#the back up man

[inkskinned]

you said you were stuck in a time loop, which was fine. i feel like late-stage capitalism has us all in a time loop, ammiright? you came barging in at 5:33. in the morning. i hadn't even processed the idea of coffee.

but you had this look of utter panic in your eyes. terror like the ocean. you grabbed my cheeks. im in a time loop.

i don't know why in movies the first reaction is to deny it. when someone is panicking like that, it's not appropriate to ask them to calm down. it didn't matter if i believed it, what mattered was that you believed it so much that it was consuming you.

so here we are. i pour you some of the dark roast. "you look like utter and entire hell," i say.

you push your fingers into your eyes. "you always say that."

i try to think of something funny to say that i wouldn't have said on previous time loops, but jokes don't land without the proper timing (lol). "remind me to think -"

"-yeah, of a joke that only works in the future. and before you say anything, i know you're pissed i just stole your punchline." you bolt the coffee, which is wild. it's very hot. you don't seem to notice.

i blow on mine to cool it down. i both am very pissed at you and also i can't see you in this amount of panic without wanting to help. but i'm also not really sure what we are, not since i saw you kiss her like that, no offense. it just was like, kind of rude when you knew i liked you.

and besides. i'm just like, barely a person. i write omegaverse fanfiction. i love the concept of a time loop, but what the fuck am i gonna do? send an alpha in there? i open my mouth.

you point at me. "you're about to ask why me. and then say some disparaging shit about yourself. i'm just a nerd who plays dnd or something. that self-own is slightly different each time." you sigh. "i know you think you can't really help me. i don't know who can help me. i only came to you because you fucking believe me." you check your watch, sigh, and throw your head back. you cover your eyes with one hand. "i've come here on 26 separate revolutions," you say. "you have believed me every time. and yeah, i have no idea how you fit into this but i just -" you sigh again. "i just like fucking talking to someone about it."

"do you need more cof-" i start, but you're already holding the empty cup out. i frown at it. "you're not getting any more until you promise not to bolt this one like an animal."

you laugh a little and sit up, pushing your hair out of your face. "okay, that's new dialogue. but to be fair to you, i'm not usually this rude. i'm still pretty new at all of this." you check your watch again. another sigh. i guess you're cruising for a personal best in the Sigh Olympics.

i almost tell you im not an NPC but i've played enough video games to know i'm very much an NPC. i pour you another cup. "so what happens in the loop?"

"really bad explosion." you mutter into the mug. you put your elbows on the table (rude) and bury your face in your arms like an angsty teenager. one hand floats up while you talk, because evidently you literally can't talk without your hands. "i have to save the day and there's this bomb and i have no bomb training and it keeps moving, you know."

"do i die?"

you peek up from your arms. "yeah. bigtime. you keep trying to run or stay or do anything and you always super die."

"oh."

"to be fair, like, everyone dies in it though.... so you're in good company."

i hate that you make me laugh. i hate that being around you always feels tingly and strange, this electric tension between us. something that is evidently (given how you stuck your tongue down a stranger's throat literally 3 days ago) (well. 3 for me) super one-sided. i take a sip of my coffee and close my eyes.

i die today, i guess. a little spark of panic starts at the top of my hands and starts whipping up my wrists.

"shit," you say. you look at your watch and jump to your feet. "i have to go. if i can come back, i will. i am still trying to figure out when is best to do everything, you know? the order of stuff. maybe morning isn't good for us."

i look up at you and think about how you keep kissing me in the back of my car and in alleyways and in the dark. and i can never fucking get a read on you. and i also think about how incredibly panicked you look. how broken. how long have you been doing this? "i don't want to die," i say.

you glance downwards. "well, you're not really dead, you'll come back in the loop."

"but i will have died." my hands are shaking. i am trying really hard to stay calm.

you push your hands through your hair again. "i really have to go. i will have this discussion with the next version of you, though. it is like, something i am thinking about."

"but i don't get a next version," i say. i don't really have the language for this, because i haven't had 26 tries with you. i only have my memories: you, a week ago. drunk and telling me you loved me in my ear. you, kissing her anyway. you, months ago, throwing up on my birthday, whispering to me i ruin everything i touch, always, over and over. please don't ask. i can't ever fucking have that be you.

i run my finger along the rim of the mug. "i don't want to die in this one."

you seem baffled by this. "i get that but - time will reset, you'll be fine, you won't even remember we talked about this."

