#that’s why we’re here. not just to see tin cans fire at the doctor.

[quietwingsinthesky]

i think. okay, so with more of the show under moffat’s watch seen now. i think the reason eleven’s seasons feel so much weaker compared to twelve’s is that the focus shifted more onto the huge seasonal arcs than the characters. which i think the worst offender of is obviously how the ponds just get sidelined after their actual child is stolen, how river herself is more plot device or mystery woman than her own character. and to be clear, i still don’t think eleven’s seasons are bad, just. a bit messy. but once you hit twelve again, the balance shifts back, twelve and clara’s relationship is the driving force of s8/9 and it is insanely good.

[histories-and-mystery]

Kevin and the Coffee Shop

Chapter 3

*Seán’s POV*

Seán led Brian into the emergency room and helped him to the front desk. 

“Hi, ye see Bria-”Sean was cut off by the nurse who took one look at the burned brown-haired man with heterochromia and a sleeve tattoo and ushered both of them back to an examination room. They both waited a few minutes before a second nurse came in. She asked Brian a few questions about the incident and his injury, all of which he answered quite calmly despite the fact that they were quite repetitive. Seán could sense Brian was getting antsy by the time the nurse left

“Brian , they’re just tryin to get the whole story”

“I know! I’m just tired and annoyed. And, oh yeah, my face hurts like a bitch” he snapped, with impeccable timing too as just as he finished the ER doctor came in. with a laugh she said

“Well now, that's what we’re here to help with isn't it” both men turned to her as she introduced herself “My name is Dr. Margret Taylor and as I see your face is burned”

Brian blinked and chuckled a little “yeah, some dickhead threw coffee in my face. Ya know casual Tuesday”

“Its Monday Brian” Seán teased. The man scoffed and turned away as Dr. Taylor came closer. She inspected his face carefully, turning his head gently to look at the wound in more detail.

“Well” she started “it could be worse. Its a second degree burn so I’ll clean it up and bandage it. And of course you’re gonna have to change the bandage every few hours and apply more burn cream but we’ll set you up with that.” Brian nodded and watched as she took a cloth and cleaned off the affected area, Seán could see Brian cringe the moment she started and he himself began to worry more. Walking away Dr. Taylor opened a cabinet and took out a large circular container from the shelf and walked back over explaining

“Its burn cream, we’ll write you a prescription for it when ya leave here, that way you can apply it yourself” she began spreading the cream on Brian’s skin, lightly she continued “you’re real lucky this didn’t hit your eye, you would've been down a brown eye”

“Oh, that would suck” was the only thing Brian had said

 Seán chuckled lightly “Yeah its one of the only traits that make you handsome in any way” 

Brian shifted and glared playfully “Come on lad, I've got my sparkling personality” “Yeah alright Casanova, you haven't proved that once”

Brian scoffed as Dr. Taylor laughed “Alright, alright no fighting in my examination room” she closed the tin and moved back to the cabinet. She took out a gauze pad and some wrapping materials. When she turned to face them she saw Brian sticking his tongue out and Seán mirroring him while pulling on his eyelid. It was like that for a moment till both of them burst into laughter. She chuckled and walked back over. Placing the gauze over the burn she began wrapping it up. Once she was done she smiled at them “Alright boys, you're all set, head to the front and get everything sorted”. They both thanked her and headed to the front desk.

*Kevin’s POV*

It had been at least an hour or so since they had arrived at the hospital. Most of that time had been spent in idle silence. None of the lads that were left really wanted to speak, and even if they did none of them could. To Daithi and Dan it had all happened so quickly. Their once mildly peaceful workplace was thrown into an all out saloon brawl where one of their friends had been horribly burned due to a dickhead with too much attitude and an easily bruised ego. For Kevin it was a bit like lighting a marshmallow on fire and then waiting till it burned, his gut feeling had been right. Something bad did happened today. Kevin looked once more to the hospital door. He was getting more worried

“Do you think Brian’s alright?”

It was silent for a moment till Daithi spoke. “why are you asking that now? He’s at the hospital isn’t he?” He moved his hand away from his chin to run it through his black hair. 

“I don’t know, it’s taking longer then expected” Kevin looked back to his lap playing with the string of his hoodie. Dan placed a hand on his shoulder. 

“I’m sure he’s alright Kevin. if he wasn’t Seán would have called us by now.” Kevin didn’t react to Dan’s words, just continued playing with his hoodie. Dan roughly nudged Daithi who grumbled before focusing outside the window again. Dan huffed and kicked Daithi 

“Augh! Yeah I’m sure Brian’s fine he’s tough”

“Alright” Kevin said softly “I guess you’re right”

The car returned to its uneasy silence. Moments later, Kevin saw that Brian and Seán were just at the door and headed back to the car. 

“There they are!” As the others turned to look at the pair the first thing they noticed was the right side of Brian’s face. Where once there was a brown eye, in contrast to the blue of his other eye, there was nothing but bandages. From what Kevin could see, Brian wouldn’t even look in the car. His fists were clenched and there was a grimace on his lips. Seán seemed to be saying something to reassure him but Kevin couldn’t make it out

They opened the door, Seán getting in first and then Brian. Once he was settled he reached for the handle but found it was much farther then he thought it was. He let out a frustrated huff and slammed the door closed

“Jeez Brian” Dan jumped “what’d the doctors say”. Brian crossed his arms and glared ahead. Seán spoke up

“They said it was a second degree burn. he’s gonna have to wear that wrapping on his face for the next three weeks”

Dan nodded “ah that sucks, least it’ll heal soon right?”.

Brian didn’t speak. Not even when Seán asked the group if they all wanted to go home and not even when Kevin, Brian and Seán were the last in the car. He was silent the whole way to his house and as he left the car. Kevin watched as he climbed up the driveway of his home, struggled with the key and went inside. 

Kevin turned to Seán “you think he’ll be alright”

“I don’t know honestly. I’m pretty sure right now he’s planning a murder” Seán chuckled “jokes aside he’s not too badly hurt. At least it will heal fine. That’s what the doctors said”

Kevin didn’t really know how to respond except to nod. He was worried for Brian, as were the other lads, he just didn’t know how to help 

“How bout this” Seán started again “I’ll get ya home to rest, ya take the day off and you start training on Wednesday?” 

“Oh” Kevin blinked “I almost forgot I got a job” laughing a little he nodded “yeah Wednesday works for me”

Seán smiled as they drove up to Kevin’s apartment. He parked and unlocked the door. Kevin said a quick Goodnight and headed into his apartment buliding. After that Kevin figured he deserved a nice long rest.

...........................................................................................................................

an: ooooooo POV change, wasnt who some of you were expecting tho but I think I’ll save that bit for later ;)

[adarlingwrites]

Absolution

Summary:

noun: formal release from guilt, obligation, or punishment

The Capital Wasteland lauded the Lone Wanderer as a hero, a Messiah, a savior who’s willing to give her life for the Good Fight. Beyond the legends, the propaganda, and the mythification that surrounded her legacy, there is only one person who knew her bare soul. She gave him his absolution, and now he will fight for hers.

XXX

February 11, 2278.

Ten fifteen in the evening.

I loaded my shotgun and watched the rear, gunfire bursting as the tin cans yelled. This was supposed to be a stealth operation. If only DeLoria hadn’t tripped on that one guard…

Truth be told, this was an absolutely fucking stupid plan. Taking away a comatose patient from the Citadel isn’t the brightest idea DeLoria and I came up with, but we had no other choice. Whatever secret about Percy that Dr. Li wanted us to protect, it seemed important. Seeing how Lyons figured out that she’s a living atomic weapon, I understand her.

DeLoria looks goddamn constipated as he helped me push the gurney with my partner in tow, secured with leather straps so she wouldn’t fly off. In the front, Fawkes soaks up most of the damage.

Of course we had a Plan B if the stealthy approach didn’t work. Thank fuck Fawkes is willing to cooperate, too. This wasn’t the first time we worked together to help Percy out of the tight spot. Then again, Percy got us out of our predicaments first. Knowing her, when she wakes up, she’ll scold us for risking ourselves for her, and for coming up with this awful plan.

Too bad. She can’t stop us now.

“Charon, what now? I only brought a pistol,” Butch yelps, narrowly missing fire.

“We’re gonna let Fawkes soak up the brunt of the gunfire, and we keep pressing forward and watch his six,” I grunted in return.

“Shit, this is a bad idea man! What if they hit Percy?”

“That’s why we’re fucking here to shield her! Are you scared of a little gunfire, DeLoria?!”

The younger man gulped and kept pushing. Our group kept pushing forward, already at the courtyard. How we managed to pull this off is beyond me. I expected to be dead right now.

“Hold your fire!”

Whoever issued the command is old, judging from their voice. Almost immediately, the tin cans stopped shooting.

“Father, what’s the meaning of this?” a more feminine voice called out. “They’re kidnapping a comatose patient! An honorary member of the Lyons Pride! I-”

“Sarah, please, enough. I’ll talk to them,” the Elder says, emerging from the crowd.

Another one of the tin cans interrupts. “Elder, they let in a Super Mutant in Citadel grounds! We-”

The old man gives the soldier a stern gaze, and he backs off. Coming face to face with Fawkes, the elder looks up, a neutral expression on his face.

“Please explain the meaning of this.”

DeLoria rushes over from the rear, facing the old man. “We’re getting our friend out of here! Clearly you assholes haven’t been doing her any good, so we’re transferring her to another hospital.”

“Another hospital?” the younger Lyons interrupts. “Listen kid, the Citadel is one of the few places on the Wasteland equipped to handle Zhou’s injuries.” Armor clinking, she marches towards the greaser, a livid expression on her face.

“What makes you think that whatever ‘hospital’ you’ll be transferring her to is equipped to help her, huh?”

A shouting match erupts between those two. Before things get ugly, Elder Lyons intervenes again, placing himself in front of the greaser and his daughter. Grumbling, I reach out and pull DeLoria back.

“I’ll take it from here,” I griped, and shoved past Sarah Lyons. I came face to face with the Elder, and I folded my arms.

“Before she left, Dr. Li told us she doesn’t think that whatever tests you’re running on Percy isn’t for her best interests. Percy trusted that doctor, so I trust her.”

Blondie scoffs, about to go off on us again, but she stops in her tracks, looking at something, or someone, behind us.

“Then, why don’t you ask Zhou herself, if she wants to stay here or not?”

My eyes widen, and I turn around and see Percy, sitting up on the bed, her restraints loose. I checked again, and no, they weren’t loosened. They were pulled away from the bed, and she’s gripping the leather straps.

My breath caught in my throat.

“Percy,” I mumble, taking slow, tentative steps towards her.

She’s looking blankly ahead, eyes glassy. No. Oh no.

What the fuck is happening?

Rough and calloused, my fingers brush against her arm, and her eyes flick towards me. “Percy? Are you there?”

Letting go of the leather strap, her small hand grips mine, and she exhales sharply, panic rousing within her. Through her hospital gown, I see a sickly green glow pulsing below her throat, at her chest.

Barreling her way through, Sarah Lyons points a minigun at my partner, ready to fire.

“Everyone, get back! She’s going to blow!”

“No!” I screamed at her, and instinct kicking in, I scoop Percy’s frail body in my arms and started to run to the exit.

“Move, fucking move aside!”

My lungs are burning as I run through the Citadel gates, Percy still pressed to my chest, unnaturally warm to the touch. Fawkes is following closely behind, footsteps pounding.

Away from the people, I gently laid Percy to the ground, the green glow emanating from her searing now, and covered her body with mine. If I’m gonna go, I’m gonna go holding her.

Screwing my eyes shut, I wait for the inevitable.

Instead, I was pulled aside, and Fawkes crouches over Percy’s body, careful not to crush her.

A bright, blinding light flashes from Percy’s body, and Fawkes covers her completely. Her body erupts, heat and energy bursting outwards, and Fawkes just absorbed all that. I watched the explosion barely made a dent on the mutant’s thick skin, and the mushroom cloud that billows towards the dark sky.

He pulls back, and Percy lies there, hospital gown in tatters.

I rushed to her side, checking for breathing, and felt my heart drop as I heard none.

“We need a medic, get a medic!” I snarl at the bystanders who witnessed the entire ordeal. After the initial shock has worn off, DeLoria weaves through the crowd and runs towards us, kneeling beside Percy.

“Shit man, shit! She’s not breathing, she needs CPR, oh my fucking God I don’t remember how to do it,” he babbles, tears pooling at the edge of his eyes.

Gnashing my teeth, I try to remember whatever first aid I learned from observing Percy in the past. I pulled away Percy’s hospital gown, and with my palms together, I pressed between her nipples, pumping and hearing her ribs crack underneath her skin.

I tilt her head, pinch her nose, press my ruined lips against hers, and blow. Twice.

Then, I go back into giving her chest compressions, and I look over my shoulder. I must’ve looked so feral at that moment.

“Where the fuck’s that medic?!”

I turned back to my partner, and after another set of compressions, I breathed into her again.

“Percy, remember what you told me when you got captured by the Enclave, huh?!” I rasped, gritting my teeth.

“Well, it’s your goddamn turn to listen to me now!”

January 14, 2278.

Fingers clacking on the keyboard, Percy hacked away at the terminal. Once given access, she terminates the hostile creatures in the other holding cells. I wince as I watch one particularly screwed up creature burst into flame, high pitched, inhuman squeals coming out of its… mouth?

Jesus Christ. I don’t want to think about it, ugh.

Then, Percy selects another command in the console, and the doors hiss open.

My partner turned around, footsteps urgent, and I followed her closely behind. Fawkes emerges from his cell, carefully, like an animal let loose from a trap, and he turns to us, towering us both.

“Thank you,” he boomed, and though his voice sounded rough, I felt his gratitude for Percy. “As promised, I will retrieve the GECK for you. This is a debt I am most happy to pay, my friends. Follow me!”

Percy smiles and nods, and she turns to me, looking over her shoulder with a pleased expression.

“See Charon? He isn’t bad at all,” she starts, and I only grumble in response. Percy senses the apprehension that lingered in me, and chuckles.

“To be frank Charon, the first time I met you in Underworld, I might have felt the same thing,” she says, and I look down with a questioning look.

“Dad told me to judge other people by what they looked like, but even then, I felt kind of uneasy around you. Then I heard you beat up Patchwork, and I was really angry for a while.”

I gulped. I never thought about what she thinks of me during that time. It was an entirely different reality back then; her thoughts, or anyone else’s, didn’t matter. Only Ahzrukhal’s did.

“But what Tulip said to me about you being Ahzrukhal’s employee really challenged my perspective. Getting back at you would only end in me getting hurt. You were at Ahzrukhal’s mercy as much as Patchwork was.”

“So is that why you bought my contract back then? You felt sorry?”

“No. I felt your frustration at being powerless. So, I bought your contract to create an opportunity to seize that back. Of course it wasn’t easy after that,” Percy chuckles sheepishly, and I sigh, remembering all the times I struggled with the contract’s hold over me.

But it’s gone, right?

No sense in dwelling over that.

“So, where were you going with this, Percy?”

“Give Fawkes a chance.”

I stop in my tracks, feeling guilty as hell. All this time, all I thought about is Percy, and myself. Meanwhile, she tries to consider everyone around her.

“Fine, Angel, I will.”

I felt a light jab on my ribs; Percy elbowed it playfully. “Whatever, big guy.”

“I don’t think that nickname suits me anymore, Percy. We’ve got a bigger guy now,” I tease her, pointing at Fawkes, who’s taking our conversation in stride as he pummeled a dumb mutie in our way.

“Nah. Fawkes doesn’t need a nickname anymore.  You’re my big guy,” Percy teases back.

Is this flirting? Is Percy flirting with me? Goddammit. If I had more skin left on my cheeks, I would have blushed.

I almost ran into Fawkes when he stopped walking. I look to the right, and see the sickly green glow of the irradiated room that the GECK is in.

“Alright. You better not enter, human. This radiation is lethal to you. Stay here, and I will fulfill my end of the bargain,” he grunts, and my partner nods at him.

“Thank you, Fawkes.”

“No. Thank you, human.”

He turns around, and enters the room. On her tiptoes, Percy watches him inside through the window, while I keep watch, guarding her six just in case. Soon after, Fawkes returns carrying a briefcase.

That’s the GECK? What the hell?

“You got it!” Percy exclaims, taking the briefcase off of the super mutant’s hands gingerly. “Again, thank you so much Fawkes. You wouldn’t believe how important this is to us.”

“It’s my pleasure, Percy. Now, I believe this is farewell.”

Farewell?

I turn to Percy and see her somber expression. Good grief, don’t tell me she’s already getting attached to him. This happened with the Big Town kids too.

“Farewell? Fawkes, why don’t you come with us?”

Okay. Okay, I am definitely accepting that Fawkes indeed is good and that I shouldn’t judge him because of him being a super mutant, or metahuman, but this? Had Percy gone mad? Travelling with him could get us killed!

Before I can open my mouth and say something that might possibly anger her, Fawkes already took care of the problem.

“Sorry, I’m afraid a Super Mutant wouldn’t be welcome in the places you frequent.”

“But you said it yourself, you’re a metahuman! You’re different from the other mutants we-”

“All I would do is cause you undue attention and probably get you killed,” Fawkes interrupts, a tinge of sorrow in his grating voice.

“I- you’re right,” Percy sighs, relenting.

“Take care of yourself, friend.”

And with that, we parted ways.

I can tell Percy is sad by the slump in her shoulders. As much as it pains me to see her like this, it’s for the better. The Brotherhood can barely tolerate my presence. Fawkes? They’d shoot him on sight. It’s definitely for his safety too.

“Do you think we’ll see him again, Charon?”

“I don’t think we’ll see him anytime soon.”

“I’m worried.”

“Worry about yourself, angel. Have you seen him? He pummeled that other mutie no problem, like a kid throwing a teddy bear.”

“I guess you’re right. I- Charon, get down.”

Out of instinct, I listen to her. Percy pulls up her PipBoy, and a worried expression is etched on her features. “So many red dots… Charon, I think we’re about to encounter a huge group of muties.”

“Should we go back and get Fawkes?”

Gripping her rifle, she checks the magazine, then she pats at the ammo pouches on her waist. I proceed to check my own ammunition too. Just two boxes of shotgun shells left, and a grenade; the same grenade Percy gave me when she first hired me. I haven’t used it yet, after all these months.

We’re running low on ammo.

“No, no. Stay low. We’ll sneak out of here,” Percy tells me, and she crouches low, the helmet of her stealth suit protracting over her face, then her suit’s stealth mechanism activates. All I can see is a faint silver-white outline.

“I’ll scout ahead. If I raise a fist, move to my location.”

I nod, and she proceeds.

Cautiously, Percy moves through the hall. My grip on my shotgun remains steady, watching her inch slowly but surely to the open area ahead.

Then, the unthinkable happened.

A pulse grenade drops from the ceiling.

It felt like time slowed all around us. Percy sees the grenade landing near her foot, and turns around, movement abrupt, her helmet retracting from her head and revealing her panicked gaze. Her eyes are wide in terror, lips trembling as she yelled at me.

“Charon!”

My feet are ready to take me to her, but what she screamed before the grenade fried her suit’s systems and took her down made me freeze in my spot.

“I order you to live!”

The pulse grenade burst, and so did the walls of the vault. The rubble flew at Percy, who was falling backwards, her helmet thumping against the metal flooring as she hit the ground. Losing consciousness, the GECK escapes her grasp, and skitters a few feet away from her.

From the newly formed hole in the wall, a man emerges. Colonel Autumn. I thought that asshole was dead!

The Enclave is here.

Heart in my throat, I didn’t know what to do. At that moment, I forgot the contract was gone. I turned around, and obeyed, fleeing from the scene with Percy’s words echoing in my head.

“Charon! I order you to live!”

“I order you to live!”

“Live!”

Live.

[mldrgrl]

Broken Things 18/24

by: mldrgrl Rating: varies by chapter, rated R overall (THIS CHAPTER IS RATED R) See Chapter 1 for summary and notes

Halfway to home, Mulder stops the wagon.  The horses have started to shake their heads against their harnesses and begin to snort and whinny.  He cocks his head a bit and stares east, out into the sky for a few moments before he sets the brake and gets down from the seat.

“What’s wrong?” Katherine asks.

Mulder works to try to calm the pair of stallions hooked to the wagon, rubbing their foreheads and jaws.  “You know that article you were reading in that journal?” he asks Katherine.  “About the weather lore?”

“Yes, of course.”

“I think these boys are trying to tell us something.”  Mulder nods off to the east.  “You feel that wind?”

“A bit.”

“There’ll be rain soon.”

“Will we make it home?”

“I think we’ll be in ahead of those clouds out there.”  Mulder climbs back up onto the wagon seat and releases the brake.  “At least, I sure do hope so.”

The weather vane at the ranch is quivering, pointing to a southeasterly wind.  Melvin and Trevor are outside, moving the livestock into the barn, when Mulder and Katherine drive up in the wagon.  Richard is closing up the shutters on the house.  Jesse and Jimmy aren’t there, having left the day before for a trip out to their family’s place.  

“Go on and grab up what you can from the back of the wagon,” Mulder tells Katherine.  “I’m going to help secure things out here and I can bring in the rest when we’re done.”

“Alright, be careful.”  Katherine loads a crate to the brim with packages and goes off to the house.

It takes some time to get all the animals moved from the pens to the barn.  The goats complain the loudest about their new accommodations and they bleat and kick the walls and leap up onto workbenches and leap off, agitating the suckling pigs and making them squeal.  Trevor provides them with fresh hay and carrots and they settle down.  

Mulder goes to the stables to check on the horses.  They move about restlessly and Mulder goes from stall to stall, giving each one his individual attention for a few minutes to try to keep them calm.

“Trevor and I are going to pack some bedrolls and he’ll bunk in the hayloft tonight,” Melvin tells Mulder.  “I’ll stay here in the stables and make sure they don’t fret none when the storm starts up.”

“You don’t think we’re expecting a twister, do you?”

“Naw, I smell the rain and my knee always acts up when we’re expectin’ a doozy.”

“Just got a couple bottles of a liniment from the mercantile today if you want me to leave one with you.”

“May not help much, but I could give it a try.”

“I’ll see if Katherine can fix up an early supper and pack some things up for you.  You have your slickers and boots on hand?”

“Told the boy to have ‘em at the ready.”

“Richard staying in the bunkhouse?”

“Reckon so.”

“I’m going to latch the doors tonight, but if you need anything, I expect you to come for me.”

“I ain’t worried about nothin’.”

“Alright then.”

Mulder fills a crate and brings it to the house and then runs back to get the last of the goods.  Katherine is in the kitchen with a fire already burning in the stove and chopping vegetables.

“Leave the crates and I’ll put everything away later,” she says.  “I figured I should get a start on supper early just in case.”

“I was just telling Melvin I’d ask you to do that.  Can I help with anything?”

“Get the lamps lit?  It’s a little dark with the shutters closed.”

“I can do that.”

Mulder lights the lamps in the dogtrot and then brings one of the ones from his room into the kitchen for more light.  He sets the table while Katherine finishes cooking and he tries to help unload some of the supplies, but he can tell she tires quite quickly of instructing him on where things should be kept so he leaves it be.  He takes the bottles of liniment and the package of denim trousers.

Supper is a quick affair.  The boys barely sit and barely eat.  Katherine seems to have anticipated a swift departure and she’s packed up some tins with more than enough provisions.  At the first sound of the slight patter of rain, they’re gone like buckshot, abandoning dishware and cutlery at Katherine’s insistence and then it’s just the two of them.

“I was afraid they might break a dish in their haste,” Katherine says.  “Are they always like this when we have a storm?”

“You’ve never been in a Texas storm before, have you?  It’s not something you want to get caught out in.”

“No, but I’ve been through my share of hurricanes.”

“Then you should be just fine.”

Mulder offers to help clean the dishes so Katherine can get the goods put away.  He has his part done faster than she does and so he goes to check that none of the shutters are loose and that the back door is securely latched.  The rain is coming down steadily and hard.  He can hear it on the roof and on the porch.

Curious, he opens the front door to see what things look like.  He’s lucky that the wind is blowing away from the house and that the deluge is moving away from the door and not towards it.  There’s lightning in the distance, but he doesn’t hear any thunder.

“Kate?” he calls.  “Come take a look at this.”

Katherine emerges from the kitchen, bringing the lamp with her.  He takes it from her when she gets close enough and sets it down on the entry table.

“Goodness,” she says.  “It looks as terrible as it sounds.  Will the boys be alright out there?”

“The roof on the barn got replaced last autumn, so it should stay pretty dry.  I’ve spent a few storms out there myself and am no worse for wear.”

Katherine leans against the door and stares out at the rain.  Occasionally, the side of her face is illuminated with a quick flash of lightning.  The thunder begins to softly growl as the storm moves closer.

“I’ve never really liked storms,” she says with a sigh.

“Why not?”

“They can be so terribly destructive.”

“That’s true.”  He watches her watch the storm.  She wraps her arms around her waist and shivers slightly.  He steps towards her and brings his arm across her body to hold her elbow.  “Are you cold?”

“A little chill, is all.”

He steps even closer so that her shoulder rests against his chest and he brings both arms around her loosely, holding her sideways.  He can feel her twisting her wedding ring around her finger against his arm.

