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yellowocaballero · 6 months ago

Note

hi! i've been reading some of your older fics and was wondering if there's any merit in watching buffy for the first time in the year 2024

This may not be obvious, but this is actually an extremely complicated and highly subjective question. I'll try to go on for too long.

As background: my mother loved Buffy and its spin-off Angel growing up. It was our Bible (besides the actual Bible). Not kidding, she was on the forums and fan groups and wrote fanfiction for it and everything (These days, she's really into kdramas and Asian dramas, and calls me about how the Thai seem like big fans of gay people). So I'm quite biased.

BTVS is both a product of its times and ahead of its times. It was a show about feminism and the struggle of living in this world as a woman, when very few shows were doing that. It was the first show to have a long-lasting lesbian couple, and the first show to depict a kiss between them. For better or for worse, it was one of the codifiers of broody vampire boyfriend. It was pretty unafraid to be experimental in a lot of what it did. It had incredibly complex and nuanced character work and growth that I still aspire to. Spike's arc is still matched in quality only by Avatar's Zuko. Angel's long term arc, from Buffy to his spin-off series, still makes him one of the most complex characters on TV. It had the most complex depiction of depression on TV at the time and I still think it's one of the best. I think the show had very high highs.

It also had very low lows. Some of the feminism is problematic in retrospect. The sapphic couple has a rather famous element that was severely problematic. There are, overall, some deeply atrocious arcs that I can appreciate objectively but not in practice. Xander: a whole-ass character aged awfully. On a meta level, the workplace conditions were bad (thanks, Whedon.) There are no people of color. The spoiler's sake I won't go into detail on this, but in general the good stuff was so influential and the bad stuff was just awful.

I think these days people tend to brush off the entire thing because it's Whedon. That is more than fair. But I'd also say that Whedon & Buffy is extremely similar to Brian Michael Bendis & Ultimate Spider-Man. Bendis was fantastic at writing sassy, bouncy, permanently stressed-out teens - issue was, he wrote entirely different serious adult characters the way he wrote these sassy teens. Same with Whedon: the annoyingly constant quips are perfect for Buffy, because that's who the characters are. They're awful in Marvel, because Steve Rogers is not Xander. Kinda similarly, Buffy was genuinely feminist for 90s TV - issue is, Whedon has not grown or developed his views, and now his works feel so sexist (oh my fucking god why did you treat Natasha like that). After a certain point it's egotistical: you're writing like that because you're Joss Whedon and it's how you write, not because it's what's best for the characters and story. But it was really important to me to get the character voices right, and it's freaking difficult to endlessly write dialogue that distinct, full of voice, witty, and clever.

I think BTVS & Angel TV's greatest influence on my writing is how intensely character-driven both of those shows were, and how intricate the characters were. What every character did was something they would do, if that made sense. Even the stuff I hated to watch, that made me uncomfortable, was the culmination of so much (usually). I think I also picked up the constant wit and humor lol. On a personal level, the conversations I would have with my mother where she broke down the character motivations and composition of the story was my first exposure to looking at storytelling from an analytical perspective and a framework of critical analysis, which was an approach I carried into the rest of the media I consumed and that was the primary reason I was able to become a decent writer. Thanks, Mom. Have fun with your kdramas.

TL:DR: There is merit, especially if you care about good character work. There are things about it that may make you want to drop it, which is extremely valid. Season 1 is rough but interesting, Season 2 and 5 are the best, Season 3 is pretty good, Season 4 and 7 skippable, and Season 6 is........epic highs, epic lows......

#my asks #the basic premise of Buffy is “what if the monsters and demons that plagued the psyche of a teen girl were real”#which is a very simple thing but the focus on character ended up creating such a complex story #and it highly influenced how i try to have the physical conflict mirror the emotional conflict #externalization of emotional conflict is great #i dont talk about it much but i was genuinely very proud of that story #it mattered a lot to me that I hit the character voices EXACTLY #and that i was earnest and honest in exploring the themes of buffy and what made it important #i think you can tell that it was written by somebody who loves buffy at the bottom of her heart #it very much is a “how meg would write buffy” thing #I wrote Angel as an awkward younger version of his self from ATVS S5 #when we as the audience has lost all respect for him lmfao #but what really stuck with me is a major theme and line from angel:#“if nothing we do matters then all that matters is what we do”#and colliding angel's nihlism with buffy's desperation to live a meaningful life was excellent #i did what i wanted to do very precisely and that is the joy of hitting a level of writing skill where you can do that #btvs #buffy the vampire slayer

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sephirthoughts · 5 months ago

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Father: Verb

Epilogue (2 of probably 4)

Summary: 11 year-old WMD Sephiroth is assigned a new handler/bodyguard, named Vincent Valentine.

