growled.

The Recruiter let out another laugh, this time more charming. The echo continued even as he retreated on his way to the stairs, completely ignoring the arrival of the last train.

The idea that he had been resorting to the bridge to witness the resolution of your own grief made your hair stand on end. You didn't want to accept that someone so crazy was after you; but this man had clearly been tracking you, and you didn't know how much longer this situation would last without something terrible happening to you. How many women survived their stalkers? You were not going to be the exemption from a tragedy.

[itsfairly]

10:22pm // Nanami Kento x gn!reader

word count: 1.4k

cw: gn!reader, fluff, slight angst if you squint, established-sh relationship, basically yall are dating but not publically, alcohol mentions, death mentions (no one dies).

summary: you're out drinking with other staff at jujutsu high when you decided to step out. when nanami comes and joins you, small talk gets you two thinking.

a/n: i wrote half in a bathroom stall when drunk, what was i even doing? i was supposed to meet no people not pin over my fictional husband. anyways, yeah, took an impromptu break but hey, if i wasn't feeling like writing, i wasn't gonna push it. but here i am again, wanting to write, so here is this!

“What are you doing here?”

You turned around, looking at Nanami standing a few feet before you. You sigh, your breath creating a small fog against the cold of the night as you lean against the bar’s entrance by the window.

“It was too loud.”

“And it’s too cold.” He responds, taking off his blazer and wrapping it around your shoulders.

You chuckled, clinging to the warmth of the fabric. “They are gonna know if they see us like this. They are all right there and we are right on sight, you know?”

Nanami walks beside you, looking at the street before you two. You were right. Considering that the two of you seemed like just coworkers to everyone else but something else between you two behind the privacy of whatever space you could find, seeing you two together like this with his blazer around you was going to raise some flags. And yet, he couldn’t help but search for you when he noticed you were gone for a longer time than his liking.

“Gojo is keeping them busy, trying to get them to play his game of saying why they like him for them to even notice we left.” He looked through the window, where, sure enough, a sober Gojo was determined to get those reasons out of the either drunk or tired rest of the table. It didn’t seem like it was successful despite Gojo’s huge energetic grin.

“Is that the real reason why you stepped out?” You smirked, teasing at his rather push-and-pull dynamic with the white-haired sorcerer. “Because you didn’t want to play that?”

“I can have multiple reasons why I stepped out. Maybe that’s one of them, but seeing you in the cold was another one.” He looked down at you, his voice softening as he saw how you were gripping his blazer closer to you. “A big one at that.”

You chuckled, looking with a warm smile that made the cold become much more bearable even when standing outside the bar well past sunset. “Aw, what a gentleman.”

“You deserve one. I want to be one for you.” He said, his eyes on the street before the two of you.

If you didn’t know better, you would say he’s quite flustered. Despite his composed demeanor, he was not looking into your eyes when he said such genuine and affectionate words, but rather towards the street in front of you two. It was almost like a confession despite how many times the two of you have gone on dinners together, or grazed each other’s hands when others weren’t looking, or the soft “be safe” whispers whenever either of you went on a mission. Yeah, those acts were confessions within themselves and you were fine with them, knowing that he wasn’t the most vocal about his feelings upfront. But hearing such feelings come from his lips into a soft and gentle tone meant a lot. Those nine words meant that he was opening up to you more and more.

You furrow your brows, however. It didn’t matter how direct his or your words were or their frequency, being a sorcerer wasn’t the best job to fall for your coworkers. Death lurked in every mission, reminding you of how dangerous it was and how painful it would be if either of you would just be gone. Never again to tease him about how buying books was his hobby rather than reading them, never again for him to feel your hands on his shoulders as you insists on helping him relax as you massaged them, never again to see each other’s eyes full of life and the possibility—the yearning of being more. The longing to not be restricted of being together because you didn’t know how much you had left.

It may be the alcohol that got you thinking about this, but it was always a thought you wanted to push away whenever you saw him, wanting to feel the happiness of what you were experiencing rather than feeling the pain of what-ifs. You wanted more, to be closer to him. Sometimes, you could see how he ached for the same despite his wish to not burden you—or anyone for that matter—with the uncertainty of his safety.

But one thing was certain, not only tonight as he accompanied you outside with your breath puffing into the air while the rest of the group drank the night away for some escape of the jujutsu world, but every day since the distance between you shortened by the day.

He never burdened you with the uncertainty of his love for you—because it was certain and it was visible in the most beautiful way. His longing for you, his worry for you, his inability to completely adhere to his idea of staying single while a sorcerer, his goddamn devotion towards you that it made you wonder how no one has even caught on that you two are a thing. He loved you, loves you in the smallest ways that, when put together, are the biggest act one has ever done for you.

“You are.” You whisper, not even realizing the words escaped from your mind and were spoken into existence until he turned to look at you. Now that you had his attention, you stood a little straighter and said with much more conviction, “you already are.”

Nanami takes a second. His eyes looking deep into yours, unable to look away as if he is trying to read them. His brows mirror yours, knitting together ever so slightly. He was taken back by how much softer you looked in this moment despite the cold tensing your body. The warm light from the bar spilled outside and kissed your skin with a yellow, gentle glow. It was hard staying away from you, which is why it was a no brainer to follow you when you stepped out. It wasn’t just because he wanted to check on you, but because you always managed to pull him closer to you without even trying. You felt so close, but he wanted you closer.

It felt natural the moment he grabbed your hand, entwining his fingers with yours without giving it much thought of his own. He was tired of thinking anyway. He didn’t want to gather more reasons to stay away from you when the feeling on his heart weighed too much for them to hold water against it. He didn’t want to love you from afar, to have you in an arm’s reach but never hold you for the world to see. He didn’t want you to be like the books that sat on his shelves, gathering dust that taunted him with the fact he bought them and had yet to read them. He didn’t want that with you. He wanted to read you like a book. To go as far as to highlight his favorite parts of you, to read you over and over until he could recite you from memory to the world. He wanted you to be his favorite book in that sense.

“Then I’ll make sure to be more than just a gentleman to you.” He adds, his thumb moving against the back of your hand to warm it up.

Without skipping a beat, you take a deep breath before repeating your words, “you already are, Kento. More than that even.”

As your hand squeezes him and your eyes shine as if they were reflecting the moon themselves, things become certain for him as well. You loved him. Through the teasing and the burden of what could happen to either of you, you loved him with such a confidence and fulfillment that the feeling would stay the same for a long time and your actions would follow. You wanted to close that distance and hold him in your hands with such care and warmth that would shelter him from the stress of his everyday life. To cherish his skin, his hair, and every crook and cranny that he allowed you to see and touch until your fingertips burned with his feel as if you were to draw a map of him from memory. He was your favorite sensation in the world. You wanted to protect and nurture that sensation called Nanami Kento.

“I guess we want the same thing then.” Nanami softly spoke, taking a deep breath and squeezed your hand back.

“You guess right.” You answered back, nodding slightly with a smile.

Nanami nods back, holding your hand and guiding you back to inside the bar and back to your coworkers. This time, when you get near the group, he doesn't let go of your hand and you don’t let go of his.

[low-budget-korra]

Let's talk about Caitlyn Kiramman from Arcane (again)

Tons to talk about her so, here we go

1. Is she privileged? Yes. Is she a bad person because of it? No.

In fact, from the beginning, Caitlyn always wanted to do what's right and that's the reason she became an enforcer(in her life experience until then, as Piltie, the enforcers were there to keep the peace and help the city and it's people). She wanted to help people and was one of the few Top Siders who viewed Zaun people as people and not monsters or trash.

2. Did she get blind by revenge and make some bad stuff? Yes.

But let's be fr, if my mom was murdered like that and by the same people I tried to help, I would do the same or even worse and probably so are you Caitlyn haters. And that's okay, we are emotional beings and rage truly is something that blinds people.

Not to be that person but half of Caitlyn's hate posts just scream "i never lost someone important in my life and I don't know how grief works" Cuz unfortunately I did and even tho it wasn't nowhere near the violent way Cassandra died, I still had to struggle with the anger phase. And I say this bc people act Caitlyn was just pulling a tantrum, overacting or smt

Sure, her pain ain't bigger than Jinx's or Vi's, but it's still hurts and the only true difference is that Cassandra had the privilege of an honorable funeral, while Felicia and many others from Zaun, didn't have. But don't be here all condescendingly try to disqualify Caitlyn pain just bc she is rich

Anyway, she was so blind by revenge that she released the toxic gas on Zaun, and it is said and shown that she only used to clean the streets before search operations and against the baroons. Still fucked up bc there's no way innocents weren't harmed but still, it ain't like she release the gas on everyone just for funzies as some people comments

Ambessa played her cards pretty well bc it's easier to do something like that if you dehumanize your enemy. And those Zaun thugs were dumb enough to fall for the Ambessa trap in the ceremony and the whole Zaun suffered because of that.

And if we can learn something from this is not to be too quick to violence bc you may be played and in the end, you and your people will suffer with the oppressors now ""justified"" actions. Yes, violence can help but we need to know how and when to use it.

3. Caitlyn is possibly the most complex and misunderstood character from season 2. Mostly bc even tho we had lots of micro expressions and subtext that explain her actions, there were things that maybe needed to be said. This would save the character from being so misunderstood

Like a scene with her saying something like "Vi...I'm sorry if I hurt you" and then Vi would respond like "if?" and then silence after. Could even be in that scene in act3 when Vi just wakes up from the coma. Idk, I know it sounds dumb but again, it would save the character from being misunderstood and hated over them

"But Caitlyn changing sides was too plot convenient and came outta nowhere". No? Lmao in fact you can see in her face how she regrets hitting on Vi and how she kinda of doesn't want to be there when Ambessa is making the speech in the end of act1

But then again, Ambessa plays her cards and calls out Caitlyn into a position where she simply can't say no. Remember that they were already thinking that someone from the Top may have helped the attack and Caitlyn was seen hanging around with a Zaun criminal and sister of the terrorist, if she refused what Ambessa was offering, people would assume she is a traitor and that could mean death to her.

Months go by and when we see act2 Caitlyn she is already more calm, her initial rage and wishes of vengeance kinda of ran out, and she is already realizing all the shit she did and disagreeing with Ambessa's ideas. In simple terms: She just wanted a way out.

Oh and let's not forget how Caitlyn was alone during all that. Her father was also grieving, Jace was gone, Mel was gone, Vi was gone...she was all alone and emotionally vulnerable, which makes it so much easier for Ambessa to manipulate her

So when she reunited with Vi and Vi called her Cupcake, it's like "wait, you not hate me after what I did to you?" moment , it was when she realized she wasn't alone anymore. And after hearing that Vi was helping her father, Caitlyn immediately wanted to help - maybe as a way of saying sorry, to redeem herself from the bad shit she did during those 6 months.

And when she got to see Jinx happily and chill, just hugging her dad...it was the moment she remembered Jinx wasn't a monster, that little moment is when she starts humanize Jinx and we can see in her eyes.