“I want to ask you something,” he says.

“Go ahead.”

“I saw how quickly you took your place in assisting the doc today with the Skinner boy.  And I may not have been conscious after my fall, but I know how you treated me during my injury and recovery.  Nursing folks seems to be something that comes natural to you.  Why did you tell the doc you couldn’t go out and help him now and again?”

She rolls her head back and to the side to look at him.  “That wasn’t in our agreement.”

“I guess I missed the fine print in our marriage certificate where it says you have to give up on your dreams.”

“My dream was to be a doctor.”

“I think you’d make a mighty fine doctor.  So, why didn’t you jump at the opportunity for some tutelage?”

“I had to leave that behind a long time ago.”

“Katherine.”

“So now it’s Katherine, if you think I’m being unreasonable?”

He moves one hand up and strokes her cheek.  “I don’t think you’re being unreasonable, I just want you to be happy,” he tells her.  “I don’t want you to ever regret marrying me the way you regret marrying Jack.”

“I don’t think you’ll ever have to worry about that.”

“No?”

She opens her mouth and is interrupted by a clap of thunder so loud that it leaves Mulder’s ears ringing.  Katherine gasps and turns into his arms with a shiver.  He holds the back of her head and tightens his arm around her waist.  The grandfather clock in the hall chimes eight times.

“What were you going to say?” he asks, when it falls silent.

Her voice trembles when she answers.  “I was going to say that...that I stopped feeling so regretful as soon as I met you.”

He can’t help but kiss her then.  He’s been feeling like that for a long time, like all the sorrow he’s been through in his life, the loneliness he’s felt, the opportunities he’s rejected to chase this dream of his, all suddenly made sense to him when he married her.  

He learns what lust really feels like in this moment.  It’s a powerful urge, to want someone so much and so badly.  It’s like something has taken over his body and makes his hands clutch her hips, makes his groin ache so badly that he has to push his hips into her belly, makes him groan into her mouth as she pushes back.  Whatever is happening he wants more of it.  Wants to rut against the door with her legs wrapped around him, wants to pull her skirts up and feel the back of her thighs in his hands, wants her hands kneading him all over instead of just his shoulders, wants his skin against her skin and nothing between them.

He has to pull away from her to catch his breath and because his heart is racing so fast his chest feels like it might burst.  Her head rolls against the door, back and forth, and then her eyes open.  She looks intoxicated, eyes dark, cheeks red, lips swollen.

“Please,” she says.  “Don’t...don’t stop.”

↭

She’s never felt this way before.  Never felt so overwhelmed with want in all her life.  She wants Mulder to kiss her again, she wants to feel his weight on her, she wants to touch him in all the places she knows are sinful and for him to touch her in the places that are too sinful to even touch herself.  She thinks that everything she was told was wicket as a girl was a lie.  None of what she feels now can possibly be wrong when it feels so right.

Mulder pulls her away from the front door and slams it shut.  She holds onto one of his hands with both of hers and follows him into his bedroom.  Her knees are shaking and her heart is pounding.  There’s an unbearable ache deep in her belly and between her thighs and it’s so unnerving for her to think that he’s the one that brought it there and the only one that can take it away for her.

Mulder shuts the bedroom door very softly and they stand before each other in the lamplight.  He’s only inches away, but it feels too far.  She breathes in the musky scent of him and sways on her feet.

“Kate,” he whispers, and catches her with an arm around her waist, hand pressed low on her back.  She gasps as a swoop of heat arcs low in her pelvis.  Is this what swooning is?

“I want to lay with you,” she says.  

“I want to undress you.”

She nods and then turns in his arms so he can undo the buttons on her skirt.  She feels him tug and pull, tug and pull, tug and pull, undoing each button down from the small of her back to just below the curve of her buttocks.  The skirt falls and she steps away from it and then turns to him again.  She helps him with the buttons on her blouse, moving up from the bottom as he moves down from her throat.  They meet in the middle and then she can shrug the shirt off, leaving her in her chemise and bloomers.

“Now, you,” she says.

He nods and pulls his suspenders down from his shoulders one at a time.  He tugs his shirt off first and then crouches down to unlace his boots.  After he kicks off his shoes, he unbuttons his trousers and pushes them free of his hips.

“I’ll need your help,” she says, leaning against the edge of the bed and pointing one foot out to him.

Mulder kneels down and takes her foot onto his leg.  He doesn’t apologize this time when he touches her ankle like he did when he helped her onto the horse.  Her foot rests high on his thigh and he looks at her as he pushes each button free.  The anticipation of removing the shoe is actually making it hard for her to breathe and it certainly isn’t helping with the ache between her thighs.

Finally, Mulder pulls the first shoe from her foot and she sighs.  He pushes the hem of her bloomers up her leg and then draws her stocking down.  She bites her lip as he softly massages her calf and ankle and then draws one hand over the top of her foot and rubs his thumb across her toes.  He brings her first foot back to the floor and then has to repeat the whole process with the other.  By the time he’s finished, she’s panting and trying not to squirm.

“I need to tell you something,” he says, massaging the back of her ankle.

“Alright.”

He doesn’t say anything for a few moments, just continues to massage her foot.  The storm outside swells and the rain splatters against the walls and the widow.  Lightning flickers through the slats of the shutters and thunder rumbles again, but it’s lower this time.

“I’ve never done this before,” he says.  “I was nearly engaged once, but we never...it was a long time ago.  What I mean to say is, if I do something wrong, if...well, if there’s something I should be doing that I’m not, you just tell me.”

She doesn’t know what to think about what he’s just told her.  It surprises her, to say the least, given her experience with men.  She also feels a pang of sympathy for him.  There are things that she hasn’t done either, though she won’t tell him of it now.  Despite having been married, she’s never seen a naked, aroused man before.  Jack would not let her look and would not let her touch him.  She’s also never been nude in front of any man.  Intercourse was always something stolen from her, something she had no participation in other than being there.  It was painful, it was unpleasant, it was beyond her control.  What’s happening now is different, and she knows it.  She doesn’t know what to expect either or what to do.  Not really.  Perhaps she should tell him she’s in the same place that he is, but she doesn’t know how to explain.

“Come here,” she says.

He stands up on his knees and then gets to his feet before her.  She slides off the bed a little and then takes his hips and has him take a step even closer to her.  She unknots the drawstring on his drawers and hesitates when the underwear loosens and slips down his hips a few inches, exposing the top of his penis.  She tries not to stare, but she can’t help it.  It’s wet and glistening and twitches slightly when she tugs at his drawers to bring them off completely.

She holds him where her palms fit nicely at the muscular dip below his hips.  Her fingers curve naturally with the swell of his buttocks.  He clenches and shifts his feet.  His hands curl into loose fists and his fingers twitch.

“Can I touch you?” she asks.

He nods quickly and then grits his teeth and swallows.  “Oh hell,” he groans when she wraps her hand around him.  For a moment she thinks she’s done something wrong, but then she looks at his face and his eyes are closed, chin dropped nearly to his chest, mouth open.  She flexes her fingers to open her hand and then closes it around him again and he sways.

“Oh yes,” he moans.  “Oh, Kate.”  Even though his penis is hard, the skin is unexpectedly soft like velvet.  She pets him lightly and then uses her thumb to stroke up from the bottom of his shaft to the top.  He grabs onto her shoulder and his knees bend a little.  

Without even thinking about it, Katherine takes Mulder’s hand from her shoulder and brings it down to her breast.  He squeezes her almost experimentally at first and then more boldly.  She gasps slightly when his thumb rubs over her nipple and the grip she has on his penis tightens a bit.  He groans and sways again only this time his hips jerk towards her and then back.

“Oh Kate that feels so good,” Mulder says.

Encouraged, Katherine continues to pet him and rub him and he groans again and then covers her hand with his and curls her fingers into a tight fist around him.  He moves her hand up and down in his, faster and faster.  His hips jerk in time with the push and pull of their hands.  He makes soft little grunting whines in the back of his throat and squeezes his eyes shut.  Blindly, he gropes for the edge of her chemise and lifts it up until he’s holding her bare breast in his hand and kneading it in time with her strokes.

“Oh, oh...oh I...I…”  Mulder’s head falls back and he bares his teeth and groans from deep in his gut.  His hips jerk forward and his buttocks clench and Katherine feels the warm rush of his seed spilling through her fingers and into their joined fists.

Time seems to come to a standstill for a few moments and then Mulder lets go of her breast and lets go of her hand and his eyes come open and his mouth rounds into the shape of an ‘o’ and then he hastily begins pulling at his undershirt to whip it over his head.

“Forgive me,” he says, wiping at her hand with his shirt.  “Oh, Kate, I’m sorry.”

“Why?  Wasn’t that what was supposed to happen?”

“Yes, but I didn’t intend to soil your hand in the process.”

“I don’t feel soiled.”

“That eases my embarrassment some.”

“Please, don’t be.”

Mulder tosses the undershirt away and then seems to realize he’s naked and moves his arms around like he doesn’t know what to do with them.  Katherine laughs and then grabs his hand and pulls him towards her.  She lays back where she is and he bends over her with his hands beside her shoulders on the bed.

“Do I get the honor of touching you now?” he asks.

“If...if you would like to.”

“Would you like me to?”

She takes a deep breath, swallows once, and then nods.  He pushes away from her and then takes her hands and pulls her back up so she’s sitting at the edge of the bed again.  He pulls the lace ties of her chemise apart and pushes the straps over her shoulders.  She shivers when her chest is exposed, sending gooseflesh up her arms.  He gazes at her openly and just the thought of him wanting her in such a way makes her nipples tighten painfully.

Mulder leans closer to her and touches the neglected breast he did not give any attention to previously.  He cups it in his hand and then bends his head and puts his mouth on her.  She is caught off guard and pushes his head away, blinking in surprise.

“What are you doing?” she asks, pulling her shoulders into her body a bit and covering her breasts with her arms.

“I wanted to...is that not okay to do?”

“I don’t know.”

“I won’t do it then.”

“You wanted to?”

“Well, yes, I...yes.”

“Okay.”

“Are you sure?”

“I don’t know.  If I ask you to stop, will you?”

“Of course.”

He says that like it’s a given that ‘please, no’ and ‘don’t’ are magic words that people just adhere to.  She knows they’re not always heard and she knows they’re not always respected.  She also knows she shouldn’t judge Mulder by the poor character of other men.  He’s proven to her several times over that he is kind and trustworthy.  She opens her arms, baring her chest again to him, but she’s trembling all over.

“Alright,” she says.  “Go ahead.”

“Are you cold, honey?”

She shakes her head no in response.  His eyes roam her face for a few moments and instead of going back to her breast he kisses her.  She responds instantly, bringing her arms up and over his back to pull him closer.  He’s warm and the sparse hair on his chest tickles her breasts when she brushes against him.  He slides his arm under her and lifts her up slightly as he crawls onto the bed.

She’s still on her back, but he’s on his side.  He moves one hand over her body, down her arm, up her arm, over her breast, around her hip, across her belly, up her neck, over her breast again, down to her navel.  

He pulls his mouth from hers and she protests with a whimper, but he starts to kiss her face and then her neck and then her shoulders and her insides start to feel like melting butter.  She’s liquidy and soft all over.  He kisses the top of her breast and the side of her breast and then the inside of her elbow where her arm is bent to hold his face in her hands.

“Mulder,” she whispers.  

“Kate,” he murmurs back.

The way he says her name makes her body flush.  She pulls his head up so she can look at him and he cocks his head a little and rubs his jaw into her hand.  He touches her face and draws his thumb over her hairline and to her ear.

“Will you take your hair down?” he asks.

“Okay.”

They have to untangle their arms a bit so she can sit up and she pulls her braid over her shoulder and unties the band keeping it in place.  She unravels the plait with the pull of her fingers and the curls spring free.

“So beautiful,” he whispers, running his fingertips over the waves of her hair reverently.

She shakes her head a little in disbelief and then lays back again and stares up at the ceiling.  She folds her arms up to cover her breasts and finds herself nervously twisting her wedding band again when she tries so hard not to.  He lays down beside her again and props himself up on one hand and then reaches over to lightly cover her wrists.

“What is it?” he asks.

She shakes her head again.  When she was younger, the other kids at school wouldn’t play with her because they thought redheads were witches.  Her brother once told her that no one would ever want to marry her because boys thought freckles were disgusting.  Her mother once told her it was a shame she’d inherited her grandmother Scully’s nose.  Jack had told her repeatedly that her body felt like a bag of bones and that it repulsed him.  

“Kate?”

“You don’t have to lie to me.  I know I’m not very pretty.”

“Not pretty?  The first time I laid eyes on you I thought you were the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen.”

“I was unkempt and exhausted the day you met me.”

“That does not mean you weren’t beautiful.  Who told you you weren’t pretty?  That horse’s ass, Jack Willis?”

“Everyone.”

“Then everyone is wrong.”

“Everyone is wrong, but you are right?”

“In all the time you’ve known me, have I ever been wrong?”

She smiles a little and then begins to laugh.  He smiles as well and brings her hand to his mouth and kisses her wrist.  In the hallway, the grandfather clock chimes nine times.  The rain falls as steadily as it has been with no signs of stopping.

“I’ve never done this either,” she says, and he gives her a questioning look.  She shakes her head a little again and brings his hand back to her face.  “Not like this.  I want you to keep touching me.”

“That’s good, because I really want to keep touching you.”

She leans up and kisses him this time and he kisses her back.  She shifts closer and pulls him to her so that she can bring one of her arms around him and stroke his back.  She wants to wrap herself around him and maybe stay there for a little while where she knows she’s safe.  

He touches her a little more confidently than he had before.  He’s more firm, squeezes her breast a little tighter, doesn’t hesitate to pull her hips up towards his and push his body against hers.  He’s hard again and she knows that consummation is imminent.  She’s not nervous about it and doesn’t feel a sense of obligation to go through with it.  She wants it to happen.  She’s ready for it to happen.

Mulder’s fingers brush the top of her bloomers and he blindly unknots the drawstring.  Once the stays are loose, he slides his hand inside at her hip, lightly caressing her backside before moving around to the top of her thighs.  He breaks from kissing her to look down and she watches his face as he brings his hand between her thighs.  His fingers move gently through her curls and slip easily into the natural groove there that brings him inside of her.  His eyes widen and his lips purse as though he’s surprised.

“You feel so...so tight,” he whispers.  “Will it be okay?  Will I hurt you?”

“I’ll be fine,” she lies.  It’s never not been painful.  She only hopes it won’t be this time.

He pulls his hand out from her bloomers and then she helps him pull them off her legs and just like that, she’s laid bare for him.  Unabashed, unashamed.  She opens her arms to him and when he comes down to her, she opens her legs as well.  

“If you need me to stop,” he says.  “I will.”

“I won’t,” she answers.

He moves awkwardly over her.  Bearing in mind he has no experience, she folds one knee up and rubs encouragingly at his shoulder.  She watches him fumble between touching himself and touching her and he blows out little puffs of frustration from his pouting lips.

“I’m sorry,” he says.  “I thought...I thought I would just know how to…”

“It’s alright.”  

Katherine wets her lips and then reaches down and takes a hold of him.  She shifts her hips and brings the tip of his penis to her folds and probes gently until she feels him begin to slip inside and then she stops and shifts again.  She lets go of him and then holds onto his hips as he pushes his way into her.  His body hunches over hers and he presses his head into the bed and pants into her shoulder.

“Oh my God,” he moans.  “Jesus, Kate, you feel so good.  Is this okay?  Are you okay?”

“I’m okay,” she says, and it isn’t a lie.  She feels a slight sting at first, but then nothing.  Nothing but the hot velvet feel of him inside of her.  For the first time, it doesn’t feel like an invasion, it feels like a welcome home.

“I...I have to move,” he says.  “Can I move?”

“Yes, move.  Please.”

He brings his hips back, but only marginally, like he can’t bear not to be as fully enmeshed in her as he can be, and then he pushes quickly back into her and moans.  She slides her hands over his buttocks and squeezes.  His hips jerk again and he cries out her name.

“You feel good to me too,” she tells him.

“I do?”

“Yes.  Yes.”  And that is not a lie either.  He has a way of undulating his hips so that his pelvis slides against hers and she can feel something building inside her, something glorious.  Her toes begin to tingle and she feels fire in her cheeks.

“This is incredible,” he says.  “I can’t believe how incredible you are.”

“Oh!”  Something happens in the next snap of his hips.  Her chest raises up into his and her head falls back.  Mulder buries his face into the straining muscles at her neck.  She can’t take a breath, can’t say a word, can’t do a thing but claw at his buttocks as her body folds up into his.  She feels as though she’s riding a wave.  No, she feels as though she is the wave, cresting and falling and then oozing towards land.  She feels as though she’s just been released of a heavy burden that she wasn’t even aware she was carrying.

“Kate, God, oh…”  Mulder holds her tightly to him as he spills into her.  She feels the warm rush of it flood through her and she’s not repulsed, like she would be with Jack.  She isn’t eager to get away.  She wants him to stay longer, stay as long as he can.

“Don’t go,” she whispers, when he shifts above her.

“I won’t,” he says, but it’s not a promise he can really keep.  He finally has to move from between her thighs rolls to his back beside her.

They lay side by side for some time and then Mulder gets up and he goes to his wash stand.  He pours water into the basin and wets a rag and then wrings it out and pats his chest and face a few times before wetting it again and cleaning himself between his legs.  He wets and wrings the rag again and then brings it to Katherine.  She reaches for it, but he sits down beside her and cleans her thighs himself.

“Thank you,” she says.

“Should I get a nightdress for you from your room?” he asks, draping the rag over the rack at the side of the stand.  “Will you be cold?”

“I’ll be fine.”

“I’ll be right back.”  Mulder goes out into the hall and turns off the lamps and then checks the door.  He brings the lamp in his room over to the bedside table and Katherine moves off the bed so he can pull the bedclothes down.  It’s apparent he expects her to stay with him tonight.  She had hoped he would ask and never thought he would just assume that is the way it would be.  She lays down and he brings the sheets over her.

“Can I hold you?” he asks, when he slips into bed behind her.

She blinks in surprise, but nods.  He turns away to put the lamp out and then lays down and brings his arm around her.  His chest is pressed to her back and his legs curl into the shape of hers.  His knees jut into the bottoms of her feet.  She lays her arm alongside his and he turns his hand into hers so that their fingers lace together.

She doesn’t fall asleep immediately.  It takes some time for her heartbeat to slow, for her eyes to droop, for the rain to lull her.  The grandfather clock chimes ten times though she hears it as though through a dense fog.  She feels Mulder move behind her, feels him lean over her and kiss her cheek, but she’s too sleepy to respond.

She thinks he might whisper ‘I love you,’ but it might be a dream.

[miceenscene]

Hi Mice!

Since you're someone who has written in several fandoms, I have a question for you. (I'm loving your Mandalorian fic, by the way. A soulmate AU is perfect for the lonely tin can cowboy!) I certainly don't feel like I have my finger on the pulse of fandom or anything (I'm pretty much just a lurker), but I've started to notice an uptick in second-person, reader-insert fics lately. (I realize this could have been a super popular trend for ages, and I’m just discovering it, haha.) As someone interested in narrative theory, I find this fascinating. Second person narratives are used very rarely in literature; the only one I can think of off the top of my head is Italo Calvino's wonderful If on a Winter's Night a Traveler.

Have you noticed a similar trend? What do you think might account for it? Is it a convention of particular fandoms, or is this a trend across the board? Is it a kind of natural evolution of Tumblr fics?

I can't decide how I feel about it overall. At its worst, it seems a shameless update on ye olde Mary Sue. But when done well, the reader can be a well-drawn, engaging character, and it can lend an urgency and immediacy to the writing.

I'm totally not expecting you to be an expert here or anything, just thought I'd get thoughts from a writer I respect. Feel free to ignore this, if you’d like! Haha. Hope you're well!

Hey!

This is rather funny that you should ask because I was just talking about second-person fics in a group chat this morning. And so I shared your ask with them and got some additional insights.

I’ve certainly noticed an uptick in the amount of second-person I’m seeing, but I also have just added a much more Vibrant fandom to my collection after living for so long in one that is defined by glories past. The group says that they’ve also noticed an uptick; fandoms like Chris Evans or Hiddleston used to be much more OC focused are now heavily second-person focused instead. It’s certainly easy to see the evidence. The Mando/Reader tag is LEAGUES larger than Mando/OC on both tumblr & Ao3. (Same with the rest of Pedro Pascal’s shippable characters, but you mentioned Mandalorian in particular. :D)

As to why, there could really be any number of reasons. 

The group wisely suggested, and I agree, that the COVID lockdowns have a part to play. Everyone everywhere is just fuckin’ desperate for happy brain chemicals. And this fic here is about my current comfort character thinking I’m pretty and wanting to spend time with me. Weeeeeeee. Happy day dreams ahoy.

I think they may also come from a natural progression of Mary Sues/OC’s of the past. A reader-insert certainly cuts out the middle man. Like how fanfic helps streamline the writing process by doing the heavy lifting of world-building and partial character creation, Reader Insert streamlines even more by letting the reader themself also half-fashion the OC in their own head. (Though to be fair, the best reader inserts I’ve ever read have the ‘You’ be very much their own character. So some writers take that labor back from their readers to some truly fantastic results.)

I think also there may be something truly engaging in the semi-communal feeling of a second-person story. Every second-person story has a story-teller. There’s another voice telling you what is happening to ‘You’, another person specifically crafting a scenario for you. And it feels more personal because it’s addressed directly to you, and often highly subjective in nature (the ‘You’s feelings typically being the key reasoning for writing in the first place). This goes back to the Covid point but with Covid and even capitalism doing its damnedest to continually separate people (because we are so much easier to market to when we’re alone), it’s not surprising that the older forms of seeking community through storytelling are getting a renaissance. Dungeons & Dragons (and tabletop roleplaying) is a really great example of second-person storytelling that has exploded in recent years. Humans have always liked telling stories (our brains even tell us stories when we sleep). Just its no longer happening around a fire after a meal, but through my phone in the middle of the night, curled up in my bed.

Though even in published fiction, we may not see ‘You’ as a character but we do see characters crafted specifically for audience projection. Both in media like Doctor Who where you have the Audience Insert Companion that’s there to ask the questions about the weird bullshit that’s happening that the audience themselves might be having (and also to make googoo eyes at the Doctor to varying levels of success); or in stories like Twilight where Bella has far more in common with a ‘You’ than she does say Elizabeth Bennet. (Bella’s even managed to get the first person POV while still being a highly projectable outline of a character. She’s essentially one pronoun away from being a ‘You’. YA as a whole genre makes a lot of money off this exact concept. Tumblr and Ao3 just take it the next step forward.)

The key to a good story is engaging your reader. Second-person seems be a new trend to doing that. But if the last decade has taught us anything it’s that things that start online rarely ever stay there. Traditional Publishing moves slow so I don’t think we’ll be seeing Simon & Schuster promoting any second-person novels anytime soon. But it wouldn’t surprise me if there are smaller boutique publishers already making them and people already buying them. 

You said that you didn’t know how you felt about Second-person overall. And I don’t think that’s an incorrect place to be. Second-person is just a tool, like a paintbrush is a tool or a rolling pin is a tool. In the hands of a novice, it can leave something to be desired. And in the hands of a good craftsman, it can be used to create something truly astounding.

(However, all this to say, the use of ‘y/n’ (or any of its derivatives) will always be a big Nope for me. I’ve read enough second person to have it patently proven that it’s possible to write without it.)

<3, Mice

[thelittlesttimelord]

The Littlest Timelord: The Fall of the Eleventh Chapter 29

TITLE: The Littlest Timelord: The Fall of the Eleventh Chapter 29 PAIRING: No Pairing RATING: T CHAPTER: 29/? SUMMARY: Elise Smith is now a teenaged Timelord. In addition to losing the Ponds, the fields of Trenzalore are calling. But first they have to figure out exactly who Clara Oswald is.

[A/N - I’m realizing that this book may be the longest one so far purely because of the amount of specials in this series.]

The TARDIS landed and they stepped out.

A big mansion stood near them.

“Please tell me we’re not going to explore the big scary house,” Elise said.

The Doctor gave her a look.

“We’re going to explore the big scary house, aren’t we?”

The trio walked up to the door and knocked.

A man opened the door and the Doctor jumped out.

“Boo! Hello, I'm looking for a ghost.”

“And you are?”

Clara appeared at his side. “Ghostbusters.”

Elise rolled her eyes at the dumb joke.

“I'm the Doctor,” the Doctor said, holding up his psychic paper.

“Doctor what?” the man asked.

“If you like. This is Clara and Elise.” He walked over to the table filled with equipment. “Ah, but you are very different. You are Major Alec Palmer. Member of the Baker Street Irregulars, the Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare.”

He leaned in towards Palmer and whispered, “Specialized in espionage, sabotage and reconnaissance behind enemy lines. You're a talented watercolorist, professor of psychology and ghost hunter.” He shook Palmer’s hand. “Total pleasure. Massive.”

“Actually, you're wrong. Professor Palmer spent most of the war as a POW,” the woman with him said.