LISTEN I LIED OK. THERE ARE MORE THAN TWO PARTS TO THIS EPILOGUE I CAN'T HELP IT. a lot of people need to have their loose ends tied up and who am i to deny them? after this, there's a heavy one (mom needed her own entire chapter), and the fun one (for everyone else) will be last. i think. who knows, at this rate.

gratuitous sephiroth because he's beautiful

“You guys come from Nibelheim?” asked a shirtless, very suntanned teenaged boy, who had just carried in a crate of vegetables. “No? Oh, man, did you hear what happened over there? Earthquake opened up natural gas vents, blew Shinra Manor sky high. The Mt. Nibel reactor melted down, too. Town’s ok, but the reactor’s fucked. Lot of people out of jobs, now. They’ve been showing up here, all week.”

“Is that so?” replied the customer he was addressing; a tall, slender, extraordinarily handsome youth, with black hair and crimson eyes. “How unfortunate.”

“Know what I heard?” the first teenaged boy’s equally shirtless and suntanned brother piped up, as he carried in another vegetable crate. “I heard a bunch of those monsters they were making there broke loose, and that’s what did it. They say Shinra’s covering it all up, by claiming it was earthquakes and gas leaks and shit. But my best friend’s girlfriend is in the fourth infantry and she told him—”

“Alright you two, shut your yaps and get back to work,” a trim, middle-aged woman in an apron and sundress scolded, shooing away her gossiping sons, who rolled their eyes and stalked off, with their crates of vegetables. She beamed at the customer they’d been chatting to, as she unfolded a paper bag and filled it with the wrapped sandwiches he’d ordered. “That all for ya, honey?”

“Yes, ma’am,” the youth nodded. “Oh—and a chocolate chip cookie. Thank you, ma’am.”

The little blonde boy at his side reached for the oversized cookie, but the youth took it and put it into the bag, with the sandwiches.

“No more sweets till after lunch,” he admonished. “You can’t grow up tall and strong like me, on an all-cookie diet. Now give me your hand and don’t run off.”

The woman behind the counter smiled warmly, to see the older boy (brother she assumed, though they didn’t look much alike) taking such attentive care of the younger, and the little one minding him so well, holding his hand and doing as he was told, without fussing or making a scene.

Just then, the sound of a crash and two young, male voices arguing came from the back of the shop. She sighed, shaking her head. If only her two idiot sons were so well-behaved and thoughtful as those two. They must have a much better father.

Oblivious to the unfavorable comparison they’d created for the other two young men, the black-haired youth and the tiny blonde boy walked down the bustling street, hand-in-hand, till they reached one of the many nearly-identical stucco buildings, with terra cotta roof tiles, that were as common as sand, in this beach-resort town.

This particular one was a small house, that was rented to tourists by the week, and had the advantage of being almost directly on the beach and also close to the town center, where all the shops and dining were located.

“Ms. Strife, we’re back!” the older boy called out, as the two entered. “Take off your shoes, Cloud, we don’t want to track sand all over the place.”

“Boys, thank the goddess,” a young blonde woman said, from the kitchen table. She’d been sipping iced tea and flipping through a copy of Midgar Magazine, but as the two approached, she collapsed in her chair and flung her arm theatrically over her face, like a tragic heroine. “You’re just in time to snatch me from the jaws of starvation! Quick, quick, my roast-beef sandwich! Before I waste away to nothing but bones!”

“Mama’s being dramatic,” the little blonde boy informed the older one, pursing his lips. “Don’t give her any, till she says please and thank you. That’s the rules.”

“Ah, my cruel son,” his mother intoned, reaching over to capture him in her arms and tickle his ribs, while he giggled and kicked. “No use trying to escape, Cloudy boy! This is your punishment for betraying your poor, starving mother! Oh, thanks for picking up lunch, Seph. If you don’t mind getting your pa, I’d appreciate it. He hasn’t come out of his room, yet, and I don’t dare disturb him.”

“It’s alright. He hates the sun and he doesn’t eat, anyway,” Seph answered cheerfully, taking a seat at the table. “He’ll probably sleep till sunset.”

“Uh-huh. But he’s definitely not a vampire,” she said, narrowing her eyes suspiciously, as she set her wriggling son back on his feet.

“Vampires eat blood. People blood,” Cloud asserted, with a grimace. “Mr. Valentine can’t be a vampire.”

“Cloud is correct, my father doesn’t drink blood,” Seph confirmed, as he poured glasses of milk for himself and Cloud. “But he used to sleep in a coffin.”

“Disappointing,” Claudia lamented, through a bite of her sandwich. “I bet he doesn’t even turn into bats or explode in direct sunlight, either.”

Seph arched a black eyebrow. “Would you prefer he was a blood-drinking monster?”

“If he’d turn me into one, too. It’d be kinda cool to be a vampire.”

“Mama! Be good!” Cloud scolded, mortified by his mother’s laissez faire attitude toward joining the ranks of the undead.

“Tch, what’s the fun in that? Besides, if I was good all the time, you wouldn’t exist, my darlin’ little bossy-boots.”

Seph nearly choked on his sip of milk, and covered his mouth with a napkin, coughing and sputtering.

“What’s being good got to do with having a kid?” Cloud wanted to know.

“Nothing, baby, mama’s just being silly,” his mother replied breezily, ruffling his golden hair. “Alright, boys, I hope you dirtied up some laundry for me to wash, or I won’t have anything to do to earn my keep around here, before the boss wakes up.”

