#the icon is her holding a bloody knife so

[regularshcw]

regina tag dump ! ( aka uh oh gamers )

🪓 regina // ic / i'll get my revenge on the world ; or a least forty-nine percent of the people in it 🪓 regina // musings / winning the fight is worth the chance of losing it 🪓 regina // likes / aesthetic / you're so easy to read but the book is boring me 🪓 regina // about / if you're going to die then die. if you're going to live then fight 🪓 regina // starter call / i only sleep with people i love. that's why i have insomnia 🪓 regina // music / intelligent girls are more depressed because they know the world 🪓 regina // visage / why can i never go back to bed ? whose is the voice ringing in my head ?

[angelfevr]

[id: a moodboard. there's text outlined in red on the far right that reads, "girl anachronism." a subheading below that in black reads, "safe end au."

there's text below that that reads, "embedded in the mud, glistening green and gold and black, was a butterfly, very beautiful, and very dead. -ray bradbury, a sound of thunder."

below that are icons of akane kurashiki, aoi kurashiki, and junpei. they're derived from art used for the novelization of 999. there's a purple filter on akane's with a shadow behind her, a blue filter for aoi, and a red one for junpei, with a similar shadow border.

below the icons are picture of a black rabbit with a red target in front of it, a monochrome image of someone holding a pair of ribs, and a frilled blouse with butterflies on it. to the left are transparent images of a bloody knife and scissors, as well as text that reads: "in which a cat escapes the box. post safe end. 3k, 999/vlr spoilers abound."

the background is the ceiling of an elaborate church. end id].

so anyway read safe end akane <3

[pt: so anyway read safe end akane (heart)].

[panthera-tigris-venenata]

Part three, aka Uma has something to say. Less dark than the previous parts.

As Uma said, so she did: She sent in Gonzo and Desiree to look for the documents and belongings of Claudine, the cult leader’s daughter.

They came back empty handed.

Normally, she  might have asked the Facilier girls to come look, they enjoy lurking in the shadows and collecting all kinds of information, but, well. Uma is human, contrary to what some might believe, and she isn’t asking the sisters to come back to that place so soon after what happened to Celia.

Maybe not ever.

So here she is, sneaking through decidedly not creepy chapel-esque halls that echo her own breath and steps. Bloody cultists and their dramatics.

She’d consider stealing a bit in compensation for all her trouble, but all walls are bare, except for writings she doesn’t want to read, and few icons, which she doesn’t want at all.

She pokes her head through another door, one hand steady at her knife. The building should be empty, but hey. Cultists. One can never really know.

The room doesn’t look like a teenage girl’s bedroom, but, again, cult. Based on what Uma saw of the girl, she might as well have been sleeping on the floor in front of a cold fire place or on the altar. 

Yeah, Uma hates it here. She has better things to do. Really, she does.

Like maybe, making sure none of her people die. Making sure they all have something to eat and to do, of at least quasi-legal nature, ideally. Getting some cash would be nice, too.

But Uma has always been curious and stubborn, as Harry often and fondly tells her.

Another door.

Still nothing valuable.

She kicks into the doorframe in frustration, and then quickly assures Gil that she’s okay, and no one has jumped her.

Another door.

Still nothing valuable, but the documents cabinet, at least.

One must Uma say: These cultists do know how to keep their bullshit organised.

And so, Uma is stealing that. It’s not like anyone is gonna notice, what with their leader freshly disappeared. So the papers quickly disappear in Uma’s, or, well, mostly Gil’s backpack.

She will go through them once she gets home, she wows to herself, and sets off home.

…Or not. Some of the gang kids insist on jumping from roof to roof like they saw the Agrabah cousins do and Bonny is barely keeping them from doing so, mostly by very visually describing the possible injuries:

„And your bones would be sticking right out!“ 

„No!“ 

„Yes! And your skeleton would shake so bad that all of your teeth would fall out and then you could eat no candy at all! No food at all, and you’d die of hunger – if only all of your brains didn’t leak through your broken skulls before!“ 

„Bonny! But Bonny! You are kidding us!“

„Am not! Uma–“ Bonny calls out as soon as she notices her in earshot, „Tell them they are not to jump from roof to roof lest they die a very horrible and painful death!“

Uma decides that the liberated papers and documents can wait.

……….

She decides she cannot deal with Claudine any longer after about three weeks: The children’s survival instincts are putting Claudine’s to shame, and, yes, that says a lot.

Claudine Frollo, former daughter of a cult leader, simply isn’t cut out to survive on the streets and Uma doesn’t have nor the time nor the resources to babysit her non-stop.

And she knows of one place (one family) that could and would take her.

„Take your stuff, Claudine,“ she tells the girl, and she mostly means the cloak she got her and the knife which she still holds onto, „And come with me.“

After a heartbeat, without turning around, she adds: „We carry the knife by the hilt, Claudine, not the blade.“

„Sorry, Uma,“ the girl apologises, already scrambling after her and struggling to quickly correct her grip on the weapon.

„It won’t happen again.“

Uma would greatly prefer it if lying about injuries and self-harm wasn’t that one street life thing Claudine picked up; she just hopes she didn’t manage to hurt herself yet.

Uma walks towards Revenge, the bar Harry runs, and Claudine follows after her. Despite the leisurely pace, she struggles to keep up; that’s secluded cultist life to you.

Uma swallows her impatience and slows a bit, hoping the girl won’t notice.

She doesn’t, or she doesn’t voice it, and she doesn’t ask where they’re going either, and Uma wants to scream at her, to find her survival instincts already.

(She doesn’t)

She doesn’t just tell her where they are going either.

Finally, they’re by the bar, which is thinly disguised as a clock work shop, and she confidently strides towards the back and the door and stairs hidden there, dragging now unwilling Claudine behind her.

Still, Claudine doesn’t protest, and thus Uma doesn’t know how to comfort her.

She feels her rapid pulse on her wrist.

At the spur of the moment, she spins around and faces Claudine, pressing her against the wall, hand wrapped around her fingers on the hilt of the knife.

It wouldn’t seem like a safe or comforting position, but Uma doesn’t do either or those things.

Instead, she squeezes her fingers around the knife, and whispers: „This is just a bar, and it answers to me.“

(Or at least its owner does.)

„You will be safe.“

She doesn’t order her to behave or to be quiet, but these requests are what Claudine answers, anyway:

„I’ll behave, Uma. I’ll be good.“

Uma looks her deep into the eyes and moves back her restless fingers that would grip the sharp blade.

„Stick to your promise, Claudine,“ she half-hisses, „It’s safe there. Just remember to breathe. They won’t touch you.“

No one sane would touch Claudine if they saw her walk in with Uma.

The she turns around, descending the rest of the stairs before Claudine could possibly protest even if she wanted to.

Pushing the beaded curtain out of the way, Uma steps into the familiar cacophony of Harry's place; a quick look tells her that Harry is not in the front today, though.

She feels a tinge of disappointment at not seeing him as soon as she walked through the doors, but she knows he is there, somewhere. He’d tell her otherwise.