“Actually, that's a like told by a very brave man involved in very secret operations. The type of man who keeps a Victoria Cross in a box in the attic, eh? But you know that, because you're Emma Grayling, the Professor's companion.” The Doctor gave her air kisses.

“Assistant.”

“It's 1974. You're the assistant and “non-objective equipment”. Meaning psychic.”

“Getting that. Bless you, though,” Clara said.

“Relax, Emma. He's Military Intelligence. So, what is all this in aid of?” Palmer asked.

“Health and safety. Yeah, the Ministry got wind of what's going on down here. Sent me to check that everything's in order,” the Doctor told him.

“They don't have the right.”

“Don't worry, governor, I'll be out of your hair in five minutes.” The Doctor excitedly pointed at the equipment. “Oh! Oh, look. Oh, lovely. The ACR 99821. Oh, bliss.”

Elise chuckled lowly. “You’re such a nerd.”

The Doctor messed with the toggles. “Nice action on the toggle switches. You know, I do love a toggle switch. Actually, I like the word toggle. Nice noun. Excellent verb.”

Clara reached down to touch something and the Doctor slapped her hand. “Oi, don't mess with the settings.” The Doctor scanned the area with his screwdriver.

“What's that?” Palmer asked.

“Gadget. Health and safety. Classified, I'm afraid. You know, while the back room boffins work out a few kinks.”

“What's it telling you?” Emma asked.

“It's telling me that you haven't been exposed to any life-threatening transmundane emanations. So, where's the ghost?” The Doctor picked up a candelabra. “Show me the ghost. It's ghost time.”

The group followed the Doctor down a dark corridor, with only the light from the candelabra to light their way.

“I will not have this stolen out from under me, do you understand,” Palmer told them.

“Er, no, not really, sorry,” the Doctor said.

“I will not have my work stolen, then be fobbed off with a pat on the back and a letter from the Queen. Never again. This is my house, Doctor, and it belongs to me.”

“This is actually your house?” Clara asked.

“Why would you want to live here?” Elise asked.

Palmer ignored Elise’s question and answered Clara’s.

“It is.” Clara laughed.

“Sorry. You went to the bank and said, you know that gigantic old haunted house on the moors? The one the dossers are too scared to doss in? The one the birds are too scared to fly over? And then you said, I'd like to buy it, please, with my money.”

“Yes, I did, actually.”

Clara crossed her arms over her chest. “That's incredibly brave.”

Elise rolled her eyes. “Or stupid.”

Clara hit her on the arm.

“What? It is!”

There was a loud creaking noise.

“Listen, Major, we just need to know what's going on here,” the Doctor told him.

“For the Ministry.”

“You know I can't answer that.”

“Very well, follow me.”

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Major Palmer led them into a living room. It was much warmer than the rest of the house and it looked almost livable.

“So, what's an empathic psychic?” Clara asked Emma.

“Sometimes I sense feelings, the way a telepath can sense thoughts. Sometimes, though. Not always.”

“The most compassionate people you'll ever meet, empathics. And the loneliest. I mean, exposing themselves to all those hidden feelings, all that guilt, pain and sorrow and…”

Elise elbowed the Doctor. Shut. Up.

The Doctor gave her a light glare as he rubbed his side.

“Would you care to have a look?” Palmer asked.

They approached a board covered in pictures.

“Caliburn House is over four hundred years old, but she has been here much longer. The Caliburn Gast. She's mentioned in local Saxon poetry and parish folk tales. The Wraith of the Lady, the Maiden in the Dark, the Witch of the Well.”

“Is she real? As in, actually real?” Clara asked.

“Oh, she's real. In the seventeenth century, a local clergyman saw her. He wrote that her presence was accompanied by a dreadful knocking, as if the Devil himself demanded entry. During the war, American airmen stationed here left offerings of tinned Spam. The tins were found in 1965, bricked up in the servants' pantry, along with a number of handwritten notes. Appeals to the Gast. For the love of God, stop screaming.”

Elise rolled her eyes and scoffed.

Both Clara and the Doctor gave her a look.

“She never changes. The angle’s different, the framing, but she's always in exactly the same position. Why is that?” Clara asked.

The Doctor picked up the candelabra.

“We don't know. She's an objective phenomenon, but objective recording equipment can't detect her…”

“…Without the presence of a powerful psychic,” the Doctor finished.

“Absolutely. Very well done.”

Emma gasped. “She knows I'm here. I can feel her calling out to me.”

“What's she saying?” Clara asked.

“Help me.”

“The Witch of the Well. So where's the well?” the Doctor asked.

“A copy of the oldest plan that we could find. There is no well on the property. None that we could find, anyway.”

The Doctor tapped Clara on the head, making her jump and turn around. “You coming?” he asked her softly.

“Where?”

“To find the ghost.”

“Why would I want to do that?”

“Because you want to. Elise is coming.”

“Only because if I don’t, you’ll get yourself into more trouble,” Elise snapped.

“Come on,” the Doctor told Clara.

“Well, I dispute that assertion.”

The Doctor and Elise started for the exit. “Eh? I'm giving you a face.” The Doctor jerked his head towards the dark corridor. “Can you see me? Look at my face.” He jerked his head again.

“Fine.” Clara walked towards them. “Dare me.”

“I dare you. No takesies backsies?”

Clara bit her lip and shook her head, before taking the candelabra and leaving.

The Doctor chuckled and turned to follow after her when Emma said, “The music room is the heart of the house.”

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

“Say we actually find her. What do we say?” Clara asked as they walked down yet another dark corridor.

“We ask her how she came to be whatever she is,” the Doctor said.

“You don’t actually believe all this do you?” Elise asked.

“What makes you say that?”

“Out of all the adventures we’ve ever had, we’ve never once run into an actual ghost. Why would they start being real now?”

“This regeneration is very practical. Did you know that?”

Elise shrugged. “Blame River.”

“Getting back to the point,” Clara said, “Why?”

“Because I don't know, and ignorance is, what's the opposite of bliss?”

“Carlisle.”

“Yes. Yes, Carlisle. Ignorance is Carlisle.”

They eventually came to the music room.

“Ah, the music room. The heart of the house. Do you feel anything?” the Doctor asked Clara.

“No.”

“Your pants are so on fire.” Clara giggled.

“Elise, anything?”

Something wasn’t right, but she couldn’t put her finger on it. “Maybe.”

The Doctor’s screwdriver started malfunctioning.

“Do you feel like you're being watched?” Clara whispered to the Doctor.

“What does being watched feel like? Is it that funny tickly feeling on the back of your neck?”

“That's the chap.”

“Then yes, a bit. Well, quite a big bit.”

The wood around them creaked.

“I think she's here,” Clara said.

The Doctor stepped out of the room and then back in. “Cold spot. Spooky.” He started walking around the cold spot. “Cold. Warm. Cold. Warm. Cold. Warm. Cold. Warm. Cold.” The Doctor drew a circle around the cold spot.

“Doctor?” Clara asked, “Doctor!”

“What?”

“I'm not happy.”

“No.”

The Doctor walked out of the room and Elise ran after him.

It took Clara a few seconds to realize the two Timelord’s had left her. “Hey!”

[cozycryptidcorner]

August the Infected Boyfriend

Hello, everyone! This is a piece commissioned by @severedreamerbeard, a wonderful person who was so patient and understanding about waiting that I bumped him up to the forefront when The Mad Prince began looking like it was going to take just a bit longer than expected. I hope you all enjoy this little break from the longer story! 

Tags: Male Infected, Male Reader, Citrus Rating.

You don’t have an alarm clock, not anymore, not with the rickety old generator that once collected sunlight damaged beyond what you can repair. Without it, though, you manage to rise as the day’s first light begins to peak through the treeline. You aren’t certain how exactly you manage this feat time and time again, but it must have something to do with stress. Or, perhaps, just the adaptability of human nature; you need to be up at this exact time to take care of chores, and so your body listens and complies. 

This morning is the exact same as many before. You get up, placing your feet on the rickety wood floor, and internally groan as you stand. God, you’re exhausted, despite the reasonable hour you went to sleep. After a moment, you come to the conclusion that the apocalypse just sucks the life right out of your body, suffocating it slowly if it can’t snuff it out like a candle within its first wave. Grinding your teeth as though it will take the edge off the soreness, you get dressed in the worn work clothes that you are certain won’t last the eternity you plan on staying put in your little haven. 

As you creep through the house, doing your best to stay silent as to not disturb your sister, you run through your usual list of chores that needs accomplishing in a kind of morning ritual. The dawn’s air outside is crisp, lively, but there is an underlying panic inside of you as you take a deep, cool breath, the slowness of winter gently clawing its roots into the earth in a mockery of what you and Ruby have survived thus far. You know just from watching tv shows and listening to your history teacher drone on in school that winter always has the highest mortality rate than all wars waged, with exposure doing far more damage than guns and men. The fact that you have to sludge through it without central heating or a nearby grocery store? It’s been done, but not within the last couple of decades. 

The binoculars around your neck must have been for bird watching, because there is a surplus of bird related books in the cabin, complete with a little sketch journal of animals native to the area. You don’t use them for that, though, and instead stand at the very edge of the water surrounding the little man-made island, lifting them up to your eyes. Out on the opposite side of the coast, there isn’t any concerning activity. A doe bends over the lake’s surface, drinking its fill of water, and a hawk sits up on the top of the tree, staring down at the ground in search of prey. The doe suddenly startles, dashing back into the safety of the trees, and that’s when you see one of them. 

A few months ago, your stomach would have dropped clean to the floor, but you don’t have the nerves left to actually care anymore. None of them have dared to enter the water, and there have been some instances where they’ve looked you directly in the eye, so you know they know you’re out here. The only guess as to why you and Ruby are still alive and uninfected would be that those things have some kind of aversion to water. There isn’t anything else you can think of, unless they have some sort of deep, terrifying fear of the tomatoes that surround the house. Still, you do your patrol as always, perhaps because the habit of doing so has become a comfort in the chaos the world has turned to.

You blink rapidly, your eyes stinging against the breeze as you turn around, heading straight over to where Morticia steadily chews on whatever old food you threw into the yard the night before. The miracle-goat, you wanted to call her, after finding the animal wandering around by herself, muzzle and neck buried inside a bush as she ate. Morticia, Ruby insisted her name be, has been your sister’s lifeline as whatever food you had managed to collect began to dwindle. Again, you are reminded of the harsh reality of winter, because you briefly imagine a world in which Morticia never managed to escape from her farm, and you and Ruby were left without her milk and company. Maybe death wouldn’t be the exact outcome, but you would wager that the prospects would look pretty grim. 

Morticia barely reacts to your hands getting all up in her business, which is a definite change to when you first were trying to figure out the finesse of milking goats. At one point, you were almost certain she fractured your jaw with a hard kick to the face, but there are no x-rays and doctors to look over any injuries you sustain anymore. All you could do was hold your breath and hope the swelling would go down, which it did, thankfully, though now your jaw clicks every time you open your mouth. Better than having no jaw at all, you muse, picking up the tin bucket of milk and carrying it back inside to the kitchen. 

You begin pondering what magic you can work for an acceptable breakfast. The pantry is sparse. It wasn’t always this terrifying to look over, when you and Ruby had just arrived, it was stocked with different kind of canned goods, dried pasta, and half a bottle of vodka you might have used a fair bit of when your jaw was threatening to fall off your face. Sure, it wasn’t like accidentally stumbling into an untouched superstore with the shelves still full with merchandise, but at the time it certainly felt like it. Even with your careful attempts to make it last as long as possible, it looks like this is where ‘possible’ ends. You shut the door, taking a step back, glancing over to the fresh pile of vegetables in the hopes it might soothe your worries for the oncoming winter. 

But fresh vegetables rot.

Still, whatever you have today can be considered a blessing from whatever spirit or deity has decided to grant you their luck. Ruby has taken a liking to the tomatoes, the big, red, juicy fruit growing in droves over the last bit of summer. You pick up one from the bunch left on the counter last night and set it on the cutting board. Paired with basil, at least, and some vinaigrette found in the pantry, it’s almost like a full meal. And every single calorie counts. 

A thunking noise sounds from upstairs, meaning that Ruby is awake. Your immediate instinct is to go investigate, to see if she needs any help, but you stop yourself. If there’s one thing that’s an integral part of her personality for the whole nine years she’s been alive, it’s the fact that she hates being babies. Hates it. So you continue trying to put together a decent looking breakfast, ears wide open to listen for any signs of struggling. She does, at least, call for you if she needs help, though you’re always afraid you might miss her cries if you are too engrossed in whatever you’re doing. Then, out of the corner of your eye, you spot her on the top of the stairs, her arm braced around a cane. 

“Are you feeling better today?” You ask, going up the stairs to meet her. 

“A lot,” she responds, letting you wrap your arms around her waist, taking most of the weight off her feet. “So I’m going to be gardening today.” 

After a moment of pondering over the morning patrol, you offer a quick nod. “It’s a beautiful morning, the fresh air will do you good.”

You help her down the stairs, watching your step just as carefully as you watch hers. As soon as both of you reach the ground floor, you slowly allow your grip to cease, making sure her legs don’t show any signs of weakness against her weight. Nothing today, you observe, which is another small miracle. True to her word, Ruby seems to be able to walk just fine with the cane today, settling herself in the chair with only the slightest bit of difficulty. Her eyes light up when she sees the tomato mess, as though it's a whole chocolate cake for her to eat, and she digs in with an appetite that you haven't seen her use in awhile.

“How’s you sleep, Rhubarb?” You ask, using the nickname you know she hates for just to watch her eyes roll to the back of her head in exasperation.

“Fiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiine,” she says, dragging the syllable out for all its worth, quickly shoveling another spoonful of breakfast into her mouth.

You hold your hands up in mock surrender, picking up another tomato from the pile and taking a good bite of it. While you try to hold up the facade of magical nature of food for Ruby, putting together her meals to resemble the decent cuisine from before, you don’t do yourself the same favor. Food is fuel, and you treat it no differently than adding a log to a fire. 

Ruby stares you down as you finish the tomato, and you know she’s daring you to eat just a little bit more, so you pick up a cucumber, breaking it in half and taking a bite out of the smaller piece just to satisfy her. 

“Protein,” she says, tilting the bowl to get the last bit of food without diggin her fingers into the mess, “We’re both starving for protein.” 

You run your fingers through your scalp, mouth pursed in thought. It’s not the first time she’s brought it up, but it’s certainly not something you can fix in the short term. Instead of saying anything in response, you just offer up a nod to show that you’ve heard her but don’t give her a solid answer. The jar of peanut butter that had served as your protein has been scraped clean, though you keep it in the pantry still, as though it might miraculously fill up and save the both of you. 

“I’ve been doing some reading,” Ruby adds, picking up her mug and taking a swig of milk, “there has to be some kind of gardening store on the mainland, something we can grow for the protein itself”

You almost snap, but catch yourself, adding some flavor of logic into the situation to try stifling her hopefulness. “And where would this store be?”

“I don’t know, somewhere,” Ruby frowns, lacing her fingers together, “but winter is coming, and we’d be able to hold off the frost by making a greenhouse. That would at least keep the food coming in a little while longer, you know, people in Alaska do it all the time.” 

Again frustration fills you up to the brim. “And what materials do we have to make one?”

“We would need some kind of clear plastic or glass- oh! And a wooden frame, we have some boards out in the shed, though we’d need more, and tools… I could use some new fertilizer, and I bet-”

You let her talk, turning around to place her empty bowl in the sink, barely paying any attention to the various things Ruby checks off on her imaginary list. Letting the water run, you try to think of a scenario in which you humor Ruby’s whim. Swim the exhausting length of water that you had only managed prior because of the copious amounts of adrenaline in your system. Maybe you’d somehow manage to hide from the creatures, you think they sleep, so you probably can go in the middle of the night. What then? You don’t know the area. It’s not like you can pull out your phone and search up garden department stores, and there are no maps in the entire house to speak of. 

“... and you aren’t even listening to me, are you?”

“I am,” you lie, “I was just thinking about how impossible this plan is.”

“I was figuring it out!” Ruby whines, “You weren’t listening!” 

You shake your head. “Any big store that could have those things is probably at least five miles away, Ruby.” God, five miles just a couple of months ago was barely a significant distance. Maybe a twenty minute bus ride, at worst, but now? Most of the cars are gone, and even if you manage to find one with enough gas to make it… that’s basically like lighting a signal flare to any of those things within a ridiculously large radius. A big, shiny object that makes noise? It probably looks like a tantalizing package of candy.

“Bikes exist,” she says, which is actually a decent point, but you don’t want to give it to her.

“How am I supposed to haul everything back?”

“Bike trailers also exist.”

“It’s too risky,” you say, as you always do when you’ve decided that the conversation is over. “It’s not worth it.”

“Oh,” Ruby flips her hair over her shoulder, “and dying of starvation during the winter isn’t at all risky. I understand now.”

“Let’s focus on gardening,” you say, trying to deflect her anger, though you know it’s futile. She’s fuming, you can tell even without turning around, and part of you is afraid that she’s going to try something drastic when you least expect it. If there’s someone you know with enough grit and courage to do something stupid like this, it’s certainly your baby sister. So you make an attempt to clear the tension by saying, “I’ll think it over, Rhubarb, I promise.”

She mutters something under her breath, probably about you being a coward or something similar, and you internally wince. Without asking for help, and in such a way you’re certain that offering would earn you a wack from her cane, she stands, making her way over to the front door. With a frustrated sigh, you follow, keeping a good, cane-length distance from her. After making sure she manages to retrieve her gardening tools with little issue, you go back inside in search of something productive to do.

This day goes by like most, with Ruby and you buried under your respective work. She stays outside for most of the day, while you go over the canning process briefly listed in your only resource  of a pocket survivalist book you got off a body in the middle of the street. It only touches on canning briefly, saying that, oh yeah, you definitely need to read a more in-depth book on this, but there are no carefully written recipes about putting sterile food into mason jars laying around the house, and you would know. You’ve already pulled out all the bookshelves away from the walls, open and dug through every single cabinet, moved mattresses, and anything else you  could think of doing in the empty months of nothing.

Outside, Ruby chatters about something to herself, though you can’t hear the exact words she says.

After dinner, you manage to scrape together something that Ruby wouldn’t find appalling, though you know she will eat most things either way. She sits at the table, just a little more primly than usual, with an aura of smugness that makes you nervous. With little ceremony, you cut straight to the point. “What are you planning?”

“Who, me?” She looks like the very picture of innocence, her large, doe-like eyes staring up at you like an angel.

“You barely made the swim when we first came out here,” you pinch the bridge of your nose with frustration, “thanks only to regular swim lessons at the Y. But you haven’t been practicing, so you won’t be able to make it again.”

Her legs stop kicking back and forth underneath the table, her gaze darkening ever so slightly. The effect only lasts for a moment, though, because she’s suddenly back to her normal, cheery self. “I’m not going anywhere,” she says, daring you to accuse her of lying, “my friend in the water is.”

That’s… not good, you decide, knowing that Ruby rarely brings up her imaginary friends to anyone but herself. A part of you wants to try to snap her out of it, but Ruby has never reacted kindly to people when they shout. You’re afraid she might pull herself further into whatever bubble she’s making, so you decide to try a far more gentle approach to suit her needs. “And… is your friend in the water going to be looking for some chips, maybe? I could use some junk food right now.”

It looks like your method has worked, at least in the short term, because she looks more perplexed than anything else. Maybe she hadn’t expected you to play along. “No, he’s getting just the important stuff.”

“Oh,” you shrug, turning around to do the dishes, “I see. And what does this friend in the water look like? Are they very nice?”

After a moment of silence, Ruby says, “he is very tall, and his eyes don’t have any color. His teeth are sharp, too, but he says they are for eating food. Oh, I guess he didn’t actually say that, he just mimed eating something when I asked. He can’t talk.”

“Oh,” you say, pretending not to be horrified. This has to be one of her attention-seeking shock tactic tricks, you think, running your tongue over your teeth. You guess that you haven’t been paying her very much attention over the last couple of weeks, it must all be bubbling up into one big mess in her head. “Well, maybe you should invite this friend over for dinner.”

Ruby cocks her head as though she is legitimately considering it, and not as though you just tried calling her bluff. “Maybe once he brings all the stuff for the greenhouse.”

You don’t like the certainty she speaks with, as though this isn’t really an imaginary friend, and someone with razor sharp teeth has been conversing with your little sister while you worked somewhere else, out of sight. “Ruby,” you say carefully, “there hasn’t been any infected activity in the water, right? They’ve all stayed out on the coast?”

She doesn’t answer.

“Ruby,” you say, your hands begin to shake from stress, “the infected haven’t tried coming out into the lake while I was inside, right?”

“No,” she says, tossing her hair over her shoulder with the sassy dismissal only a girl of prebuscense can truly emit. 

It doesn’t even occur to you that she could be lying, though it should have. Perhaps even more damning to your fears is that the very next day, there’s an unfamiliar pile of two-by-fours thrown out onto the sandy beach of the island. You run from one end of the coast to the other, rifle in hand, eyes wildly looking around for whoever or whatever it was that crawled up onto the land and left building materials in an easily accessible pile. This doesn’t make any sense, none of this makes any kind of sense, but Ruby’s voice nags in the back of your head while you finish up the search. My friend in the water, she said, and a splash coming from your blind spot almost makes you empty every bullet you have into the water. 

When you turn around, though, all you see is the faintest flicker of movement beneath the glassy surface. A fish, you try to say to yourself, wandering away from the shore on your wobbly legs. A fish and nothing more. Mouth pressed together in a firm line, you go back inside the house. Every door needs to be locked, you decide, turning the deadbolt, then checking the windows for good measure. Once all is done, you storm up to Ruby’s room, knocking on the door loud enough to wake her up as you enter.

“Hmfff- what-”

“Ruby, what did you do?” You ask, voice strained with panic.

She sits up in bed, rubbing her eyes, shaking her head in confusion. “What?”

“The wood, Ruby, what did you do?”

It takes her a moment to process what you say, then look out the window to see the pile outside. Her eyes light up, which is the opposite thing you wanted to happen, because now you think you’re going insane. Or maybe she’s going insane. Or, the worst option, the both of you are going insane. With a shaking, deep breath,  you ask, “Ruby. Ruby, baby, my sweet little sister, who is the boy in the water?”

“Him.”

You look down to where she’s pointing and feel your stomach drop. There is definitely… something down there, in the shape of a boy, no doubt, but even from the second floor you can see that something is very, very wrong. You clutch the rifle tighter, wishing that there is a limitless supply of bullets instead of the handful you have to last you until the end of time. With your hands trembling like a leaf in a hurricane, you open the window, trying to take aim with the fear that makes your vision fuzzy.

“Wait- what are you doing?” Ruby tires grabbing the barrel.

The image of accidently blasting her fingers off nearly makes you vomit, and you manage to detangle her hand from the trigger. “Ru-knock it off, I need to take care of it-”

“You can’t shoot him!” She wails, trying to grab the rifle again, but you manage to push her away with your knee. Her breath sucks in, though she looks more enraged than hurt. “Friends don’t shoot friends!”

“That’s not our friend, Ruby!” You grit your teeth, eyeing the creature with a panicked, weary gaze, think that any second now, its going to make a run for the door. Then you’ll both be toast. “It’s one of them.”

Ruby glares even harder. “No, he’s my friend, and he brought stuff to help because you’re too much of a coward to do anything!”

You don’t want to admit that her words manage to deal a bit of damage, and you especially don’t want to admit that it hurts that Ruby when looking for help elsewhere, and found it. Now you glare right back at her, then at the creature hanging out on the lawn. It's just… staring, vacantly, up in your general direction, not making even a breath of movement. You wonder what it’s thinking, it it thinks anything. Maybe it’s worried about its safety? The lack of emotions, though, doesn’t give you much to work with, and that might be the most unsettling part of it all.

But Ruby. Oh, Ruby. She doesn’t understand that those things  kill and tear and eat people, especially little girls who can’t even keep up with the rest of the kids in her grade. You’ve tried protecting her from seeing the carnage, always sent her back inside when you saw a stray animal limping along the sand, making sure time and time again that she would never lay witness to the bloodbath only perfect predators can make. It seems, though, you’ve done too good a job, and now she doesn’t realize what they are, that they’re dangerous, terrifying, and always hungry, and she’s the one on the menu.

She’s not going to give up, though, you can see it in her eyes. A determination that you’re well familiar with is there, her mouth in a single line, her brow furrowed with frustration. If you don’t try to get control of the situation, she’s going to take it in her own hands and run with it, and god knows what will happen then. So you relent. 

“Alright, fine,” you take a deep breath, shaking breath, trying to figure out just how you’re going to do damage control. “We’ll go down there, but I’m keeping the gun loaded and ready.”

“Bu-”

“No buts,” you close your eyes, trying to sort out your frazzled thoughts, “that’s non negotiable, Ruby, do you understand?”

Her lower lip wobbles for the barest second, before she nods.

“Alright,” another deep breath, “alright, let’s go meet your friend.”

You know that Ruby is beyond pissed off at you, especially since she refuses any help going down the stairs.  Her cane makes a firm thunk, thunk, thunk against the wood, her eyes on the ground to look over the terrain and purposely ignore you. Without another word once she’s down the stairs with no incident, she heads straight to the front door, opening it wide open as though inviting that thing in to eat you.