“You did laundry yesterday, Ms. Strife,” Seph pointed out. “We’re wearing the only clothes we’ve dirtied up.”

“What about your linens? Those must need a wash, right?”

Both boys shook their heads.

She slumped defeatedly. “Can’t one of you be a team player and wet the bed? Are you trying to make me obsolete?”

“My father doesn’t really expect you to be working, all the time. He mostly hired you so that I wouldn’t be lonely.”

“I know that, but…I’m just so grateful to him, for getting us outta that shithole town—”

“Mama!”

“Oops—I mean, that dirthole town. Anyway, I can’t ever repay your pa for giving us this opportunity. So I at least want to do everything I can to be useful.”

“You’re already doing more than enough, Ms. Strife,” Vincent’s deep voice said, from the archway, where he had appeared unnoticed by the group.

“Father!” Seph smiled, hopping up to throw his arms around him, as if they hadn’t seen one another in a week.

“Ah, well—ha ha. I just wish I could do more for y’all,” Claudia said awkwardly. “Seph looks after Cloudy all day, and aside from cooking dinners, I hardly have any housework to do. I feel like a regular bandit, taking what you’re paying me.”

“Don’t worry, Ms. Strife, I have more money than my father and I will ever know what to do with,” Seph assured her. “If we can use it for something that helps you and Cloud, and makes us happy at the same time, why not do it?”

Claudia raised her eyebrows. “Don’t you mean your pa has money?”

“No, it all belongs to my son,” Vincent said serenely. “Since I have been legally declared dead and have no wish to be declared living again, Seph is the sole heir and legal possessor of the family assets.”

“That’s right,” Seph put in cheerfully. “Plus, I emptied Hojo’s account before Shinra froze it, so I have all of my fake father’s money, too.”

Vincent nodded approvingly and patted Seph on the shoulder.

“I’m guessing there’s more to that than I want to know about,” Claudia remarked. “I was just wondering, why us? I mean, Cloudy ain’t even close to your age and I’m a high-school dropout who’s never been outta Nibelheim. There’s gotta be better companions for a couple rich, educated gentlemen.”

“Ms. Strife, do you believe in omens?” Seph asked. “Or portentous dreams?”

“Uh. I’m as religious as the next person, I guess. You’re not saying you had a dream about us, are you?”

“I am saying just that,” Seph nodded earnestly. “That day we first met, in the bakery, I had the strongest feeling that there was some fate between us. Then that night, I had a dream. A messenger from the goddess came to me, and showed me…a lot of confusing things, about the future. But amidst all the chaos, the thing that stood out most clearly was little Cloud, here. He is deeply important to the Planet, and it’s my goddess-given duty to act as his guardian angel. To protect him and help him, any way I can.”

This was all news to Cloud, who was staring at the older boy, with eyes as wide and round and saucers. He’d even stopped eating his chocolate chip cookie.

“It’s so strange you’d say that about a dream,” Claudia said, with a glance at her son. “Because…well, you wanna tell ‘em about it, baby?”

Cloud frowned and drew into himself, shaking his head.

“Is something the matter?” Seph asked, looking back and forth between them.

“Cloudy had a dream that night, too. He came running into my room, screaming about the town was burning down, and we had to get out of the house. Scared the tar out of me.”

As she said this, a look of pain flickered across Seph’s face, so briefly that no one observed.

“I ran to the window to look, but everything was quiet, just like normal. I told him it was just a nightmare, but he kept saying it wasn’t a dream. He insisted that the town was gonna burn and the boy with the silver hair was gonna fly down and save us from the fire, cause…uh. Cause you’re an angel. With wings and everything.”

“It wasn’t a dream,” Cloud muttered sullenly, without looking up. “I wasn’t even sleeping.”

“I thought nothing of it, but then the very next day, there was that huge explosion at the manor,” his mother went on, as if he hadn’t spoken. “Broke windows all over town and shook our whole house. Then all those helicopters started flying over and a lot of big trucks came roaring through. People running by said the manor went up like it was full of dynamite. Cloudy was trying to drag me out of the house, to go over there, but it was too dangerous, and the soldiers wouldn’t let anyone anywhere near it, anyway. It was plain eerie the way it happened right after his dream, and all. I mean, the town didn’t catch fire, but it was damn close. They say rubble got thrown all the way to the old Lawson cabin, in the outskirts.”

Seph nodded gravely. “I’m glad no one from the town was harmed. It seems the goddess truly was protecting you.”

“You and your father, as well. Unless you think it was just dumb luck that you weren’t there, when it happened.”

“I don’t believe in luck. But, in any case, that’s my reason for having you two with us. I want to protect Cloud and take care of him, no matter what it takes. If that means helping you establish yourselves in a better place, with more opportunities than Nibelheim, then that’s what I mean to do. But we can talk about all of that another day. If you don’t object, I was planning to take Cloud to look for shells and beach glass.”

“Sure,” Claudia smiled. “I mean, as long as the boss doesn’t mind.”

“Father?” Seph prompted, when it became clear Vincent wasn’t aware he was being deferred to.