"then why did she arrest Jinx" Because Jinx surrendered and she had no choice, Jinx didn't kill just her mom. But she waits for Vi to wake up, to decide what to do and I bet while this happened, people were pressuring her to execute Jinx already or something.

That conversation she had with Jinx kind of seal the deal. Probably the first proper conversation they had and seeing Jinx so weak and vulnerable...it totally makes her destroy the image she previously had of her. There's no way back, she didn't forgive Jinx and I don't think she ever will, but she stopped hating her. Which is a start.

And knowing Vi would never allow Jinx to stay in jail, Caitlyn just say "fuck it" and let Vi release her sister. This was an act of love, especially bc Cait knew Vi could just run away with Jinx and she may never see her again.

"the CaitVi sex scene was unnecessary" I didn't see any of these when it was Jayce and Mel tho 🤷

It is both sad and funny how a huge part of the Caitlyn haters also loved and forgave Silco. This just proves that if a woman will be judged harder, a lesbian will be judged 2x more harder cuz the amount of lesbophobic comments I've seen...

[baffledandbewildered]

“You can kill me,” Betty says, before she can talk herself out of it. Poll and Evi’s eyes light up, and she can’t bring herself to regret saying anything. They’re her… allies. They’ve been kind to her. She doesn’t lose anything by dying today - “You’ve got to give the heart back, and let me e-chest my stuff first,” she says hurriedly.

They both nod immediately, and Betty shakes her head fondly and goes to place her e-chest… 

“You’ve gotta let me leave the corner, you know,” she adds.

Evi mumbles something that sounds like a half-hearted complaint, but steps back a little, letting Betty sort through her gear. She glances up where Mari is circling above them before taking off her armour.

“Right - okay, yeah, you can kill me,” she says again, a little nervous now - she doesn’t care about dying to people she cares about, but armourless at spawn is a terrifying thing.

Pollock grins, takes out his sword, and in less than a second she’s gone, the world lighting up in a brief flare of pain that calms the moment she respawns in her bed under the ocean.

For a moment, she lays there, giggling, hand clamped over her mouth from residual paranoia. 

She was so scared of dying for so long. It’s good to be reminded that death doesn’t actually have to mean anything.

She grabs her gear and goes back to spawn, takes the heart Poll gives back to her with a laugh and presses it against her wrist, hissing a little as it settles into place alongside the others. For a moment, she’d worried she wouldn’t get it back - but they’re allies, and yes trust doesn’t come easy but their alliance is official and she doesn’t think either of the team would want to hurt her, despite the nagging voice in the back of her mind that reminds her that no one on this server is safe to be around.

She’s not sure she could call what she feels for Hamhams trust. It’s care, certainly - she’s not sure she wants to know how many hearts she’s given Evi4 over the last few weeks, and she’s tried her best to keep the both of them safe, to stand up for them - a flickering memory of sharing information and a plan with Evi crosses her mind, because messing with Hamhams is cruel and she doesn’t like it - but trust? Probably not. She knows it’s a risk to let someone kill her. She let them anyway. 

Maybe that is a kind of trust. She wouldn’t let Chips kill her all those weeks ago, even with the promise of returning the heart. She doesn’t like dying.

She doesn’t know. She doesn’t want to think about it too much. If she starts thinking about alliances and allegiances and friends and enemies she’ll start to panic and she doesn’t want to go back to the frame of mind she was in a few weeks ago. She’s fine. She’s fine.

The next day finds her and Evi and Seri at spawn, and Seri dies to lava while Betty is still reeling from a couple of messages from Cogmented and suddenly Evi and Seri are arguing about a stolen elytra and she doesn’t know what to do. She tries to de-escalate, make Evi give it back because she knows that Nara would be well in his rights to kill for this and she doesn’t want to see another Evi4 death, not today, but she’s still shaken and confused and she’s never been the best of talking people out of things at the best of times.

And somehow things have spiralled even further, with Seri being chased halfway across the ocean and bitterly it feels almost like being a bodyguard again as she runs after the two of them, not sure who she wants to save.

Cog calls her a bad ally, her relationship with Hamhams a bad alliance. She can’t exactly blame him, or any of the others who echo that sentiment.

In the end, Seri dies, Evi4 dies, and she and Evi are left alone at spawn. 

“Do you want to blow something up?” Betty offers.

“Yes!”

They settle on the hillside under Nara’s bar, next to the waterfall they built the other day when they were first experimenting with TNT minecarts and windcharges. Betty stains her hands with gunpowder as she crafts more, and the second explosion they make goes a little wrong and sends them both stumbling, blows a hole in something they didn’t mean to.

“No one has to know…” Evi says slowly. Their crown is a little crooked, knocked loose by the explosion, and Betty fixes it with a giggle and they go back to explosions. They call it date night, just for fun.

Eventually, they have to stop before they actually destroy something important, so they start building instead - there’s about 10 shulkers on the ground and so many different blocks but they somehow make it work, Evi sets herself on fire a couple of times and when she accidentally steps on a shrieker Betty yelps like she’d been shocked but it’s funny and it’s fun and - it helps, after the last few hours they’ve had. 

Evi lets her rant about Cog, too, as they work - Betty feels bad but Evi claims not to mind, and the funny insults and comments help, a lot, and by the time they’re done with the build she can joke about being mischaracterised without feeling like she’s going to pass out. She thinks it hurt Evi too, being called a bad ally, because occasionally she mentions something about their “mutually beneficial alliance” and it sounds bitter. It’s petty, maybe, but she’s glad.

Eventually, they judge the build done, and sit together on the blackstone stairs watching the sunset. Usually, Betty turns her face away in those final minutes of day, but this time watching the golden glow fade in the distance doesn’t cause something to twist in her chest. 

As they worked, earlier, Evi4 told her a secret, an important one, and the trust in that made Betty’s heart warm. She wants to give something back.

“I have a secret of my own,” she says, carefully keeping her eyes fixed on the horizon. “I’ll tell you it if you want. Not today, not here. But - I want you to know, I think.”

The next day, they meet at a stronghold - it’s not the most hidden location to disclose the most important secret of Betty’s life, not with the nether roof portal right next to them, but Evi4 wants an end-portal table and she’s not going to argue with that, even if the thought of being overheard makes her feel faint.

Betty’s been shaky all day, unable to concentrate on anything but the looming conversation - it won’t be the first time she’s said this story out loud, but it’s different today.

“Mmmm,” Evi4 says, looking around at the room. “You can talk while I decorate.”

So. Betty does. She paces as she speaks, shaking hands shoved in the pockets of her cardigan, and she doesn’t look at Evi unless Evi makes some strange comment but that helps, a lot. Poll shows up 20 minutes late to the conversation, signs a hello, and she has to restart the story for him, but by that point the panic is… lessened. Still there, simmering in her chest, but it’s manageable. And HamHams are easy to talk to - apart from when Evi decides it’s a funny bit to say “Hi Cogmented” every time she mentions his name - it makes her flinch each time, heart rate spiking briefly, but it also makes her laugh. They make her laugh a lot, honestly, Poll at one point waving for her attention then signing something that she sends her on a tangent for a good few minutes.

She needs that, really. It’s - scary, talking about this, the guilt a stabbing pain in her chest as she speaks.

Hamhams don’t try to tell her it’s not her fault. Instead, when Betty explains why, Evi, who’s been staring silently for the last few minutes, yells “BAD DECISION!”

And… he’s right. It was a bad decision. And despite the fear choking her, her shaking hands, it feels good not to be immediately dismissed. To have her mistakes recognised, and for it not to matter.

It was a bad decision. And they don’t care. 

She lets Evi kill her, when they leave the meeting room. Being Evi4, they decide to punch her to death, but the entire time they’re both laughing and Betty can’t really find it in herself to care, even as she respawns in a deepslate room with faded bruises on her skin. 

Once again, they meet at spawn, and she gets the heart back. This time it’s through Evi grabbing her hand and pressing the heart against her palm, then not letting go and using the hold to drag Betty towards the hole to bedrock and make her jump in after him.

Hamhams have the oddest ability to make the scariest situations… not. It was the same when they first spoke about allying. The conversation itself wasn’t difficult, really, but watching Poll hide his hands from her so he can sign something privately to Evi was nerve-wracking after the day she’d had so far - but within minutes she was laughing again at something he said. It’s nice.

Betty has a date with Ace the day after… the conversation. Date night 2, to use the official name, the not-at-all-flimsy cover story. Betty’s been on a lot of dates this week, and it makes her giggle when she thinks of it. 

Evi4 shows up midway through, invisible, to hand Betty three stacks of gold blocks with a hurried promise that they’re not stolen, then disappears again, but not without showing them his new armour - stolen from Cogmented, because Evi had killed it only a few hours ago - that was an awesome thing to wake up to. 

A little while later Evi finds them again, and there’s a strange look in their eyes when they look between Betty and Ace. It doesn’t feel threatening, just… thinking. Betty wants to know what they’re thinking - it’s weird, standing between the two people she’s - really, they should have a talk about labels at some point.

She finds out what Evi4 was thinking the next day. They’re just - talking, gossiping if she’s honest, and Evi is complaining about Void - “He told me to kill Ace cause Ace had an elytra after I - failed the first mace kill,” she says.

Betty freezes. Ace. “What the fuck?” she says. “What the fuck?”

“I thought about it… very briefly! But you and Ace are lovely sooo.”

“Thank you,” Betty says quietly, automatically, mind whirring. Her hands itch to grab her e-chest, look through the shulker full of books and flowers and all the other things Ace gave her - she knows the words off by heart, so she stops herself, but god it still hurts. “I - what.”

“Mhmm.”

“Can I - tell - someone? I - fuck, I don’t -”

“Only if they don’t tell…”

“Ah, alright, okay - I won’t, I just - I’m - that’s - I don’t - is this to try and break us up? Like - what the fuck -”

“What is wrongggg with himmmmm oh my god,” Evi groans.

Betty laughs shakily. She doesn’t speak for a little while more, then - “I just - can I talk to him about this?”

“Do whatever you want forever BettyIsBaffled,” Evi4 says, and it’s so reminiscent of another person who Betty misses so much that she flinches.

“Okay. Okay. I will.”

They part ways, and Betty gives in to the urge to sort through her e-chest, taking out a single allium and holding it gently in her hands. She doesn’t particularly want to look at the books - the most recent one still stings, slightly, and even though she knows things are better now she doesn’t want to think about the Gameshow and all that happened after.

The Gameshow. She puts the flower down before her shaking hands can crush it, then pulls another book out of her e-chest, this one unsigned. She doesn’t need to read this one, either, really, but she flicks through the pages anyway.

Void’s hurt Evi too - they deserve a win. Betty needs to stop feeling so conflicted.

So now she grabs her communicator and types out a message for Evi4.

I’ve thought of a really funny idea. Do you wanna try get Void with the mace when I speak to him later?

Of course, it isn’t that simple. He agrees to the location Betty and Evi had decided on earlier in the day, but plants rose bushes around him as they talk - the mace now won’t work, there’s so many panicked messages in Betty’s communicator and then an offer: Yo I’ve got TNT minecarts?