She doesn’t bother greeting the bartender that has the turn on the front bar today:

„Rosa!“ (That could pass for greeting anyway, and the other girl doesn’t bother to greet her either, which means Harry isn’t in earshot. How disappointing.)

„Where’s Harry?“

„In the back saloon,“ Rosa answers unenthusiastically, clearing a glass, „What do you want?“

Uma ignores the question, smiling with too much teeth:

„Excellent!“ she flings Claudine towards the bar, and gestures at her vaguely, „Watch her for me, Rosa, will you?“

„What am I, a babysitter?!“ protests Rosa loudly enough to attract the attention of some of her less drunk customers, but Uma is already walking away.

„She is not allowed near sharp objects!“ she calls over her shoulder.

„And you are telling that to me?!“

Oh right. Rosa Hearts does have a rather infamous penchant for stabbing too annoying and/or handy customers. Good for her.

Whatever. Uma is sure they’ll be fine for the few minutes.

She just shakes her braids around and shows Rosa a rather rude gesture. She ignores her muttering, which is almost definitely along the lines of „I am not paid enough for this,“ and Claudine staring holes into her back.

She weaves through the tables and greets some of her favourite regulars – fine, mostly just those that owe her a favour or two, so they wouldn’t forget – and finally reaches the semi-private saloon.

She doesn’t knock on the doorframe, instead slipping through the beads as quietly as possible, mostly just because she can.

She gets about five seconds of watching Harry discuss something with two older and rather wealthy looking men, before he notices her, and she smiles a bit at that, just for herself.

„Uma!“ he quickly rises to greet her, stepping around the still seated men as if they were nothing, „What are you doing here, darling?“

He looks so happy at her surprise visit, and her heart flutters. She should do this more often.

He comes closer yet and kisses her cheek in greeting.

„Anything you need?“ he says so so that it could pass for a whisper.

(Yes. More often. Definitely.)

Uma takes few seconds to get the thoughts straight in her head and arches her eyebrow, her eyes flickering toward the men. Still seated men who are watching them with too much interest.

„Right,“ Harry takes the hint and without hesitation, he turns around: „You might be excused, gentlemen.“

He raises his eyebrows at them too, when they don’t move fast enough in his option, and his eyes flash towards the fully functional gun displayed on the cabinet; Uma brushes her fingers against his, and absentmindedly taps at the one clearly displayed knife at her belt.

They finally leave, and Harry offers her his arm: „Right this way, love.“ He leads her to one of the seats and drags another one closer almost in the same motion.

„Now, what did you need?“

„Harry,“ she starts slowly and pauses immediately, dragging her tongue over her teeth. (She can see his eyes lingering on her mouth before he snaps his attention back.)

„The man that attacked Celia Facilier – the cultist – do you remember him? She asked me to help her with the body, I told you about it few weeks back.“

He thinks for a moment before taping his fingers at the armrest of her seat and agreeing: „Aye, Uma. I remember that.“

„He had a daughter – did I tell you that, too?“

„I think you did, yeah.“

Right. She probably did, yeah.

Still, Harry looks at her with rapt attention, intrigued.

So she breathes in and continues:

„I took the girl in, she had nowhere to go.“

„Of course you did,“ he tells her and raises her hand to his lips for a kiss; Uma tugs her arm away. Now is not the time.

„Sorry.“

She quickly smiles at him to show him she accepts the apology, which was not needed in the first place, and continues:

„Anyway, I… I can’t keep her anymore. She can’t survive on the streets; she can barely feed herself. I need to remind her to eat with the rest of us. She… I don’t know, Harry. She needs more attention than I or my people can give her…,“ she trails off for a moment, feeling like she has failed the girl.

(She did everything she could, and she has more people to look over.)

„Yes?“ prompts Harry, laying his hand on hers so that she could move away at any time.

„Anyway,“ she bites at her lip and looks him in the eyes, „I need you to take her in.“

„Yes,“ he answers without a heartbeat of hesitation.

Another part of the 1920 au, this time featuring Celia Facilier and Judge Frollo being a creep (and paying for it.) Also known as: How did the Facilier sisters get a cult? Part one, part two to come soon. I hope.

(...Proceed with caution?)

There are steps behind Celia Facilier. Darkness all around, and the steps that have been following her for the last three blocks. Never faster than her, never slower than her.

Her heart races in her chest.

She can still hear the deliberate footsteps and the deep breathing.

She herself takes a shuddering breath and finds the dagger she carries around, as her father and sister insisted. 

She should run.

Everything in her is telling her to run and never look back.

Her fingers trail over the package she was supposed to deliver and she decides to go on. Everything will be okay, and she will leave with a sizable packet of money for her family. See?

She picks up her pace.

The steps behind her speed up too.

She breaks into a run, her dagger already out, the goods in her other hand.

„You can’t run from me, babydoll;“ a raspy voice behind her breathes out and a new wave of chill runs down Celia’s spine, „Noone can run from God. Come with me peacefully, my child. Don’t resist your fate.“

As if. 

Celia’s fate for tonight was supposed to be a payment and then a date with Dizzy. Not… This.

„Get her.“

Oh, fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

He has help. There is more of them. 

Fuck.

She vaguely registers more heavy footsteps falling into the pace behind her, and then?

Then just a dull pain at the back of her head.

She comes back later – too late – to a pair of too bright grey eyes staring at her unblinkingly and some decidedly very creepy murmurs. 

She doesn’t have her hands tied – amateurs.

The girl with too bright eyes quietly offers her some water, which Celia refuses, pinching her lips together.

What if it is poisoned?

Instead, she tries to calm her heart and her thoughts and make some sense of her surroundings.

Ignore the creepy muttering that is starting to sound suspiciously like a prayer.

Ignore the girl watching you like she has never seen another girl before.

…Definitely ignore the writings and paintings on the wall, please.

The sound ceases, and a familiar voice asks: „Is she awake yet?“

The girl jerks, which causes Celia to jerk as well, and she watches with a sense of a morbid curiosity as the girl scurries away and presses her back against the wall.

„Yes, father, she is,“ the girl confirms, looking down at the floor and letting her hair fall over her eyes.

The man, the creepy stalker in wavering grey robes, slowly crouches down in front of Celia. He has the same too bright eyes as the girl.

Celia glares at him with all the hatred she can muster, which is apparently not enough to repel him. That bloody bastard puts his cold, long fingers at her chin, raising her head higher, and Celia shivers.

„You have such pretty eyes, doll,“ the man mutters, trailing his fingertips along her skin, his leering stare-, „Shame you’re–––“

Instead of the words, blood flows from his mouth. Coughing, wheezing, droplets landing on her skin, still thousand times better than his fingers.

(The girl by the wall doesn’t move, doesn’t run, doesn‘t scream.)

(Celia has plunged a knife into his heart.)

(Heart or lungs or somewhere close enough, deep enough.)

Celia doesn’t move either as she watches the- the man choke at his own blood. He might be saying something, but she isn’t listening. If he tries to plead mercy, grasping at her shirt––

Well, it isn’t her fault, is it now?

He kidnaps young girls – he should’t be surprised if the young girls stab back.

(It’s not her fault.)

She shoves the still writhing corpse off her body and stands over it, mechanically wiping her hands down, as if it was doing any good.