Vincent looked startled. “Hm? I’m the boss? When did we decide that?”

“You’re my father and Ms. Strife works for you. You’re literally the boss, in that respect.”

“I see,” Vincent said, slumping gloomily. “Then my first act as the boss is to tell everyone to do whatever you like. But don’t keep Cloud out too late. And if you get the slightest whiff of trouble, you call me. Do not engage. Understood?”

“Yes, sir,” Seph said dutifully. “Come on, Cloud. Let’s go change into our swimsuits.”

“Leave your dirty clothes on the floor, this time!” Claudia called after them. “I need something to do!”

“My son is…very spiritual, Ms. Strife,” Vincent said, once the boys had gone. “I hope his ideas don’t trouble you. If so, I’ll ask him not to say such things, in your son’s presence.”

“Oh no, I don’t mind at all. The goddess speaks to everyone in different ways,” she said, as she began to clear the few lunch things from the table. “So, when were you planning on telling me the truth, about who you two are, and why you’re on the run from Shinra?”

A little while later, Cloud and Seph were headed to the beach, hand-in-hand, with plastic buckets hung over their arms. Cloud was wearing bright blue swim trunks, with a yellow starfish pattern, and Seph was in black surf shorts and a white v-neck t-shirt.

He’d pulled his shoulder-length hair back into a low ponytail, and with his outsized height and visible muscle tone, he looked much older than fourteen. Cloud, however, was small even for a boy his age, and so they made something of an odd pair, as they strolled along at the surf line, stopping, ever so often, to pick up shells and colorful bits of sand-tumbled glass.

“Why’s your hair and your eyes different now?” Cloud asked, as they crouched to paw about in the wet sand.

Seph smiled at him. “Did you like them better, before?”

Cloud nodded.

“I’m sorry I changed them, then. But people are looking for me, and they’d recognize my silver hair and mako eyes, right away. I have to disguise myself when we’re in public, for now.”

“What’s mako eyes?”

“I have been regularly treated with mako infusions, since I was a baby.” Seph dispelled the crimson illusion on his eyes, and Cloud leaned close, to inspect them. “My eyes are naturally light blue. That green in the center is from the mako.”

“Why aren’t the black parts round, like other people’s?”

“I was just born that way,” Seph said, with a rueful smile.

He preferred not to explain to the child that, despite his purification by Chaos, the effects of Jenova’s cells on his body couldn’t be reversed. The damage had already been done, as it were, and so the related traits were permanent. Among these, were his slit pupils and silver hair.

“Do they look scary?” he asked Cloud. “Like monster eyes?”

Cloud shook his golden head. “They look like cat eyes. Cats are nice.”

“When we settle down somewhere less temporary, would you like to get a cat?”

“Yeah! Lots of cats!” Cloud said excitedly, then his face fell. “But what if your pa won’t let us?”

“Don’t worry, I happen to know that my father likes cats. Even if he didn’t, he’d let me have as many as I wanted. He has a lot of paternal guilt, and I’m afraid it manifests in over-indulging me.”

“What’s paternal guilt?”

“It’s when a father feels bad for not being a better father, or for his child having had an unhappy life. None of what happened to us was his fault, of course, but he still blames himself.”

“Is that why he’s sad all the time?”

“Yes, partly. He has suffered a lot. But I’m doing my best to take good care of him and make him happy.”

“But you’re not supposed to take care of him. Grown-ups are supposed to take care of kids,” Cloud asserted.

“Don’t you take care of your mother, too?”

“Mm. Yeah, I guess so.”

They dug around for a while in silence, but for the roar of the ocean and the plunk of shells and glass into their buckets. When there was nothing more to be scavenged, they moved on, in search of another spot.

“What people are looking for you?” Cloud asked.

“Shinra. They are not nice people. But it’s nothing you or your mother need to worry about. There’s no one in the world who can hurt you, if you’re with me and my father.”

Cloud made a dubious face. “Not even soldiers?”

“Not even soldiers.”

“What if they have guns?”

Seph’s eyes flashed with bloodthirsty intent. “If anyone dared to use a firearm in a manner that threatened you, they wouldn’t live long enough to regret it.”

Cloud’s eyes went round and his mouth fell open. “You would kill them?”

“Yes.”

“Have you…killed anyone before?”

“Yes, I have,” Seph answered, matter-of-factly. “Does that frighten you?”

Cloud thought about this for a moment. “Well, why did you kill them? Were they bad?”

“Not all of them. I have killed and hurt people, who didn’t deserve it. I was very little, not much older than you are, now. When I couldn’t control my emotions, bad things happened, and people died. I didn’t know right from wrong, back then, because no one taught me. But I do now. Those bad things won’t happen again. Never. I’m going to protect people, not hurt them. I’m going to save everyone, this time.”

Cloud picked up a broken sand dollar and fiddled with it. “Did you didn’t save everyone before?”

There was an oddly mature pointedness to the question, that made the hairs prickle up on the back of Seph’s neck. “Cloud, do you ever…remember things that haven’t happened yet?”