Betty doesn’t even think before responding. Do it.

Void claims he didn’t mean anything by the Ace comment. She believes them, and it does make guilt twist a little in her chest but that’s a familiar feeling by now and she swallows it down, tries to keep them talking because Evi needs a little more time for this to work -

In the end, she dies mid-sentence, the phantom sound of the explosion still ringing in her ears as she respawns. She can’t breathe for a long long moment, all the air in her lungs gone, then she gasps and the world comes back to her. It - worked? It worked. She laughs, giddy. 

Oh she is fucked, but - it worked! They did it.

She messages Evi immediately: Are you safe?

Evi says he is, so Betty digs herself down to bedrock and decides she can wait here for a little bit. There’s no point being stupid. Consequences will come sooner or later, and she can happily wait for that. 

Except… she doesn’t exactly get the chance. Evi4 dies, and their spawn point is public so moments later she’s receiving messages about Pathogen at their spawn point - Betty doesn’t even know why the entire bloody megateam is involved in this. It seems overkill but hey that’s the Pathogen way at this point…

Fuck she doesn’t know what to do especially when Evi dies, and again and Betty’s frantically messaging them trying to work out a way to get them out of spawn because Betty’s fine dying again if it means Evi is okay but Evi either doesn’t answer or answers with nonsense or “Don’t ever come back to spawn” at one point and Betty’s awful at ignoring order’s but she can’t just stay here. 

If she’s honest, Betty’s pretty close to a panic attack now, pacing back and forth in the tiny stone room she’s carved out with her now-close-to-breaking pickaxe, vision blurred with tears she won’t allow to fall - she doesn’t know if they’ll let Evi go if she goes back and if she dies she won’t be able to help at all but she doesn’t know what to do - 

In the end, she doesn’t have to choose. Nara comes and picks her up from her cave beneath the ocean, escorts her back to spawn, and Evi’s there, alive, and she runs over to them immediately. Evi4 is - he looks a little battered, bloody, his dress is torn but he’s alive and that’s what matters.

“I’m sorry - for getting you killed,” Betty says immediately. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t even worry, bro,” Evi says, then dramatically, a little clumsily, kisses her on the cheek, giggling.

Betty laughs weakly. It’s - well. That’s Evi4, really. 

She’s suddenly so so aware of the soot stains on her clothes, the throbbing half-healed burns across the left side of her body. There’s deepslate dust under her nails, and it looks almost like the gunpowder from when she built the TNT minecarts for their first date - she tears her mind away from that thought before the shaking can start again. She’s so tired.

“Can we leave?” she begs.

They end up going to the drowned farm. Betty sits on the side, tapping her fingers anxiously against the wood as they wait for drowneds to spawn - Evi needs hearts, after all. 

Evi4, who has died twice, who had offered to take the blame for this fully - it’s purposeful kindness. It’s not something Betty’s used to - she usually grows to care through circumstance, shared experiences, but Evi is trying. From the secrets shared with no expectation of anything in return, to the care for the things Betty built, to unspoken apologies, to self-sacrifice -

She thinks she trusts them. It’s taken her a while to realise.

The sun’s setting now, and the gold light reflects off Evi’s crown as they wander randomly around the platform, fishing rod in hand - the next thing Betty knows there’s a fishing hook tangled in her hair and she’s being tugged forwards, laughing, complaining, until Evi puts the fishing rod down with a giggle and pushes her towards the drowneds. Betty doesn’t even think about the sunset as she kills the monsters and rifles through the chests for shells, holding them out with a smile that is brightly echoed. 

Yeah. She trusts them.

[aritsukemo]

Comfort at the Edge of Darkness | Himeko

Summary: Himeko is the best at comforting people, even if that person is knocking on death's door.

Warnings: Major Character Death ahead! ( reader ) This drabble was written with strictly platonic intent! ( Reader is implied to be underaged ) Teen/Pre-teen reader is implied ( whichever you want to envision ) Reader is also lightly implied to be a Masked Fool. Mentions of being crushed ( Reader had a giant pillar fall on them and end up bleeding out ) I still consider myself a new player to HSR so Himeko may be a bit ( or very ) ooc. With all that said, read at your own discretion.

A/N: Did I plan to ever write something star rail related? Yes, yes I did. Did I think it would be platonic or involving Himeko comforting a dying child? No, no I did not- 💀 Uh, anyways, this was spontaneously written at like two in the morning after reading this Dan Feng x reader drabble made by @milksnake-tea ( go check them out btw, their writing is AMAZEBALLS ) so I'm sorry if this is a bit sloppier than my usual works. I'll try not to let it happen again! 🙏

Tagging: @nursedflowers / @onmysundaybest

People are such liars.

It's not like they can help it. Like eating and sleeping, lying was just another humanly function the body nor mind could resist. It's impossible for someone to be 100% truthful all the time because even claiming that would be a lie in itself.

All that's to say that you've been told many lies in your lifetime and have spewed such falsehoods just as much. Others' lies are what led you down this path and your own have both built you up and made you fall from grace with almost no hope of crawling your way back up. Both have made you the enemy of many, but neither have made you friends with the few good saps you've come to travel with. Those pathetically soft and forgiving Trailblazers you've come to dine with, joke with, cry with, and ultimately, die for.

Heh. It was all so stupid.

That's what past you would probably say to you right now if they were here to see your hair being died red by your own pool of blood. They'd probably scoff, maybe even sneer at the sight of the bottom half of your body crushed under this pillar. And oh, the way they'd absolutely glare with disappointment and disgust at the sight of your smile growing like it is right now, or rather, who it was directed at.

"Miss Navigator, heh.. Come to send me off?" Talking felt like running without toenails. It felt like sticking a sword down your throat. It hurt like hell. But, it is in your character to joke at a time like this.

And what were you without this role you've been playing for oh so long?

"Y/n... You.." Her voice was unlike her usual cheerful mellowness. It was sunken, rasped by dreadful surprise. It was a tone you never thought would come from her ruby lips. To you, she always seemed like the type to be composed in a situation like this one.

Maybe she would if the person laying under this pillar wasn't you. Who knows.

"I've had worse done to me honestly.." You managed to force yourself to say, though it left a bitter taste in your mouth. You roll your tongue and that bitter taste begins tasting more and more metallic, though you decide to ignore it in the end.

"Heh..aren't you happy?" You asked, "Finally..at long last.. The-.. The Astral Express will be rid of pranks and folly. It'll..at last, harbor the peace it once had.."

"Of course I'm not," She whispers. You pick up on the slight quiver her normal voice deceptively masks, "Why would I be happy about something like this?"

"Why wouldn't you?" You asked, for once, with your genuine emotions leaking over your tone.

You couldn't wrap your head around a reason for such a reaction as the one on her face. Sure, maybe the aspect of your age may cause a heartstring to be tugged, but that would be more so out of disappointment because of the wasted potential—the extraordinary power and protection—that would be lost following your death, and even then, you don't see that as something she should be relatively choked up about. After all, with the luck the Astral Express has, there's bound to be much stronger vessels than yourself willing to join the freight that would give them much less of a headache. That Stellaron for example.

..Now that you really think about it, what even was their reason for inviting you on the train at all? They had more than capable people aboard already, and while the untapped power within you could bring worlds to their knees, those goody goodies would never think of using it. You weren't much for peaceful entertainment either and caused nothing but discourse amongst the crew members even after swearing to turn over a new leaf when you became a Trailblazer.

It made no sense. She made no sense, and to that, you sought out answers... Though, the one you received wasn't very satisfying; silence.

So you ask her, though with a bit of your typical sarcasm, "Why..Miss Navigator...aren't you jumping for joy over this thorn in your side finally being cut away?"

And she answers with sickening authenticity, "Because I wished to protect you."

You huff out a laugh, though you end up coughing up more blood than air. It was incredulous. After all, there was no need for someone such as you, younger or not, to be coddled and protected like some wounded birdie. Your character wasn't constructed for such a pillowy fate.

"You of...all people know I'm in no need of protection," You say, "It's not something I deserve or yearn for... It's utterly pointless to me."

"Is that really what you think? ..Because all I can see is child in need of nothing more than that," Your eyes widen. Himeko catches a glimpse of it for only a moment and it tugs at her heart strings when thinking about how it'll be one of the last expressions she'll every see you make. You, who though once walked the path of darkness with your fool's mask and caused many nothing but pain and suffering, she could never come to even greatly dislike.

..Because in her eyes, you were never a criminal or a murderer or a weapon of destruction. You were just a fledging who attempted to soar too early and ultimately fell out of their nest and into a dangerous forest of tyrannical wolves and manipulative foxes. You were just a child who was ripped apart and never pieced back together—who, at some point, must've screamed and cried for their mother to come and take them home, surely.

And in the face of such a person, how could she have wanted anything more than to whisk you off to safety and slowly mend you back together? To teach your body that it was made for more than just endless strife and pain? To let your soul become aware of the fact that the role of your character was no longer needed because she was here now to witness your vulnerability and allow it to spread free of consequence, cherish it, and shield it as if it were a precious gem?

"Hey... Miss..Navigator," She heard your faint call. She looks down again, her eyes at a sorrowful downcast as she asked, "Yes?"

"I'm...real' sleepy... Could I.." You didn't finish your sentence. You couldn't, but whether that was because you were adamant on dying wearing your cracked mask or that it was simply too much work to continue formulating your sentence was unknown.

Nevertheless, your silent request reached her and in seconds your head was resting on her thighs and one of her hands had found purchase in the only one you could still feel.

In an instant, her warmth began to spread throughout your body, replacing the warmth that had long since left you. It felt nice, kinda like taking a warm bath after treading through a blizzard to get home. And, as stupid as it was to admit, the feeling unclasped the lock that you had placed in the very back of your mind—unsealed the gate you had barricaded past memories your heart was never able to part with behind—and brought you back to a time you had forgotten long ago.

And for the first and last time, you broke character and allowed the tears to fall freely and wet your cheeks, all while a look of tranquility crossed your features; like a little kid dozing off to sleep after a long day's work of playing with the same broken toys.

And as numbness began to creep over your consciousness, you whispered to her, "Good..night... Miss Navigator..."

To which she returned the favor, as any mother would do, "Goodnight, dear.. I hope your dreams are forever sweet."

Dividers were made by me, pictures used are from Pinterest, post formatting is inspired by @xxsabitoxx

[allastoredeer]

Do you have any headcanons about Alastor's participation in WW1? The Selective Service Act of 1917 made it mandatory for men aged 21-30 to register for military service and was later expanded to include men as young as 18, so if the stream saying that Alastor was late thirties to early forties when he died is still canon he'd have lived through that

So, I hadn't gotten to this part in my development of Alastor's backstory, but it got me thinking because, huh, how DID Alastor manage to get out of that?

Unless he just served in WW1. Which...I find oddly funny. I don't know why, but the the image of Alastor in the trenches...

But anyway, you got me curious so I looked into it. You're 100% right about the Selective Service Act of 1917 making it mandatory for men aged 21-30 to register for military service, and they even came up with different "classes" of the men who qualified, and if they exhausted one class, they'd go down to the next.