„Mercy,“ she is almost certain she hears.

„Mercy,“ the corpse pleads again, blood bubbling from its purple-pale lips. Celia stares at the liquid with distant revulsion.

(„Mercy…“)

(By the wall, the girl falls down to her knees.)

Celia painfully swallows, staring down the still breathing corpse. It takes her a few times to speak up properly, the words stuck in her throat, hurting her as they come out.

(She doesn‘t want to give him mercy, or anything.)

She asks anyway: „What is your idea of mercy?“

„Salvation,“ he breathes out.

„Your death for mine,“ his eyes say.

„Your eternal suffering,“ she can almost read on his lips, and she refuses to read anymore.

„Well,“ she says, cold and distant, „My idea of mercy is your quick death.“

With that, she stabs him again, this time aiming properly for the heart.

(And again and again and again.)

(She can’t see the corpse anymore or feel her own fingers, she can’t hear anything but her own blood rushing through her ears–– except for when she can, of course.)

She can hear the girl slowly coming closer, dropping something heavy as she goes. (She can hear her crying if she really tries.)

Likewise, Celia drops her knife.

„I better go get Uma,“ she says, and then she is gone.

[mrshipsmcgee]

Monkshood

TASM!Peter Parker x Reader (female)

Based on this prompt by the incredibly talented @liz-allyn

Warnings: adult themes, blood, boo boos and ouchies, angst

They really shouldn’t have done that.

Your stomach churned as you studied the few texts you had just received from Peter’s phone; a few pictures of Spiderman strung up in the air by his wrists and a text message that read, ‘come get your spider boy’ with coordinates to an abandoned factory.

It looked like Peter was cut and bruised, his suit tattered and ripped - exposing his muscular chest, painted with blood - so much so that you were unable to see where the blood started and the injuries began. Your heart raced as you shook, seeming to begin to vibrate as you saw your husband strewn up by chains, so terribly hurt.

Your hands began to clench into fists as you gritted your teeth together. Unadulterated rage began to flow through your veins as you stood up from the couch, walking over to the armoire in the corner of the room. Fingers quickly search through the winter coats and rain jackets, meeting a familiar fabric in the very back.

Your heart raced as ancient feelings unearthed pulling the suit out, remembering who you used to be so long ago. That person you were didn’t exist anymore, not since Peter had saved you all those years ago from the hands of Hydra. After falling in love with you he helped work you through your hurt and rage, showing you love and belonging - eventually marrying you and hoping to start a family soon.

You had become everything you had always dreamt for yourself for all of those years being a slave to Hydra - their weapon. You were Y/N Parker now - you had morphed into a loving wife and supportive friend with a beautiful life.

But you couldn’t be her right now. You had more important things to deal with. You had to tap into the monster you used to be so long ago to save the love of your life.

A villainous smile spread across your face as you imagined what you were about to do, slinking back into the suit you used to wear so often so long ago. It felt like a second skin as you zipped up the suit completely, putting on your mask and fixing your wild hairs before quickly grabbing your iconic weapon - a black leather whip with a small dagger woven to the end of it.

You step in front of the full length mirror behind the bathroom door, fingertips caressing the skin tight material as you looked at your reflection - staring at what felt like a stranger.

Looking down at your cellphone you see the terrible pictures of the love of your life in despair, quickly remembering the rage from before as it raced through you as you clutched the whip in your hand.

“I’m coming, Pete.”

•

Peter hung by his wrists, wrapped in chains which were slowly starting to dig into his skin as it began to rip open after hanging there for hours.

“Have you had enough, Spider-Man?” A large man asked as a crowd surrounded where he was strung up. Different people would come up, marking Peter however they wanted. Some would cut him, others would try degrading Peter in other ways. Unimaginable ways.

Peter could barely speak now, thankfully still somehow sporting is mask - at least his emotions were hidden from the mob surrounding him. At least he still had this one small bit of dignity left. He silently cried, grimacing with every continued abuse.

“Ah - no words, eh?” The man joked, holding up Peter’s phone to Peter’s face - letting him see the already sent texts to you - his love. “How about this? This make you talk, Spider-man? We make things interesting now, eh?”

Peter groaned as he tried to adjust his exhausted body, the chains digging deeper as he winced loudly, gaining a few cat calls from the excited crowd around him.

The man with the phone chuckled, stepping closer to Peter, pulling out his already bloodied knife and wiping it off on some of Peter’s exposed skin, cutting him with every flick. “So, Spider-man - should we pass ‘your love’ around like a little slut when she gets here? Or do we beat her senseless first? Your choice. You get to watch either way.”

A low laugh came from Peter’s mouth as he shook his head weakly. “Good luck with that, bud.”

The man smiled, quickly spitting at Peter before punching him in the gut. “You’re a worthless piece of shit. We’ll just maybe have to pass you around exactly like we do with her once we’ve gotten bored after we’ve killed her.”

“No you won’t,” Spider-Man whispered as he laughed lowly. “Dude, you have literally made the biggest mistake of your life texting my wife about all of this.”

“I’m sorry, are you expecting me to be scared of Spider-Man’s wife?” The man asked, “I have forty men surrounding us. You’re telling me she can take forty of us? Ridiculous.” He motioned a few people closer, urging them to do their worst.

Peter’s skin stung as they start to abuse his body again, slashing, groping, punching and kicking him. He cried out as he felt a knife enter his ribcage and twist around, “Agh!”

“Give it a rest!” The leader said, holding his hand up - the henchmen backing away as the man began to look around. “He needs to be alive when she gets here, he needs to see what we do to her since he thinks his fucking wife can apparently take forty of my men-“

A distant blood-curdling scream cut the man off as he and the crowd began to look around, wide eyed and silent. Every few seconds they could hear distant screams echoing from the men placed throughout the building, ending quickly and growing closer with every moment.

“What the fuck?” The man whispered as he saw the silhouette of a woman standing in the doorway of the abandoned factory they had been hiding out in for the past sixteen hours.

Peter smiled, whispering as he shook his head, sighing contently “Monkshood.”

“What?” The man turned back to Spider-Man, approaching him as the people around him slowly began to disappear - screaming as they got pulled into the darkness. Sounds of a whip cracking flesh open stung the man’s ear as he cursed in response, beginning to fumble for his gun.

“Monkshood, aptly named after a beautiful yet deadly poisonous plant. Hydra’s favorite play pretty for over a decade. Well, that is until I saved her,” Peter spoke, coughing a bit from the pain in his gut from the continuous abuse. “Now, you should probably stop talking to me and start running if you even want to try to live.”

Before the man could reply he had been lashed in the back, gashed open wide as he cried out in pain, “Wha-“

Again, he was lashed - this time across the face as he let out another loud scream, pulling out his gun only for it to be smacked from his hand as you finally ran into the light, shown for all to see as you stood with your whip contracted - ready to strike.

The man’s eyes adjusted, seeing a sea of the bodies of his men lying dead around where you stood. “No fucking way,” he whispered under his breath as Peter began to laugh.

You crossed your arms with your whip in one hand, flashing him an evil smirk as you started to speak. “Yes fucking way, you moronic fuck.” You turned to Peter, waving as you blew him a kiss, “Hi, baby. You okay?”