The boy started to shake his head, then paused and turned it into a hesitant nod. “Mama says it’s dreams, but it’s not when I’m sleeping. And sometimes the things I remembered happen.”

“What kind of things do you remember?”

“You won’t believe me.”

“Cloud, you can tell me anything. I promise, I will always believe you.”

“W—well, ok. I dreamed about…you, before I knew you. And then we saw you at the bakery. Mama already told you about the dream where you flew down to save us from the fire. But after that, I dreamed about you again. You didn’t look like you look, but I know it was you. You were big and tall, and you had a long jacket and long hair, all the way down to your butt. And you were burning everything and standing in the fire and…and I had to kill you.” Cloud burst out sobbing and threw his little arms around Seph’s waist, burying his face in his t-shirt. “I don’t want to kill you! I won’t do it! I won’t!”

Seph picked him up and cradled him tightly in his arms, rocking and soothing him, pressing kisses to his golden head. When the boy was calm again, he set him down on his feet, and crouched to be on his eye level. “I know what you saw was terrible, but it will never happen, I promise.”

“You believe me?” Cloud sniffled, wiping his pink-rimmed eyes.

“Of course I believe you. I saw the same thing.”

Cloud’s eyes went wide yet again. “You did?”

“I did. I think what we both saw was a memory of a different future, from before I changed everything. That was the future where I didn’t save everyone.”

“But it’s not gonna happen now?”

“No. The things we saw were real. Terribly real. But they’re not, anymore. I’ve broken the shackles of fate, from all of us. Now, we’re free to make our own destiny.”

Cloud gave a bewildered frown. “You talk weird.”

“I know,” Seph smiled.

“Your pa talks weird, too. Like he’s from a book.”

“Well, he’s an old man. He can’t help it. I’m just weird. Is that alright?”

“Mmm…yeah, it’s ok,” Cloud decided. “You sound smart, like a grown-up. But you don’t act all grumpy and bossy.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment. Only, don’t get into the habit of assuming all grown-ups are smart. A lot of them are extremely stupid. Especially the grumpy and bossy ones.”

Cloud laughed delightedly at this, as Seph took his hand, and the two walked on, to seek out another spot for gathering shells.

“Do you think my mama and your pa will get married?”

“To each other? I certainly hope not. Then we’d be brothers.”

“You don’t want to be brothers?”

“No.”

“Oh,” Cloud said quietly, lowering his head to look at the sand he was kicking.

Seph squeezed his hand. “Don’t be sad. It’s not because I don’t like you. I don’t want us to be brothers, because I want to marry you, one day.”

Cloud gave a start and jerked it away, his round cheeks turning bright pink. “You want to marry me??”

“Yes. Not for a long time, though. When we’re grown up.”

“B—but I’m a boy! Boys can’t marry boys!”

“I think it’s good we got you out of Nibelheim, sooner rather than later,” Seph remarked, making a distasteful face. “Those kind of backward ideas seem to be epidemic in small towns, like that.”

“What’s a backwards idea?”

“A backward idea is one that relies on ignorance, prejudice, or blind adherence to tradition, to make a moral judgement, about something with no inherent morality attached.”

“Uh…”

“For example, the idea that two men or two women can’t be married. People like to say it’s wrong, but what is actuallywrong about it? Is it bad for a woman to love another woman and want to be her wife? Is it bad for a man to want to build a life and a family with another man? If it’s not wrong for a man and woman to do those things, why is it wrong for two men or two women?”

Cloud thought for a moment, then his face lit up, like he’d had an epiphany. “It’s not! It’s the same!”

Seph gave an approving nod. “Exactly. When you hear moralizing statements like that, never just accept them. Interrogate the idea and form your own opinion.”

“What’s interrogate?”

“It means to honestly ask yourself what you really think. If you can’t decide, ask someone you trust. Seek out other perspectives and information. Never take a right or wrong statement at face value.”

“Ok. If I can’t decide, I’ll ask you.”

Seph blinked. “Wait, me? You mean…you trust me?”

“Uh-huh!” Cloud beamed. “You’re my guardian angel. Even if you don’t have wings.”

He had to swallow against the aching tightness in his throat, at the pure, guileless sweetness of this innocent child. A child he remembered as a young man, looking upon him with the bitterest animosity, as he drove a sword through his gut—after Sephiroth had done the same to him. But…that wasn’t truly them. They would never become the mortal enemies, who drew one another’s blood in madness and hatred. Destiny was defeated. Their fate was their own to write.

“Cloud, can I tell you a secret?” Sephiroth said, leaning down to speak softly in the boy’s ear. “I do have wings.”

THE AUTHOR HAS SOMETHING TO SAY we all deserved a beach episode i think

next chapter

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ineffableclassics · 19 hours ago

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Preparing for the arrival of the Messiah, The Son Of God, King Of The Jews and Saviour Of Mankind is stressful enough, but Silas the Shepherd (happiest goats this side of the Jordan!) a.k.a Aziraphale, Angel Of The Eastern Gate, seems to have it all under control... until a certain demon shows up in Bethlehem with some more than alarming news...