Oh, it’s still there. Just chillin’. Standing over the shore with its hand around one of the wooden two-by-fours. You don’t even know what to think, so the parts of your brain that aren’t actively controlling your body movement shut down, your fingers almost spasming around the rifle. There���s no mistaking it, no accidently thinking it could be anything other than a twisted mutation, its wide smile revealing rows and rows of sharpened teeth. Black eyes stare emptily at you, then Ruby, the harsh facial expression softening slightly in the presence of your sister. Not to you, though, you can see its spine stiffen when it notices the very apparent gun in your hands. An immediate dislike, by the look of its expression as it gives you a once-over, though to be fair, you are aiming a weapon of mass destruction at the center of its torso.

Then Ruby walks over and hugs the damn thing, because of course she would do such a thing. The anxiety from merely that thing within biting distance of your sister feels like a hammer wacking at your chest and throat. It lets her go just before you get trigger happy, taking a generous step back as if obnoxiously signalling that it has no intention of harming her. You still don’t think the reassurance is good enough, and you also wish your damn hands would stop shaking.

 “So,” god, you hope your voice isn’t wobbling, but you can’t be sure when your heartbeat is roaring in your ears, “how long have you two known each other?”

Ruby smiles a little too smugly for your liking. “A few days.”

“A few days,” you begrudgingly echo.

“Yeah,” she picks up one of the wooden beams, her legs slightly wibbling in a way that makes you worry, “I told him all about what winter is going to be like, I think he understands.”

“You think.” To be fair, the thing did show up with building materials that Ruby has been nagging for, so the fact the creature listened isn’t all that farfetched. 

“We could use that plastic food wrap as a temporary fix.” Ruby is already strategizing, looking over what she has to work with. She is, unfortunately, the one who holds all the brain cells in the family, so she has the mental capacity to back up her ideas and plans. Her body trembles with the weight as she tries to lift the wood, but before you can rush to her side, the creature is there first. It takes the two-by-four from her hands in a smooth, fluid motion that doesn’t seem to startle her in the slightest.

“Thanks.” Ruby doesn’t huff or puff at the thing’s help, which would be a point in that thing’s favor if you trusted her judgement. Which, right now at least, seems mildly questionable.

“Ruby,” you let out an exasperated sigh, “you still haven’t had breakfast. Maybe you should eat something before we-” you wince at having to include the creature in your speech, “begin building.”

Ruby purses her lips, which means you’ve already taken the first step at convincing her to send that thing away just for another hour while you try to figure out how to handle this.

“After all, you know how you can get dizzy first thing in the morning when you haven’t had any food.”

She puts down one of the smaller boards she had been trying to pick up. “Alright,” she relents, and you try not to show how excited you are, “I’ll go inside and make breakfast while you two start on the greenhouse.”

Oh, ho ho ho, very clever, Ruby. She just checkmated you into a corner, and now you can’t offer to take her inside without taking eyes off the creature outside, neither of which you really want to do. 

“Or,” she offers in an alternative, “my friend can come inside for breakfast.”

If she thinks that you’re just going to allow her to invite the creature into the house you have meticulously cared for just because she’s being difficult… she would be absolutely correct, unfortunately. And that’s how you find yourself sitting on the opposite side of a rectangular table from it. From this distance, you’re almost certain that the creature has baby blue scales brushed alongside a pair of gills that drill deep into his neck, much like a fish. This understandably distresses you, deeply, but you really can’t do anything to voice your worries with Ruby sitting right by your side, munching on some of the berries that grow along the house, chattering nonstop about her plans to turn this place into some high-tech paradise.

To the creature’s credit, it is a good listener. Actually, though, like Ruby had said before, you don’t think it can speak at all. The gash-like strikes in its neck are deep, it must affect its speaking somehow. Still, its nodding along to Ruby’s infinite list of demands, as though it somehow has access to a full hardware store stocked with things like solar panels and gas generators. You highly doubt that any of the stores have much left thanks to any looting that came with the announcement, but you don’t open your mouth to burst Ruby’s bubble. This has to be the most fun and interesting thing that has happened to her for the better part of a year, and you’d be loathed to end it.

You take a deep, calming breath, and drink some water. If only the thing had irises… or pupils, really, anything to tell you what it’s looking at, this might be less nerve-wracking. Every slight movement brings your hand back down to the rifle, so that thing has taken to move so very slowly, almost as if to mock your stress. You grit your teeth, though, and deal with it, because you don’t think its going to try gutting you or Ruby here at the dining table. At least, you certainly hope not. Actually, now that you think about it, do these things even eat humans? Sure, you’ve seen a few twisted infected take down whatever meat they can find, but you’ve never actually seen one of them… hurt a person.

It refuses the food that Ruby offers. Just holds its hand up and gives the lightest shake of the head in refusal, its palish blond hair still wet enough to stick to its head. She doesn’t take any offense, instead shoveling whatever is left into her mouth, and you have to resist reminding her not to talk while she’s chewing. After all, she isn’t a baby anymore, even though it’s difficult to remember that at times, so instead of voicing your opinions, you take a large bite out of tomato. 

Ruby kicks you from under the table, and you snap out of your thoughts. She must have asked you something, but you can’t for the life of you remember what.

“Any suggestions?” Ruby says in deliberate slowness, you see that she’s resisting the eye-roll.

“I-” you’re trying to take this seriously, you really are, “not that I can think of at the moment.”

Ruby purses her lips, and gives an exasperated look over to her friend. “I’m sorry, he must be a little tired. My brother can be difficult at times.”

You’re the difficult one, Ruby, you want to clap back, but don’t for the sake of maturity. 

But the creature laughs, which almost sends your soul crawling out of your skin. The laughter isn’t like… how someone might giggle if they were told a particularly funny joke, the sound is more like a gentle huff of air being forced out of its lungs. Maybe it isn’t actually laughing, and the lack of human contact  outside of your little sister is beginning to drive you absolutely mad. The thing is smiling, though, that’s the kicker. It’s looking at your sister and smiling, and while you aren’t one hundred percent sure how you feel about that, shockingly, there isn’t a lot of suspicion on your part.

Once Ruby finishes eating, everyone just has to go back outside. You suppose that now, with the materials to build such a life-saving building, it must be constructed with all due haste. And you feel the urgency, too, so it’s not just Ruby who is driving everything by herself. Like an ancient, integral part of human instinct that knows winter is coming, even without an accurate calendar on hand, you have it blooming in your chest. Even though you don’t have any building experience, so long as Ruby watches over the project with her unusual gift in architecture, you have a bit of confidence that everything is going to be alright. 

You work tirelessly, with Ruby micromanaging every single thing you do. Though, for whatever reason, it doesn’t bother you as much as it might have just a week ago. She is also doing a share of the work she can management hammering together little squares that will separate out the plants, her eyes glazed over with a feverish concentration whenever she isn’t judging your craftsmanship. She’s enjoying this, you think, letting a tense layer of anxiety slip away, she’s only ever had her garden. Human beings, after all, need change and projects to keep happy, and there hasn’t been much variety in the way of daily routines.

Letting your guard down is probably extraordinarily foolish, but you do so anyway. The thing isn’t so bad, you decide, watching the creature while it shows Ruby how to make sure the square is even and balanced, as though it somehow retained the information from whoever it was before the plague. Building the frame is grueling work, and while you begin to breathe a little heavier from the exhaustion biting through your muscles, that thing seems unbothered by it all. That makes sense, you supposed, since what little was known about the creatures before the blackout was that they are awfully strong. And fast. And relentless.

By the time the sun begins to sink beyond the treeline, not too much has been accomplished. It might be because no one but Ruby is giving out instructions, as she is the only one between you that has any prior building experience on account of that tree house she made over a year ago. Still, the haste that has poured into your veins is still there, thrumming beneath your skin, like your body has suddenly awoken from a deep slumber. Now you’re only ready to go, go, go, until everything is finished. Ruby, however, needs to sleep, and as long as you’re up, she’ll be up. So you watch her say goodbye to the creature by giving it a tight hug, before limping back into the house.

Even though you had let your guard down while you were building, you have it back up in full. The rifle is heavy in your hands as you watch it retreat back into the water, your mouth in a firm, thin line. It simply just… walks into the lake, not even bothering to try to keep its pale head above the surface like a fucking salamander or something. While you are thoroughly horrified by that, Ruby thinks it’s fascinating, and that’s her exact word to describe it as you try to put her to bed.

“The infection must mutate them to adjust to their surroundings!” She’s excitedly drinking her warm milk, courtesy of a late call to Morticia that almost got you a black eye. “Or maybe it tries to regress our DNA back to some kind of primeval source, like that Star Trek episode. Or, like- it could, like, bond your body to the nearest animals, though I don’t know how that would happen, just that it could make sense. Maybe-”

“Drink the rest of your milk, Ruby,” you say, feeling a tad bit sick to your stomach just listening to her talk. Not that listening to your sister speak exactly annoys you, no, it’s what she’s talking about that bothers you. Because if the one infected could somehow breath in both the water and land, how many others are like that? 

How much danger have you put Ruby in without even knowing it? 

You lock the doors, both of them. Place a wall of furniture in front of the ground floor windows. Ruby looks on with a look of half bemusement, half pity, her lips pursed as she takes another drink from her mug. You ignore her, checking once more to make sure that the rifle has enough bullets to… maybe pop off one or two heads with your god awful aim. It’s nothing near what you would hope for, but then again, nothing has been ideal since the city went dark.

Inevitably, you fall asleep on the living room couch, albei lightly. Every slight creak of the house sends you rocketing up, trying to decide in a split second if that dark, shapeless lump is one of the infected, or a pile of Ruby’s laundry that she has yet to put away. Somehow, through grit, determination, and adrenaline, you manage to make it through the night without accidentally blowing anything out of existence. That’s a plus. A downside is that you are absolutely exhausted, and want nothing more than to take the longest nap known to what’s left of humankind. 

“You can totally do that,” Ruby says when you mention it at breakfast, “I’ll work on the greenhouse with my friend while you rest.” 

“Not happening.” You don’t even hesitate. “And- look, Ruby, I don’t mean to be an absolute prick or anything-” she snickers at your profanity, and you continue without pausing, “but you can’t go hanging out with it-”

“Him.”

You let out a frustrated breath, but accept the correction just to get the conversation over with. “You can’t go hanging out with him without me.” 

“Why not?” 

“Because, it- he is dangerous.” You knew she wouldn’t let it go without a fight, but god, you wish she would, just this once. “Ruby, baby-”

“I’m not a baby.”

“Almost teenager.” You resist rolling your eyes, you need to set a good example. “Ruby, the almost teenager, that… that creature isn’t a person anymore. Yeah, he looks kind of human, but you saw him slither down into the water like a snake.” 

She just stares at you, unmoving in her stance.

You sigh, the motion filled with frustration. “I just need you to promise me that you aren’t going to visit him without me, alright? That’s all I want. If you see him hanging around outside, get me. If you want to try calling for him or whatever, get me. I promise I’ll say yes every single time, just please, please promise me that you’re going to always remember to tell me that he’s here, alright?” 

Her eyes narrow, and for a moment, you think she’s going to put up more of a fuss than she already has, but then she offers up a nod in agreement. 

Your body relaxes slightly. “Alright, eat your breakfast, then we can keep working on the greenhouse.” 

Ruby’s friend waits out on the porch, almost giving you a panic attack when you notice its slim form sitting on the cement. You don’t say anything, though, hoping that Ruby hadn’t just seen you jump into the ceiling like a startled rabbit, and continue about your morning like everything is one hundred percent normal. After all, it doesn’t look like you can regain control of the situation without allowing the creature too much power. You hope, though, as you cut up tiny pieces of tomatoes, that a creature with some kind of cognitive ability to remember how to properly level a building’s base might also hold the self-restraint required not to eat a family of two. Or, alternatively, it’s just not hungry enough. 

Once Ruby finishes eating, she manages to stand with a wobble, wincing as her weight gets set on her legs even with the aid of her cane. That’s not a good sign, not at all, and your worry grows tenfold as you see her eye twitch in a silent admittance of pain. 

“Is it bad today?” You ask, glancing down at her twig-like legs as though they could tell you that something is wrong.

“I’m going outside,” Ruby says, her voice hard as iron.

“That isn’t what I asked,” you respond, wishing that she wouldn’t act so stubborn when it came to her health. “Is the pain bad today?”

She shrugs non committedly. “It’s not as bad as it could be.”

Also not an answer, but, you suppose, it’s enough to figure out that her pain is just enough of a bother for her to dodge the question, yet not enough to put her in bed for the rest of the day. “You can come outside to be with your friend while we continue on the greenhouse,” you say, feeling just a tad generous, “but you have to sit the entire time and do nothing strenuous.” 

“Fine,” she agrees, maybe a little too quickly, but it’s enough for you. Instead of simply opening the door for her, you pick her up, like a small baby, and carry her out into the yard to avoid straining her weak muscles further. Since she doesn’t offer up any word of protest, the pain must really be bothering her, which is awful. All you have are a few pills of a generic painkiller, but you’re trying to save them for the inevitability that one of you will be getting sick during the winter, so you have to seriously consider giving her a single pill.

Ruby’s little friend shows concern when you pass by him, still carrying her slim frame in your arms. With a tired, defeated voice, Ruby lets out a word in greeting, but doesn’t try explaining why exactly she’s not walking today. When you set her down on the little, cushioned bench overlooking the greenhouse project, she lets out a slight sigh of frustration. 

“Rhubarb,” you say, and you hear her groan in exaggerated anger, “you know, when you were doing swim lessons at the Y twice a week, everything seemed better.” 

She perks up slightly.

“Maybe,” god, you hate that you’re even suggesting this, especially after meeting with that thing only once before, “maybe your friend can take you out into the shallows for a little bit. The weather is still warm enough for a swim, maybe you’ll improve after a week or two.” 

She seems a little too pleased with your idea, and you immediately regret it. 

“Not now,” you amend, “only when your friend has earned my trust. That hasn’t happened yet.” Saying all of this while said friend is standing right beside you is a little awkward, but something you still manage to do with a straight face nonetheless.

Then you start working. Today seems a little more grueling than usual, the sun unabashed by clouds, the heavier frames of the greenhouse’s walls just a tad bit more than what you’re used to. Sure, you’re carrying Ruby around whenever her body gives out, but she’s as light as a feather, and the still-damp wood weighs as much as you’d expect hunks of building material would. You carry on, though, working through the fatigue that takes hold of your muscles, letting the creature help out without too much tension on your part. The day’s progress is far more visible than yesterday’s, with two of the walls ready to be placed onto the base. 

Ruby had stated sometime before that plastic food wrap stuff might be acceptable in the short term, but you know that glass might be the only thing between you and death in the coming months. The plastic might break with the heavy snowfall, then an entire batch of food would be gone like a snap. Again, you think of canning, but you aren’t sure the progress you made in your first attempt is anywhere near acceptable. Or even food, anymore. So, even though it pains you to do so, you turn to Ruby’s buddy.

“You wouldn’t know how to get books over here without getting them too wet, do you?” You ask, trying to keep your voice from wavering too much, trying to look at him in those cold, empty eyes. 

He turns to Ruby, who seems completely overwhelmed by the prospect of more books. “Oh! Oh, do you know Harry Potter? Artemis Fowl? What about Star Wars, the New-”

“Maybe we should focus on getting things like canning books first, Ruby,” you say, interrupting her excited list of all the books she never got to read. “Or construction books, and maybe some gardening books and maybe some more medicine.” 

“Oh,” she deflates somewhat, but there’s still that spark in her eye that means this is not the end of the conversation, “I guess that’s a better idea, yeah. Can you get some gardening and canning books, August?”

It takes you a second to realize that she’s talking to the creature. “August?” 

“It’s the month of August,” she says as though her reasoning is super obvious, “and he doesn’t remember his name.”

You purse your lips, but don’t argue. The creature doesn’t seem to mind, anyway, not even batting an eye at Ruby’s audaciousness in the slightest. Does he even care? “Alright,” you amend, slowly, “August, would you mind terribly making a brief run to a drugstore?” 

He shrugs, the gesture so human that it takes you for a loop. 

“That means yes,” Ruby translates. 

You take a deep breath. “Alright, then, I suppose we have a lot of stuff to do tomorrow, then.” 

A list begins to form in your head, a long one, of all the things you might be able to do now that you have the means. Canning, more extravagant gardening, maybe you can brew some alcohol for disinfecting and cleaning purposes. You don’t even have to worry about the validity of the creature’s supposed promises, because the next morning, he has a backpack full of books that had been sealed away by plastic bags. Which… that means that he’s clever, and that’s literally the exact opposite of what those news announcers had reported before the city went dark. That the infected are predators, sick mutations that have been reduced to the barest  form of life, fueled by nothing but bloodlust. Maybe, just maybe, not all of the infected are like that. Maybe August isn’t completely infected, either, maybe the disease only partially spread through his body, twisting his physical form into something else but keeping his mental fortitude as strong as ever. Whatever the case is, you don’t think you can hate him anymore, especially since you might have to attribute you and Ruby’s survival to his help. 

The canning books are going to save Ruby’s life, very literally, you think, because there’s a section on how to make sweetened condensed milk, and you are one thousand percent ready to try stocking up Morticia’s milk before she begins to decline in health. August has taken it upon himself to help you with the canning when it’s too dark to continue working on the greenhouse, and Ruby very politely informs you that you don’t get a choice in accepting his aid. So the two of you chug along, using the coal grill outside as a stovetop, boiling what little vegetables you have in order to sterilize them for long-term storage. 

The schedule is a strange one over the next couple of days. You build the greenhouse during the day, and when you are either too exhausted to pull any more hours or the light is too dark to see, you begin the canning. August and Ruby both help with the daily tasks, and soon enough you find yourself getting used to the creature’s presence, enough so that you occasionally forget bringing out the rifle when you work. Not that it bothers you when you realize you’ve forgotten it, because August doesn’t at all seem to hold any of the same aggressions as his kindred. Also, with every visit, he brings something else with him that can be used to boost your lifespan. More books, like Ruby asked for, a box of dried pasta that only got marginally wet from the swim, and a fish that you think is probably edible that still wriggles in August’s hands as he holds it out in and offering. 

Ruby usually falls asleep during the tailends of the canning sessions, and you honestly don’t blame her. The work as of recently has been rather grueling, and even though you know that exercise is good for her condition, everything has been a little over the moderate suggestion the doctor made  at her last appointment, almost a year ago. But it is kind of awkward to have to deal with August on your own, without Ruby’s unending chatter to break his strange silence. You don’t mind, though, you guess that company is rather nice after not having it for as long as you have, even if he is rather stoic in conversation and barely offers up a shrug or nod in response to any questions you might have.

Once you pick your sister up and carry her to her room, August goes ahead and silently excuses himself by walking into the lake. You wonder if he has some kind of home or nest down there, or if he sleeps on the slimy rocks the same way you and Ruby slept on the cold forest floor when the evacuation had first begun. It makes you feel a bit bad for him, even though August seems wholly unbothered by it. Still, after all his help, you decide that you’re going to at least play the part of grateful host and give him another option just as a suggestion. 

“So,” you say, once Ruby is tucked away in her bed upstairs, “I know that you, um, live in the water. Or maybe you don’t, and I just making some baseless assumptions here.”

August blinks at you, two clear eyelids sliding sideways.

“Anyways, um, Ruby really likes you a lot.” You feel your face heating up just a bit. “And I’ve come to appreciate your help as well. I’m sorry about waving a gun around in your face.”

He shrugs his shoulders, as if brushing off the apology with understanding. You suppose that’s a sign of forgiveness, or at least, you hope so, and continue on. 

“Anyways, I don’t know where exactly you go at night, but I just want you to know that you don’t have to. Go, that is.” You try to wrack your brain for some better wording you can use, because right now everything seems light and fuzzy. “There’s another bedroom you can have, it’s right upstairs next to mine. Or, if you’re an outside person, you can take some blankets and chill out in the yard. Whatever you feel like doing.” 

You realize then that August is smiling, his shark-like teeth shining in the moonlight.

“And you don’t have to say yes now, you can decide later if you would rather not go back if we are especially late with the work, so the invitation is open.” You don’t want to maintain eye contact, but you decide to offer up one last reason for him to stay. “And I’d like it if you spend the night, so.”

August places a single hand on your shoulder. Still smiling, he offers up a nod.

“Oh,” you feel a bit of relief bubble up through your body, as well as a different kind of anxiety filling up your veins, “Good. Great. I’ll get your room ready, then.”

He arches his eyebrows.

“Or,” you say, “I guess the alternative is that you share my room. That guest room is kind of drafty, after all, I wouldn’t want to put any guests at risk of… um, a cold-”

August kisses you, and you think your world is about to go black. Or explode. Or something, because this is the best thing that has ever happened to you ever, and the apocalypse can go fuck itself because everything is fine. 

“My bedroom it is, then.”

[siribear]

whisper fiddles with the knobs on her pipboy, switching between diamond city radio and radio freedom every other word. the minutemen are calling for their general. the ink spots don’t want to set the world on fire. and whisper remembers everything that happened yesterday.

but dr. amari should be finished with nick by now. it’s been exactly fifteen minutes since irma left and came back, and the hostess has even set up a customer in their own memory pod. a ghoul, likely reliving pre-war memories. eyes closed, a small smile tugs at the corner of their mouth. happy memories to relive, at least.

whisper remembers - almost everything.

click, set the world. click, calling general alice. click, on fire. click, to the castle. click, i just. click, calling general - click, want to start - click, alice to - click, a flame - click, the castle - click, in your heart.

‘hey, doll.’

‘nick!’ whisper jumps to her feet and looks him over. hard to tell how he’s doing, glowing eyes giving away absolutely nothing. he doesn’t wear any signs of fatigue or duress. at least his voice is his own. ‘how are you feeling?’

he brings a cigarette to his lips. doesn’t light it. maybe it’s just about the comfort of it. ‘i’m fine. the doctor told me about my passenger. he didn’t do anything to you, did he?’

with a jerk of her head, she leads him to a side room, empty but for another memory pod and decorated with old paintings on the walls. whisper walks to the middle of the room, her arms crossed. nick’s eyes narrow. ‘alice, if he hurt you - ‘

she raises a hand. ‘we talked. we - really just talked.’

‘you talked.’

even to her ears it doesn’t sound real, and she’s the one that sat with the mercenary. the man that murdered her husband, stole her child. talked. she runs a hand through her hair. ‘do you remember anything?’

‘not a lot after leaving the memory pod.’

‘and before that?’

he stares, frowning. ‘how much do you want me to remember, doll?’

she sighs. too much unraveling. ‘ideally? nothing. i only ask that you don’t talk to anyone about it.’

‘and your friend?’

deacon - ‘especially not him. everything is.. complicated.’

after a moment, he nods. ‘things often are. that little boy, was that your son?’

‘shaun,’ she says on a sigh, her eyes watering. ‘yes, it was.’ happy, reading comics, smiling.

‘not a baby, though.’

whisper frowns. ‘no, i guess - i lost more than i thought.’ two hundred years is two hundred years, but to lose those years watching their son grow up on top of everything?

nick grunts, tucks away the unlit cigarette. ‘can i ask how long you were down there?’

‘this is the real interview, then?’ she tries at a smile. ‘two hundred years.’

‘you were frozen pre-war, then.’

‘the last thing i saw was the bomb drop before the vault elevator took us down.’ she keeps her breathing surprisingly even. but she doesn’t want to talk about more, has to steer this away from her or she might remember that she can’t - ‘now that you know, i have a question of my own.’

‘whatever you need.’

‘are you the real nick valentine? i’m familiar with him, and operation winter’s end, but this - ‘ she waves a hand. ‘i don’t understand how he would be here.’

‘i - ‘ he pauses, trying to collect himself. ‘he was being treated at CIT for PTSD, and they scanned his brain. the institute took those memories and uploaded them into me. kellogg’s weren’t the first memories i’ve had in my head.’

‘i - i’m sorry. i didn’t mean to put you through that again.’

‘the institute is to blame for this one, doll. i’m here to help you, and you aren’t alone.’ she blinks, eyes stinging, and throws her arms around him. just to know that someone else understands that shock of waking up in a different world.

a soft knock on the door makes her step back, and deacon sidesteps into the room. ‘why am i never invited to parties anymore?’

nick looks to her, unsure, so she goes along with it, like they’re who they were before yesterday and she can still look him in the eye. ‘your invite must have gotten lost in the mail,’ as if he understands the postal service. she taps a finger against her chin. ‘did i even mail it? who knows these days.’

deacon pouts. ‘maybe one day i’ll be cool enough for your parties, partner. anyway, i bring word from the commonwealth!’ he announces like a town crier. thankfully, nick prompts deacon to continue. ‘our stalker from last night was... apprehended the other night.’ he looks to her - or somewhere over her shoulder. ‘you remember?’

‘i remember,’ she says, a little too quickly.

deacon shoves his hands in his pockets. ‘hancock’s men killed him. turns out he was a synth. they picked him up going into the rexford.’

‘looking for us,’ she figures. ‘dodged a bullet there. literally.’

nick looks between the two of them, probably deducing where the ‘complicated’ is coming from. ‘well,’ he starts, stepping around deacon toward the door, ‘i’ll leave you two to handle the rest. alice,’ she looks over to him. ‘remember what i said.’