“I am now,” he replied, grunting as he tried to adjust the painful chains on his wrist.

“Don’t worry, baby - I’ll be there in just a moment, okay? Then we can go home,” You cooed as Peter weakly nodded. Turning back to the man in the floor you grimace, “Where were we?”

“How many of them did you kill?” The man growled, slowly backing away from you, tripping over an arm of a lifeless body strewn out in the floor, falling into the floor, wincing as his hands met the ground. You stalked towards him, stepping right above where he lay as you gripped the whip in your hand, “Oh - I’ve killed all of them that I’ve gotten my hands on so far. That’s kinda my thing - if I want you dead, you’re dead.”

“And how - how - how many is that?” He stammered as tears started to swell in his eyes.

You just smirk, lassoing the whip before cracking it on the ground beside the man - making him yelp as he jumped. “Oh, maybe around thirty, forty - I don’t know, I don’t really keep count anymore,” You teased as you began to lean down towards the man, smiling widely, “All I know is you’re the last one to go.”

The man’s eyes widened, beginning to speak and being cut off by his throat being sliced open abruptly by the end of your whip, hands trying to grab the wound as he bled out below you.

“Don’t fuck with Spider-Man’s wife.” You growled, wiping the blood from your whip.

Running over to Peter you cut him down with your whip, gently holding him in your arms as you sat on the ground, pulling his mask off as you started to inspect his injuries, seeing he was in far worse shape than you could have ever imagined. How dare they do this to him?

“Oh my gods,” you murmur as tears started to form in your eyes, “My Peter, my sweetheart. Oh - my sweetheart,” you cry out as you caress his face, weakly smiling at you through bloody teeth. “I’m going to take you home now, baby. Everything is going to be okay now. This will never happen again. I swear on my life, I will protect you until the day I die.” “I love you so much, Y/N,” Peter whispered as you rocked him in your arms. “I love you, Peter.”

•

Tag List: @rose-writes-shit @xuxialling @itwasallinmyhead1 @mypalbuck @angelcritterz @levylovegood @gwenebear @saltedcoffeescotch @thelittlebirdwriter @mbjackie

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Thank you for reading! I apologize if it is short and sweet, I’ve had covid!! - Cait <3

[ragingbookdragon]

My Love For You Was Bulletproof, But You're The One Who Shot Me

Ghost-Maker x Batsis One-Shot

Word Count: 1.3K Warnings: Explicit Language, Violence, Angst

Author's Note: Y'all asked for it and now I have delivered! Based on this ask, it's the fic that's going to ruin all of you! -Thorne

**********************************************************************

She knew she’d meet her end at the hands of vigilantism. There was no doubt in her mind that she’d die before she was fifty either by a stray bullet or a knife through the ribs. Maybe a death squad sent by Ra’s or some other homicidal maniac. But never in all her years as a vigilante, did she ever think she’d be staring down her death at the hands of her oldest friend. Of the man she loved—and thought loved her too.

***

“This is your fault,” she scowled, slamming her fists against the sides of the metal wall. “I told you this was a trap, but did you listen to me? Noooo, Ghost-Maker knows everything.”

“Oh please, you’re the one who pushed us,” he retorted, tapping his gauntlet and she looked over her shoulder, seeing him leaning against one of the other walls without a care in the world.

“I pushed us because we were about to be squished by spiked walls, genius.” Her glare darkened and she looked around the metal box. “And now we’re stuck in this…in this thing.”

“Look on the bright side,” he offered. “No impaling walls in sight.”

“I’m going to murder you, Ghost-Maker,” she retorted, then a click sounded, and the walls fell away, revealing an electrified cage, much bigger than the box. “What the fu—”

“Well, look who I caught!” a voice pitched and they turned, seeing Riddler in some kind of theatre box, his feet propped up on the railing. “Ghost-Maker and Widow-Maker! Now isn’t this surprising?”

She scowled at the supervillain, pointing at him. “When I get out of this, I’m going to plant my foot in your ass.”

Riddler tsked at her. “Now, now, Widow-Maker, that’s no way to treat a host.”

“A host to uninvited guests held against their will,” Ghost-Maker interrupted, crossing his arms over his chest. “What do you want with us?”

“Now isn’t that the million-dollar question,” he replied, then clicked a button on his cane, and a wall outside the cage slid up, revealing five civilians tied to chairs, some type of collar around their necks.

Her eyes widened. “What the hell?” she shot Riddler a glare. “What are you playing at?”

He cleared his throat and stood up. “I want to play a game, Widow-Maker. Or better yet, I want you and Ghost-Maker to play a game.”

The two vigilantes shared a glance then Ghost-Maker stepped forward. “And what game is that?”

Riddler grinned. “I want you and Widow-Maker to beat each other to death.”

She huffed a laugh. “That’s not a game. That’s a death trap.”

“True. But there is an objective to the trap.” He tipped his head to the people. “One of you dies…or they all die.”

“You’re bluffing,” she retorted, and he merely blinked and pressed a button.

One of the collars started beeping profusely, and the woman’s eyes widened in terror as she screamed behind the gag.

“Wait! Okay!” she yelled. “Stop!”

Riddler clicked the button again. “I don’t bluff, Widow-Maker.” He reached over and pressed a new button and numbers flashed on a sign above the cage—ten minutes. “You’ve got ten minutes or you all die.”

She frowned at the supervillain, quietly asking, “Ghost, what do we do?” hearing no response, she looked over. “Ghost?”

A hand shot out, cracking her across the jaw and she went to her knees, one hand coming to grip her jaw, the other fumbling along the floor for grip. She pulled her hand from her face—her lip had been split open and blood flowed down her chin.

“Ah, what the hell!” she screeched, turning her head to look up at him, but he gave no response, coming down at her with one of his swords. “Jesus Chr—” she rolled out of the way and scrambled to her feet, holding out her arms in a defensive pose. “Ghost, what are you doing?”

“Saving their lives,” he merely replied, swinging the sword in a wide arc. “You heard him. Either we all die or some of us live.”

“So what?” she bellowed, catching the sword in the claw outside her vambrace; shifting, she slammed her free palm against the flat side of the katana, snapping it in half. “You’re just going to kill me! The lives of the many outweigh the lives of the few!”

“In a way,” Ghost-Maker said, tossing the broken handle to the ground. “One of us has to die.” The blue lights of his mask narrowed. “And it’s going to be you.”

Her own eyes widened, and she could barely prepare herself for the barrage of strikes that came her way. And while she had flexibility on Ghost-Maker, he had reach on her, and at some point, during the fight, he’d managed to grab her by the collar of her suit, slinging her backwards with all his strength.

And she realized much too late what he was aiming her at when her back collided with the side of the cage. A scream ripped from her throat as the electric current tore through her veins, frying her nerves to crisps; she collapsed onto the ground, pitching forward onto the cold floor, her cheek resting on the metal.

She saw him coming towards her and tears flooded her vision as she begged, “Ghost, please. Stop. Don’t do this.”