Words: 13,076

Status: complete

Rating: teen and up

By @gaiaseyes451 , art within by @vavoom-sorted-art

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buckssuspenders · 5 months ago

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pining and anticipation (I don't want you like a best friend)

By heartbeatdiaz

Summary:

"Okay, fine." Eddie rolls his eyes and rests his elbows on the table, leaning a little bit. Buck gets distracted by how Eddie's muscles look on that tight shirt he's wearing. "Show me, then."

Buck slowly moves his gaze from Eddie's arms to his face. "S-show you what?"

"Show me your game." Eddie smirks and leans in a little bit more, his muscles straining against his sleeves. "Hit on me."

"W-what? Eddie, c'mon."

"What? You're the expert, right?" Eddie takes another sip from Buck's beer and gazes up at him, his eyes are heavy-lidded.

"I guess I did say that, yeah."

"So teach me. Show me the Buck 1.0 moves or whatever." He grins at him and moves his hand, brushes his knuckles against Buck's forearm— ghosting over his skin.

Buck gets goosebumps and pulls away, nearly falling off his stool.

When he straightens, wincing, Eddie is grinning at him, delight all over his face. "Who doesn't have game now, Buckley?"

or:

Buck inadvertently challenges Eddie to try to hit on him by laughing at the fact that the guy has no game. It ends up being the best thing ever.

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Words: 3,348

Status: Complete (1/1)

#buddie fic recs #ao3 #buddie #eddie diaz #evan buckley #teen and up audiences

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quietwings-fics · 2 months ago

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at the end of most, but not all, things

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Archive Warning: Major Character Death Fandom: Supernatural Ship: Gen (Michael & OCs) Additional Tags: Post-Apocalypse, Future Fic, Major Original Character(s), Angst, Siblings, Past Character Death, Michael Wings the Apocalypse (Supernatural), POV Original Female Character Wordcount: 2,754 Summary:

Look after your brother.

Notes:

consider: an alternate take on michael winning the apocalypse. life goes on. for some people. for michael day of @spnarchangelweek, prompt: decay.

“Luke!” Michelle calls. “Luke! Get back here!”

It’s one simple job. Look after your brother. He doesn’t have to make it so difficult for her. Already, she can hear the raucous sounds of the caravan they’re traveling with disappearing behind her as she forces her way through the brush. Luke’s legs are way too short for it to be fair that he can run so fast. He’s going to get himself in trouble. She tries to think that vindictively, because he would deserve it for the sticks getting caught on her curls and the bushes clawing at her legs, but she can’t stop the way her stomach still drops imagining it. If he got bit by something or even hurt too badly while they’re on the road… Michelle swallows. “Luke!”

There’s snakes out beyond the barely tamed roads. Coyotes. Bears.

And other things. Things Michelle doesn’t believe in because her mom always told her they were just stories her grandfather was making up. But the way he’d always gone so deathly still. After the end, he’d say. (“End of what?” Michelle asked. No, no, the end, he’d always answered. She still didn’t know what that meant.) There were people who stopped being people, who’d tear you apart limb from limb, or worse, make you like them-

She doesn’t even know what he thinks he’ll find out here. Little boys have stupid ideas about adventures that don’t end in them getting eaten. Michelle tries to kick a rock out of her way, but it’s lodged firm in the dirt. She kicks it again to no avail, shakes her head, and goes around. There’s more of them, all lined up. She pauses for a moment, peering down at the well-worn stone, eaten away by rain and moss and most of all, time. If those markings on them were once words, they haven’t been read since before she was born. She makes a face and moves on.

Michelle shoves her way through a particularly thick patch of branches, her brother’s name on its way out of her throat, when her foot doesn’t meet solid ground where it should. She yelps before she falls forward, spinning wildly until the only thing she knows is each harsh point of impact—her shoulder, her back, her knees, rolling over and over until gravity finally spits her out at the bottom.

Immediately, before she tries to move, she starts checking all her limbs just like her mom taught her to. Nothing feels worse than bruised. It probably felt like a longer fall than it was.

She rolls onto her back, about to let out a pitiful sob of a breath to get through the pain.

“Michelle!” Luke’s voice. Finally. She catches the sob and locks it up tight behind her gritted teeth. He’s already next to her before she’s managed to sit up. She appreciates what little help he can give.

She takes his little round face between her hands. There’s dirt all over his cheeks. She licks her thumb and tries to scrub it off, only for him to wriggle out from under her. “Gross! Don’t spit on me!”

“You’re a mess!” she says back. He probably took a similar tumble to her, but she still shoves him for being a brat, hard enough to knock him back on his butt. “And you’re in so much trouble when I tell Mom!”

“I got lost.” He sticks out his tongue. She does it right back and then feels her face flush as she snaps her tongue back into her mouth. She’s so much more mature than him. She can’t let him drag her down to his level. She stands up, trying fruitlessly to brush her pants clean of dirt.

That’s when the ground beneath her feet catches her eye.

She glances back up at where she’d fallen from. The bank isn’t steep, just unexpected in the middle of nowhere. The top is exploding with greenery, but as her eyes trace the path of her fall, it… dies. Plants wilt and dry to crackling remains that have broken in her wake. Michelle swallows and looks down again.