"but i know now." i stand up too. "i have to live the rest of this day knowing i could die. knowing i probably am going to."

"you could always die, to be fair."

i feel my hands get out of control. "earlier, you said i always say a different insult about myself. what if you're just going through different parallel universes and those are all just different - but real - versions of myself? what if you're not in a time loop, you're in a fucking universe loop?"

"if it helps, i've wondered this too. also, you're hot in all of them. if that helps."

i point at you. "no flirting. i'm trying to figure out if i die today."

"who's flirting?" you catch my wild hands and give me that long, perfect smile. like we're in this together. "i won't let ya die." you check your watch and sigh again. "well. maybe not this time."

i grit my teeth. you are so not making quips at me while i try to explain the existential dread i'm having. "does the time loop reset if i fucking kill you?"

"honestly i don't know how long it continues after i die, because i just wake up. it could be that the loop goes until the explosion for everyone, and we're all in the loop, or it could be that when i die, the loop restarts. when i die i wake up, is all."

i pull away from you and stalk into the kitchen and start doing all 3 of my dishes. "okay, first, you know i was joking. and secondly, this is exactly my point. you don't know if this is just a parallel universe. maybe in the ones where you died, the explosion happened and nobody reset and it's just you travelling." i have to stop and push the heel of my palm into my eyeball. "... how often have you died?"

i look at you. you look at me. you give me this very sad, halfway smile and a little what can ya do shrug. something in that action seems so old and weary that i want to burst into tears.

"i have to go," you say. "really. for real. there's this family of five i save from getting into a car crash. and i know it's like oh but we're all gonna die in the explosion anyway, what's the point. and..." you shrug again. "it matters to me, is all. at least i saved them for now. at least i saved anything."

you pad over to me and wrap me in a tight hug. you always seem so tall against me. i feel your cheek rest against the top of my head for a moment. for a second, it's just us, and the space is warm, and my heart is a little broken hare.

you leave me there, and i stand in my stupid badly lit kitchen with my stupid mugs. i think about you. i start texting my mom that she needs to get out of the city, but it feels pointless.

i don't know what to do. tomorrow is the same day for you. but i have to prepare to die in my today.

[logicallyblind]

something there’s a distinct lack of in batman fanfics, especially ‘brucie wayne’ centred ones is the networking he’d have to be doing on the daily to maintain that sorta reputation

like, we all know the man knows how to throw a gala but where are the brunches? the happy hour gossip session with his cover’s clique of the week? the golf club dinners he has to attend every third week of the month? what about visits to hospitals or schools or the soup kitchens for his philanthropy? come on now

you’re telling me he’s the most sought after celebrity in gotham city and beyond, an infamous playboy and supposed extroverted people person who can use long holidays that can last weeks at a time away in tropical islands supposedly partying it up as a plausible excuse to hide his injuries sometimes but when he’s in gotham he’s either at wayne enterprise meetings or tucked away at home alone? nah

i want to see bruce having to really utilise those meditation breathing skills he learned in the league while he’s having to sit upright in a chair with 4 broken ribs, a sprained wrist and a minor concussion in a painfully bright restaurant at 3pm on a wednesday having to listen to bethany-anne titter on about the latest gossip about her neighbours affair with the maid that’s basically an open secret by now like pls there’s so many different routes you can go with this depending on the genre,,, make bruce have to REALLY commit to that cover of his lmao

[duckysprouts]

if you were at your worst, if you’re a villain or a screwup or whatever, there is a goth man dressed as a giant bat who keeps coming after you, bothering you. he sabotages your journey of self destruction over and over. ur ready to give up but he won’t let you. you think, today he won’t come. today he will give up on me too. he never does.

[liquidstar]

Yes, Greece still exists, we didn't all die 2000 years ago. Yes, people speak Greek. You people are so fucking stupid for real. So many of you claim to love ancient shit but can't even acknowledge the actual living culture of the people whose mythology and classics you romanticize. You keep leaving annoying comments about how you just forget Greek people still exist, thinking you're being quirky because you love ancient stuff soooo much that you forgot about the people it came from. You think about it so little you don't even realize that an actual Greek person has to read this shit, making it clear how little you actually care about the culture beyond the romanticized (and westernized) mythology. Don't claim you love Greece, don't use our mythology anymore if you can't acknowledge that we're still around without making it about how little you think about us. It's mind boggling that you'd think a Greek person would read this and think you're anything but obnoxious. Explode.