However, even with the Selective Service Act, there was still a lot of draft evasion going on. In fact, a significant amount of draft evasion happened in the South, which, as I'm sure you know, Louisiana is part of (some of it was in part of Southerners not having documentation, and thus, unable to even legally draft, which would probably give them a whole other slew of problems).

So, I was looking into how people evaded the draft. A lot of it is split up into different groups, like draft avoidance and draft resistance, with their only little list of things, but that's a lot and I don't wanna get into all of that. But my bet is on Alastor doing draft avoidance.

And there were actually quite a few interesting ones, like:

Claiming to have a mental or psychological problem (if you could find a doctor willing to certify that for you)

Student deferment, when someone is primarily in school to learn and study (or obtaining one in an effort to avoid the draft)

Deliberately failing the military intelligence tests

Professing sincere or religious ethical beliefs (join a church, avoid the draft!)

Bribery

and my personal favorite:

Being homosexual.

Because, as you know, the government can't allow the gay in the military!

And look, I'm a silly goober, so of course I immediately went to Alastor claiming to be homosexual. But the thing is, I kind of do think that is something Alastor would do for a majority of reasons.

In the 1920's, social values were evolving, and a lot of postwar "youths" began questioning traditional concepts of family, sexuality, and gender. There were "little Bohemia's" around the US, including in Manhattan and San Francisco, with communities and groups like this, and they weren't exactly unknown.

Back to Alastor, he lived in the French Quarter in New Orleans (or, at least, that's where I think he lived as a majority of mixed-raced Creole people lived there, which we know Alastor canonically is). And it just so happens, that it became the birth place of New Orleans gay community in the 1920's. There were entire gay neighborhoods, there were clubs where people dressed in the clothing of the opposite gender, they had parties and bars, and while it wasn't "the norm" to live this "lifestyle," and there was still a lot of harassment, it was still fairly normal to see. (Of course, then came what we can call the "gay panic" where government started cracking down on it, and claiming the gay community were all predators and pedophiles, and - well, you know. You know.)

But that was after/close to Alastor's death, so...

Anyway, I 100% believe that Alastor did take part and lived in communities like those. Names and labels for those things didn't exist at the time, so it's not like he knows what they're called, but homosexuals, cross-dressing, drag queens, they were normal to him. He's lived with them, partied with them, maybe even tried a few things out himself(so many headcanons, guys. So many).

This is to say, I think Alastor would 100% be comfortable claiming to be homosexual to avoid getting drafted. You've seen getting married for tax benefits, now consider becoming gay for draft evasion! I actually had a pretty fun talk about it with a friend in Discord, which only cemented it in my mind LMAO.

I have SO many headcanons around Alastor and him living in the French Quarter, in gay communities, where they challenged social norms (and we all know how he feels about challenging status quo's 😏)

But if not that, my runner up is that he totally bribed his way out of it. I don't know how he got the money, maybe he killed someone and stole their wallet, IDK, but bribery is a yes from me.

And if not THAT one, then he joined and church and claimed to have sincere religious and ethical beliefs 😇 🙏 (Yes, this is inspired by Nun Alastor, and no, I do not take constructive criticism. That's what happened guys, I was there). Besides, New Orleans was pretty Catholic, I'm sure he could find a church somewhere.

That's my take on it XD I think the one closest to Alastor's canon character would be bribery, but this is fandom, and if I say he claimed to be gay to get out of going to war, then goddammit he claimed to be gay to get out of going to war.

[worthyprnce]

i saw this post and I had an idea (for a fic maybe?) but I don't have the time for it right now, so I'll try to summarize it. I also don't even know if this will make sense or if anyone else will see my vision, but anyway... (I'm also going to ignore the premise of stopping a wedding because it's the love of you life's wedding, I'm going to give merlin another reason)

arthur is about to marry a random princess. uther continues to insist on bringing princesses from allied kingdoms for his son to marry, to form powerful alliances and ensure heirs. and, after so many discussions, uther managed to convince his son to a marriage of convenience, which broke the hearts of both arthur and gwen, the true love of the prince's life.

merlin knows that this marriage shouldn't happen, it simply can't happen, and he was determined to stop it, even if he had to take drastic measures. not only because he's the number one arwen shipper we have in the show, but because he and gaius discovered that it was just another plan by the princess's father to overtake the throne of camelot. so he runs, desperate, to the church where the wedding would take place, his eyes wide, his lungs pulsing against his chest, heavy and tired.

his magic was agitated because his body,mind, soul and heart were agitated, so when he opened the doors of the cathedral and shouted with all his strength "I OBJECT!", the last thing he expected to see was a collection of pairs of unknown eyes and a decorated coffin in the middle of the people instead of arthur and his future wife. in fact, the last thing he was really expecting was to see the deceased slowly rise from his coffin, dazed like a hangover, scratch his eyes and look around, confused.

some women screamed, but it didn't seem to be out of fear, it seemed more like irritation, as if they had been caught in an old prank once again. but what really made the deceased come to his senses, were the angry cries of "you scoundrel! there's no use playing dead, gwaine, you'll pay my money!"

that was what made the deceased, gwaine it seemed, get up, his energy renewed, and run away, tripping over flowers and candles while merlin remained standing in front of the door without understanding what had really happened, stunned and lost.

gwaine ran out, passing merlin like lightning, and merlin had to run after him, because now the resurrected man's collectors were thinking that merlin was part of his plot. which wasn't true, but merlin needed to understand what had happened. there was no way merlin could have unintentionally used his magic to bring someone back to life, right? there was no way, he would know if he could do it. but he needed to get this straight.

the two ran to a hidden alley, where they caught their breath.

"what the fuck was that?" merlin asked.

"and do I know? one minute I had a knife in my heart, the next I was at peace and then I saw you like in a dream and now I'm here." gwaine replied. "I think I really should stop drinking, for a minute I thought I was dead and you brought me back. like an angel or something. you sure do look like one."

merlin didn't know what to say, so he stared at gwaine for a few seconds while the latter's mind calculated the events.

"I died. I died, I'm sure I died, I was cold and weak and when I woke up we were in a church, I was in a coffin." gwaine said, finally merlin was afraid that he would need to find some quick and plausible excuse in case gwaine threatened him. he didn't know that man and didn't know what his reaction would be to someone using magic, even if it was to bring him back to life.

that's why merlin was very surprised when gwaine hugged him tightly.

"man, you literally brought me back from death! ha! I can't believe that really happened, I owe you a huge debt now. let's have a drink, we can get to know each other better and you can tell me about these jesus-like acts of yours."

merlin's mind was racing, he almost didn't notice the sound of the church bell, the right church to stop arthur's wedding.

"listen. if you want to repay me for something, give me your word that you won't tell anyone. I brought you back to life, I can kill you again, I know your name and I for sure can find you anywhere" merlin said, pointing his finger at gwaine and trying to sound intimidating. gwaine smirked and raised his hands.

"oh, I wouldn't be that stupid," he replied.

"apparently you're only stupid enough to get yourself into too much debt."

"it's a complicated life, you know how it goes." gwaine's smile was too wide and playful for someone who had only been dead for a few minutes, but it was a beautiful smile, and merlin couldn't help but notice it.

"yeah, sure… uh..." merlin shook his head, as if that would put his thoughts in place "okay then, it was nice meeting you, but I need to run now."

"wait!" gwaine grabbed merlin by the wrist before he could even take a step "I don't even know your name, and that can't be all that you need from me. I don't have much, as it's already obvious... but I can be useful. I'll do anything, you literally gave me my life back. please, let me repay you somehow. I'm serious." merlin thought for a few seconds, the church bell ringing in his ears, the weight of a wedding that wasn't even his on his shoulders, his best friend's broken heart, the fate of an entire kingdom. merlin sighed. "whatever, what else do I have to lose?" he thought to himself

"I'm merlin, and I need your help to stop a wedding."

[toxinoire]

Kara never thought of it when Lena first asked her this question.

"What if someone says; in like a few years maybe, I'd be...gone?" Lena asks, staring at the distance.

Kara got confused at this question. But decided to answer anyway. "Well, I'd most likely, punch them or something. I'm not letting that happen."

Lena chuckled. "You're right...I guess it's just another existential crisis."

"Want to talk about it?" Kara asks softly. Lena just smiles at her. "No, darling. It's alright. It's just one of those times."

"Well, if you need anything...food, movies, a hug, I'm right here."

Lena laughs and nods. "Got that."

She didn't ask that question for no reason. She isn't sure if Kara already figured this fact out already, but their time is limited. Because Kara won't die unless she gets killed with Kryptonite or the day the yellow sun flying over them dies.

Lena knows there's a chance that Kara's life could be at stake at any given moment, but at the same time...there's a possibility that she could have Kara for the rest of her life. While Kara won't have Lena, nor the rest of their family for the rest of her life.

See here's the thing, Kara knew that. But ignorance is a bliss, as they say. She pretends that the day won't come.

But...maybe she indulged herself too much.

Because right now, Kara, swear to Rao, drops the car she's currently carrying as her eyes widen in fear. Through a window, not that big, but big enough for her to witness it firsthand.

Lena, sweet, gentle, beautiful Lena, with a knife pierced through her neck. She heard the enemy responsible for it, the one who's back is facing the window, laugh. Fucking laugh. Kara and Lena make eye contact through the window, Lena smiling gently, softly, warmly, at her. Muttering something no human could hear, but Kara heard so clearly. Her voice as soft as her gaze.

"I love you."

Kara barges in, breaking the whole wall, she rushes to her, hoping she could still save her. Hoping she wouldn't lose her. She can't lose Lena, she just can't.

However, it was too late. The knife stabbed a very fatal spot, and Kara witnesses Lena drop to the ground.

Kara can no longer hear her heartbeat.

"Aww, look at Supergirl. The Paragon of Hope, looking hopeless-"

Before this asshole can finish, Kara pushes him, actually pushes him off the broken wall, she hears him scream and plummet down, but she doesn't care.

"Lena?"

Nothing.

"Please, no. No. Fuck. Please don't leave me, don't take her too, please." Kara tries to get help, but to no avail.

Lena Luthor's death was publicly announced two days later. Many were happy at the fact that there was not a single Luthor left. The Superfriends grieved in their own ways. At least some people in the city actually acknowledged what Lena did for the world and paid their respects. The Superfriends tried to comfort Kara. She appreciates it, of course, but it won't bring Lena, Kara's...everything, back to her.

Now everywhere she goes, Kara just sees Lena.

She would try to go to Big Belly Burger, she just remembers that time they celebrated Lena's birthday there. Noonan's? She just sees Lena's smile when Kara gives her coffee from that place. The park in National City? That time Lena used her magic fully for the first time. CatCo? She remembers every hall Lena ever walked in. She sees a book? She remembers Lena giving her one.

Her own apartment also reminds her of Lena, all the times they had there. Certain foods remind her of Lena. Everything around her is now just a ghost of Lena. Even fucking kryptonite reminds her of Lena.