Under her shoe, the ground isn’t dead. It’s blackened. She licks her lips and knows the taste on them isn’t dirt. There’s too much smoke in it. She moves to see the shape of the Earth’s burn scars, stepping off of them back to the comforting dry brown of sand and dust. Luke looks at her funny as her gaze travels up the extended fingers of the mark he’s still sitting on.

“What?” he asks.

“Nothing,” she answers too quickly. “We’re going back.” He’s on his feet in an instant, but the pout on his lips tells her she won’t be getting them to safety without a fight.

“Not yet,” he demands, and then he points behind him. “I want to get one for Mom.”

Michelle turns her gaze beyond him.

There’s an impossible blossom of life in the middle of the pit they’ve fallen into. It towers above their heads, beaded with thick scarlet between the vibrant leaves. A rose bush. She can’t put words to why her heart is beating too hard in her chest.

“No,” she says. Luke’s face screws up. She tries to reason with him. “She’s probably already worried. She’ll be less mad-”

“If we bring her something!” he cuts her off, bouncing on his toes in agitation.

“I said no.”

“I said yes!” Luke ignores her. She tries to grab him before he scampers off, but he ducks under her hand. Brat. Her heart pounds as his feet take him down the length of the burnt ground.

It’s leading to the bush.

She scrambles after her little brother. She doesn’t know how he can even think here. Michelle feels like the air is choking itself down her throat, and tears spring at the corners of her eyes for her to wipe away as fast as she can before Luke sees.

“Just one,” he promises, inspecting the roses. They’re unreal. Michelle has never seen anything so alive or so bright. They’re as fat as fists on the ends of their stems, petals folded so tightly that they remind her more of meat before it’s been cooked than of flowers.

Michelle tries to compose herself. Whatever they look like, they are only flowers.

She circles the bush as Luke picks a flower. She rubs her hands together. “I don’t think- Fuck!” She’s not sure what surprises her more, the word bursting out of her mouth and making her sound more like Mom than she ever has, or the statue she’d thought was a person standing in the thick of the branches.

“What!” Luke says. She feels his hand grip the back of her shirt. His voice is too high. “What!”

She squeezes her eyes shut. “…Statue,” she admits, as he sees what spooked her. Luke snorts and hits her in the arm. Her bruises ache, and she bites her lip against a hiss of pain.

“You’re so stupid,” he says, going back to his roses.

The statue is heads higher than Michelle like most adults still are. It’s too perfect, just like the rose bush. Michelle has seen so many statues in her life, sitting in front of abandoned houses, on the sides of roads, some even on pedestals in the middle of the reclaimed towns. She likes the horses best. They already look a little odd, so time hasn’t weathered them into something weirder, just something as weird as most horses look.

She doesn’t like statues of people, usually. Their features all wash away. Their hands stretch out fingerless, if they still have hands, or arms, at all. The outline of a person remained, anonymous and breaking down with every passing year. And then there were the ones she saw bowing their heads, hands together, broken extremities strapped to their backs like torture devices. She hated those most of all. When she’d been little, she used to pick up rocks and tell herself that she would knock them down or chip their worn faces. She always stopped herself before she let the stones loose.

Luke had broken one’s head clean off once, and their Mom had scolded him while laughing.

This one’s face is immaculately preserved. Every frozen detail of him sits as it must have back when her Grandfather was a little boy. The only disturbance is the lichens growing up the sides of his body. The teal spreads across his pale skin. She frowns. Most statues with colors are faded, but he almost hurts to look at. She takes a step closer.

He stares down into the bush. When she looks at his face, her chest hurts like she’s been shoved. For a moment, she’s a little girl again, and her mother is screaming like if she’s loud enough, she’ll wake the dead, and Michelle knows that her Grandfather won’t tell her any more stories to keep her up at night ever again, and she has her brother in her arms, held so tight because she can’t imagine letting him go, not like that, not ever, not Luke.

She wants to apologize to a statue without knowing who he’s lost. She shakes herself out of it. Luke’s right; she is stupid.

“Got one,” Luke says. She looks back at him. He’s down in the blackened dirt, arms deep in the bush.

“Careful of the-” He jolts. “…Thorns,” she sighs as he pulls a hand free and sucks on a sore finger for a moment. “Let me get it.”

“I can do it myself,” he says, stubbornly. Michelle shakes her head, stepping over next to him and crouching low to see the rose he’s chosen. It’s deep in there, but it’s gorgeously red. Luke grasps at it, surrounding it with his little hands. He pulls. The rose moves a little, but it refuses to come free. Luke huffs. He pulls harder. The thorny vines wrapped around the bush cave towards his yanking, and Michelle puts a hand on his shoulder.

“Careful,” she warns. He pulls again, and the bush seems to groan as its branches pitch towards them. The rose won’t come.

“I’ve got it!” he insists. He throws his whole body behind the next pull.

The rose explodes between his hands, and he falls backwards trailing dark red petal droplets all the way. Branches snap and vines shift and an alabaster stone rolls out after her brother as he sits, dumbfounded. Michelle rolls her eyes.