‘thank you, nick.’

he leaves them alone with only their tension to fill the void. though deacon still stands with his hands in his pockets, his shoulders are still held high. whisper, for her part, wraps her arms around her stomach, looking everywhere but at her partner. now, she’s face to face with her shame, her guilt. it’s only been a month since nate’s death - has she been unfaithful in a way? acted in poor taste?

deacon’s likely here to tell her she’s lost her position in the railroad. crossed a line because there were definitely better options in that alley, and she didn’t choose those. instead she gave into the cigarette smoke on her tongue.

maybe she’s the only one worried about it, the only one making a big deal of it, because deacon breaks the silence with a grin. ‘secrets, partner?’

she attempts to mirror the grin. ‘planning our next party, obviously. consider this your invitation.’

‘looking forward to it,’ he says. then, ‘thought you took off without me this morning. went to face the horrors of the glowing sea all by yourself.’ he adds, ‘again,’ almost sternly.

she left before he woke up. leaving a note might have been proper etiquette, but really she just wanted to avoid a morning-after conversation. oh well. ‘didn’t want the radio to wake you up.’ she tunes into the radio. static hisses from the speakers before radio freedom begins to play. the recorded message loops again, calling her to the castle. someone is there who wants to meet with her. repeat.

didn’t take long for them to call her back, so she has to wonder who this person is. not a regular recruit.

‘well, then, what’s the plan?’

she turns off the radio. ‘i have to go see what this is about, obviously.’ she leans back against the wall, feels wallpaper flake off as she shifts. ‘maybe cash in on that brotherhood information, get a set of power armor that can withstand the radiation.’ her suit from the museum of freedom is missing parts and the parts it does have need to be repaired, still. another group could scavenge for new parts -

‘i can hear the gears turning in your head, you know.’ he sighs, eyes the door. ‘in that case, i’ll head back to hq, tell them about our tail, and see if tom’s got anything that can help us in the sea.’

whisper stands up straight. ‘you don’t - you don’t have to go out to the glowing sea.’

‘of course i do. knowing you, you’re going to throw yourself at a deathclaw the size of a skyscraper if i’m not there.’

she huffs. ‘i would not.’ then it hits her: he’s not coming with her to the castle, to the brotherhood.

it’s like he reads her mind in her sudden frown. ‘i shouldn’t show my face too often on that flying tin can or else i’ll have to get a new one.’

‘and i’m so fond of this one, too.’ that gets a genuine smile out of him. ‘i understand.’ not that she wants to. what she wants to do is ask him to stay with her, her singular constant in this new world. but she’s monopolized his time enough. ‘hopefully this whole.. endeavor doesn’t take long.’

‘eager to go swimming? i’ll find you when you’re finished.’

‘go back to your old stalking habits?’

he grins. ‘you leave a trail wherever you go. you’re hard to miss.’

she clears her throat. ‘sure. take care of yourself, okay?’

he looks like he means to move toward her, but instead veers to the door. ‘you, too.’

-

boston seems bigger when she’s alone. without deacon’s constant chatter, she has only herself to talk to, her inner monologue to keep her company. herself and travis on the radio, tearfully talking about how they’re all going to die, the poor guy sounding like he’s two seconds away from a full blown panic attack. lately, she can relate, but she keeps the radio on for white noise, humming along to the songs she knows from before.

travis does eventually report the minutemen taking the castle, along with their influence spreading throughout the commonwealth. she smiles, ‘see, deacon, we’re making a,’ she trails off, ‘difference.’ at least no one can hear her talking to herself. before the war, she would definitely have earned herself some strange looks.

nowadays, there’s no one to even notice her walking down the street. with a sigh, she continues her solo journey toward the castle.

-

water sloshes against her ankles as she walks down the flooded street to fort independence. but where the street used to be littered with moss and seaweed, carried in from mirelurks as they crawl in from the sea, the roads and even nearby buildings have been cleared. whisper jogs the rest of the way up the street and runs into a familiar face near another abandoned building.

‘general! good to see you.’

‘sturges? what’re you doing out here?’

he gestures around to the street, the buildings. ‘preston wanted me to do some tuning up on the area. whole place got hit hard by mirelurks, but preston said you’re turning the whole place into a new settlement?’

‘that’s the goal. maybe some place their families can live, so they’re close.’ like an old military base without the strict military rules. minuteman families and anyone else just looking for a safe place to stay.

‘i get it, boss. they were talking about some lady at the castle needin’ you though.’ he heaves an exaggerated, put-upon sigh. ‘i’ll be cleanin’ up the streets if you need me.’

she nods. ‘then be careful out here by yourself. some mirelurks might still be hiding in the shallows.’

he pats a flare gun on his utility belt. ‘i’m not alone, ma’am.’

-

ronnie shaw recites the history of the minutemen while they clear out more rubble in the general’s quarters. past generals, past battles, the people she’s lead and followed in her time. ronnie wouldn’t be out of place pre-war, dressed in her army fatigues with a beret atop a head of short cropped hair. the way she tells the stories, with a voice rough after years of service but warm enough to relay the fond memories - it makes whisper think she’s done something right drawing her here.

preston says as much as they heave the rubble out of the way. ‘i figure we must be doing something right if ronnie shaw’s come back.’

the woman enjoys talking in the way mama murphy enjoys talking. to be heard and remembered. to pass on her knowledge, whether it be drug induced future-sight or memories of the past. shaw still leads them with purpose, pointing out landmines hidden under scattered pieces of paper even as she notes which general might have left them behind. whisper disarms each one while penny puts them in her bag.

the group skirts around barrels of radiation and weaves through the storerooms of the basement. there are supplies sturges could use for the neighborhood and more food to back their stores. across the storeroom, under the other end of the courtyard, is another side room lined with barrels of gunpowder.

‘just through here. on the other side should be stairs up to the armory.’

‘okay.’ whisper steps through to the other room, preston at her shoulder. they’re greeted immediately with the sound of machinery booting up, low beeps and a sharp hiss of air. whisper draws deliverer and aims at the other end of the room at a sentry bot lifting itself to its full height. ‘what is that?’

ronnie pulls up behind them, her shotgun drawn, before lowering it. ‘that’s just sarge. he was programmed to protect the armory.’

‘so, we’re safe?’ whisper asks, and ronnie hums in agreement.

‘don’t know ‘bout that one,’ penny says, pushing forward, her laser musket buzzing with energy.

‘intruders,’ sarge intones in a deep, robotic voice. ‘leave the area or be met with lethal force.’

‘c’mon, sarge. we’re minutemen. you don’t have to protect anything from us,’ ronnie reasons.

sarge halts with a low series of beeps. ‘minutemen database corrupted,’ he states after a moment. ‘intruders, leave the area or be met with lethal force.’

‘general,’ preston hisses, backing slowly out of the room. ‘we can’t fight that thing in close quarters like this.’

he’s right. the tunnels under the castle are capped with an arched ceiling, and sarge stands as high as the arch, with his body half as wide as the room itself. and then there’s the fact that sarge has miniguns for arms.

‘penny, ronnie, back up,’ whisper commands. ‘we aren’t prepared for this. let’s retreat for now.’

‘the armory - ‘

‘isn’t going anywhere. we come back with bigger guns and we move sarge by force if we have to.’

whisper waits until penny has backed up to the other room to make her own retreat. however, she’s stopped by sarge breaking his repeated warning to leave. ‘database accessed,’ he says suddenly, ignoring whisper raising her gun once more. ‘citizen of the united states, acknowledged.’ sarge lowers his weapons and seems to stand down.

‘what did that thing just say?’ penny peers back through the door.

sarge picks himself up again, provoked to an alert stance. ‘intruder - ‘

‘penny, back up.’ she does, and sarge cools back down. ‘you’ve got to be kidding me,’ she mutters to herself. ‘i’ll see what i can do from here, i guess?’

‘sarge’s terminal is at the back of the room. it’s a shame, but if he’s corrupted, we have to shut him down. the password is... uh,’ ronnie pauses. ‘one if by land. try that one.’

‘okay,’ whisper says slowly, and approaches sarge with as much caution. the sentry bot shifts slightly to follow her, turning on the wheels of its legs. whisper picks up her pace to the terminal at the end of the room.

‘civilian, step away.’

whisper types the password quickly, one if by land, and - nothing.

‘civilian - ‘

‘ronnie, that didn’t work,’ whisper shouts over sarge. he looms over her, one minigun pressing between her shoulder blades.

‘try: for the commonwealth,’ ronnie shouts back.

she’s almost knocked over when sarge whips around to the door, but she takes the distraction for what it is. for the commonwealth - nothing. quickly, she tries two if by sea and... no. ‘not it.’

‘civilian, you have ten seconds to cease this activity.’ nine, eight -

behind her, she hears preston and penny pressing for another password as sarge turns his attention back to her. seven, six, five - ‘okay, okay. united we stand!’

four, three, two - whisper types as quickly as she can, the sound of miniguns spinning up loud in her ears. there - and thankfully the option isn’t difficult to find. one - shut down, sarge.

‘shutting down,’ sarge announces over the pounding in her ears. hands braced against the desk, whisper sighs heavily.

‘general!’ preston runs up to her. ‘jesus, are you all right?’

‘all in a day’s work,’ she says. ‘i’m fine, preston. thank you.’

down a level from sarge’s shutdown option is the key to open the door to the other side of the tunnels. the door swings open to another room, and there they find the long dead body of a previous minuteman general dressed in clothing that wouldn’t be out of place in a museum: a navy blue coat over a dirty white dress shirt, with four stars stitched into the collar. though the late general supplemented heavy coat’s defenses with a custom combat armor chest piece. and there, on the mummified general’s head, is whisper’s true reward.

‘my hat,’ she says lamely, drawing attention from her companions.

preston catches on quicker than the others, bending down and picking the tricorn hat off the body. ‘your hat.’ he chuckles, likely remembering their conversation from so long ago. it fits neatly on her head, but it smells, so she carries it under her arm instead. it can wait until she finds a box of abraxo.

from there, they head back upstairs to find themselves on the other side of the castle’s hollow walls. ronnie flips a switch, and the metal arm blocking the entrance to the courtyard rises. a handful of minutemen gather nearby to be led to the armory.

even whisper’s jaw drops when they get there. shelves full of stockpiled microfusion cells, different kinds of laser muskets, turrets, grenades, and schematics for each. on the back table is another set of blueprints for artillery. ‘there we go. that’s what we’re here for,’ ronnie says around the commotion of the other minutemen moving supplies from the armory.

‘preston, can you get sturges?’ to ronnie, she says, ‘he can put these together in the morning.’

‘good. over there are smoke grenades, you can use it to test the aiming on those old things.’

whisper cants her head. ‘you’re not staying?’

‘i think i’m getting too old for this stuff, you know? not sure if i could have kept up if sarge actually attacked.’ ronnie shrugs.

but whisper can see the reluctance in her. ‘we could use someone like you around here. once people know ronnie shaw’s on board? more people will join the minutemen, and they’ll need to be trained.’

ronnie smiles wide, easily swayed. ‘all right, kid, you got me. i can see you’ve got a good thing going here. hard not to listen to all the tales that kid on the radio tells.’ she sighs, wistful. ‘time to whip these young’uns into shape.’ ronnie makes a show of rolling up her sleeves before walking over to a group of minutemen carrying a crate of ammunition.

‘oh boy,’ comes penny’s voice at her shoulder. ‘what have you done?’ she asks, even as she grins at the sight. the younger minutemen stand up straighter with ronnie at their backs, barking orders.

‘made things more entertaining around here.’ whisper grins.

penny exhales heavily. ‘speaking of entertainment, where’s your shadow?’ at whisper’s furrowed brow, penny clarifies: ‘the one with the bad wig.’

it surprises a laugh out of her. ‘he’s, uh - ‘ her smile fades. ‘he’s working on something else,’ she finishes lamely.

‘trouble in paradise,’ penny surmises. whisper can’t be bothered to correct her, not when sturges approaches soon after. preston doesn’t join them, instead follows ronnie shaw and the other minutemen. she leads sturges over to the artillery blueprints and breaks away from the others as they prepare to work into the night.

chatter that would have kept her awake now acts as white noise while she attempts to fall asleep. no one comes after her; her job is done until the next step with the artillery, and even then they shouldn’t need her help with testing. preston can be trusted to know if a shell hits its target.

whisper presses the heel of her hands against her eyes. sarge recognized her. pulled her from some old database, knew she was out of place. everything coming apart all at once. but she’s one step closer to shaun, and that’s what she focuses on as finally falls asleep.

[letterstothemidnightsociety]

It’s week three of my Global-Pandemic-Induced decision to rewatch all of Supernatural, and so I’m still attempting to make this watch more productive than the last show that I binged.

So I’m on disc two now - that’s episodes 5 - 8 for those of you watching on Netflix. By the time we get to this disc, we know the basic formula for Supernatural as a series - Two Hunks + Fighting Evil to the Power of Acceptable Levels of Gore x Missing Dad = Ratings Gold. Or at the very least, good enough ratings that we’ll give you a season (or fourteen). And then...well...then.

Episode five is “Bloody Mary”, easily the scariest episode of this first season and, based on the nose dive that the formula takes after season 1, probably the entire series. Maybe it’s that the Bloody Mary legend was one that really got me as a kid, maybe it’s just that I don’t do so hot with ghosts, but guys this episode still made me turn on all the lights and avoid all my mirrors. I accidentally turned this episode on at 9pm and regretted it immediately. I walked away at one point to go clean my kitchen to strategically miss some of the spookier points and I walked back in during an even spookier point. I was mad that there were no commercials at the commercial break cut-to-black! The first time I watched this episode, I’m pretty sure I watched it through my fingers. This most recent viewing, I ALSO watched it through my fingers. Guys, THIS EPISODE. 

I will say it a-hecking-gain: This episode scared the SHIT out of me.

AND THEN, THEN! Then this show has the gall to go ahead and drop a major season/character plot point right there in the middle of all this content that I am actively trying not to look at: SURPRISE! Sam has premonition powers and sorta kinda knew that his girlfriend was gonna die a terrible death weeks before she dies. Because sure, why not? 

Ohmiglob the DRAMA.

I’m gonna take a moment to say that, yes, technically this piece of plot gets dropped within our first six episodes, so we can still safely say that, you know, they’re still setting up the story for the rest of the series. It’s not like a sudden twist they drop half way through the season, it’s being laid down as ground work. And I know that this turns out to be a MAJOR issue for the next four seasons at least, but can I just say: Kripke, you’re really throwing a lot at us. I mean, OK. here’s what we’ve got - 

The Winchester’s lost their mom at a young age to some evil thing. Cool, got it.

THEN they have daddy issues with C-minus Single Dad John Winchester. Alright, that seems logical. 

The brothers hunt bad guys looking for the thing that killed their mom. Ok still on board. 

There’s family drama, relatable. 

Dad’s gone missing and we gotta find, ok ok ok. 

Also Sam’s girlfriend dies in a fire, alright, so we’re looking for that thing now too. 

OH! And now Sam has magic powers. 

I mean, it’s a lot, right? We got a lot of layers here. That’s all I’m sayin.

So “Bloody Mary”, right? Big episode, big bad guy, they kinda loophole their way into defeating her but I’m not mad. Big reveal at the end, so kind of an important lore episode. And then...well...then we get the following episodes:

“Skinwalker” - gross-out fx, establishes Dean as a lonely asshole with a lot of APB’s out on him

“The Hook Man” - takes the Urban Legend angle of the show and dials it up to 11

“Bugs” - Does what it says on the tin.

Now to be fair: all three of these episodes have at least ONE shining moment that reveals a little more about the characters we’re working with, and that character development plays out in important ways in the rest of the season/series. But all three of them are arguably---

FILLER EPISODES-ODES-ODES-ODESSssssssss. 

Alright, maybe that’s unkind. Maybe we should call them standalones or self-contained. A Filler is an episode designed to “fill out” your season. It doesn’t necessarily move the overarching story of the season forward, although it may contain some concepts or revelations that are important later. I’d argue that Supernatural has only ever had two kinds of episodes - Series Arc and Filler. Not that that’s a bad thing -  I like a filler episode now and again. Depending on how heavy your season gets (and by all accounts Supernatural gets pretty heavy), they can be a nice breath of fresh air - also known as a Breather Episode. Or they can be just for fun. I’mma reference “Once More with Feeling” again because sure, why not throw in a musical episode in season 6 of a show about vampire slaying, that’s fine. I wanna reference something from Community here too, but honestly anything after season 2 could probably be called filler or self contained, so who even knows. I’ll point at the Voltron episode where they spend a day in the mall to gather some unobtainium for the ship and wacky shenanigans ensue. Point being, they can be times to break the mold and experiment and have fun with what you’re writing. Or they can be ridiculous nonsense. Mileage may vary. 

The crazy thing about these episodes is that they most closely resemble what Kripke intended the show to be in the first place. Kripke wanted a show that revolved around characters investigating American urban legends. What is more quintessentially urban legend than Bloody Mary, the Hook Man and curses from ancient Native American burial grounds? These were stories that I as the viewer was already sort of familiar with because I’d heard of all of them before. What I appreciated, specifically about the Bloody Mary episode, was that they a) acknowledge the fact that these are Urban Legends (capital letters and all) and then b) acknowledge that the legends vary wildly so a part of their job is figuring out what is true and what is rumor. I guess you could also call that a cop out but when I was a kid, I was told that Bloody Mary was the ghost of Queen Mary of England who was sister to Elizabeth I and was also violently anti-protestant. WHERE did I get this story? I have no idea. But I also have no idea where Sam got the “mutilated bride” story from either. 

In an old article I found circa season 2, Kripke actually talks about preferring standalone content to mythology/lore episodes in television. Both as a creator and as a viewer, he wants a show where people can jump in at any time and “join the party” wherever they are. That’s the beauty of procedurals - you don’t need to start from the beginning to enjoy them.

But what really got me personally hooked on the show was the mythology, was the season long arc to find John Winchester and whatever killed their mom. Those mythos episodes were where the meat of the show was for me - it usually involved a lot of feelings and a lot of character development which is still mostly my jam. If I’m obsessively watching a show, it’s because I’m connected to the characters and watching them struggle through the challenges in their path, not because I want to see what monster they kill next. 

And again, I’ll reiterate that each of these episodes contains an important nugget of character. In “Bloody Mary”, easily the least likely to be called Filler, we find out that Sam has weird magic powers that are the real source of his guilt over Jessica’s death. 

In “Skin”, we find out a lot about Dean’s inner landscape from the DopppleDeaner, who reveals that Dean is probably most afraid of people leaving him (be still my 19-year-old heart). 

Wasn’t mad about this bit...

Coulda done without this bit tho...

In “Hookman”...alright, you kinda got me on “Hookman”, but we do get the first appearance of the rocksalt shotgun and Sam talks with a girl about her dad issues which is really Sam talking about his own dad issues in the language of tv shows. Also, he maybe starts to move on from Jessica???? It’s unclear, and also a little weird but I guess he’s only 22 and that’s not that far off from 18/19. 

Really, WB?? Sneaking into sorority houses?

And then in “Bugs”, yes, even in “Bugs”, we get juicy little bit of tension between the brothers as they advise some teen boy about family dynamics. The fight shows a lot about what each character feels about their own experiences growing up the way they did, how they manage the expectations from their own father, and how they believe those family dynamics should exist. I mean I guess you could also argue this is the episode that plants the seed for Wincest, but I don’t really want to go there, let’s not talk about it.

This kid’s like, “This is...not a conversation about me and MY dad, is it?”

So they could be worse. I mean the last two definitely aren’t great, and we’ll see how they measure up to the Monster Truck episode later in the season, but they’re not bad episodes. 

So let’s flash forward to Now again - have we seen the end of Filler Episodes?

As I have mentioned in previous posts and will probably continue mentioning in future posts, the 22 episode season is not the norm anymore. A lot of articles I’ve read point to Breaking Bad as the first American show to really break that mold. Breaking Bad released only 7 episodes in it’s first season in 2007. When you’ve cut your story down that much, there’s no room for filler - you’re basically producing a 7 hour movie. 

Now notice I said American TV show. I’m pretty sure for most of the rest of the world, 22 episodes is way outside the norm, but really I can only speak to UK TV. Seasons in the UK do not last as long as seasons in America. Doctor Who, one of, if not the, longest running show on BBC, aired its first season with 42 episodes, which is mind boggling. But since the series revived in 2005, it hasn’t had more than 13 episodes in a season. Spooks/MI5 never had more than 10 episodes. The IT Crowd only aired 6 episodes per season. Broadchurch had only 8. And because I must complete the Superwholock trifecta, Sherlock seasons were only 3 episodes a piece. These are the shows that spring to mind while I’m writing this, but you get the idea.

So why does American broadcast TV have such long seasons? Well, the answer is: moneymoneymoney.

We live in an age of “prestige” TV. Some throw around “Golden Era”, but there’s been like, a Golden Era of television every 10 years since tv’s became household commodities, so that phrase basically means nothing. TV today is more similar to long-form film making than it was a decade ago. We associate terms like “film” with other terms like “art”, and sometimes we forget that television is, and always was, a business. It’s a business that’s making a lot of money entertaining you for hours on end, but a business nonetheless. I’d argue that it doesn’t mean it’s not art, but I don’t think we can separate the art and entertainment value of tv from its actual monetary value. 

Strategically, the 22-episode season was to get a show to a magical number of total episodes - 100. Once you hit the 100th episode, somewhere around season 5 (thanks math), then you can sell the show in syndicated reruns. This is also referred to as second-run syndication or off-network syndication. When a show is syndicated, that means the production company that produces the show can now sell the right to air episodes to other channels. Think channels like TBS or TNT or even USA Network - they don’t really dabble in producing their own content, they just repackage content from other networks to plug in to empty slots in their programming. And because these channels can air episodes 5 days a week, 365 days a year, that means the production company can actually make more money by selling the show in syndication than when they sold the show to the primary network. The more episodes you have in a season, the faster you get to syndication, and sometimes that means a show that’s on the brink of cancellation due to poor numbers may still get greenlit for another season or two if they’re closer to that magic 100th episode. For a show like Supernatural, that has a very procedural, not-super-heavy-mythos, structure, you can do very well in syndication. Just cuz another network agreed to air your show doesn’t mean they agreed to air it in order, so procedurals work better in syndication than your season-arc shows do. And that’s why we have episodes like Bugs, that have nothing to do with the overarching plot of the season and also phone in some questionable CGI. 

Apparently they DID use real bugs to shoot this scene and everyone got bit to hell but the bugs didn’t show up good and they went with CG anyway?!?

But these days, you don’t have to hit 100 episodes. Sometimes only 80 episodes will do. Sometimes, you run a streaming site and you don’t have to worry about reruns at all because your revenue isn’t generated from air time or even ads, but from subscription prices. Honestly, when you think of it that way, it makes way more sense to greenlight shorter seasons so that you have the budget to buy more and more diverse shows that will appeal to a broader audience of viewers. 

So if Supernatural was produced today, would we get these off-shoot, self-contained episodes that have little to do with the plot of finding Sam and Dean’s dad? It’s hard to say. Knowing what I do about Kripke’s original plans for the show and his thoughts on procedural standalone episodes in general, its possible that he’d still try for a traditional season aired on a traditional TV network. But in that same interview I quoted above, he also mentions that the only way to get into a show with a heavy mythos is to buy the DVDs. We don’t need DVDs anymore - we have Netflix. And Hulu and Prime and any number of other streaming services that pick up any show they can get just to have a larger library of content and attract new viewers. I think a good indicator of what Supernatural would look like if it aired today is Hulu’s Helstrom - a show about two siblings with a childhood marked by strange and terrible happenings, who spend the season trying to defeat an evil demon. This show is a Hulu original that dropped all 10 episodes on October 16, 2020, and damn if that doesn’t sound familiar. I told a friend, “it’s like Supernatural but more emotions.” (Her response was, MORE emotions?!?!?) And before you dive down the rabbit hole, the characters in Helstrom made their debut in a Marvel comic back in the 70’s, so you can just chalk it up to nothing new under the sun. 

Big Mood, guys. Big Mood.

I’ll close this one by reiterating I don’t mind a filler episode. Some fillers can be weird and great and wonderful. I’d say “Tales of Ba Sing Se” (Avatar the Last Air Bender, Season 2)  is a great example - with the possible exception of Appa, the vignettes presented in “Tales” are basically side quests that have nothing to do with the main quest of season 2 and only serve to develop characters. The stories are sweet and touching and also light and fun.

I’m not crying, YOU’RE crying! It’s ok, I’m also crying. 

 And the longer a show runs, the more likely you are to run into these fillers - episodes that take a break from the main action to bring something that’s new and out of the box and possibly/probably writers getting bored with the every-day formula of the show. I think season 1 of Supernatural does a decent job of balancing the two styles of episode so that neither gets boring. In fact, I’m pretty Supernatural was what taught me the difference between the two episode styles in the first place. And the first time around, I was hyped for those season arc episodes, because back in the late 2000’s, I hadn’t seen a lot of TV content like that. Now, 15 years on and mired in a sea of seasons that stick mainly to a season arc story with little to no room for breathing, I think that if all TV became nothing but season arc episodes...well, it’d get pretty boring. 