[chloesimaginationthings]

The Vanessas and Mikes if they met sooner in FNAF..

[egophiliac]

you know, I've been thinking about it, and there is actually one single scenario in which I would be okay with not getting a big ol' "Silver Vanrouge" out of Lilia.

(just kidding, I still need some "call me Silver, Mr. Vanrouge is my father" in my life, please don't let me down on this one Twst)

[dinzeeyz]

Dawggggggggg look at these miners

[itsmeglycine]

[a-dumb-sarcastic-bisexual]

Like the majority of society I’m obsessed with Nimona

And I rewatched it a million times and one thing always sticks out to me 

There are moments when Ambrosius is surrounded by light like a little protective bubble 

That keeps him away from the man he loves more than anything 

[tiger-grace]

I think Alfred is constantly dreaming about retirement but is shackled by the knowledge that he is the glue holding this barely functional family together

Alfred: sir I really don’t think

Bruce: why not. why should I not invest millions into funding a therapy corporation that Jason will ACTUALLY be able to trust

Alfred: quite honestly sir I think if it says “wayne” on it he’s 10 times less likely to go

Tim and Damian kicking the hell out of eachother rolling around on the floor: (unintelligible screaming, glass breaking, various cartoon crashing sound effects)

Alfred: (stares into batcamera like he’s in an office episode with several decades worth of exhaustion)

[han-ban-bam]

how many of their dates do u think end up like this.

[inkskinned]

okay is she being actually immature or is it just a woman over 30 expressing a human experience you find to be immature.

like yeah. at certain ages... let shit go. im not defending the real immature shit. im not defending the karen you're picturing. i worked in retail i hate those people too. (once somebody got mad at me because she didn't like how our winter window decor was a snowman smoking a pipe. i wish i was joking).

but men at 57 will write books about how 17 year old girls are soooo sexy. they will invent worlds where women have to be naked for "armor reasons." they will write songs that treat women as objects. people rush to defend them. meanwhile a woman at 35 will be like "heartbreak is hard, actually" or "i feel betrayed by a friend" or "i am struggling with something emotionally." immediately people will say stuff like this woman is 35 by the way. by the way this woman is SO OLD to be experiencing this. BY THE WAY.

im 31, almost 32. the other day a poet was blasted online because at her "big age", she had written a poem about feeling unloved. top comment was "this woman is 29 by the way." this woman is too old to still be useful, by the way. she has to behave better . maybe if she was a good wife and mother she could stop existing loudly, and the story could continue on without her. this woman has served her purpose, by the way. she's so cringe, by the way. at 29 - so old! - she still hasn't figured out that her existence should be one of shame.

[zan0tix]

ALPHA KIDS: Draw your best friends!

DIRK: I'd say I'm better at one on one character interaction work of the more intimate variety, but I think this piece came together nicely. DIRK: Fun for the whole family style wholesomeness, any motherfucker in the radius of a screen displaying this image will instantly get hit with a sore case of heartburn and their tear ducts will clock in overtime at the weeping factory.

ROXY: im so proud of these i think these are my best designs yet :3 but omg dirk callie and jake were SOOO peculiar about their damn designs over my shoulder. jake wanted me to clarify that even in pink pen form his little guy is BLUE. so there. sigh this is the one occasion they could take notes from janey.. JUST LET LE ARTIST WORK!

JANE: Boy! I don't draw often but I always was fond of calligraphy growing up. I was kind of inspired by all of the other's works, but especially Calliope's swirls she puts in her art. It's very fun to add!

JAKE: Im not quite the best with posing, but i find the head very fun to study! Especially skulls.. so good ole calliope makes for the perfect muse! (hehe)

CALLIOPE: i realized i hadn't ever made a piece with Us in the same place at once. u_u CALLIOPE: bUt since it's reality now here's all of Us together, United at last! ^u^

==->

[paintedcrows]

Introducing RoyalAuthor! ...I cannot stop thinking about these old man scientists...

[thecmaly]

can't even cat nap in peace 😾

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more windbreaker comics

[time-woods]

sleeping habits