She's everywhere Kara goes.

No one in the city realized how much Supergirl was so torn over the loss of Lena Luthor.

Some dickwads actually thought she was happy about it, which some idiot reporter asked her one day.

"You must be really relieved that the last Luthor is no longer a threat."

Kara stays silent, yet her eyes emmit everything she wants to say.

Kelly holds back an angry Alex from hitting someone, but Kelly herself is yelling about how insensitive that was, about how this reporter is disrespecting the dead, about how they forgot that Lena worked with Supergirl. Both Brainy and Nia list down everything that Lena has done to save the city.

Kara? She's been silent, before taking a deep breath, looking at the reporter, knowing there are cameras surrounding her, she says,

"This world is nothing without her."

Then, she flies away, higher into the blue skies and screams.

Would you look at that, world. There's a Luthor that successfully broke a Super.

[raina16]

Perspective

I'm of the opinion that Keyleth's perspective now in the past 30 years is not one she needs to have in the future, even if Vax still remains the Champion of Ravens, or some other position in the celestial sphere. I think much of her anger and pain could be abated if she changed her perspective. Instead of mourning the life they didn't get, appreciating what they do have.

One thing that is a fact is that Keyleth, assuming she was not killed in some way, is going to live a very very long life. This was always an issue, her friends, and Vax'ildan, would die many centuries before her. Initially it even stood in the way of her relationship with Vax. She'd live without him something like 10 times longer than she'd lived with him even if they both just died of old age.

Yes she nominally accepted that but thinking you've accepted something that is 150 yrs off is not the same as living through it. When Vax died would she really have been so accepting and just moved on? Or would she have mourned him for the many centuries to come? What if she never got over it for her 1600 more years of life? How might that affect her personality, her friendships and leadership?

It's only been 30 years since he, not sure what you'd call it, ascended. That's only a very small percentage of her lifetime, something like 2 percent. It's perfectly normal to still be in the "anger" stage. There is no timeframe on grief.

But what about in 500 years when all of her old friends in Vox Machina are gone, when almost everyone she knew from that time is gone, except maybe a few fellow arch druids?

Those ravens would almost certainly be a comfort to her. Just as he meant them to be now. And if he had suddenly stopped sending them, so she could "move on", who is to say she'd have moved on? Maybe she'd have felt an even worse emptiness, maybe she'd start looking for signs in all the ravens (would people start calling her the "crazy"raven lady?)

The same with Vax himself. No he's not with her physically, most of the time, but if things had gone as she'd imagined, he would have been centuries dead already anyway, and her still with most of her life still ahead of her.

But because he's become Champion of Ravens he's still there in some form and she's still loved and someone still remembers her as Keyleth and not only the powerful nearly godlike herself Voice of the Tempest.

Letting Go

I don't think she has to let go. I don't think he has to let go. Not of each other. They simply have to let go of the old dream and move forward as what they are. I think he's perhaps further along that path than she is, in that he doesn't seem angry, but not completely.

Instead of mourning(or being angry, I think it's ok to feel some sorrow for what might have been) about they didn't get, Keyleth could take comfort in the fact that much like her, he'll still be out there centuries from now, and as the ravens showed, still thinking of her too, instead of long buried and completely unreachable for 90 percent of her life.

500 years from now she'll likely feel that way anyway but I think she can get there now if she tries to change her perspective and takes a long view instead of a short one.

Keyleth even now lives a full life, she has family, she got her mother back, she has friends. She can continue to make more friends, though admittedly it's harder in her leadership position and because of her already mentioned extended lifespan, but not impossible. She by no means has an empty life, even if she didn't have a new romantic partner.

If anything she's in rather a better position in that regard than Vax, who as Champion it appears doesn't really seem to get to form new close relationships. He's got the Matron, fleeting interactions with the dead and getting tough with anyone who tries to mess with the rules of life and death. And loving him, being the one who remembers the man inside the mantle, is such a kindness to him as well.

Mythic Romance

Here's the romantic in me, it's bittersweet yes but it's not bad and it doesn't have to be something Keyleth finds so painful.

There's no reason they can't continue to love each other. They don't have to "move on" from each other. From a certain perspective this actually may be better fit for the lives they lead, for the life she was always meant to lead. She was always meant to have a life apart, not one like most people, and in a way it's fitting that her love would take a different course as well.

When she finally passes on, if she becomes a tree, ravens can sit in her branches. Or if she doesn't go the tree route perhaps the Raven Queen(assuming she's still around) would allow her Champion to finally be at rest himself, for Keyleth to be the final soul he greets in death and they can move into the next chapter together.

It's the stuff of legends really.

[madrone33]

So, I've been re-reading the Deltora Quest books for the first time in years because my obsession with them has recently been revived (just finished Valley of the Lost), and man, I don't think I realised before just how, like, absolutely devoted Lief is to getting rid of the Shadow Lord and freeing Deltora. It's especially apparent in the first few books.

The Belt is basically all that matters to him. Not even finding the Heir is more important, honestly the heir is very much secondary to the Belt. They're just the person who will put on and activate the Belt's magic; they are a means to an end. His own life is secondary to the Belt - which isn't to say he's not afraid of dying, he really really is, but when shit gets real and it looks like this is the end, his thoughts almost always go to the Belt. Just like the heir, Lief thinks of himself as a means to an end. (Which is ironic, seeing as how he is the heir.) Lief will make the Belt, and the heir will wear the Belt, but it's the Belt itself that matters most to him. Because it's the Belt that will save them.

'Do not worry about me,' Lief whispered, trying to keep his voice steady and calm. 'Nothing matters but that we seize the gem. If I die in the attempt, it will not be your fault. You must take the Belt from my body and go on alone, as you have wished.'

I must prepare myself for death, Lief thought. But he could only think of the Belt around his waist. If he was killed here, the Belt would lie forgotten with his bones. The gems would never be restored to it. The heir to the throne of Deltora would never be found. The land would remain under the Shadow forever.

'No!' Lief cried. 'Wait!' At this moment of terror, his one thought was for the Belt of Deltora and the topaz fixed to it. If he did nothing to prevent it, this golden eyed giant would surely find the Belt after he was dead, take it from his body- and perhaps give it to Thaegan. Then Deltora would be lost to the Shadow Lord forever. I must throw the Belt over the cliff, he thought desperately. I must make sure that Barda and Jasmine see me do it. Then they will have some chance of finding it again. If only I can delay him until I can do it...

[Literally just died] Lief felt himself pulled to his feet and slung over Barda's shoulder. His head was spinning. He wanted to cry out, 'What of the crown? The opal?' But then he was that the crown was in Barda's hand.

Lief's fingers felt for the clasp of the Belt he wore under his shirt. If necessary, he would unloose it and let it fall into the mud at the bottom of the stream. It would be better for it to lie there than for it to fall into the hands of the Shadow Lord again.

And maybe it didn't really hit me when I first read them 'cause I was approximately A Child, but it's really sinking in now just how bad things have been in Deltora for the last 16 years. When they talk about slavery and fighting arenas and brandings and starvation and executions in the streets. For some reason all these human atrocities are hitting home a lot more than before. It used to be the monsters that seemed the scariest, but now I can see that yes, the monsters are horrifying and traumatising and terrifying, but Lief and Barda and Jasmine continuously choose to keep going, they willingly put themselves through hell, because the Shadow Lord is worse.

Anyway, all this to say, Deltora really couldn't ask for a more selfless and loyal King that Lief. This kid is willing to die so many times over if it means his people are safe.

(The only thing he tends to go off mission for are his friends and family, but even then, I'm thinking of that part in Isle of the Dead where Laughing Jack holds Jasmine hostage and demand the Belt in return. And Lief refuses. Because his people must come first. And he knows Jasmine would never want him to betray their land for her. Like??? So many feels.)

[eadrey-the-iptscray]

Last Days of War 2025 - Day 1

Author's Note: I might not be able to write every day but I'm going to try my hardest to complete some of the prompts. Shoutout to @lastdaysofwar for the idea!

Prompts: celebration, memorial, dog tags

Wordcount: 850

Main characters: Raleigh Becket, Yancy Becket's ghost, Mako Mori (implied Maleigh toward the end)

Hong Kong Shatterdome was still celebrating the success of Operation: Pitfall weeks later, but not everyone was enjoying the moment. Raleigh had excused himself from the festivities, choosing instead to sit with the memorial plaques that had been relocated there from all the decommissioned Shatterdomes. It felt wrong, somehow, to be celebrating when so many people had died.

He wasn't the only one with that sentiment. Some of the mourners at the moment included members of the Crimson Typhoon and Cherno Alpha strike crews, still in their uniforms. Sniffles filled the otherwise silent hall as everyone paid their respects to the fallen pilots.

Mako and Herc had been to the Hall of Heroes a few times. Raleigh had seen them on occasion, standing in silence with the memories of their fallen loved ones weighing heavily on their bodies and minds. Wreaths for Stacker Pentecost, Chuck Hansen, the Weis, and Kaidonovskys had been set up in the center of the room, and that's where most of the mourners had gathered.

Raleigh, however, was sitting in front of the Icebox's memorial plaque. And he wasn't alone. A ghostly figure in a white drivesuit was hovering in his peripheral vision, its presence so lifelike that Raleigh could've sworn it was actually Yancy looking down at him.

Raleigh didn't believe in ghosts, but he spoke to it, anyway.

"Hey, Yance."

Somewhere in the back of his mind, a voice replied, Hey, kid.

Even after five years, Raleigh still missed Yancy so much it hurt. So what if he indulged in a conversation with his brother one last time?

"I've been thinking. My air supply ran out down there." He thought back to the burning sensation in his lungs as the sluggishness of his body as he tried to initiate Lady Danger's self-destruct protocols by hand. "I don't get how I made it out. Unless…"

But Yancy didn't answer.

Saying it out loud, Raleigh realized how ridiculous it sounded. No matter how real ghost drifting or this figure's presence felt, it wouldn't change the fact that ghosts weren't real. They sure as hell couldn't interfere with the lives of mortals.

Could they?

"Yancy, did you save me?"

Again, silence.

Raleigh sighed. "Well... thank you," he said. "For at least keeping me company. I still miss you."

Yeah? The ghostly voice had a sad smile in its tone.

"Every day." Raleigh's chest tightened as he held back a sob, and he rubbed a palm over it to sooth it. The chain of Yancy's dog tags moved underneath his fingers.

I know. You remember what the Marshal said, though, right?

Raleigh thought back to Pentecost's last words: You can always find me in the drift. Said to Mako in his final moments. They'd been tender words from a proud father to his grown daughter, but they rang true for every pilot who had ever lost someone. And maybe, Raleigh figured, he needed to hear that. To release the guilt of Yancy's death, once and for all.

Yep. I'm in your brain, remember?

Raleigh smirked. That's what Yancy had said to him before they'd deployed together that fateful day in February 2020. Memories of the Knifehead attack still hurt, and would probably always hurt. But they'd lost their sting over the years. His eyes, however, hadn't, and Raleigh rubbed the tears away with the sleeve of his sweater.