[aemperatrix]

Keats Is Coughing

by Marianne Boruch

Everything is made of everything. — Leonardo da Vinci

I found Rome in the woods.

Fair to admit it’s mostly tundra to the west in the park, past Toklat the Denali I revised, low grasslands engineered to freeze deep by October — this being Alaska — the great

           Tabularium close to the Temple of            Castor and Pollux I rebuilt that same summer —             not superimposed, exact as any scheme

in secret — the Arch of Septimius Severus at the gravel bar        where fox drank from a river turned stream,           a Theater of Marcellus near               the ranger station where one raven,                                                                                    such a brat,   complained of                      my Circus Maximus, Trajan’s Column,                              my Baths of Diocletian, too many spots soaked in unpronounceable Latin.

                   I really did, I shouldered bits of it,      a ruin-hushed haunted business, my brain                                                         a truck bed, a lift, pulleys big as a whale’s heart, expletives of cheap wonder all over                                                                  my woodlot and expanse.                          One self-anoints to embellish day, years, life thus far, and think oneself so...    

                      Then busted — 

by a raven!

Well, that’s memory for you, that’s so-called        civilization for you, to layer up,                         to redo the already done.

I mean it’s a fact, the puny life span we’re allotted.              And proof — Denali in August, fireweed, spunky scrawny first Latinate — Erechtites hieracifolia — 

              giving off flowers to mark               what weeks left, little               time bomber, time traveler, ancient               slips red-flagging the countdown to winter               by climbing its own stalk.

Something perverse about that. Something perfectly fiendishly self-conscious about that.

•

From the start perverse, any premise.      Ask...We can’t know. To be compelled

           makes an occasion. Rome’s grand     past horrific, fire and ash, swamp into bog, lust              and bloodlust — 

The Alaska Range dreams lurid as Rome,                                        the worst way below being fire, summer snow at night      off the highest peaks by noon              as distant from our cabin as the size of a hand if I                         held up the one with                         an eye in the middle

to know how this works. Some have the power to raise from the dead a before, before scary and beautiful           back to mystery cults, in caves, rubble far under a Roman street, the altar to Mithras still slaying his bull, crumbling the stonework.

            All things being equal. But they’re not.                    Agony, it’s older.                      Ask the moose at Denali,                         the snowshoe hare, the lynx,

such a wily courtly lot.                                           Ask Ovid      banished to his hovel on the Black Sea, aching                for Rome’s exalted rude cacophony, each      exiled month a big thick X down

                                  Februarius,                                 Aprilis to home-shattered sick enough

for an undersong. Look it up! Undersong: a strain; a droning; the burden of a song —                                              Maybe that lowest common denominator is contagious. Rome or Denali, a mash-up of lunge and cry out, predator and prey throwing coins to a fountain, footholds made first by a hoof, pickpockets at buses and trains, nuns queuing up their no-nonsense, thorny brambles, raggedy spruce groves,                                           a look, a nod to sell loveless love on the street, a chain of mountains in choral repeat, saints stained to glass, how ice gouged rivers from rock-bound,                                 the one-lung rapturous common-sense Pope all outstretched arms, his little popemobile circling the thrilled at St. Peter’s up on our rickety chairs to see in six, seven languages how radiant —                             Cross my heart, he was. And Keats, Keats is coughing.

•

You find the fossil record everywhere. In woods, tundra, under streets, in cadaver labs.                                 Not those bright transparencies, wistful orderly page after page in biology, a lie, a kind of flip-book romance. It’s the one big mess of us in us, the generous extraordinary dead prove that, signing a paper, giving themselves away                                            to be cut, disembodied for the knowing it, sunk to their chemical depth in some afterlife, opened on a table by kids really,                                             belabored doctors-to-be, our shabby shared wilderness to untangle, bones   joints   arteries   valves,                                                         The Dissector in hand, weirdest how-to book on the planet. For Keats too, 1819, his scribbled roses and sunflowers in margins,                                                                  his training,                                                           his anatomy theatre, looking down and later: still London, then Rome (he who gets it,  body fails, second floor, beside the Spanish Steps).                                           Heart, not my heart anymore.                                     Forgive me. I’m worse than the hopelessly confused misnamed English sparrow, descendant of the great weaver birds of Africa, a finch that lost the gene

      for nest, how to beneath, to across so intricate, precise, bringing bringing sticks and hair and bits of shiny paper. Undersong: the burden of a song.                                                       Poor bird. Poor sweet muddled middle of it. I watched morning after morning, his offering...                                                                           It’s Keats who made claims about beauty and time. His bed at the last                        too low for the window, his must-have                                 tell me, what’s out there — 

I admit: a ridiculous layering, Rome in Denali. Just because? Because I went to both in short order? Two continents, an ocean apart. My mother loved hand-me-down expressions — never the twain shall meet. They do meet.                           To repeat: that’s civilization for you. Happenstance and right now drag along future and past                             and why the hell not the Denali, the Rome in any of us, no two states of being more unalike, worn-out compulsion to collect and harbor, piece together,                                                                    stupid into some remember machine.

  Such fabulous unthinkable inventions we’ve made to merge or unmake: the trash compactor,   the poem, all tragedy and story, pencils sharpened to

a point that keeps breaking, wilderness gone inward as

                  an ocean-going ship’s container,                         a Gatling gun,                                 the AR-15 of the seething deranged,                                         the H-bomb,                                             Roman legions to Canterbury to blood-up fields into legend then dig the first plumbing but

                                            how can you                                             be in two places at once                                             when you’re not anywhere at all!

       (Thank you, Firesign Theatre, brilliant wackos,              old vinyl on a turntable still in the game... )

                     Fine. Fuck it. Start over.

•

See the sheep on high ledges, the arctic squirrels below.

See the way Dante saw, sweeping his arm across Vasari’s great painting as Boccaccio looks off, the plague sealing city after city. Dante

in hell, steady-luminous     those fact-finding trips to service           his worldly Inferno.

Winter sleeps through. August at Denali, bears shovel it down       a razor-edged maw —                                                 twigs! berries! more stems! —  Fate hoards to prepare, sub-zeros, fattens into...   

See the park’s camper bus, 92 miles how most of us jolt and slow, crossing hours more daylight than night all summer, rattling tin can with its exhaust and hissing gravel, the fear landslide                  an undersong just-possible, how we zigzag a mountain. Look!

                 Nearing a bear, the young caribou abruptly                             hesitant, shy as a leaf — 

No! Don’t! Do not! That grizzly huge, bent to his ploy just                                                 these berries around here, his ignore ignore, sure, quiet-tense as a trigger, and we of                      fogged scratched windows so hard to open — 

stop! The bus stopped. Jesus. The thing curious, closer...                          They’re not

that smart anyhow, a stage-whispering drunk from the back      of our imperial realm, mile 62, the Park Road.

What did Venus decree in her temple up whichever narrow street in Rome, the Ancients’                             stink of slops, standing water,           a bear chained to a slave (out of slav, by the way,                             backdrop is horde, human spoils)

both shackled to a grindstone for                                                             a later mob and roar.

Here’s what we saw: the little caribou  in reverse wanders sideways and safe.                                             Our bus one big sigh or like a wheezing asthmatic the brakes unbrake.

Bad dream, bad dream, the undersong start to all fable if                        for real we’d seen that kill back to lions off their continent cornered, bloodied in the great amphitheaters, rearing up, a nail to hammer’s                                   bite and blow. The wilderness in us

is endless. Near the cabin, near evening, a warbler                               in the fireweed                                                    hawk saw or heard,                          his switchblade clicked to —                                                                         I was and I was                      whirling feathers, either bird —    Every hunger                            is first century. Forever-thus   feral cats at the Forum about to leap too.                                                        The Forum, last homage   I shoveled holes and rocks to   remake, mile 82, while the haymouse riddled the meadow   down deep, her catacombs.

•

Time + beauty = ruins. Perfect shapes in the mind       meet my friends Pointless and Threat and Years of       Failure to Meld or Put to Rest. Ruthless                                                                                 is human.

I ask a composer: How to live with this undersong thing                             over and over, how to

                                                                   get rid of it,                                                                        the world of it — 

 He looks at me. What undersong thing? And shrugs       I’ll put it on the test! Let students define it.

     So I dreamt such a test: Go there. To Rome.                    Half-doze against a wall                      two thousand years of

    flesh    sweat    insect wing ago, stone laid by hand, by a boy when a whip, a whip, a welling up, his will not speak.

   Have at it. Please explain. Please fill in this blank.

Grief punctures like ice, moves like a glacier   to flat and slog and myth, low blue and white flowers       we hiked trail-less. The rangers insist. They insist — 

      never follow or lead, never lay down a path.

                                                                       From above the look of us spread out, our seven or eight a band, little stray exhausted figures                                           as over the land bridge from Asia,

circa: prehistory keeps coming, older than Rome, both   both underfoot, understory, underway

        miles below numb, it’s burning.

•

To see at all, you time                                         and this time and time again.

The spirit leans intrigued, the other part bored, then there’s want,                                                                    then there’s wait.

Once a city began with a wolf whose two human pups would      build, would watch it fall, nursing                                              at her milk for centuries               in marble               in bronze.

         She stands there and cries of                                                               that pleasure, by turns a blood-chill. The tundra. At night.

A snake eats its own tail, forever at it on a fresco. A real snake                       leaves his skin near the gravel bar. Some words sting, some are sung. Another life isn’t smaller.

[nubnubblr]

If You Do. 28 Still Detoxing...

CHARLIE

We got to his house, I hadn't actually been here before, probably because of the whole Shawn also lives here thing. Doobin closed the door behind us as I heard footsteps thudding through the house. Seconds later a large grey husky ran directly towards him. Needless to say, the way he was with animals made him more attractive.

"Oh my god," I cooed over the puppy.

"This is Ookami," he introduced patting his dog on the head.

"Awe," I sat down on the floor and patted him.

"What are you doing? I thought we were going to bone?"

"That was before I knew you had a puppy," I retorted without looking away from Ookami.

THEA

"Can't we just leave and come back tomorrow?" I sighed.

"No Thea," Shawn sighed.

We had already been sitting here for an hour an half and I still hadn't even gotten an x-ray. Apparently, everyone had decided that today would be the best time to hurt themselves.

I was scrolling through my Instagram feed when a message from Charlie came through.

ChaCha: WHy didn't you tell me Doobin had a puppy?

Thea: Because, attractive guys having animals and raising them right it like 100000000 times more attractive to you.

ChaCha: I see your point.

Thea: Have you seen Lexi yet?

ChaCha: Who is Lexi...?

Thea: Shawn's princess

I replied as they finally called my name. Austin one side of me and Shawn the other helped me up and assisted me in walking over to where I needed to go.

SAM

"You looked stressed," I commented waling into the bar. BM looked like he was on the verge of pulling his own hair out.

"Just a little, do you need something?" He asked not looking up from the paperwork in front of him.

"No, but it seems like you might, what's up?"

"I fired Austin this morning,"

"About time," I nodded.

"So now there is no one to cook and we open in ten minutes," he vented.

"Why did you fire him without having someone to fill his place?" I frowned.

"It was a heat of the moment thing, I wasn't really thinking it through,"

"Why don't you ask Thea to come and cook?" I suggested. He just looked at me with an 'are you serious?' expression.

"I know you're not really talking to each other right now but she will drop everything to help you out and you know it," I shrugged.

"I don't need her help," he stated flatly.

"Can't your kitchen hands cook the food? I mean it's not like they weren't already carrying the entire workload of the kitchen," I pointed out.

"Technically for today that will work," he sighed clearly not thinking of that option.

"Well then do that for today and then you have time to work out what you're going to do for tomorrow," I stated.

CHARLIE

"Do you want anything to eat?" Doobin asked casually slipping a pair of pants on.

"I could eat," I shrugged catching my breath. I wasn't so sure Thea's theory was going to work, but it was fun trying to find out.

He didn't reply, he just smirked at me and left the room. I was so entangled with DOobin that I had forgotten that Shawn could come home at any moment, I wasn't worried about Koosung I know he had classes all day. In a slight panic, I messaged Thea.

Charlie: Are you still with Shawn?

Theo: Yep.

Charlie: How long do you think you can keep him busy?

Theo: Probably the rest of the day, don't rush, we're stuck in the hospital.

Charlie: When you said you would keep him distracted I didn't think that meant you would injure him.

Theo: He is perfectly fine, I didn't do anything to him.

Charlie: ....Did you fall over?

Theo: Why don't you just focus on getting Doobin in and out of your system? I'll message you if Shawn leaves.

Charlie: I'll take that as a yes...

Theo: I faked a fall to distract Shawn who was coming to find you, you happened to be in a room with his brother and no supervision, so you're welcome.

Charlie: Oh so you're fine and wasting their time at the hospital?

Theo: Just go get laid and leave Shawn to me.

Charlie: Nk.

I rolled my eyes stretching out my already relaxed muscles. I slid on my underwear and threw on a shirt making my way out of the room. a small kitten ran across the lounge room towards the kitchen where it stopped at Doobin's feet. It sat down next and looked up at him then meowed.

"Meow," he cooed down at it, I leant against the bedroom door frame and watched the kitten circle his feet. He pulled a piece of whatever meat he was frying in the pan and set it on the bench as the kitten meowed at him again.

"It's hot, you have to wait," he told it softly. It meowed at him again, a little louder this time.

"Did Shawn forget your breakfast this morning?" he frowned setting the spatula on the edge of the frypan and walking to the pantry. He pulled out a small tin of cat food and emptied the contents into the little pink bowl on the floor next to the counter.

"Jesus," I let out a sigh when he noticed me standing there.

"My bad," I smirked.

"I think you're the one that should be wearing the bell," I stated.

"Is that a kink of yours?" I raised an eyebrow pushing off the door frame and making my way over to the kitchen.

"Wouldn't you like to know,"

"Mature," I shook my head.

"So who is this?"

"That's Lexi, she's Shawn's kitten. She only loves me when he's not around,"

"Or because you have food,"

"I can have food when he is around and she doesn't even want to come near me, I swear Shawn thinks I'm mean to her when he's not home," Doobin frowned down at her. She'd finished her food and was back at his feet purring and rubbing up against his ankles for the chicken he had set aside to cool.

"You just attract all kinds of cats, huh?" I raised an eyebrow.

THEA

"Seriously?" I sighed.

"I'm afraid so," the doctor nodded.

"I hate my life," I mumbled.

"I told you," Shawn stated.

"There is no need to rub it in," Austin frowned at him.

"I'm just saying, she wanted to go home and ignore it,"

"Can you two bicker outside? The doctor is trying to speak," I shook my head.

"Sorry," they both mumbled.

"As I was saying, it's a fairly fine fracture but the placement is the issue. You're going to have to wear a moon boot and keep all weight off it for the next 4 weeks, then we'll talk about gradually putting weight back on it. So for the time being, moon boot and crutches, and stay off it,"

"You want her to sit still for 4 weeks?" Shawn raised an eyebrow.

"That's what she needs to do," the doctor nodded.

"She's going to go stir crazy," Austin commented.

"Would you two shut up?" I sighed.

JACKSON

"So, how is this mystery girl going? Are you dating yet?" Jessie asked.

"Not yet, we've only met a few times in person," I shook my head.

I wasn't sure she wanted to even date me anyway, she didn't seem to be looking for something serious and I wasn't interested in something that wasn't monogamous. She was a great person and given the chance I would definitely date her but at the end of the day, we both have to want a relationship for that to be possible.

"So? You're just taking it slow then?"

"We're getting to know each other, we haven't talked about dating yet," I tried to shrug the subject off but she didn't seem to want to let it go.

"Is she crazy?"

"No, she's a great girl, a little bit unpredictable when she's drunk but who isn't? We're just testing the waters so to speak to see if we both want the same thing,"

"Well, if you don't then I'm sure there's a girl out there who shares your values and wants the same thing as you do," she gave a small smile.

THEA

"This is stupid," I huffed sinking into the couch.

"It's also necessary," Shawn stated.

"Oh yeah? Would you sit still and not do anything for 8 weeks?"

"He said 4,"

"He said for to 6 no weight-bearing but 8 to 12 for a full recovery and don't change the subject," I frowned.

"Seeing as dancing in my livelihood I wouldn't really have a choice, if I didn't stay still it would just get worse," he pointed out.

"You're annoying me," I huffed again.

"You're just in pain," he shrugged my attitude off.

"You're a pain," I retorted.

"Chill little lady, we'll just hang out and watch movies, eat junk food, and wait for Charlie to get home," Austin sunk in next to me.

"Did you just call me little lady?" I raised an eyebrow.

"Not if that means you're going to hit me," he gave an apologetic smile.

"Fine, but I want clinkers," I sighed.

"I'm on it," he jumped up from the couch, probably more to retreat from me than to actually volunteer.

"You stay with her and I'll get supplies," Austin took SHawn's keys out of his hand.

"Why does everyone steal my car?" he shook his head.

"Because your keys are always accessible," I shrugged.

He didn't respond, he just sat down next to me. I wasn't going to lie, I enjoyed the company, I mean I if I am being completely honest I wanted my dad, but I usually did when I hurt myself and was in pain. I'm not really sure why it was my dad and not my mum but that's the way it's always been, every time I got hurt when I was a kid or when I was sick I just wanted my dad.

"Charlie should be home soon and then you can kick me out," he stated when I let out a sigh.

Really I was just bored and annoyed at myself, there were so many other ways I could have distracted Shawn and instead, I chose a fake fall which resulted in an actual injury which is going to take weeks to recover from.

"I don't want to kick you out," I stated, I didn't really think that Charlie was going to be home anytime soon, and the longer Shawn stays here, the longer she stays with Doobin and can hopefully get the temptation for him out of her system.

"Can I get you anything?"

"Can you please pass me my phone?" I pointed to the cabinet next to the door.

"Seriously? I meant like getting you a glass of water, or something not in this room," he teased.

"I can get it myself if you like," I started getting up.

"Don't even," he frowned at me getting my phone.

"Am I that boring that you need your phone?" he raised an eyebrow.

"I want to ring my dad," I rolled my eyes at him.

"Really?" He frowned at me.

All I really did was complain about my dad, I mean don't get me wrong I understood where he was coming from but he was always going the wrong way about it, in his defence her was used to giving orders rather than suggestions.

"Yeah," I nodded. He just shrugged and got me my phone.

"I'm going to make a coffee, do you want one?" He asked as I dialled my dad's number. I just shook my head and waited for dad to answer.

It kept ringing, I thought he might be at work and wasn't going to answer but on the last ring, he answered.

"Hey baby girl, can I call you back in five?" He sounded rushed.

"Sure,"

A second later he hung up. I had been handling the pain fairly well up until this point, but him hanging up even though I knew he was going to call me back in a few minutes seemed to smash through the emotional block I had been holding and I started to cry.

"Thea?" I heard Shawns voice seconds after I reluctantly let out a loud sob.

"I'm fine," I choked out.

"What's wrong?" he frowned at me from the lounge room door.

"Nothing," I tried to wave him off, but he just walked over to me which didn't help me stop crying, it just made the want stronger. He sighed placing his cup on the coffee table, sitting down next to me he pulled me into a hug.

"I brought snacks!" Austin burst into the room, holding bags full of whatever he had just bought, up in the air.

"Dude, I was gone like 15 minutes, what did you do to her?" Austin frowned dropping his hands.

"Nothing," Shawn defended himself.

CHARLIE

I stretched out, even with my eyes close my room was way too bright. I frowned, my room was never bright, I peered through one eye and looked around, I shot up when I realised that I wasn't in my room, I was still in Doobin's room, and it was the next day.

I wasn't really sure what to do, what if Shawn was home? I couldn't just walk out there, how would I explain that? I looked for my phone but couldn't find it, I wanted to slap myself when I remembered I left it on the kitchen counter. What if Shawn was home? Isn't not like my phone case wasn't recognisable, it was bright pink with an alpaca phone ring on the back.

I wanted to kill Doobin, why would he let me fall asleep here? Why wouldn't he wake me up? I almost groaned out loud, instead, I froze when I heard Doobin talking. I felt like I wanted to throw up, how was I getting out of here without getting caught? The door handle turned slowly and I panicked ducking under the covers, I'm not sure how that was going to save me from this situation but at least if it was Shawn checking on his brother he wouldn't know what girl was in his bed.

"Are you awake?" I heard Doobins voice, I didn't trust my own and I was scared that Shawn would recognise it, so I just made a noise.

"You can stop hiding, Shawn is still looking after Thea and Koosung didn't come home last night, he won't be home for another couple of hours,"

I hesitantly pulled the blanket down, peering over the top of it I saw Doobining wearing nothing but boxer briefs and a smirk, holding a cup and a plate with what looked like jam and cream covered scones.

"What is wrong with you?" I frowned at him getting out of bed, looking for my clothes.

"Good morning to you too, you're welcome for the tea and breakfast," he didn't seem to be affected by my attitude.

"Good morning? You let me sleep here, what if your brother had of come home? Or Koosung? You think he knows how to keep a secret?" I started getting dressed.

"Relax, Shawn texted me saying he wasn't coming home and that Koosung was visiting his mum, not long after Thea text you telling you Shawn was staying there and that she would explain today. Besides that I tried to wake you up, as you can see I failed," he shrugged.

"Clearly you didn't try hard enough,"

"Or I tried to hard which is why you were so tired," he smirked.

"You're unbelievable,"

"I've heard that before, so, morning sex?" he offered. taking a bite of the scone.

"Did you bake those?" I frowned, please say no.

"Yeah, fresh this morning," he nodded, I dropped my shirt on the floor instead of putting it on.

"Fine, but then I'm going home," I sighed.

THEA

"What did you do?" Charlie frowned at me walking into the lounge room, I smirked at her, it was almost 2.30, which meant she either slept in, which I doubt, or she got laid again this morning.

"What have you been doing?" I raised an eyebrow.

"Stayed at a friend's, had some breakfast, I couldn't say no to fresh scones," she shrugged.

"Did she bake them herself?"

"Yep," was all she said dropping her back by the door.

"Well, now that you've got someone to supervise you, I'm going to make sure my unsupervised brother hasn't destroyed my house," Shawn stated, getting up from the couch where I had been made to stay since I woke up this morning.

"I'm sure he found a way to occupy himself, and I don't need supervision," I frowned realising what he had said.

"Seriously, what did you do?"

"Minor injury," I shrugged.

"She broke her foot, she's not allowed to put weight on it for 4 weeks," Shawn dobbed me in.

"How did you manage that?"

"Dancing," I shrugged.

"I'm off, I'll call you later,"

"Bye, thank you," I called after him.

I waited until I heard the car before I spoke again, once I was sure that he was gone I smirked up at Charlie who just rolled her eyes at me.

"Have fun?"

"Clearly more than you," she retorted.

"Did you bone all night or did you take a break?"

"I fell asleep,"

"Damn, remind me to high five the kid,"

"Don't call him a kid," she frowned.

"Why?"

"Because I just spent the last 36 hours boning him,"

"Clearly not the whole time if you fell asleep,"

"What did you do to your leg?" she changed the subject.

"Nothing, let's go back to talking about you boning a kid," I huffed.

"I gather from your avoidance that it was embarrassing," she laughed.

"I did if covering for you,"

"What?"

"Shawn was going to come looking for you, I had to do something, I had just seen you and Doobin go into a room together, so I faked a fall," I shrugged.

"Faked a fall,"

"The fake fall resulted in a real injury," I muttered.

"I can see that, but to be fair there were plenty of other things you could have done to get his attention," she shrugged.

"Like what?"

"I don't know, taken your shirt off?"

"In the middle of a class?"

"Wouldn't be the first time,"

"That was a sports class and some hoe had just attacked me with juice to try and embarrass me,"

"She should have known you were more than capable of doing that all by yourself,"

"Rude,"

"I'm going to shower,"

"You should probably wash the smell of child off of yourself before people come over,"

"What people," she paused.

CHARLIE

"Well, considering I'm stuck here, and it would be irresponsible of me to go out anywhere I thought that I would invite Jackson over," she shrugged.

"But he's bringing Mark," she tried to mumble.

"Ew, why?"

"I don't know, maybe he feels weird about sitting alone with two girls," she stated defensively.

"Do you want me to see if Jae and Sam want to come by too? We can turn it into a game night ro something?"

"I'll call them,"

"Just tell them not to bring BM," she mumbled.

She didn't mean it though. This was the longest the two had gone without speaking, actually, I think it was the only time in the history of their friendship that the had actually intentionally not talked to each other. Maybe getting them both together in one room would actually help, they would be forced to at least acknowledge each other.

BM

"Yo," Jae answered his phone pausing the tv. I frowned at him, we were literally in the middle of the good part of the movie.

"Dude," Sam sighed.

"What? Oh right, he dies," he waved us off.

"Dude!" Sam and I frowned simultaneously.

"Well he does," Jae shrugged.

"We should know better than to watch a movie with him, he's managed to see them all before we get to them," Sam stated.

"No, I just have Tumblr and twitter,"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm listening," he rolled his eyes at whoever was on the other end of the phone.

"I'll ask, but I'll be there. Yeah, like that will happen, kay, later," he hung up.