“Mom will love those.”

“Shut up,” Luke mutters, reaching for the stone at his feet as Michelle steps around to peer at the statue again.

They both gasp in fear at the same time.

Michelle stumbles back. The statue is facing her. Its eyes bore into her. She reaches desperately for her brother, and she finds his hand grabbing back. The statue moves, effortlessly pulling itself free of the vines wrapped around its entire body like it’s nothing. She sees its hand release around something, the hilt of a hidden weapon, and she shrinks back with her brother shielded behind her.

“Leave us alone!” she shouts. “Go away!” She can barely speak around her own fear, but she can feel Luke’s hand trembling in hers. “Help! Help!” But no one hears them, and no one comes, and the statue advances in rough motions, like it knew how to walk once and forgot. Michelle is breathing too fast to think.

It stops.

He slowly goes down to one knee, just below her eye level. He looks at her brother first, and then to her, and when he speaks, it’s like the groan of an old house settling.

“Don’t be afraid,” he says.

“Please don’t hurt us,” Michelle whispers.

His eyes fix on her for too long for comfort. She can’t meet them. They’re too deep. She’ll get lost. She squeezes Luke’s hand. She can hear him hyperventilating.

“I won’t,” the statue says. “Please”—He outstretches his hands, and Michelle takes another step back with Luke.—“give him back to me.”

“Leave my brother alone!” she snaps, louder. A look hangs across the statue’s face, much like the one that was frozen there before but he’s almost smiling, like he wants to but won’t let himself have that.

“Not your brother,” he says, and he tilts his head until Michelle follows his gaze to Luke.

Luke is looking up at her, but in his other hand, he’s hooked the stone-

It’s not a stone.

Chills go up Michelle’s spine. The skull hanging from its eye socket in her brother’s hand is missing its jaw, and many of its teeth, and a long crack runs up the middle from the nose.

Movement drags her gaze back to the statue, more terrified than ever. He stands up to his full height and turns away from them. He picks along the rose bush, fingers brushing the petals of many roses until he finds one near the top that neither of them ever could have reached. He breaks the stem in one quick motion.

He offers it.

He wants to trade, Michelle realizes.

She’s more scared of what he’ll do if they don’t.

“Luke,” she says. She takes a deep breath. She’s more mature than him. She can stop her hands from shaking, at least for a moment. She has to. “Luke, give me the skull.” Luke looks like he wants to do nothing more than get rid of the bones, but he shakes his head. He won’t let her take them. “It’ll be okay,” she won’t know if she’s lying or not for another minute, so she can sound like she believes herself. “I promise.”

Luke presses the skull into her hands hesitantly. Tears streak his face with wet brown trails that she keeps herself calm by imagining drying off later, teasing him about how snotty he gets when he’s crying.

The skull is freezing cold in her hands. Her fingers go numb just from carrying it.

She takes one step forward, and another, and another. The statue is so still again that she might believe he’d gone back to being frozen. Her gaze jumps across moss-covered patches of his body, refusing to look up into his face until she’s close enough that all she looks at is the rose in his other hand.

In the blink of an eye, she shoves the skull towards his outstretched palm, snatches up the rose, and darts back to her brother’s side. The thorns dig into her freezing skin, bringing it back to life.

The statue turns the skull over in his hands. Luke grabs Michelle’s hand again, squeezing and sniffling.

She suddenly feels like the statue has forgotten they were ever there at all. It strokes the bones it’s recollected with the same love her Mom gives the two of them goodnight kisses. Michelle’s stomach roils unpleasantly.

“Let’s go,” she whispers to Luke, wary of attracting attention back to them. She gets no arguments this time.

They back away slowly. They follow the burnt ground back, each extruding point from the center streak of destruction growing smaller and smaller as they get further from the bush and the statue. Michelle keeps her eyes on him as she listens to her brother climb back up out of the pit.

The statue raises the skull up and presses his forehead against the broken bones of it. Michelle stares.

And then she climbs after her brother as quickly as she can, back into the world on the living, amid buzzing flies and reaching plants and the distant sounds of people calling their names.

Michelle wants to look back. She freezes.

Luke tugs on her hand.

“Are you crying?” he asks, voice very small.

Michelle’s cheeks are hot. She wipes tears off of them. “No,” she lies.

Luke presses forward into her. He shudders as he tries to breathe. She wraps her arms around her little brother and holds on tight.

“Do we tell Mom?” he asks.

“No,” Michelle says. “I don’t think we tell anyone, ever.” She doesn’t know who that protects, but she doesn’t want to know, either. She doesn’t want to think about the statue, or the skull he held, ever again. She pets her little brother’s hair.

He’s safe. That’s all she needs to think about. That’s her one job. Look after your brother.

“Okay.” He shakes. “Okay.” She gives him the rose to hold in his trembling hands, and they follow the voices back to the caravan.

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#SPNArchangelWeek #fanfiction #1001-5000 #teen and up audiences #spn #genfic #michael & oc #oc #michael spn #endverse #<- well. a variation on endverse. technically.#angst #character death

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