You don't have to carry me around, you know.

"What?"

My tags.

It had been a jaeger pilot tradition to trade dog tags before every drop. The idea was that you couldn't die if you were wearing someone else's tags. And the superstition worked... until it didn't.

"I can't give 'em back," Raleigh muttered. It was true. Yancy's body had never been recovered. As far as he knew, it was at the bottom of the ocean with Raleigh's dog tags.

Then quit wearing 'em.

Part of him didn't want to. Those dog tags were the last thing Yancy touched before—

Raleigh.

He feels a warm hand on his right shoulder; for a second, he expected to find his big brother in the flesh and standing over him. Instead, Mako peered down at him. Raleigh gripped her hand and returned her sad smile.

For nearly five years, Raleigh had carried the guilt over Yancy's death everywhere he went: from job site to job site, from Anchorage to Nome to Sheldon Point to Hong Kong. But with the breach destroyed and the kaiju gone for good, he could finally set that baggage down. Yancy's death hadn't been in vain. And for the first time since, Raleigh felt that weight lift from his shoulders.

He didn't realize he was crying until Mako wiped the tears away. She had crouched in front of him, and now she wrapped him in a tight hug. The ghost drift between them was still strong, and he knew she could sense his gratitude. But he would tell her anyway, after his eyes had dried and his mind was clear. For now, they sat in silence, embracing on the floor of the Hall of Heroes and sharing their grief.

[writing-ca-ira]

HASARDER — PART 2

YJ/Teen Titans Dick Grayson x Reader

Part 1 << MASTERLIST >> Part 3

Trying to explain something that doesn’t exist is hard… so you can only imagine what it was like trying to explain the Titans to a bunch of skeptical cops. Luckily for you, they turned you over to a couple of people who believe your story slightly more.

Reader is gender neutral.

Contains: civilian reader, mentions of death (your own), spoilers: you’re actually alive, it’s the you from the YJ universe that’s dead.

You have no idea who you are anymore.

Well, that isn’t true. You’re (Y/N) (L/N), and from how many times you’ve said your name to Leaguers (oh, yes; Leaguers, from the Justice League… but now’s certainly not the time to get starstruck all over again) from this week alone… god… it would be impossible to forget that you’re (Y/N) (L/N). You’ve told Batman, Martian Manhunter, some science guy named Adam, Doctor frickin’ Fate… not to mention all of the lab results that you’ve looked over (well, that you were allowed to look over, anyway. Dick would confide in you about the Bat’s preference for secrecy all the time, so you had a hunch what you’ve seen isn’t all there is to know)… all of them would have your name printed on them; (Y/N) (L/N).

So, yeah. The problem didn’t stem from who you were. It was… well… whose were you.

Of all of the people who got to run their little tests on you — the world’s greatest detective, a telepathic alien, a lord of order — you found it a little funny that it was the random science guy named Adam that provided some sort of lead on your situation. He did an MRI scan on you, and something emitting from your body caused the computers to fritz out a bit. Upon closer inspection, he discovered that there were traces of Zeta Beams in your body.

“Zeta Beams are what power our Zeta Tubes,” Adam explained. “You use Zeta to… teleport.”

Teleport…

Well, that would explain how you ended up on the other side of the country when you… died… in Rhode Island.

You addressed this hypothesis to Mr. Science Dude, wondering if that’s what he himself was thinking. It seemed logical, after all; it’s not like a dead person could get themselves across the country without raising a few federal eyebrows. But Adam shook his head at your words, steel eyes darkening with something unrecognizable.

“I… considered the possibility. Maybe you were somehow hit by a Zeta Beam before you died, and maybe something in string theory…” you recalled him shaking his head, as though to get rid of whatever digression he was going down. “(Y/N)… you’ve been an anomaly to us for a week straight. You died, and then showed up 2 years later in a town we know you’ve never been to. The next logical step — extreme, but still logical — was to dig up your grave, and… you’re still there. It’s still… you… in there.”

That all was his buildup to a jarring question;

“(Y/N)… how much do you know about parallel universes?”

That conversation happened a few days ago. You were now standing in front of the bathroom mirror of some random apartment Batman had you stashed you away in by Adam — a “safe house,” as he called it — studying each and every inch of your face. After waking up at 6 a.m. from a horrible dream about your towermates, you began to worry about the weirdest things. Were you a ghost? Was this all a fever dream from a coma? Did your friends randomly disappear off the face of the Earth like you did, and now they’re “dead” as well?

… Have you stopped looking like yourself?

That last one is why you were staring so intensely at your reflection in the mirror. You looked like… you. At least, you were pretty sure you looked like you. The same skin tone, eye color, hair style… yup, 100% (Y/N). And while you might’ve not been this… world’s… (Y/N), you were still your own (Y/N); the civilian housemate of the Teen Titans and Di— Robin’s best friend. You are the (Y/N) that plays fetch with Starfire and Beastboy, and watches Cyborg tinker with something in the garage while Raven reads in the corner. You are the (Y/N) that listens to Robin vent and then go out for milkshakes to make him feel better. No matter what bits and pieces you may hear about this other (Y/N), the one in the mirror is the one that’s… y’know… you.

I’m (Y/N) (L/N), you thought to yourself. And while I’m… a little lost right now, I’ll be back home with the Titans before I know it. The Justice League will make sure of it.

You watched in real time as your eyes hardened with determination. Batman promised you that they were working on something. While you weren’t exactly sure how parallel universes worked (it was hard to stomach the notion of parallel universes to begin with), you had no other choice but to believe that there was some way to get you back home. In a galaxy with super-powered humans, aliens, magicians, literal gods, what-have-you, there just has to be a way. You got here somehow in the first place, right? Surely, you can go back.

A faint knocking on your door caused you to snap out of your thoughts.

Knock knockknock knock.

Knockknockknockknock.

Knockknock knock.

Knock knock.

You furrowed your brows at the weird rhythm, until you remembered Batman’s instructions; don’t answer the door for anyone unless they knock in that specific pattern (apparently, the pattern was “chum” in Morse). If you heard the code-knock, then that meant it was him at the door, though he hadn’t visited since you since your last time in the lab. After giving yourself a final scan in the mirror, you made your way over to the door and mentally prepared yourself to be face to face with Batman.

… Except, upon opening the door, you weren’t face to face with Batman.

At the doorway stood a man around the same height as Batman, but most definitely not dressed like Batman. Instead, he was dressed like a business casual man, his crisp white button-up layered under a grey sweater and a black coat. His dark slacks looked recently ironed, and his shoes looked just polished. The entire ensemble made his worn down Gotham Knights hat look a bit out of place, but when you noticed his sunglasses, you recognized that this was no stylistic choice; he was undercover (being friends with Robin made you quite familiar with the “civvy” look).

Taking a few moments to study his face, you couldn’t shake the feeling that he looked… familiar. Not a personal kind of familiar, but a what-movie-have-I-seen-this-actor-be-in kind of familiar. That chiseled jawline, those prominent cheekbones, the slight beak of his upper lip… something about him screamed tabloid target to you, and it was eating away at the back of your brain.

Then, it finally hit you. “Bruce Wayne.”

The man in front of you grimaced, the corners of his lips twitching upwards for a fraction of a second as though he were attempted to smile. “You don’t… want an autograph, do you?”

“Uh… I’m good,” was all you could respond with. Formulating a sentence was quite difficult. What were you supposed to say to Gotham’s very own billionaire playboy? You know, they guy whose face is basically everywhere across not only the United States, but the entire world? The guy whose ward is your very own best friend Dick Grayson… who is also Robin… the sidekick of… well…

“… It really is true,” you said, your voice barely above a whisper. “You’re… him.”

A sigh left Bruce’s lips. “I’m guessing Dick told you everything, then.”

You shook your head at this. “Not really. He only told me his name was Dick. Then he showed me his face one day, and…” you tried to fight off the urge to look smug from your own detective skills. “Only so many people in the world have the same face as Richard Grayson.”

Just as only so many people in the world have the same face as (Y/N) (L/N).

That thought painfully reminded you of the reality of your situation. This wasn’t Bruce Wayne. Well, it was, but it wasn’t your Bruce Wayne. And his ward, Richard Grayson, wasn’t your Dick. These were all strangers that may look, sound, and act like people from your world, but… this wasn’t your world.

And one look at Mr. Wayne’s troubled face told you he was thinking something along those lines. “(Y/N)… can I come in?”

You silently nodded, stepping aside to make room. The billionaire crossed the threshold of the apartment and watched intently as you closed the door. No words were said for an uncomfortable couple of seconds, and you soon realized you would have to be the one to speak up first.

“So… is there anything new? About sending me home?”

Mr. Wayne pursed his lips together. “No. Nothing new.” One of his hands moved to soothingly plant itself on your shoulder. “But rest assured, we’re doing everything we can to figure out a way. We’ll get you home, (Y/N).”

This… was weird. Not just the fact that Bruce Wayne was comforting you, but the man that’s supposedly Batman — Gotham’s protector that strikes fear in the hearts of criminals — is being… well… kind. During your interrogations with the Caped Crusader, he was nothing but cold and distant with you, making you feel as though you’re guilty of something despite knowing you’ve done nothing wrong. And Dick tells you stories of Batman’s heartlessness all the time (by sticking his pointer fingers up by his head and doing his best Batman voice). Was it because you were talking to Bruce Wayne, and not Batman, that he was kind to you?

Maybe THIS Batman is just so different from MY Batman, you mentally noted.

Nevertheless, you offered Mr. Wayne a sad smile. “Thank you… and…” your smile dropped as you thought of this world’s (Y/N), “… I’m sorry…”

“There’s nothing to apologize for,” said Mr. Wayne. “You have no idea how you ended up here, and really, this whole thing is a field day for our trusted scientists.” He offered you a lopsided grin. “Adam Strange has been talking everyone’s ear off about… stuff that I don’t really understand.”

You tried to give out a humored laugh, but it came out more as a pathetic chortle. “Always happy to help make earth-shattering discoveries in the realm of theoretical physics.”

But… of all the people in the world (well, you’re world) to be a scientific anomaly, why did it have to be you? You were just a normal civilian that just so happened to live with the Titans. There’s no reason why you should be involved with this whole parallel universe fiasco… and what if there isn’t a way to send you home? What if there’s so many parallel universes out there that it’s impossible to pinpoint yours? What if you spent the rest of your life being studied by scientist after scientist in this foreign timeline, while your own universe becomes nothing but a distant memory?

Mr. Wayne’s deep voice brought you back to reality. “(Y/N)…”

Your eyes snapped back to him. “Uh… yeah?”

“I… didn’t just want to check up on you,” the billionaire hesitantly admitted, his brows furrowed with uncertainty. “There’s… well… there’s something…”

The way he trailed off made you feel uneasy. Though you were hoping this wasn’t going where you thought it was going, you knew it had something to do with… the elephant in the room. It was the one thing for the past week that caused your stomach to churn and your throat to constrict with pure guilt.

Of course, never addressing it seemed very unlikely. “It’s about… your (Y/N), isn’t it?”