"You up for a game night at the girls?" Jae asked, he was looking directly at Sam which gave me the impression that I wasn't invited.

"Well, it's not like there's a point in watching this movie anymore,"

"Oh, you're not invited," Jae shook his head at me.

"Seriously?" I frowned.

"Have you apologised yet?" Sam asked.

"For what?"

"And that's why you're not invited,"

"Well go on then," I rolled my eyes.

"I didn't say you couldn't come, I just said that you weren't invited, I don't care if you come or not, I would actually prefer if you did come along," Jae shrugged again.

"Why? So I can drive?"

"Well that too, but it's highly entertaining for me and I want to see how long it takes for Thea to stab you,"

"She won't stab me,"

"Right, she doesn't stab her friends like someone I know," he smirked.

"Dude," Sam frowned.

"Too soon?"

[ryanmeft]

MCU Phases 4 and 5 Wishlist

Last night at San Diego Comic Con, Marvel dropped their pants and coated the audience in a thick, rich layer of big-and-small screen announcements. Briefly recapped: across Phases 4 or 5 (not that that means anything), we’re getting Black Widow, The Eternals, Shang Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, Thor: Love and Thunder, Black Panther 2, Captain Marvel 2, the Fantastic Four and Blade. On the streaming front, the previously announced series were all confirmed, and in a move most probably didn’t see coming, Marvel added a series based on their often bizarre What if? Series, which speculates on what might have happened had some element of continuity gone a different way (and which has become a bit moot in the comics in an era where continuity is gleefully mixed and nixed whenever an editor wants a sales boost).

As folks might be aware, I’m not a huge fan of Disney, skipping almost all their movies, but I have a severe weakness for the MCU. There’s a lot of wish lists going around as to what we want to happen in these movies and series, but as you know if you’ve read my blog before, the correct answers are mine. Since you can rest assured these answers are the best, I graciously share them with you now. Remember, I’m never wrong.

Mjolnir Gets Retired

I am totally down with Natalie Portman’s Jane Foster as the God of Thunder. There will be those who call to give her the same powers and weapons Thor had, but why would we want to do that? In the comics, she’s still Jane Foster while Thor is still Thor, and with Chris Hemsworth also in the film, there’s no reason to think that won’t be the case here. Instead of simply “Female Thor”, she needs her own set of traits and skills. Start with giving her a new weapon; a magical spear would be just right. Mjolnir got its greatest moment of glory in Endgame, and from a sheer story perspective, it is time to retire the venerated hammer.

Rebellion in Wakanda

I’m going to be in the minority on this, but: the Dora Milaje have gotten shafted in the MCU thus far. In the best of the comics, they are the king’s guard, but they are also a group of women with independent minds and goals who don’t always agree with the king. In fact, members have rebelled several times. In the movies to date, they exist to devote total fealty to T’Challa, never once seriously questioning anything he does. This is a terrible fate to befall an actor with Danai Gurira’s fire. Instead of existing merely to poke holes in things on behalf of a (male) ruler, it’s time these ass-kicking ladies got to play a more important, and complex, role.

Christoph Waltz as Doom

This idea isn’t mine, but was passed on by a friend who is clearly brilliant. There’s not much to say about this one: the actor who made his reputation playing two very different roles in Quenton Tarantino films is the perfect choice for the literally tin-plated dictator. As for the rest of the cast, Keanu Reeves is the favorite for Reed, but I have another idea in mind for him...

The Master of Time

That said: it’s about time to get Kang involved in this universe. When it became obvious that Endgame was going to involve time travel, I slapped together what I thought was a pretty good post-credits tease that would introduce both him and the Fantastic Four side of the universe. Obviously, nothing like that happened, and there were no Avengers movies or mass team-ups of any kind announced at SDCC. Yet with time travel established, the potential to bring in this reality-warping mega-baddie is always there.

Don’t Undo Iron Man 3

Yes, fans are shooting their shorts over the fact that the real Mandarin will be the villain of the Shang-Chi movie. But those of us who don’t rub the comics on ourselves regularly recognize the truth: Iron Man 3 had a great twist that was one of the few truly creative decisions in a modern blockbuster, and it would be a shame to overturn on the whim of a handful of hardliners. Have a “real” Mandarin, but keep Ben Kingsley’s washed-up, hedonistic actor on the books. Maybe even give him a cameo.

Unrelenting Nightmare

Director Scott Derickson has already said he wants to use Nightmare, a being who feeds off his namesake, in the Doctor Strange sequel, and given that it is apparently multiverse-focused (and that Strange has few interesting villains), this is probably a given. Marvel has been after Keanu Reeves for a long time; most people seem to want him for Reed Richards, but may I humbly suggest we go against the hype and cast him as a dimension-devouring trickster deity instead? As a side note, please, please follow up on Chiwetel Ejiofor’s Baron Mordo. He was the best part of the first film, and it’d be a shame to let him trail off into the ether.

Take Some Risks in Captain Marvel

Captain Marvel was fun. It was not the kind of movie that took risks, however, or blew anyone away, despite amazing box office numbers. CM will be an idol for little girls; it’s time to think outside the box, utilize the oddness of Marvel’s galactic properties, and make her next movie one that can rival the time-hopping chances DC has taken with Wonder Woman. Brie Larson needs more to do than pose heroically and hit things.

Where’s Spider-Man?

More of a question answered than a wish: a lot of people are freaking out because Spider-Man was not mentioned last night, despite a post-credits tease that’s impossible to ignore. Relax: the deal between Marvel and Sony likely just means Sony has to finalize plans and sign off on the next film before Marvel can announce it. Far From Home cracked 800 million at the box office, and the refurbishing of Spidey’s tarnished reputation by Marvel is one big reason Sony’s own dull, uninspired Venom series is now a viable money-maker. It would be the height of stupidity for Sony to pull out of the deal now; expect Spider-Man: Homeboy or whatever it is called to be announced for 2021 before much time passes.

Make What If? Truly Bizarre

As a series, What If? wasn’t always great, but it was always interesting. There are some obvious concepts they could include in the series, and probably on the top of most people’s lists is “What If Iron Man had survived Endgame?” Old Man Tony would be absolutely delicious, but we can get stranger than that. This series should be a chance to explore concepts that would never fly in a massive, internationally-marketed blockbuster movie. Think stuff like “What If Loki had been Thor?” or “What If Peggy Carter had been Captain America?” Get wild up in this.

Make Loki a Reverse Doctor Who

Loki became a far less evil, far more complex character by the time he was dispatched in Infinity War. The Loki that will star in the series, however, is the one from Avengers, before all that character development. Audiences didn’t truly and completely fall in love with him until he went from evil god of chaos to a more ambivalent trickster figure, so pulling off sympathy for this older Loki across an entire series will be difficult. The obvious answer is to make him a sort of reverse Doctor: instead of an eternally-helpful alien who influences everyone he meets for the better, he’s an alien out for himself who is gradually influenced by those he meets to be (a little) better.

[trade-baby-blues]

Taste of Home

Pairing: Bones x Reader

Word Count: 2292

Warnings: a swear, a little angst, soooooooo much fluff

A/N: Prompt “Character A overhears Character B’s Christmas wish and decides to fulfill it” requested by @kawaiiusagichansan for the Christmas celebration that I.....definitely....fell behind on. This one was....really hard to write for some reason so I’m not sure how it ended up being so long. Idk if I’m just not in a writing mood or if this is some weird writers block but...hopefully writing this has cured me. 

A crash from exam room two had every head in Medbay turned up to watch as an exasperated Leonard McCoy kneeled down to pick up the tools scattered across the floor. His foot connected with the tricorder, sending it skidding away from him. He stood, lips pursed, and rolled his his shoulders and neck. It was supposed to help him calm down, but the creaking of his bones only reminded him of how much he’d been working. How much he’d been missing.

Leonard opened his eyes at the sound of shuffling in front of him and Christine offered him the tricorder without any of her usual snark. Leonard wondered briefly how tired he must look. “Thank you,” he mumbled before making an excuse about paperwork in his office.

Once inside, Leonard dropped the tricorder on his desk and hunched down over it. It didn't respond to his touch, so with a clenched jaw and rising heart rate, he set to work trying to fix it. He must have gone through a dozen videos on fixing tricorders and was still no closer to reviving it. He mimicked the man in the video tightening a screw, expecting the screen to light up but receiving a nasty shock again.

Leonard succumbed to the rage for a moment and hurled the tricorder across the room. The office door slid open as the it sailed through the air, colliding with the door frame and missing Jim’s face by mere inches.

“I know I’m not a doctor, but I don't think that's how those work.”

Bones glared at Jim before deciding an argument wasn't worth it. “I’m not in the mood, Captain.” He sat back at his desk and hoped that would be enough of hint for Jim to leave. Of course, it wasn't.

Jim sat down in the chair across from Bones, propping his feet up on the desk and ignoring the pointed glare he received in response. “Good thing I'm not here as the captain then.”

“Then why are you here? You seem to be in perfect health. For now.” Bones reached across the desk to shove Jim’s feet off, but Jim’s damn smile didn't even falter.

“Cause I’m your friend. Friends need a reason to see each other now?”

Bones sighed, running a hand through his already messy hair. “No. I’m sorry. I...I don’t know. I think I’m gettin’ restless being cooped up on this damn ship so long.”

“Hm,” Jim replied. “Didn’t expect you to apologize so this is awkward.” Bones raised an eyebrow in response, and Jim fidgeted like a child caught in a lie. “I might have hypothetically come here not to see you but to see the cute new Engineer I called to come fix your tricorder Hypothetically, of course.”

“Of course,” Bones snorted.

Although you wore the tell-tale red uniform of an Engineer, you specialized in medical equipment repair, which meant you spent most of your time in your workshop or in Medbay, tinkering away at whatever machinery was malfunctioning. It also meant you got to spend plenty of time getting to know a certain grumpy CMO. You tried your best to keep the relationship professional, but that didn’t stop your heart from jumping to your throat every time you got called up to Medbay.

You heard Leonard’s voice before you saw him, letting it guide you like a pilgrim to the altar as you approached his office. You stopped to savor the sound.

“A Christmas party will definitely not brighten my mood.” Even through the door, you could tell Bones was scowling.

“Come on, Bones. I bet we could get Scotty to hack the replicator to make some eggnog, and I’ve got a bottle of rum stashed away. Tell me that doesn’t sound like a good time.”

“It doesn’t.”

“Then what does sound good?” Silence followed. You stood closer to the door, trying to hear Bones’ answer but it didn’t come. “I’m trying to help, Bones, but I can’t do that if you don’t tell me what you want.”

“What I want is to see my daughter. To go home. To finally be off this stupid metal death trap careening through space.”

“I put a request in for shore leave. What else do you want me to do?”

“I want you to get out of my office.”

“Fine,” Jim snapped. You heard the creak of a chair as he stood and did your best to duck out of the way. Luckily, Jim stormed out of the office without a glance in your direction.

You poked your head in the doorway, eyeing Bones as he leaned over his desk, head in hands. You cleared your throat and he looked up. “I’m just gonna…” You picked up a small box with the remnants of what was once a tricorder. With a small smile, you rushed back out of the office, wishing your brain wouldn’t freeze up every time you so much as looked at Bones when all you wanted to do was help him. There had to be something that would cheer him up.

With a sigh, you dumped the tricorder corpse onto your desk, hands immediately getting to work while your mind wandered to Bones, conjuring up daydreams of clandestine meetings in storage closets between shifts or holding hands on the beach during the next shore leave. Dreams of meeting his family and chasing his daughter through a field of wildflowers or camping together under a summer sky in Georgia. Even if it was just a fantasy, you felt a pang of homesickness, and, for a second, you had a glimpse of what Bones must be feeling. You also had an idea of how to help him.

The plan took longer than anticipated, and by now it was damn near Christmas. The tricorder had long since been returned, and you and Bones continued to skirt the edges of romance, each of you waiting for the other to make the first move. Unable to find the words to tell Bones how you felt, you decided tonight was the night to show him.

He was just getting of a double shift in Medbay, stumbling back to his room like the zombie he felt like. Bones punched in the room code, ready to fall onto any flat surface, but freezing on the spot when the doors slid open and you stood before him in your civvies.

Bones closed his eyes and shook his head, expecting you to disappear when he opened them again but you stood firmly in his way. “Did I fall asleep on my desk again,” he murmured, taking you in. Your hair tumbled down to your shoulders, resting on a dark flannel shirt, sleeves rolled up to your elbows. There was a slight sheen of sweat on your forehead and a blush rising to your cheeks as Bones reached out to you, thumb caressing your jaw. You really were a dream to him.

A slightly hysterical laugh slipped past your lips as you fought against your fight or flight response. “No, you’re not asleep. Unless we’re both having the same dream.”

“‘s a good one so far.”

“Well, it’s about to get better. Close your eyes.” Bones obeyed without question, squeezing your hand as you linked your fingers with his. You led him into his own room and pushed him gently down onto the couch.

“I’ve definitely had this dream before,” he said, reaching out to place his hands on your waist.

You jumped back, grabbing his other hand with yours and holding them both in place while your brain short-circuited looking for a response. All you could do was laugh again and let Bones’ hands fall to his lap. “Don’t open your eyes yet.”

He sucked in a breath as he heard your footsteps retreating. “That laugh might just kill me,” he breathed out. He leaned back against the couch as he waited for you to return.

You weren’t sure how long you watched him. Some people might have been annoyed that he fell asleep that quickly, but you could have stood there all night. He was like a statue carved from marble by divine hands, jaw set and strong, mouth turned up into a half-smile in his sleep. One arm was thrown over the back of the couch, leaving the vast expanse of his chest open for you to snuggle up against. He would probably be warm. Like a furnace. Hot enough to burn -

“Fuck,” you cursed, dropping the pie tin in your hand. You sucked your fingers into your mouth. Bones sat up straight, bewildered as he took in his surroundings before his eyes fell on you and the pie now at his feet. You cursed again as you bent down to pick it up. “Glad I made two,” you said, but your voice was far away to Bones, who stood up and stepped around you.

His eyes were transfixed on the contraption behind you. It looked like a makeshift fire pit built out of scrap metal and old paper scraps. A projector stood beside it, aimed up at the ceiling but not powered on. Bones turned to you for some explanation and his eye caught the flower display on the table. A bouquet of paper wildflowers with a Cherokee Rose dead center. He ran a hand over the petals and it felt almost like silk.

“I’ve never actually been to Georgia,” you admitted, “But that’s what all the guides say is the state flower.” You held out a plate to him with a slice of pecan pie. He stared at it and then you again. “If you don’t like it, I can also get you some cobbler. I reprogrammed the replicator to-”

Bones cut you off by throwing his arms around you. He buried his face in your neck, releasing a shaky breath that cascaded like a warm wind down your skin. You hugged him back as best you could with two hands full of pie, trying to comfort him as his shoulders started to shake. He pulled himself together quickly, pinching the bridge of his nose to dam the tears. “Thank you for this.”

“Oh, don't thank me yet,” you smiled, handing him a piece of pie, “we haven't even gotten to the best part.”

You all but skipped back into the living area, taking two couch cushions and tossing them on the floor by the fire pit. With the few button presses, the fire and projector both kicked to life. Bones stood, neck craned up to the ceiling as he took a bite of pie.

You patted the cushion next to you. “It’ll be easier if you lie down.”

“Mm, sugar, you can’t just say things like that,” Bones teased as he put his plate on the floor and settled down next to you. Your legs brushed, sending a shock up your body and putting your brain on red alert again. You grabbed the PADD next to you and shut the lights off to hide your nerves.

The room was plunged into near darkness, lifted only by the small fire crackling by your feet and the stars smattered against the ceiling. Bones stared in awe.

“That’s…”

“Cepheus,” you offered. “And Lynx over there.” You pointed to a patch of stars near the Big Dipper.

“No, that’s...that’s the view from my parents’ house. How did you…” Bones’ voice trailed off again as he turned his head to look at you. You shrugged.

“I called your parents and told them you were homesick. They said you used to stargaze whenever you got restless.”

“Yeah, it...It was Jo’s favorite. She could name damn near every constellation before her sixth birthday. Said one day she’d join me up here.”

“Oh,” you said, shooting up straight, “that reminds me.” Bones watched you jam a few buttons on your PADD before handing it over to him. The screen lit up as a video call connected. You weren’t sure who was holding their breath harder, you or Leonard.

Bones exhaled first, laughing as the call finally connected, revealing Jo’s smiling face beaming up on him. She sat on his parents’ porch, wrapped in a sweater and a blanket. She turned the camera up to the sky. “See Daddy! We’re not that far apart! I can see the same stars as you.”

His shoulders shook as he covered a sob with another laugh. “You’re right, pumpkin. Can you remind me what they’re all called?”

Jo let out a tired sigh, as if she were the adult and Leonard the child gnawing on her patience. “Did you forget again, Daddy?”

“Well, I can’t help that you got all the brains. I’ll do my best to remember this time.”

“Fine,” Jo said, turning the camera back to the sky. Her small hand poked into frame, pointing at a collection of stars. “This one’s Gemini because it looks like two people.  That one’s the Big Dipper, because it looks like a spoon. The Little Dipper looks like a spoon, too, but it’s little. That’s why it’s called the Little Dipper.” Jo continued her explanation and Bones set the PADD beside him, watching the ceiling as if Jo were beside him. Tears reflected the light in his eyes, making them look like a galaxy you wanted to get lost in.

Suddenly, his eyes shifted to you, the brightest star in the room. He slipped his hand in yours and mouthed the words “Thank you.” You simply smiled in response, shifting closer to him. The fire crackled beside you and the smell of roasted pecans filled the room as Jo continued her explanation, and, while he didn’t consider himself a very religious person, Bones finally caught a glimpse of his personal heaven.

Tags: 

@8bit-arc-reactor @jimtkirkisabitch @sjlovestory @kristaparadowski @outside-the-government @martinawalker @thevalesofanduin @goingknowherewastaken @thefanficfaerie @brooke-taylor0323 @slither-in-a-half @cuddlememerrick @reading-in-moonlight​ @resistance-is-futile81

[gumnut-logic]

The Bellini Incident (Part Six)

Title: The Bellini Incident

Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four | Part Five | Part Six

Author: Gumnut

Apr 2019

Fandom: Thunderbirds Are Go 2015/ Thunderbirds TOS

Rating: Teen

Summary: Kayo was going to kill him.

Word count: 2288

Spoilers & warnings: Virgil/Kayo, Virgil!whump with a side order of Scott!whump.

Timeline: Standalone, not Rain Series.

Author’s note: For @soniabigcheese who threw the prompt at me, and @i-am-chidorixblossom who suggested some Virgil whump. Scott got a bit whumped, too, I’m branching out as a writer, blame @scribbles97.(And thanks to her for the read throughs :D )

The prompt: The character who doesn’t realize they’ve been hurt trying to see if everyone else is okay only to slowly realize that everyone is looking at them with mounting horror. Then they touch their side to find it’s wet and oh no…

Why do I do this? Stuff happens, I hope you enjoy it :D

Disclaimer: Mine? You’ve got to be kidding. Money? Don’t have any, don’t bother.

-o-o-o-

“Mr Tracy!”

Virgil startled out of sleep. The voice was sharp and authoritative.

“I told you to rest in bed. Do I need to list the complications of an untreated concussion? The possibilities for disablement should the injury worsen?”

“I’m just sitting at his bedside.” Scott.

Virgil frowned.

“Honest, Doc, he hasn’t been doing anything but sitting there.” Gordon.

“We’re just waiting for him to wake up.” Alan.

“I know you are worried about your brother, Scott. But you must take care of yourself. That was no low-grade concussion you received. You need bed rest. Especially after the strain from this morning. It is late. Rest.”

The woman’s voice had gone from anger to pleading in one paragraph. Obviously, she had become familiar with his brother.

“Scott, do as she tells you.” His voice came out as a rasp.

“Virgil?”

He didn’t need to open his eyes to know he suddenly had everyone’s attention. A hand wrapped around his.

A frown and he pushed his eyelids up, finding exactly what he expected minus one very important person.

“Where’s Kay?”

He turned his head slightly to his left and found Scott sitting beside his bed. The man was pale. Virgil’s frown deepened. “Scott?”

“Virgil?” It wasn’t his brother speaking. The doctor moved around the bed and approached him. He blinked. He’d seen her before. His eyelids closed on him and he had to open them again. “How are you feeling?”

“Tired.” Another involuntary blink. “Where’s Kay?” Another frown. “Where’s John?”

“I’m here.” John’s voice came from the corner of the room. Gordon moved aside and Virgil saw his brother sitting up against the wall manipulating his tablet and a hologram. “Kayo is on the ground doing the necessary footwork to get this bastard.”

“What?!” He tried to sit up, but several hands held him down. A gasp as he was reminded why he was in a hospital bed. “‘S not safe!”

“She’s fine, Virgil. She has IR security with her.”

“Still not safe.” His heart rate was up. Worry clawed through his mind.

“Virgil?” That doctor woman again.

“What?”

“I need to check you over.”

The hand holding his tightened. He frowned and found it was Alan clinging to him. His little brother was almost as pale as Scott. “Alan?”

“Maybe you should do what the doctor asks as well.”

Another involuntary blink. “Kay...”

“She will be fine.”

He turned his head back to Scott. “You should be in bed. You look horrible.”

“Pot, kettle, Virg.”

“Yeah, but I’m already in bed. Do as you are told.” A frown. “Where’s Grandma? She can kick your ass.” God, he was tired.

“Virgil.” The doctor patiently drew his attention again.

The woman had very pale blue eyes. Quite lovely contrasting against her dark hair, porcelain skin, like a painting.

She blinked. “I hope you’re not referring to a Picasso, Mr Tracy.” But her lips were curving into a smile. “Now let’s see how you are.”

There were pokes and prods, a touch to his forehead and his blood pressure was taken. Didn’t nurses usually do that?

“I’m afraid you are under strong security arrangements, Mr Tracy. Usual doesn’t apply.”

Alan was still holding his hand.

“You are always so entertaining when you’re on the hard stuff, Virg.”

“Shut up, Gordon.” His eyes suddenly closed of their own accord and he had to force them open again. “Scott, bed.”

“Virg-“

“Now.” He winced. “Before I make you.”

His brother sighed and with a touch to Virgil’s arm, stood up.

A frown as he swayed. “Damn it, Scott!”

“I’m fine.” But he put a hand to his head and the doctor and Gordon grabbed him. His protests petered off as they dragged him around Virgil’s bed to his own. Virgil didn’t let his breath out until his brother was as prone as he. He watched Scott close his eyes with relief.

Alan still hadn’t let go of Virgil’s hand, but his worried gaze was now on his eldest brother.

“Allie, it’s going to be okay.”

His little brother turned to him and pained blue eyes hit him hard. “It is not okay, Virgil. You were shot.”

“I’m still here.”

“That bastard wants you dead.”

“I’m not dead.”

“Yet.”

“Alan!” Gordon stalked over to his brother. “We can’t afford to think like that. John and Tin will find proof. We’ll take him down.”

Alan’s hand tightened around his again. Virgil squeezed his brother’s smaller fingers. “It will be okay.” A second and he was pulling his little brother down into a one-armed hug. “It will be okay.”

The younger man submitted to the awkward embrace and Virgil hoped it provided even a little reassurance. He couldn’t help but feel he was lying through his teeth. Kay was out there. His Kay.

Alan pulled away suddenly. “Virgil? What did you say?”

“Huh?” His eyelids dropped of their own accord again and he had to force them up to look at his brother. He let out a breath. God, he hated this.

“Don’t sweat it, bro. We’ve all seen it before. You is a dopey dog on da drugs.” Gordon’s grin split his face and spoke of blackmail material stocked up for the next decade.

“Shut up, Gordon.”

The doctor was standing to one side her gaze bouncing from one brother to another as the by-play jumped about the room. “I think we should probably let these two rest.”

Virgil frowned again. “Where is Grandma?”

-o-o-o-

Sally glared at Val Casey. “I thought we had an agreement.”

“Sal, don’t push it. This was unexpected and we are doing our best to remedy the situation.”

“I know it has been some time since I wore the uniform, but this does not appear to be a remedy.”

Casey sighed. “The threat uncovered by John negates moving your family immediately. That conversation led to the Network. Do you know what that means? There is enough money behind this to take out the entirety of Tracy Island and half the South Pacific with it. These bastards have their fingers in everything. International Rescue is not the only issue currently at hand.”

“International Rescue is not an ‘issue’, Val. They are my family.”

“I know!” The woman bit her lip. “They’ve angered the wrong people, Sal. People with power. You know the deal. You fought them for years.”

A sigh. Damn it, she did know it. “I had thought I had left that all behind.”

“Unfortunately, assholes in power are a worldwide phenomenon.” The colonel sighed again and put her hand on Sally’s shoulder. “Sal, Kayo is out there. We have the information John dug up. She will find the connection between Polominka and the assassin. He will go down. The boys will be safe.”

Sally straightened shrugging off the other woman’s hand from her shoulder. “How? You said it yourself, this goes beyond Polominka. The man’s an idiot, but he has lit a fire. He’s obviously thrown money at the right people to get what he wants done, done. You need to kill this and kill it now.” She glared. “And I find it very interesting that despite everything we still have to dig ourselves out of this. Where the hell is Rigby?”