“Begging isn’t going to save you.” he rolled her onto her back, not that she had any strength to stop him, and wrapped one hand around her throat while the other pulled the second sword from his back. He paused to examine her, the swollen right eye, the busted left brow, split lips, and bloody nose. The tears slipped down her cheeks, mixing with the flowing blood and he brought the sword down at her.

Her hand snapped up, catching his wrist and she plead, “K, I love you.” Her arm shook with the strain against his strength. “I love you,” she cried, squeezing his wrist. “I know deep down there’s something there. Please. Just—just stop.”

He said nothing in return and suddenly, she felt her arm go slack, letting the sword come down again. A blast rocked the side of the room and Ghost-Maker shifted, wrapping an arm around her as he pulled her away from the debris. A pained cry sounded above them, followed by a grunt, then the electricity snapping against the metal of the cage fizzled out.

Ghost-Maker pulled away from her, getting to his feet, and said, “It’s about time you showed up.” She turned her head, seeing Batman free the last captive, then he came to the cage and started unlocking it.

“When Icon sent the S.O.S., I knew something was wrong.” He looked at them. “Good job keeping the distraction up.”

“We tried.” Ghost-Maker turned and bent down, reaching for her. “Come on, (Y/N), let’s—”

She slapped his hand away. “Don’t touch me.” Her voice was frigid, like frostbite and she staggered to her feet. “Don’t ever touch me again.” Her ankle was sprained, and she bit back a whimper as she stumbled and limped to the door.

“(Y/N), I wasn’t going to kill you. You know that.” Ghost-Maker murmured, and she glared over her shoulder. “You know I never would.”

“He was right all those years ago. You are a sick, broken, monster.” She spit at his feet. “And if you ever come near me again—I won’t hesitate to kill you.”

She spun on her heel and shoved by her brother, ignoring his gaze, as she hobbled to the nearest exit.

Batman glanced at Ghost-Maker, eyes widening for a split second at the defeat in his oldest friend’s stance, his shoulders low, head turned away in shame; not wanting to breach the subject, he merely stated, “I’ll go after her.”

And Ghost-Maker said nothing in return.

[kim-poce]

Burning to Ashes - Picrews

Undercut because there are 10 of them plus id so that's A LOT! They are in kidnapping order

Nanda Hayes - She/Her

[ID: Picrew of Nanda, she is white, has amber eyes and black hair up to her neck. She is wearing a dark blue shirt and has blood on her face. She is making a "silence" sign with her hand and she has a mean smile on her face. The background shows two "danger zone" tapes. End.ID]

John Killian Oliver (aka Dog) - He/him - 31yo

[ID: Picrew of Dog, he is white and has amber eyes, wavy short black hair, a scar on his cheek and chest. He is wearing a black t-shirt if an eye icon, a black dog collar, and there are band-aids on his face. He is looking down with a sad/anxious expression. The background is black with huge realistic eyes. End.ID]

Camile Dakota (aka Shy) - She/Her

[ID: Picerw of Shy, she is white with a more pinkish tone of skin, has blue eyes, orangeish hair tied in a ponytail, a vertical scar under her right eye, and several scars on her chest and shoulders. She is wearing a yellow shirt that shows her shoulders, a red dog collar, band-aids on her face, and a pair of earrings in the shape of half of a broken heart. She has an anxious expression on her face and both her hands are raised in a weak attempt to keep her aggressor away. The background is dark. End.ID]

Arthur (aka Water) - He/him

[ID: Picrew of Water. He is white, has blue hair and blue eyes with dark circles under them. He is wearing a blue t-shirt and a blue dog collar, there are scars under his shirt,. He has a scared/sad expression. The background is blue and shows several jellyfishies. End.ID]

Austin (aka Crumb) - He/him

[ID: Picrew of Crumb. He is white and has orangeish brown hair and blue eyes. He is wearing a black hoodie and a silver dog collar, there are six bloody band-aids on his face. He is looking down are his empty open hands. End.ID]

Amos (aka Shock) - He/him

[ID: Picrew of Shock, he has slightly dark skin, really short and smooth black hair, dark eyes with dark circles under them, and a scar across his left cheek. He is wearing a black t-shirt and black dos collar. His expression is sad. The background is yellow. End.ID]

George Hungria (aka Toy) - He/Him (well, it/its with Nanda)

[ID: Picrew of Toy, He is white, has dark green eyes and amber hair, and a lot of small scars on his face. He Is wearing a silver dog collar and an open black shirt that shows bloody bandages underneath there are also six band-aids on his face. He got a pained sad expression and is looking down. The background is a dark tunnel. End.ID]

Sammy (aka Sugar) - They/them

[ID: Picrew of Sugar. They are black, have several small scars on their face, messy black hair up to their neck ornamented with candy accessories, and black eyes. They are wearing a black dog collar and something like waiter clothes but with orangeish color. They have a sad expression and are holding a kitchen knife. End.ID]

Igor Thompson (aka Ash) - He/him - 23yo

[ID: Picrew of Ash, he is white, has tired brown eyes, a scar across his right cheek and black hair up to his neck. He is wearing a white t-shirt. He is crying. End.ID]

Paulo Killian Oliver - He/him - 35yo

[ID: Picrew of Paulo. He is white, has amber eyes, black wavy hair, and a short beard. He is wearing a red t-shirt with the drawing of a hearth, there are band-aids on his face. He has an angry expression and is holding a pistol. End.ID]

Link (Nanda) | Link (Ash) | Link

Taglist: @cupcakes-and-pain, @badluck990, @extemporary-username, @wolfeyedwitch, @rose-pinkie, @latenightcupsofcoffee, @whump-blog, @inpainandsuffering, @nii-chans-rabiddogs

[kmikaelsonimagines]

Always Yours: A Kol Mikaelson Imagine

Request from @divergirl99: Hey! Could I have a Kol x reader where they grew up together and she is also an original and maybe they have a falling out where he thinks she betrayed him because a witch convinced him so she leaves but stays in contact with Klaus and she returns when they are fighting marcel and she gets bitten instead of him and he panics and after the five year slumber he confesses feelings and they have a fluffy reunion??

Iconic gif time! Hope this is okay for you lovely, and enjoy x 

“So what? We hide in here while our enemies mass at the front gate?” Kol looked over at his brothers as they prepared for what was bound to be an attack on their family. Each of the Originals were in danger now, even the one who wasn’t living with the family anymore, but Kol tried not to think about her.

He had already lost Davina and he couldn’t add to his pain by thinking about the other love of his life who had caused him immense pain.

“Well, if they’re determined to die at our hands, let them come,” Klaus smirked, “Besides, we won’t be alone in this fight.” Kol didn’t bother asking what he meant by that, nor did he care when the three brothers heard people swarm into the compound. He tucked the knife he was holding into his waistband, and joined Klaus and Elijah as they went to confront what they were hoping wouldn’t be their doom.

Of course, what he didn’t know was that his brother had been expecting such an ambush and had called in his secret weapon. The most agile of the Originals, the one who had fallen in love with Kol and then left after a severe argument.

The one that would still risk death to save the people she considered her family.