Mr. Wayne stood as Still as a statue for a brief period, but eventually let out a shaky sigh. “The only people who know about… this situation… are me, Martian Manhunter, Adam Strange, and Doctor Fate. We have a few JL-affiliated scientists working on the possibility of dimensional travel, but… your name has been kept out of those projects.” His voice was becoming more and more gruff, reminiscent of the Batman voice you were accustomed to. “You do understand why it’s preferable that way, right?”

“Everyone who knew the (Y/N) here knows they’re…” you could barely finish your sentence without the stinging sensation of bile rising in your throat. “They’re… dead. It’s just better to keep your (Y/N)’s close ones away from all of this… just so no one gets false hope.”

At your response, Mr. Wayne nodded. “Exactly. We’re trying to send you home without anyone noticing you were here.” He then bowed his head towards the floor. “At least… that was the plan…”

You dumbly blinked at him. “Was?”

The billionaire took his sunglasses off to rub his face. “… Dick… he…”

Your heart rate picked up when he mentioned Dick, but you had to remind yourself that it wasn’t your Dick he was talking about. This Dick wasn’t your best friend that you like to hang out with around Jump City. All you could do was patiently wait for Mr. Wayne to continue as apprehension ate at your brain.

“He found out,” he finally admitted. “About you. I don’t know how, but I’m sure he had… some help.” Worry lines formed on his face as his ocean-colored eyes found yours. “He wasn’t happy that he was kept out of the loop, and… he wants to see you.”

“But I’m not his (Y/N),” you quickly blurted out. “I… I mean… I’m not the (Y/N) from this world. I’m not the same (Y/N) that… knew him.”

“And he knows you aren’t.” Mr. Wayne’s frown somehow grew bigger. “At least, he says that he knows you aren’t. He just feels… kept in the dark. You were his— (Y/N) was his best friend, and he told me that… I shouldn’t keep secrets about his best friend. Even if it… isn’t…”

“… his best friend,” you finished.

Mr. Wayne slowly nodded. There was a blanket of silence that fell over the room, and it felt like hours later when the billionaire spoke up again. “He was… extremely upset. You two were close, so I… I understand. But… you were also close with so many other people that… that it’s…” he had to lean against the wall to steady himself. “I thought I… was doing the right thing. I thought I was saving him from so much pain and… and heartache by hiding all of this…”

The immense self-pity that wafted from his form reminded you so much of Dick that you struggled to breathe. Moments like these were all too familiar to you; Dick would disappear after a mission, and you would find him beating himself over the head for something. You wondered if the Dick in this universe was the same exact way, and if the Dick from your universe got it from your Batman.

“Dick never liked secrets,” you began, putting a hand on Mr. Wayne’s shoulder, much like he did for you not too long ago. “He would always tell me about some guy named B, and how B didn’t seem to trust him.” You cleared your throat in order to attempt your best Robin impression. “I’m his partner!! He needs to trust me more!! I don’t wanna have anything to do with him!!”

A sad puff of air left the man’s lips. “… That definitely sounds familiar.”

“But if there’s one thing I know about Dick…” you couldn’t help but roll your else. “He’s a giant hypocrite.” Mr. Wayne’s eyes snapped up to meet yours quizzically while you continued. “Do you know how many secrets he’s hidden from the Titans? And how many he still keeps hidden? Can’t believe that guy has the audacity to go on and on about how he hates B’s lies, only to turn around and lie to his own team.” Throwing your arms up dramatically, you let out a frustrated sigh. “And I tell him! Every time his secrets are brought to light, I tell him, Dick, why would you keep secrets from your team if you hate secrets? And you know what he says?“

Mr. Wayne continued to stare at you. You gave him a reassuring smile and answered your own question, “he says, I thought I was doing the right thing.”

“… Wow,” was all the man could mutter.

“Deep down, he knows you were trying to keep him safe,” you explained, heart squeezing as you thought about your best friend. “Because it’s the same thing he would’ve done.”

Another puff of air came from Mr. Wayne, though it sounded more humorous than the last one. “You always knew him better. Probably could predict his next move before he even thinks to make it.” Any fondness that he held in his face turned stone cold. “… It’s been hard. Without you, I mean. It’s been hard for him, for me, for everyone. If only…” he cut himself off, shaking his head. “I’m sorry. I… this must be uncomfortable for you.”

A frown tugged at the corner of your lips as you watched him straighten up. “It’s okay, Mr. Wayne… I understand. It’s… probably better to get everything off of your chest, right? Maybe it’ll help with healing?”

“… You’re not (Y/N),” the man uttered, voice barely above a whisper. It was hard to tell if he was speaking to you or himself, so you didn’t respond (it was hard to tell if you even had the right to respond). Taking a few steps towards the doorway, he gave you a solemn look. “I… apologize for putting you in an awkward position, with mentioning Dick and all, but I just wanted to give you a word of warning.”

“A word of warning,” your flat voice echoed.

He nodded, fiddling with his sunglasses. “He’ll show up here eventually when he obtains the address. It’s… inevitable, and I know I can’t do anything to stop it. But… when he does…” a small pause, “be careful with what you say.”

Though he didn’t elaborate, you knew exactly what he meant; don’t give Dick any false hope. A heavy lump formed in your throat as you tried to give a response. “Of course… I will.”

And, with that, Bruce Wayne was out the door.

Your first encounter with this universe’s Bruce Wayne was officially over. This was a crazy week (to say the least), but you never thought that your next VIP visitor would be Bruce Wayne. And he seemed… very unstable. Which you totally understood; you’re a parallel version, or alternate dimension version, or a whatever version of a very dead (Y/N), and that (Y/N) was close to a lot of people (including Batman, apparently?). It didn’t help that he and Dick must’ve had a fight quite recently, and you could only imagine how hard it was to admit to your son that you were keeping secrets… for his protection… again. Yeah, you don’t blame him for that tiny pity party he had.

Putting billionaire playboy Bruce Wayne aside for a moment, your thoughts went to Dick.

He’s trying to come see you.

You had… absolutely no idea how to feel about this. Part of you was excited, relieved even, to see his face. After an entire week of not seeing your best friend’s face, it would calm you down significantly. But… of course… this wasn’t your best friend; this was another (Y/N)’s best friend. And that (Y/N) is… no longer here. Excitement boiled into dread very quickly at the thought. This Dick Grayson knew you weren’t his (Y/N) (L/N)… so why would he want to come see you? At first, you thought it might’ve been for closure. While you weren’t his (Y/N), you were still (Y/N) in general, and maybe seeing you would be enough to help him… move on.

The thought sounded nice… but you knew Richard John “Dick” Grayson better than that.

Dick is a very defensive person… especially when it comes to the honor of his friends. If things start getting rough, you can practically see him put his shields up. And if he feels like things have gone too far, he’ll go fully offensive. You’ve seen it happen countless of times with you and the Titans, where he steps in with a sharp tongue and fists ready to fly whenever some unlucky jerk comes after one of you.

This Dick Grayson wasn’t your Dick Grayson, but judging from your conversation with Mr. Wayne, he’s pretty dang similar in both worlds. And if this world’s (Y/N) was his friend…

Then you’re the unlucky jerk coming after them.

[vind3miat0r]

Hush EA spoilers

(also a whole lot of word vomit. and for once its not copied and pasted from texts i sent to my boyfriend)

I TOLD YALL I TOLD YALL VEGA WASNT DEAD!!

okay wow theres a LOT to unpack here. uhm.

so the general theory that demons dont go to Death when they die has been confirmed!! yippee!! their magic just gets scattered to the winds and it seems like its up to someone to stitch said magic back together in order to revive(?) the demon that was killed. yay!!

taking a moment to talk about Hush because HUSHH?? Hush freaking out about how he killed Vega and how Vega confused him was just. heart-breaking. omg. i was expecting many things today, but not Hush of all people having a breakdown. that really hit too close to home </3

now, Hush mentioned something when talking about Vega: he used the term "anacruses" to refer to our beloved manipulator. hello? sudden lore drop?? question mark??

more lore drops is Hush talking about how he met Vega before he was formed, and how he thinks he wasnt supposed to remember the demon, and i quote: "But a part of me, a tiny echo within me is made of those who made me, and that’s the part of me that knows him. Knows… Vega. The daemon before the demon. The voice before the song broke from the stave. I don’t think I’m supposed to remember him."

focusing on the "voice before the song broke from the stave" part; i looked up the term "anacruses", and what i find interesting is that the word "anacrusis" popped up. "anacrusis" has multiple meanings, but one of them caught my eye: "one or more unstressed notes before the first bar line of a piece or passage."

now, i dont know much about instrument lore, but (correct me if im wrong) this is referring to music. personally, i think this is really interesting (this may be the autism speaking), because we know that d(a)emons have some sort of connection to the spellsong. im sure Gavin or Hush maybe explained it once, i cant really remember. we also know that Hush is literally the silence in the spellsong. the plural of "anacrusis" is "anacruses". you can see where this is going.

we know that Vega is really old. we know he was around before the Cacophony, which makes me think that he was one of the first daemons to be created. like, "within the first ten" kind of first. Hush calling Vega "one of the Anacruses" has me thinking some things.

firstly, the term "Anacruses" may just be a sort of title for d(a)emons who were created before the Cacophony. this is plausible, and i think it would make sense. it could also refer to d(a)emons who were created before the existence of the spellsong, maybe?

we dont know much about the spellsong, other than that its this non-corporeal thing that d(a)emons and Hush have a connection to (and if we really want to reach, the Sovereigns as well). we know that every empowered person's core has a "voice" in the spellsong, and that if said person dies, their "voice" goes silent.

we dont know when it was created, or how it was created. but the definition of "anacrusis" got me thinking... maybe the "Anacruses" daemons are the ones who created the spellsong. its a bit of a reach (thats an understatement that a very long reach), but i think it's plausible. its like FNAF lore: if you dont think about it, it makes sense.

you must be thinking, "wow vinn thats a lot of word vomit! what are you trying to say?" what i said a few paragraphs ago: "Anacruses" just means "old demon" but with significant lore and meaning attached to it. thats it.

(i really like how Erik's brain works — props to him for working this into the possible spellsong lore)

i dont really have much to say about Hush saying he existed before he... well existed. what i take from that is that he could have been a non-corporeal being who physically couldnt take a physical form until very recently. whatever created him took parts of themself to make him. i dunno, im still trying to understand it myself.

uhhh anyways thank you for coming to my ted talk, youve been a great audience as per usual :D

[ninyard]

Hey! Do you have specifics for your prompts? Do you want just one person or is a couple ok? If just one person could you do something with Seth? Maybe a what if he didn't die and got his shit together?

And if a couple Kevin and Seth getting along?

(I'm in my loving Seth era...)

Thank you for sharing your writing, you are awesome!