“Rigby is on it.”

“He better be or Penelope will have him. She and Parker are not any happier than I am.”

“I have no doubt.”

“You promised, Val. You signed the agreement. The damned world government signed the agreement. International Rescue operates to save lives. All you have to do is protect six so they can do what they need to do.”

“I know that, Sally. Believe me, I do.”

“Well, prove it or I will do it myself.”

Brown eyes caught hers. “That will not be necessary.”

“I define ‘necessary’, Val, and believe me, I will follow through if ‘necessary’. I’m not completely out of the game, I have contacts.”

“Sal-“

“No.” She held up a hand. “This is my family, Colonel.” She spat the rank. “I will do what I have to do.”

“Very well.” But the woman’s lips were thinned with displeasure. “Rigby will be in contact.”

“I can’t wait.” Sally turned. stalked out of the room and slammed the door.

She had grandchildren to attend to.

-o-o-o-

Every town had a place like this. An establishment tucked into a corner, hidden in an alleyway. The graffiti on the door was stylised, a little too stylised to be the real thing, planted like the paint over one of the windows and the scratching that had half peeled it off.

It was an ‘in’ place, a trendy drinking spot that claimed to be one thing while actually being completely another. It tried to look rough, low on the IQ scale, but was actually smart in all the dark places.

The sign above the sill said ‘O’Connors’ in roman letters. Beside it was a spray-painted Japanese scrawl that basically said ‘All comers’.

Kayo stepped through the door; her tight jeans low on her hips. Her equally high cut shirt left her navel to sparkle in the dim light, her emerald piercing a silent reminder of why she was here and the man she needed to protect.

And what would that man say if he could see her now? Her dark hair was now a deep red, plaits mixed with ringlets cascading over her shoulders. Her eyes were pale blue and she wore dark green lipstick to match her long green nails. She was a sight that might have set Virgil laughing or lusting. She wasn’t sure which.

Aiden was already in the bar. An unassuming bearded individual faking one too many drinks over in the far corner. Jo would be entering two minutes after her, pink in her hair and hanging off Chu as if he was the love of her life. The two definitely had a relationship, but it was one of sparring rivalry that often led to bruises.

This was Kayo’s front-line team. Three trusted friends who had trained with her, known her and her father for a long time. They were IR security before there was an IR.

She called them in the moment Virgil was safe.

Walking up to the drink service, she asked politely in Japanese for a mineral water and once delivered, she holed up at a table in a dim corner and awaited her contact.

Exactly two minutes later, Chu and Jo laughed through the door and planted themselves on the far side of the room going all out and ordering a meal.

The room was full of people.

Most appeared to be locals, some were definitely not. Japanese outnumbered other peoples, but there were still a fair few westerners dotted amongst the crowd.

She waited, eyeing her phone.

Three men entered the establishment several minutes after her friends. A split-second assessment summed them up as dangerous. The man in the middle scanned the crowd, his eyes brushing across her as if she was nothing of interest.

She wanted to be nothing of interest.

“Kim?” The young woman who sat down opposite her was not what she expected. White blonde hair, porcelain Japanese complexion. A small tattoo of a bird high up on one cheek. “You are looking for someone?” Flawless Japanese as expected, but the smile on her face was suspect.

“I am.”

“I could be your someone.” Her tongue brushed over her lips as she smiled.

“And you are?”

She shrugged. “Useful.” A pause. “You GDF?”

“Of a kind.”

“The bad kind?” The smile turned smug.

“Depends who you speak to.”

“Oh, I’ve spoken to a lot of people.” Again with the smile. “Some say you’re not GDF. Some say you are worth so much more.”

Kayo frowned. “Some people have no idea what they are talking about.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that.” The woman leant back and her smile growing more confident by the moment. “Why’d you come here?”

“I need Network access and what I can offer in return is to your benefit.”

The woman leant forward. “Do tell me, what can you offer me, Ms Kayo Kyrano?”

She didn’t blink, but her heart sank. “At this point, that is entirely up to you.”

“Kayo, get out of there now.” John’s voice was little more than a whisper in her ear, but she couldn’t agree more. This end was a dead one.

The woman’s eyes sparkled. “So, you are open to negotiation?”

Kayo kept a straight face. “What are you offering?”

That sickly smile turned into a grin, her tongue teased between her teeth. “Oh, your boyfriend. Word is he is worth a lot of money...dead.”

Do not react.

John yelled in her ear. “Kayo, there is movement in the alley behind, get out of there!”

Aiden had climbed to his feet and was wobbling between tables, a haphazard trajectory that no doubt would end up in her lap before he made it to the bar.

Useful sighed and raised a single finger.

Aiden collapsed where he stood. Several people gasped, crowding around him.

“You don’t really think we wouldn’t identify your companions, did you?” On the far side Jo and Chu were limp at their table. Dead or unconscious, Kayo did not know. How?

“Ms Kyrano, did you think a history with your petty criminal uncle put you in the big league? This was far too easy.” The woman leant back and crossed her legs. A finger toyed with her lips. “Far too easy. I do hope your dear Virgil is more of a foe or this could just get boring.”

Kayo stared at her, her calm slowly beginning to crack.

The woman waved her hand. “Take her.”

Something bit Kayo in the neck, and the world went dark.

-o-o-o-

End Part Six.

[bellatrixobsessed1]

Of Farms Fairs And Fame (Part 18)

It was both strange and thrilling to hear her music on the radio. Her own voice cutting through the static. She wasn’t quite sure how she felt about it. For as much as she loved singing, she didn’t know that she liked hearing the sound of her own voice. Not coming from a radio anyhow.  Especially, knowing that it would end with hearing herself choke up. She supposed that it was something that she was just going to have to get used to. Ideally it would be happening more often.

Iroh offered to her, a kind smile. “Congratulations, niece. Your mother would have it, she always did like that kinda song”

“She did?”

Iroh nodded. “She was a musical woman ‘erself.”

“You sing like her.” Ozai cut in. “Almos’ exactly like her.”

Azula swallowed and nodded, not know quite how to take the news. She made herself comfy near the window. Sokka and Katara would be there soon and hopefully Mai and TyLee in tow. As she had hoped, the lot of them would be decorating the house together. It was so large she couldn’t see it getting done without a few extra hands.

Sokka and Katara lived the closest to her, so it came as a surprise when TyLee rang the door first. It was a struggle for her  to do so with the crutches in the way, but she leaned in to give Azula an awkwardly angled hug. “I heard yer song on the radio!” She gushed. “It’s so purtty ‘n sad but breathtaking ‘n lovely at the same time.”

“Thank you, Ty.” Azula helped the girl into a chair. “Window’s fine, right?”

TyLee nodded. “I love lookin’ at the snow. Winter’s my favorite.”

“Well, I know that. You’ve only been sayin’ that since we were kids.” Azula paused. “So, how’s yer leg.”

TyLee stared down at it. “Well, my doctor said that it should be healed pretty soon.” And with more glee she added, “Only a few more weeks.”

Her optimism was precious, yet the smile on Azula’s face couldn’t last. She wasn’t one for apologies but one was escaping her lips before she could hold it back. Somehow she felt awful for having achieved her dream after obliterating TyLee’s, accident or not.

“What are you appologizin’ fer?” TyLee asked.

“ You ain’t win because of me.”

“The county fair comes ‘round every year. It was a lil’ crazy with my family hostin’ it anyways.” TyLee shrugged. “‘Sides, Mai told me about a competition that ain’t local that happens in the spring. I’m gonna go fer that.”

“You’ll have to invite me.” Azula smiled. “I promise I won’t ruin it this time.”  

Once again, Azula found TyLee’s arms around her torso. “Of course you can come. I wouldn’t wanna compete without you watchin’.”

She heard the doorbell. Before she could stand, Zuko was at the door.

“They’re jus’ on time fer tea ‘n cookies.” Azula heard Iroh call from in the kitchen. Enthusiasm oozed in his tone, the man had been waiting all year to break out his holiday assortment of teas, which mostly consisted of mint mixes.

.oOo.

Katara was generous enough to drive that time around, in fact, the girl was rather insistent upon it. Their mother’s warning was probably fresh in her mind. Not that he could tell by looking at the light little flurries, but apparently they were in for a blizzard. The forecasters had been calling for it all night.

At the moment, the weather wasn’t too terrible, and the roads were pretty drivable. Kya made the both of them promise that if the roads became particularly icy, that they would just spend the night with Azula’s family. From the looks of it, they wouldn’t have the need. Though no green could be seen beneath a blanket of pure white, the roads were plowed well enough.

Katara hopped out of her car, she had to be the only person in their whole town who didn’t have herself a truck. She made her way to the trunk and pulled out their tin of cookies. Ma’s special winter recipe, the one she had yet to pass down to either of her children.

Sokka knocked on the door. Completely expecting it to be Azula standing there, he threw his arms around the person who answered.

“I’m happy to see you too, Sokka.” Zuko rolled his eyes. “Though I was expectin’ Mai.”

Sokka flushed and rubbed the back of his head. He could hear Katara’s bursting laughter behind him and his face felt that much hotter. “I were expectin’ yer sister.”  

“She’s with TyLee in the livin’ room.” Zuko pointed. “Once Mai gets here we can start on decoratin’.”

“I refuse to hang the lights up.” Azula declared.

“That’s dad’s job anyways.” Zuko shrugged.

Sokka plopped himself down on the sofa next to his...was it safe to call her his girlfriend? “Yer wearin’ my hat!” He smiled.

“Yeah. You know how many folks are questionin’ my fashion choices now?” Azula mumbled, crossing her arms.

Azula was risking her reputation now. It really was true love.

.oOo.

Only thirty or so minutes in and Azula’s hands were already pulsing with cold, hell, that had started probably fifteen minutes in. Her cheeks were probably a decent shade of pink and she was sniffling to top it all off. Regardless, she hug a wreath on the barn door. Across the way, Zuko and Mai--who had arrived well into the decorating process--were lining candy canes along the driveway. Katara and TyLee were taking care of the barn and hanging a few icicle lights were they could reach without the use of a ladder.

Sokka held out a roll of tinsel made to look like ivy and holly. Azula looked upon the perimiter of their fencing and let out a soft groan. Why’d her property have to be so damn large. Walking to all four corners of it and back would be her exercise for the day.

“Ya wanna do the lights or the tinsel?”

Azula elbowed him. “Ain’t you pay attention? I said I ain’t fussin’ with the lights this year.”

He tossed her the tinsel and they worked their way from the upper righthand corner to the left, weaving tinsel and lights into the fence as they went. By the time they had that task finished the wind was beginning to pick up, spitting bursts of snow at them without mercy.

“Suppose we should git on back, ma said it was supposta get bad.” Sokka informed.

Normally she would question the man’s judgment, he wasn’t the best for gauging the weather. But this time, she had a feeling he and his ma were correct. The weather had taken a turn pretty quick.

“Kat ‘n I better git on home ‘for it gets real bad.”

“Uh-uh. Yer stayin’ right here tonight.” She didn’t save the boy from a tornado just to lose him to a different weather phenomenon. “You better not put yer sister in danger like that either.” She thought unfondly of the few times, as children, where Zuko had insisted that they stay at the park a little longer. Which had always ended up being just long enough for them to get caught within a wicked downpour.

“But Ma…”

“Can handle bein’ on her own fer the night.” Katara approached. “‘Sides, she said ta stay here if the weather got bad.”

.oOo.

Wrapped, once again, in the blankets with Azula, Sokka could say why he had put up any protest at all. The girl looked relaxed sitting before the fire with a book in one hand and Iroh’s homemade mint-chocolate tea in the other. Katara had taken it upon herself to let their ma know that they wouldn’t be home that night and that Ozai had showed them to the guest rooms already.

He listened to similar calls from TyLee and Mai respectively. The passing of an hour left them with only firelight for illumination.

“When do y’all reckon they’ll have the power back on?” Sokka asked.

“Last time it took ‘em a good week.” Zuko noted.

Mai hovered by the window, the girl hadn’t left it since they’d gotten inside, making herself into their own personal news anchor who provided life updates; “Yup, still frosty.” or “nope, no changes. No wait! Nope, still snowy.”  Most recently it was, “pretty sure we’re gonna be snowed in.”

“How deep is the snow?” Azula put her book to the side.

“Hmm.” Mai muttered. “I’d say deeper than Jet’s personality but no shallower than Chan’s.”

Azula rolled her eyes. “Thanks fer the update.”

“Anytime.” Mai mumbled, returning her gaze back to the window.

.oOo.

“Oh! If we get snowed in it will be like an extended slumber party. It’s exicitin’ don’t ya think?”  TyLee perked up.

The look on her father’s face at those words...Azula had to stifle a laugh. Her father could handle a night or two with Mai, TyLee, Sokka, and Katara but three would be pushing it. And at the rate the snow was falling, three nights snowed in wasn’t out of the realm of possibility. For herself, Azula wouldn’t mind spending that much more time with her friend, hell, she was even fine with Katara being there. It had been a good long while since they’ve had a sleepover.

“Ya think ma’ll be alright?” Sokka asked.

“A’course she will.” Katara replied. “We have plenty ‘a food left over from the harvest. She ken handle herself.”

But Azula could feel how tense Sokka still was. “It’ll be fine, Sokka.” She murmured, giving his torso a little squeeze.

“Thanks, Azula.”

She rested her head at the crook of his neck. “C’mon, this happens every winter, yer mother made it out okay then, she can do it again.” Sparing Ozai a quick glance and finding that he wasn’t paying attention, she kissed Sokka’s ear. One of these days she was going to have to get the man used to see her kissing Sokka. She’d have to wait until after the blizzard, the poor man would probably have a stress-related heart attack if she added a boyfriend onto their extended sleepover. Not that Ozai hadn’t taken note of how closely she held Sokka, but she’d let him keep his denial for the time being.

She probably wasn’t doing a very good job of hiding it though, begin as  Ozai responded to Iroh’s, “radio says we’re gonna git a few feet tanight.”  With a, “these kids are gonna drive me mad ‘for the snow reaches a foot.”

“Hey, we should all play truth or dare.” TyLee declared.

Ozai’s concern doubled.

“Spin the bottle.” Azula suggested.

Tripled.

“We should all play, got ta bed ‘n leave yer ol’ man alone.” He grumbled.

Zuko laughed. Azula was certain that the remark had even earned a chuckle from Mai, who, otherwise, still hadn’t averted her attention from the window. Frankly it was rather nice to have a break from everything, even if it was because it was too frigid for the world to not come to a standstill. As chilly as it was, Sokka was warm. She nestled closer up to him.

[sorrythatwasmean]

We’re Not Out of the Mountains Yet

They excavated Bruce out of the Hulkbuster armor and the mountain. They’re not sure how long he was trapped. It was long enough for them to fear the worst. Bruce was unconscious, barely breathing, heart barely beating, but he wasn’t dust. It was enough.

A Wakandan doctor said anyone else would’ve died. They weren’t sure how to wake him. Or if they should. What if while Bruce slept, if the Other Guy percieved it as an attack? There was too much to deal with as it was.

But then the flatline, the warning beeeeeeeep, and the medical tent staff froze. They hestitated. Get the voltage wrong, do too much and what if-if-Bruce Banner wasn’t the one who woke up?

Thor lifted his head. They were spending too much time on fear. On numbers. Science explained, but what they called magic bound them all. He could not revive the ashen heaps that remained of lost souls, but this... this he could do.

They had survived Ragnarok. Banner had not given up even when he thought Thor lost to Valhalla.

“Not yet, my friend.”

Electricity crackled from right Thor’s hand and he placed it over Bruce’s heart. Zap! One. Zap! Two. Zap! Three. At the fourth, Bruce gasped, his eyes flashed green and Thor tensed, hand still on Bruce’s chest, ready if that was who was coming, but the green faded.

Bruce blinked up at Thor. The lightning stopped crackling from his fingertips and Thor almost smiled. “Banner. Welcome back.”

Bruce tried sitting up, but Thor stopped him. “Rest.”

“What happened did…did the Other Guy…?”

Thor shook his head. He knew they’d have to break the news to Bruce, but couldn’t they have this moment?

Steve appeared at Thor’s side.“Doctor. We thought we lost you there…”

Confusion still clouded Bruce’s features.Thor wondered how many times he’d had to reassemble events from scattered memories, but this was different. The Hulk had not been on the battlefield.And no one seemed to know what to say now.

Bruce would not glean answers from silence.So, he asked, “...No Tony?”

Bruce glanced at Thor. Thor wondered if the next question forming was because Thor had returned. But he didn’t have answers either. Someone had to speak. Natasha exchanged a look with Rhodey before responding gently.“Not yet.”

Silences added up to more questions and Bruce Banner, ever the scientist, wanted answers.“What aren’t you telling me?What did I miss this time?”

“Why are all of y’all pussyfooting around this? It’s disgusting.”

Thor turned and looked down. “Rabbit—“

“Rocket. I ain’t whatever that is,”said Rocket striding in.“Have a nice nap? Where were you when we needed you?”

Bruce’s brow burrowed.“I don’t even know you—“

“I heard about you,”said Rocket pointing a finger. “On Sakaar? Big, green, powerful. We needed that and you weren’t there.This is your fault.”

“How is this—? What are you saying?“

“Your fault!”said Rocket launching himself at Bruce. The two rolled off the cot. Bruce’s hands pushed at Rocket’s face and paws, trying to avoid his claws, but Rocket kicked, too.

Steve shouted, “Knock it off!”

“I’ll-knock-him-off!”growled Rocket.”Shut it, Stars and Stripes!”

Bruce tried to shove him away, tried to roll to pin the smaller being, but Rocket was quicker and Bruce was too busy defending himself, trying to stay calm even as the scratches and blows landed. Medical tent. They were in a medical tent. It didn’t matter if the Other Guy probably wouldn’t come out. He hadn’t yet. Bruce couldn’t risk it.

A crack of lightning zapped near them. “Enough, Rocket!” said Thor pulling Rocket away by the scruff of his neck.

“Put me down!PUT-me-DOWN!No right!”

Rhodey offered Bruce a hand. Bruce stumbled back to the cot and Bruce examined the scratches on his arms. He turned to Rhodey. “He’s pissed off and it’s not about me, is it?”

“No,”said Rhodey. “It’s...”

“They’re dead. They’re ALL dead! And it’s your fault!”screamed Rocket.

Bruce wanted to ask who, but he stared at the raccoon who was tiring as Thor restrained him. Bruce tried to remember. “Where’s the—the tree?”

“Not a tree! How dare you?”

And Thor had to hold Rocket tighter as he tried squirming away again.Bruce scrambled for something to say.

“What was...” His? Her? The alien tree? Bruce settled on words not knowing how the usually plural pronoun was appropriate. “...their name?”

“...Groot. Their name was Groot,”said Rocket. And Bruce knew Rocket’s mass hadn’t changed at all, but he seemed smaller somehow.

“I’m sorry,”said Bruce.”If I could’ve...I tried...I did. I don’t know what’s happening with us.”

Rocket’s gaze lingered on the handle of Stormbreaker. And the flash of another memory. We are Groot. Rocket finally met Bruce’s gaze. “...Us? Like ‘we’?”

Bruce thought maybe it was a yes. He didn’t know what was happening here with any of them.But that wasn’t what he meant.The Other Guy hadn’t abandoned him. Bruce felt that familiar flare of fire beneath his skin, that uneasiness and dull ache of being on the verge of turning, but it wasn’t going anywhere and he didn’t know how to calm it. And he wasn’t the only one holding it back. Bruce didn’t know what the hell the Other Guy was doing. But that seemed too difficult to untangle here in front of everyone and Rocket.

“Yes. No. The green guy and me. We... I-“

“Still kicked ass without him...”said Rocket sniffing a little in Thor’s arms.“...you in your tin can suit. I saw.”

“Not enough ass kicking, then.”

“A lot of that goin’ around,”said Rocket. He elbowed Thor a little. “I’m not gonna bite him. Put me down.”

“Maybe I just enjoy hugging angry friends...”said Thor still holding Rocket.

“Shut up.”

Thor set him down. Rocket waved a hand. “Quit staring and someone show me where the food is. I’m hungry.”

“Thanks for not biting me,”said Bruce.He touched his lip and a spot of blood was on his fingertips.”And I’d wash your hands before you eat.”

“Why’s that?”said Rocket stopping in front of the tent flap.

“My blood’s a biohazard.”

“No shit?” said Rocket. “Let’s make sure I don’t turn green.”

“I could eat,”said Steve joining Thor and Rocket.

“I told y’all I ain’t gonna bite anyone,”said Rocket as he lifted the tent flap.”You don’t have to chaperone...”

“Okay. I don’t trust you,”said Steve. “You might have rabies. Might attack everyone.”

“Smarter than you look and I’m insulted. Don’t know what rabies is, but it sounds like bull, Stars and Stripes...”said Rocket as they left.

Rhodey and Natasha did almost smile at that. Rhodey waited until Rocket was out of earshot. “Am I allowed to tell Tony when he comes back that you didn’t defend Veronica’s honor?”

“You’re worried about the hulkbuster’s honor?”said Bruce. “What about me?”

“Raccoon called it a ‘tin can’ and you didn’t say anything. Get your head and those scratches checked out,”said Rhodey. He glanced at Natasha. Then, he looked at Bruce. “Where did all the doctors run off to?I’ll find somebody.Hang on.”

“What? Why? I’m fine.“ said Bruce as if he hadn’t just warned a talking raccoon about his blood, but Rhodey was already bee-lining to the other end of the tent where there were a couple of doctors and nurses.

Bruce cleared his throat and tried to look at his arm fully aware Natasha was the only one left at his cot.

“Guess no one wanted to tell me what happened, then. You could’ve left, too.” He met her gaze. And he knew Ultron and Clint’s house was years ago for her, but Hulk had piloted for much of that. And Bruce couldn’t help it even if he’d never unraveled that thread between them. “Missed your window.”

Natasha tucked her hair behind her ear. And Bruce didn’t know if his words had registered. She was a spy. Or she had been. She was hard to read.Natasha stayed where she was. “You know what happened. You tried to warn us.”

Bruce tried to steel himself, but it had to be asked.“Who?”

“We’re still trying to figure that out,”said Natasha crossing her arms.”But...Bucky. Sam. T’Challa. Wanda. Vision. And I’m not counting the ones who weren’t dust.”

“Dust?Like ashes to ashes? Dust to dust?”

“You didn’t see it?”said Natasha.

“Guess I miss things even when I don’t have to worry about the Other Guy.”

“Maybe he was still trying to protect you.” Natasha stepped closer.

Bruce didn’t know. “He’s not saying.”

“We lost you for a moment there.But here you are. That’s good.”

“Longer than a moment.” Thor had said two years, but Bruce wasn’t sure how long ago that was. It all blended together: Ultron, Sokovia, bits and pieces of Sakaar until he’d come to in the quinjet in the middle of a space-dump heap, Ragnarok, and now the dusting of the universe.

“I meant...not that,”said Natasha shifting her weight from one foot to the other. “I meant...”

“Just now. Not then?”

“Maybe I meant both. I don’t know.” Natasha sat on the cot next to him.“Thor said you were stuck. What’s the last thing you remember?”

Bruce didn’t know why she was asking. And he wasn’t sure he wanted to answer that or if it was even true. Maybe it wasn’t the last time he was himself. Maybe it was just what he wanted to remember.

“Sokovia. You asked if I had a key. I shot the cell doors open and--” Right. The kiss. And...

“I pushed you away,” she said. Pushed him off a ledge. And Hulk leapt back out. If she was reading his thoughts or if he was just that easy to read,she was focusing on the wrong thing. Bruce shook his head.

“Maybe I needed a push.You--all of you needed the Other Guy.” Hell. Bruce had jumped out of an alien spaceship in front of a gigantic alien wolf named Fenrir to coax Hulk out.Natasha had meant well. Betrayed for the right reasons? He’d rather that then what other people had done to him. “I’m sorry. I know it’s been longer for all of you.”

“But that means for you, it’s been shorter.You're apologizing again. Why? This was Thanos. Not you. Big Guy stealing a quinjet then getting sucked into space somehow? That wasn’t you.”

“It was and it wasn’t.”

“It’s complicated,”said Natasha.

“It always has been.”

“Not sure I know any other way to live,”she said with a shrug.”Who has simple? No one.”

“Can’t run from that. Hulk tried. Look what happened.And we’re not out of the mountains yet, are we?”

“We freed you from one. But no, plenty of mountains. Mission just means more now.”

Rhodey was coming back with a hesitant huddle of medical professionals. Natasha stood. “Gotta let them make you pretty again.”

“Not a fan of bruised Banner?” He would’ve winked, but his cheek hurt too.

“I’m sure dying and getting attacked by raccoons is exhausting so I’ll forgive the pun.”

“Living, you mean.Living is exhausting.”

“All the more reason to let them make you pretty again and get your beauty sleep.” She waved at Rhodey. “Take care of him.”

Rhodey shook his head. “I’m the only one doing that. I got the doctors.” He turned back to Bruce.“ ‘Bruised Banner’? Really?”

Bruce definitely smiled at knowing he’d caught that.“Ow.”

“See even your body hates that pun.”