Y/N looked up at the gates of the Mikaelson compound. It had been so long since she had been there, after leaving as a result of breaking up with Kol. She had grown tired of trying to convince him that that bloody witch had tricked him into thinking she was a traitor, working with Klaus in the witch wars. And so she had left, however, she still remained in contact with the love of her life’s hybrid brother.

Originals needed to stick together, as he often liked to remind her, especially since she had been around since childhood.

She had never imagined what it would be like to face Kol again after a century, knowing that they had left things on such bad terms, but Klaus has called her and told her that they needed her help, her wisdom, her skill. Danger was brewing for all of them.

She could hear the conversation going on inside the gates, hear Kol’s voice as he asked if Marcel was planning to put on a show. She laughed at that, remembering their rather failed production of Hamlet back in the 1800s. Still the same Kol, then.

She knew about Davina too, and she couldn’t help but feel a pang of jealousy. She waited, waited for Klaus to call her, waited for her cue.

Then she heard it.

Kol made to move, made to fight against Marcel, but a figure stopped him. A figure that blocked his path, that pushed him out of the way as Marcel’s teeth landed on her skin instead of his. She screamed, and it was a scream that was all too familiar.

Y/N.

There was blood on her neck, her own blood, and as he looked at her, lying there, knowing that she was going to die, Kol didn’t know what to do. There were so many questions running through his head. Why was she here? Where had she been? Why did she save him? Why did he still feel so much love for her, rekindled after a century of hating her with just one look?

There was no time for his questions to be answered, not as Kol looked at Klaus, at the horrified expression on his brother’s face and realised what the hybrid had meant when he said they wouldn’t be alone. Her. It was always her.

She was always there, always watching, always staying with the family that she loved. Just as she had promised a thousand years ago when she joined Kol in his transformation into a vampire.

So much was going on behind him, but Kol couldn’t focus on that, not when Y/N Y/L/N, the first love of his life, was lying in front of him, dying.

He didn’t know how he got from the compound to the apartment, didn’t know the full details of what was going on. All he knew was that he was holding her hand, telling her to hold on, all his feelings coming back to him as she fell into a forced sleep.

Y/N replayed the scene over and over in her head. She had been standing outside, waiting for Klaus to call her when she had heard Kol start a fight. Something had come over her, that same protective instinct that she had always had when it came to him, and she had flown to protect him.

There was pain, unimaginable pain, and then there was Kol clutching her hand like nothing had ever happened between them. There was Kol, close to tears, telling her that he couldn’t lose her, telling her that he was going to see her again and they would make everything better together. There was Kol, no anger flooding his features, only love, the man who had loved her for so long, who she had never stopped loving despite their time apart.

There was Kol, and then there was peace.

She spent the next five years thinking about what she would say to him when she woke up. She spent the next five years thinking about how they would get over what had happened between them. She spent the next five years waiting to tell him she still loved him, that she wanted to be a part of their family again, hoping that he would still feel the same way, hoping that his words weren’t just the product of panic.

And then her eyes opened, and there he was.

“It’s been a long time.” Kol smiled as Y/N opened her eyes, his hand clutching hers tight like it had five years ago, like it had for the centuries since he had met her that first time as a young boy. She smiled back, and for a moment, he couldn’t quite believe what was happening.

“Just a while.”

Kol knew he had to confess his feelings now, had to apologise, had to tell her that there wasn’t a single day when he hadn’t thought about her. Had to tell her that he still loved her. That he always had.

“Y/N, I’m so sorry. I should have believed you all those years ago. I never should have let you go.”

“Kol, it’s okay.” She reached up and stroked his face. “I’ve never been that far away. Not really.”

Kol made a mental note to thank his brother later. That was, once they saved him of course. He put his hand over Y/N’s, bringing her palm to his lips and kissing her skin ever so gently. He had missed her incredibly, and it had taken her almost dying to make him realise that she was the best thing that had ever happened to him, that ever would.

He would stay with her until she told him to leave.

Always hers, until the end of time.

Masterlist

[inagetawaycarxo]

In A Blink Of An Eye | Jay Halstead

❛❛ Local psycho running around breaks into Jay and yns house. Shes alone and he's just getting off work and comes home to find yn hurt really badly...you choose the ending; And connor takes care of her in the ER❜❜-IsaacLaheysAnchor

Pairings: Jay Halstead x Reader, Connor Rhodes x Reader (Ex fling)

Featuring: Jay Halstead, Y/n (Reader), Connor Rhodes, Unnamed Psycho, Maggie, April, Will Halstead, Unnamed nurse, Ava.

Summary: Jay comes home to find y/n all bloody and goes into panic mode.

WARNINGS: angst, jealous!Connor, worried!jay, worried!Connor, hospitals, blood, injured!reader, comfort, plot twists, errors.

Word Count:2591

A/N: Got a Jay Halstead or One Chicago request? Send it in!

The sound of a loud thud and the floor creaking made you look up from your book. Eyes going wide. Shaking in fear. You quietly put your book down, taking the throw rug off your legs as quietly as you can. Standing up quietly. Turning not to make a sound. You cautiously walked towards the kitchen. Grabbing a knife out of the knife block. Cringing at the sound as you took it out.

gulping as you walked out of the kitchen, peeping out behind the wall. You felt relief wash over you as you saw nothing there. Taking a step out from behind the wall. You felt a wave of courage as you took small steps. The knife held out in front of you. Heart rate increasing by the second.

You were so focused on in front of you that you didn’t realize something was sneaking up on you until it was too late.

You felt a strong grip on your hair. Squeezing their hand hard against the back of your head. Slamming your head against the wall hard. It startled you enough to let go of the knife. Making the knife fall to the ground.

They let out a deep grunt. Slamming your head against the wall again and again. They let go. Hastily Taking out a gun from the band of his jeans. You reach up to your forehead, feeling it is sticky with blood. Making you let out a whimper. Bringing your hand down to your eye level. You let out a whimper as you saw blood. Your head pounds.

You crane your neck towards your attacker. Giving them a pleading look. Lips trembling. Eyes welling up with tears. The guy pointed the gun at you. Making you shake in fear.

A tall, disheveled man looked down at you, with a sinister smile. Observing you.

“Please, don’t.” You begged. Scooting away from him.

He ignored your pleas. Lunging towards you, you quickly scrambled up. Only for him to grab a hold of your hair. Yanking you back to him. Then pushing your face into the ground. You tried to crawl away from him, but he grabbed a hold of your ankles. Pulling you back towards him. Rolling you over onto your back. He climbed on top of you.

You tried putting up a fight. Trying to grab his gun but to no avail. He elbowed you hard in the nose.  Making you gasp. He took the opportunity to shot you in the shoulder. A sharp pain shot up and down your arm. More tears pouring out of your eyes. Your vision blurring. He shot you, again and again, all in different places, your hands going up in defence. Trying to fight him off.