THANK YOU okay so here’s what I offer you: Seth survives and nobody believes him when he says he didn’t do it (but Kevin can’t live with himself if he doesn’t tell him he knows who did) TW: drugs, suicide mention, overdose

-

It was Halloween, and Seth was not stupid enough to think that the bar would be quiet. Wall to wall bodies in costumes, a fire hazard waiting to happen, he wasn’t even sure they would get in, but when the bouncer noticed him and Allison at the back of the line, he waved them up and let them go ahead. He was a decent guy like that. A larger man with a buzz cut, tattoos creeping up his neck, donning a pair of devil horns on his head for the night that was in it. He smiled at Seth when he entered the building.

It was his third drink in when he started to feel wrong. He chalked it up to too many sweaty people in one room, each ones body heat raising the temperature a few degrees. Only a minute after he noticed something felt wrong, did he really start to know that something was really wrong.

Allison had asked him if he was okay. He didn’t remember answering. One minute they were there, stood by a table they’d managed to squeeze their way over to, and the next he was sat on the cold and dusty sidewalk out the front, not enough cool air in the world enough to ease the growing nausea that grew from the pit in his stomach. “I feel like I’m coming up off a real fuckin’ bad pill.” At least, that’s what he thought he said, what he meant to say. He could barely hear his own voice, his neck not strong enough to hold up his head.

“Look at me, open your eyes.” Allison held his head in her hands. “Oh, your- what the fuck?” Seth wasn’t sure what she’d seen in his eyes, but her phone was in her hands, and then by her head, and then he woke up in the hospital two days later. For some reason he was surprised that Allison was still by his side, her hand wrapped so tightly around his, as if letting go would mean she would never hold it again. She didn’t look like she’d slept, or taken a break from crying, either, hair unkempt and out of her face, makeup non-existent. She was wearing his sweats with a hospital blanket across her lap, and she cried and kissed around the medical equipment when she finally got the courage to touch him. She was so gentle, like he would break; It felt like he would, more fragile than he’d been in a very, very long time.

Allison told him that he’d overdosed. His heart sank at that, disappointed in himself before he remembered that he hadn’t taken anything. Then he noticed the nurse sitting in the corner, who smiled his way. The psychiatric team came up not long after they were informed that he was awake. He was confused, but given his history, he wasn’t that surprised. He was surprised, however, when they told him what the concoction was that he’d overdosed on.

The blood test showed a toxic level of his anti-depressants, alongside traces of both heroin and painkillers that had been an opiate he favoured when he was actively using back in the day. He should’ve died. It was a miracle that somebody in the queue had naloxone in their bag, and they’d saved his life by administering it. He would never find out who they were, or why they’d helped him, but the consequences of surviving were much more painful that the death he would’ve never remembered anyway.

He wanted to die when Allison looked at him with tears in her eyes and whispered, “how could you do this to me?”, or when the psychiatry team asked him for the tenth time in an hour if he had plans of ending his life. He wanted to die when the nurses who had him on 24/7 suicide watch had to accompany him to the toilet, and when Dr. Dobson accompanied David to the hospital the day he was allowed to leave. They’d proposed an involuntary stay in a psych ward, but Betsy had managed to convince them to let him go.

Nobody wanted to hear it; somehow he’d overdosed on his own medication, and even when he counted out the pills and tried to prove that he hadn’t done it, nobody seemed to believe him. They only sent him this look of pity, as if a failed attempt was worse than a successful one, as if he was simply trying to cover for the fact it hadn’t worked. Allison tried her best to support him, but it was hard for her. She’d watched him seizing outside the bar, foaming at the mouth and choking on his own vomit. She’d sat in the ambulance as the paramedics resuscitated him the whole way to the hospital. Betsy told him she hadn’t left his side since he was admitted; and it was really difficult for her to watch him lying there with tubes and wires blocking her view. She’d broke down two days after they returned to campus, and begged him to just be honest, that there was no way he’d been coincidentally spiked with his own medication, one that had seizures at the top of the list of warnings. Even just doubling the dose of his meds had the potential to be fatal, and he knew that. He hadn’t been depressed for a long time. His meds worked, so much better than any of the others that he’d tried, and he wouldn’t have risked being taken off them by doing something so stupid for no reason at all. It felt as though he was being gaslit into believing he had in fact taken too many pills before leaving, but none of it made sense. He took his pills in the mornings. He had been clean from hard drugs for months. Even on the off-chance that he had taken a handful of the little circular pills, how did the heroin get there, the opiates he hadn’t touched in years?

He’d been curled up in a ball in the corner of the couch, alone in the dorm when a knock came at the door. It was no more than two weeks after the incident, and he’d just returned from a session with Betsy. He didn’t respond to the knock, but kept his eye on the door as it creaked open. The last person he expected to see peeking around it was Kevin, but there he was. He shut the door behind him and sat on the opposite side of the couch. If he tried to sit any further away, he would’ve fallen off.

“I’m not interested, man.” Seth glared at him. “Fuck your game, and fuck you if you’ve really just come in here to ask me to come back to practice.”

Kevin sighed and looked away. “That’s not why I’m here.” His hands were clasped together on his lap, thumb running over the opposite hands knuckles. “I just wanted to see how you were doing.”

Seth snorted and threw his head back. “Yeah, right, asshole. You don’t give a shit.”

“Did you do it?” Kevin had paused for a second before blurting out the question. His eyes searched Seth’s for the truth, with his shoulders practically touching his ears and hands locked together as he stopped himself from fidgeting.

He laughed again, shifting positions so he was better facing him. His voice turned serious, and he pointed towards the door. “Leave my room.”

“I’ll believe whatever you say, I just have to know.”

“Oh, you have to, do you?” He said. He was angry, and after a draining session with Betsy, he couldn’t handle another person insinuating he was lying. “You don’t deserve a fucking thing. None of you do. Stop looking at me like that. Tell them all to stop fucking looking at me like that.”

“We’ve not friends, Seth, and I don’t give a shit about your history. But I know you didn’t do this.” Kevin considered his words. “Because I think that… If you didn’t do this to yourself, man, I think I know who did.”

Seth froze and sat up, far more alert than he’d been in days. “How dare you, you pretentious piece of shit? How fuckin’ dare you? Are you going to give a status report back to your little toddler squad, is that what this is? Finally your fucking…” He mimicked dangling something in front of his face. “Ammo? Something you have over me?”

“I get it.” Kevin didn’t look back to him. “I don’t blame you for not trusting me.”

“I haven’t trusted your crippled ass since the day we met.” Seth leaned forward. “But humour me, then. Who somehow knows exactly what meds my crazy ass is on, and tried to murder me in a packed bar, busiest night of the week? Because your explanation is bound to be better than mine.”

“I owe it to you to let you know.” Kevin lowered his voice. “But I can’t explain it. I just have to tell you that I think it was Riko.”

“Fuck off, now, or I’ll start screaming.” Seth was frustrated, feeling like the butt of a joke, feeling like Kevin was just trying to stab another dart into a board that was already full. “This is not a fucking joke. Al has to give me my pills because nobody trusts me with them right now. The shrink calls me twice a day. Everyone is so fuckin’ disappointed in me, man, I could’ve died, and you’re telling me your little bestie over there did it? You’re a coward, Kevin. You’re a fucking liar and a fucking coward.”

Kevin held up his scarred hand as if that was explanatation enough. “Neil humiliated him on live TV. He wouldn’t think twice about killing someone to get back at him. You’re an easy target.”

In all the chaos that had ensued, he’d forgotten about what Neil had said on Kathy’s show. None of it made sense to him, why he would be an easy target out of all of them, why, if Riko was capable of such a thing, he would go after him and not Neil himself. As if reading his mind, Kevin continued. “Neil’s too public now. He couldn’t have done it to him.”

“Who else believes this shit?”

Kevin held back on whatever he really knew, and settled for, “Anyone who understands it, agrees with me.”

“Explain it to me like I’m a helpless little kid.” Seth said, straight faced and seething. “Tell me how it could have possibly been him.”

“Did they check you for track marks?” Seth shook his head, but in all honesty, he wasn’t sure. They’d seen the evidence of his pills in his system, and his charts said he was a past user. They didn’t have to, really. Everything they needed to know was right there in his blood work. “If you have a prescription out there, it’s not that hard to find out your meds. You wouldn’t even feel a needle through your clothes with so many people around you. Mix it with your drugs of choice and nobody is going to believe that you didn’t do it yourself.”

“You’re joking.” Seth repeated again, disbelief at how serious Kevin was, at how his face sunk as he spoke, how his eyes trailed off somewhere into the distance while he explained. “And you really believe that?” Kevin nodded. It was infuriating to Seth to finally hear something so outlandish still that actually made a little bit of sense. He knew himself he hadn’t done it, so why was it so hard to believe it had actually been someone else? It hadn’t happened by the grace of God. Somehow the drugs had gotten into his system, and by the amount they’d found, they hadn’t been there long before he’d lost consciousness. So he’d been spiked in the bar. It also made an annoying amount of sense that he’d been poked by a needle and not had something sprinkled into his drink, because Allison had been across from him the whole time they were there. She was smart with her drinks in that way, and she was always aware of wandering hands near their beverages. She would’ve noticed. “So he fuckin’ failed, then. What happens next? He’s gonna just, what, try again?”

“I don’t know.” He said. “I just had to let you know. You’ve been going crazy in here trying to understand it.”

“If I mention your theory to anyone other than your little gang, they’ll fuckin’ have me committed. They’re just waiting for an excuse.” Seth rested his head on his knees, his feet up on the couch. “Nobody is going to actually believe this other than you, you know that, right?”

“I���m sorry.” Kevin’s voice was small. “And for what it’s worth, I know what Riko is like, and you’re just a meaningless pawn in his game. I don’t see you that way. I don’t hate you like you think I do.”

“Don’t push it.” Seth grimaced. “You only tolerate me because your lineup can’t handle the loss of another body.”

“Maybe.” Kevin admitted, and Seth laughed, because he didn’t even try to hide that it was the truth. He didn’t say much else before nodding at Seth and leaving the room, and suddenly Seth felt like a weight had been lifted from his shoulder and quickly replaced by another, heavier tonne of bricks. He hated Neil, he hated Kevin, he hated Riko. If it was the truth, if it really was him who’d orchestrated this whole thing, he’d fucked with his life in ways he didn’t even understand. He had people he cared about in his life, people he wanted to live for, but Riko was happy to ruin it all, all for the sake of petty revenge. For a week he’d been in some sort of state between withdrawals and a heavy craving to fall back into a hole he’d assumed he’d crawled out of for good. Nobody trusted him, and everyone looked at him differently, no matter how much they tried to hide it. He looked at himself differently, a brush with death an untimely reminder that his life was finite. He’d avoided death too many times, and his chances had to have finally been depleted. Riko didn’t know what he’d done to Seth’s bare minimum instinct of survival by fucking up and letting him live.

He had looked Kevin in the eye, as the only one who seemed to understand him when he felt like screaming from the rooftops it wasn’t fucking me! Kevin who he’d despised since the first time he opened his mouth, Kevin who was too good for them all, full of himself, in love with himself; he’d felt so alone since waking up in that hospital, and God, did it feel terrible that Kevin Day was the one person who seemed to understand.