He kept going till you weren’t fighting him anymore. The pain as unbearable. Blood was covering your clothes. Your body spasming. Your blood was all over him, as well as the ground. He got up putting his gun away. He stood over you looking at you with a satisfied smile. While you just looked at him through glazed eyes. Your breathing labored. Your eyes getting heavy. The guy then turned away from you, leaving you to bleed out on the floor while he exited the home. Spots danced in your vision. Darkness soon surrounded you as your breathing got slower. Heartbeat pumping slowly. The sound of your phone ringing getting distant, as your body slowly shut down…

Jay let out a sigh, as he got into his truck. Putting the keys ignition. Turning the truck on. Blasting the heat, taking out his phone. Unlocking it. Jay tapped the phone icon app. Dialing your number. The sound of the phone ringing. Jay felt an unsettling feeling form in the pit of his stomach, as your voicemail played.

“Hey, babe, I’m coming home now, I will see you when I arrive.” Jay spoke. Ending the call. He looked down at his phone. Dread washing over him.

Something just didn’t sit right with him. You always picked your phone when he rang you. His eyebrows furrowed into confusion.

He quickly put his truck into gear. Putting his seatbelt on. Pressing his foot hard on the accelerator. Speeding out of the parking lot. Going through red lights.

His mind tried to think of excuses as to why you didn’t answer the phone. Maybe you were asleep or taking a nap. Or in the shower or binge-watching or lost in a book. The more he came up with excuses the more anxious he felt.

Jay quickly parked in front the of the house he shared with you. Turning the truck off, yanking the keys out of the ignition. Unbuckling the seatbelt. Getting out of the truck, he locked it in a rush. Rushing over to the front door. Unlocking the door in a hurry. He opened the door. Just as he walked through the threshold he stopped in his tracks. His heart plummeting to the pit of his stomach. Going pale, as he saw you lying limp on the floor. Blood staining your shirt as well as the floor around you.

Jay quickly rushed towards you.

“Babe.” He cried. Tears welling up in his eyes. His heart aching.

“No.” He sobbed. His body shaking with sobs.

“Y/n.” He gasped out. His hand shakingly extending towards your wrist, picking it up and trying to find a pulse, he felt his heartache, even more, when you couldn’t find one. He then moved his index and middle finger to your neck. Feeling slightly relieved when he found a pulse, but it was weak.

“It’s okay, baby, I’m going to take you to the hospital.” He cooed. Reassuring you, but himself more than you.

“Stay with me.” He pleaded as he slipped his left arm behind your knees, his right hand resting on your lower back. Pulling you towards his chest, as he cradled you to his chest. Standing up rushing out of the door. Shutting the door behind him. His eyes were on your face the entire time. his heart beating faster by the second. He felt like he was going to be sick. He couldn’t lose you.

Tears fell rapidly from his eyes, as he unlocked his truck, doing his best to open the backseat door near the driver’s side without dropping you.

“It’s going to be okay, your going to be okay.” He reassured you. Gently laying you on the backseat. He looked at you with a pained expression. Before closing the door and getting into the driver's side without hesitation.

He put the keys in the ignition, struggling to put them in since his hands were shaking. Cursing under his breath as he cried harder. He finally got them in. Turning the key, as the truck roared to life. Putting the truck into gear. He pressed his foot hard against the gas. Making the car speed off, not even bothering to put his seatbelt on. Speeding to Gaffney Chicago Medical Centre, breaking all the road rules. Looking at you in the rear-view mirror now and then. He wiped his tears away, but it was no use they still fell from his eyes.

Jay felt slight relief as he made it to Gaffney Chicago Medical Centre. Jay didn’t bother finding a park, he went straight to wear the ambulance park. Quickly opening the door and rushing to open the backseat door. Grabbing you gently. Carrying you to the emergency area.

“HELP.” He yelled desperately. April and Maggie looked up. Rushing over towards Jay who was holding a limp, bloody you.

“Baghdad.” Maggie instructed Jay. Jay rushed over. Putting you gently down on the gurney. Grabbing a hold of your hand, as Maggie hooked wires to you. While April cut your shirt open.

Jay stared at your chest and abdomen in horror. Lips trembling.

“Jay, you need to leave so we can help her.” April spoke. Giving him a sympathetic look. But Jay wasn’t listening to he kept staring

“Page Dr Rhodes.” Maggie spoke, as she continued to examine you. April nodded her head complying.

Will noticed the commotion happening. Coming over to his brother. His hand grabbing Jay’s shoulder. Giving it a reassuring squeeze.

“Jay.” Will spoke. Looking at him with worry in his eyes. As they bagged you.

“She…” Jay barely gasped out.

Jay felt someone rush past him. Which happened to be Connor.

Connor felt his heart leap to his throat. His heart racing. He rushed over to you. Bumping into Jay in the process.

“Y/n.” Connor gasped, putting the disposable gloves on. Taking his stethoscope from around his neck. Putting the ear tips in his ear. Then putting the diaphragm in the middle of your chest.

“She’s been shot, multiple times, her pulse is weak, she isn’t responding.” April told him, as he listened to your heart pump slowly. This made him panic even more.

“Her hearts weak.” Connor sighed, taking the diaphragm away from your chest, and pulling the ear tips out of his ear. Putting the stethoscope around his neck.

“Let's do a scan, see if the bullets are still in there.” Connor ordered. Taking out his flashlight. Turning it on.

“Y/n, can you hear me?” Connor asked as he shone the light in your eyes. But you were unresponsive.  

“Dilated pupils.” He sighed. Feeling more dread wash over him. Connor took a step back, as April slid a black pad underneath you, another nurse tilting you, then gently putting you back down.

All of them looked anxiously at the screen. Maggie stroked your hair.

Connor felt like his heart was being squeezed way to tight. As he saw five bullets still in you one in your shoulder, two near your stomach, one near your abdomen and the other one slightly near your heart.

“She needs to go to the OR now.” Connor spoke.

Jay stared at the screen in horror. His face was ghostly white. He felt lightheaded.

“Oh my god.” He gasped out. As Connor, Maggie, April and a nurse pulled the rails up.

Will pulled Jay out of the way as they wheeled you out.

“They are going to help her.” Will reassured Jay, guiding him to the waiting room.

“They are going to save her.” Will spoke. As Jay sat in the seat. Will crouched in front of him.

Jay raised his hands in front of him. His body trembling as a sob left his lips. His hands were stained with your blood.

“It’s okay, Jay, hey look at me.” Will spoke. Putting his hands on Jay’s hands and putting them down.

Jay looked at his brother through tear-filled eyes.

“What if she dies?” Jay sobbed out.

“She won’t, she’s a fighter.” He reassured his brother.

“I can’t lose her. I don’t think I could survive losing her.” Jay sobbed. Will gave him a pained expression. Wrapping his arms around Jay and hugging him. This made Jay break down.

“I can’t.” He sobbed….

 Connor, Maggie, April and the nurse rolled you out of the elevator, rolling the gurney to an operating room.

Connor let go, going to scrub his hands. he heard the door open. Ava stormed in.

“You can’t treat her, you’re her ex.” She shouted. Making Connors jaw clench. He continued to scrub his hands.

“I’m the best option.” He spoke. Turning his head to look at Ava. She let out a sarcastic laugh.

“I’m her best choice, you’re her ex, what happens if you make a misjudgment, then what is her boyfriend going to think, that you did it out of spite because she is with Jay, not you.” Ava hissed out.

“You don’t know her as I do, you aren’t close to her, so yeah, I’m her best shot, and you're wasting my time and her time by talking.” Connor growled out. Moving towards the doors.

“Bastard.” She muttered to herself. As he turned his back to her. Opening the doors with his elbows…

“She should be out by, now right?” Jay asked his brother. Jay was pacing restlessly. While Will was sitting down. Jay’s eyes were red from crying. His cheeks stained with dried tears.

“I’ll go check.” He responded. Getting up. He gave Jay’s shoulder a reassuring squeeze when he walked past him.

Will got in the elevator. Going up. He exited the elevator going over to the desk.

“Have you seen Dr Rhodes?” Will asked the nurse at the desk.

“He’s over there.” she replied. Pointing her index finger to the room behind him. Will turned around to see Connor sitting next to you. Holding your hand to his lips. While you laid on the hospital bed asleep.

“Thanks.” He spoke. Walking over towards the room. Sliding the door open then close the door.

“So, where you going to tell Jay, she is out of surgery or were you just going to keep it from him? After all, she is his girlfriend.” Will spoke. Making Connor’s jaw clench. He untwined his fingers from yours. Delicately putting your hand down.

“She lost a lot of blood, I had to give her a blood transfusion, there were some complications during surgery, I nearly lost her. I had to put her in an induced coma.” Connor spoke, ignoring what Will said.

“She isn’t yours anymore Connor, you blew it.” Will spoke. Defending his brother.

“I know that.” Connor spoke. Standing up. His eyes were red from crying.

“I don’t think you do.” Will spoke again. Glaring at Connor.

“Have you ever thought that when she came in it affected me too? That I felt like I made a huge mistake letting her go. That the love of my life was dying.” Connor shouted. Fresh tears welling up in his eyes.

Will gave Connor a deadly glare. Connor let out a sniffle. Shaking his head.

“Jay can see her.” Connor spoke, as he gave you one last longing glance before leaving the room.

Will took out his phone. Sending Jay a quick text with the room and floor you were on. He would have gone and got him, but he didn’t trust Connor at the moment, not with what he saw.

Will looked up at you. An oxygen mask covering your mouth. The monitors showing your heart rate. Letting out a sigh. Just as he took a step, the door opened. Then shut. Will craned his neck seeing his disheveled brother.

Jay rushed over to you. Sitting on the chair Connor sat on. He grabbed ahold of your hand. Bringing it up towards his lips.

“My baby.” He sobbed. Kissing your hand repeatedly.

“She had to have a blood transfusion. She’s in an induced coma.” Will spoke. Making Jay cry.

“I promise you; I will find the person who did this to you.” He promised you. Looking at you as he kissed the back of your hand.

“I love you so much.” He sobbed.

“Please don’t die on me, please wake up.” He pleaded…...

[yourdeepestfathoms]

I Ain’t A Judas (part two)

[Off-West End]

TW: Blood

-------------------------------------

Lynn had seen her fair share of gruesome injuries in her time, both as an active sports player and gym coach. 

When she was on her high school’s wrestling team, she vividly remembered throwing her (male, mind you) opponent to the ground and hearing the distinct sound of bones cracking. There was something haunting about being on top of a person while their skeleton seemed to fold inward, having her ear so close to that sickening snap. The resulting nightmare-inducing scream was actually a mercy to the other noise.

She had scrambled off of the boy, backing away on her hands and knees like she was a scared animal. Her opponent must have landed wrong when she pinned him because his knee was bent at an unnatural angle and he was screaming bloody murder. Someone in the audience threw up. Someone else fainted. The boy’s parents rushed over to him and began yelling.

The parents had tried to sue Lynn for the broken leg, but the school defended her, saying it wasn’t her fault and injuries were to be expected in sports. She obtained a title of sorts, being one of the most feared wrestlers in the district. She took it with honor, despite its double-edged outcomes.

The experience desensitized her to all types of gore, but not without a price. For a while, she was sensitive to any sound that resembled snapping bones. Even a foot stepping on a twig was enough to bring back the memory of the boy and the broken leg. She got over it eventually, but at the time, it had been hell.

Injuries became repetitive after that. Broken arms, broken legs, broken noses- she saw it all when she became a coach. They always went the same way, too- that damned snapping sound, a limb bent at an angle that wasn’t normal, screaming that was so loud it could probably break the sound barrier, everyone in the general vicinity panicking like chickens with their heads cut off. Not that Lynn blamed them for such a reaction; she supposed it wasn’t ever the same after you were chest-to-chest with someone when the injury happened.

But in sports, broken bones were the worst thing that could be inflicted upon someone. Scratches, bruises, black eyes, bloody noses, even the broken bones themselves to some extent were nothing compared to other horrors. So as the repetition of injuries continued its cycle, Lynn believed nothing could get worse than that time back in high school.

And then she entered the darkened White bungalow and saw Carrie on the ground, surrounded by blood and covered in blood and frothing up blood, and that way of thinking was thrown out the window.

This. This was worse.

Lynn used to think that the screaming was the worst part of any injury, regardless of severity. That elongated, guttural sound of agony that the victim didn’t have the power to mute or muffle, bearing completely raw emotion, ripped out from the throat without control or consent. 

But as Lynn had knelt above Carrie White’s body, she now knew that the screaming was a mercy. The silence was the real thing that she should have been fearing all these years.

The screaming, at least, as awful as it was, meant the victim was alive. Even with their mind clouded with agony, they were sentient enough to even feel that agony. They were there, they knew, they could feel.

Carrie White was not, did not, could not.

The silence did not bring serenity. The silence did not bring peace. The silence brought panic- overwhelming, blood-rushing panic that made Lynn feel like she was standing in the middle of a rushing white water river, battered by the current. It made everything fall away into little broken pieces that would never be able to form its proper puzzle ever again. It made her feel true, unadulterated, unbridled terror for the first time since she was sixteen and in a gymnasium that smelled of salt and sweat with another kid screaming his heart out right beneath her.

It made her feel helpless.

And then, as if a giant log had been hurled from the raging river of dread and hit her in the face, awareness came rushing back to her. She stopped the flow of tears that she had not been able to fight back in those initial moments of hysteria and got her head on straight. 

Sue was there, holding Carrie’s body close to her chest. Margaret was there, too, face-down on the floor, unmoving, but Lynn could have hardly cared. Her focus was entirely on the young girl bleeding all over the place before her.

The cause of that bleeding didn’t feel real, either.

  “Her throat. She slit her throat.”

Lynn remembered watching something on TV, one of those cookiecutter crime shows that had been copy and pasted dozens of times before, saying something about how a throat wound could bleed out within minutes, if not seconds. She cursed her school training for not teaching her how to deal with this, opting instead to make all the teachers relearn the heimlich maneuver and CPR for the hundredth time in a row.

When she took Carrie’s small, shaking body into her arms, she discovered something worse than the silence. The gurgling. That wet, foamy sound that gargled in the back of Carrie’s throat, so desperate for proper articulation and enunciation, choked back by a torrent of her own blood. It may have meant she was still alive and fighting, but Lynn much preferred the silence.

Unwrapping Sue’s shirt from around Carrie’s neck and actually gazing upon the wound felt like a physical knife against Lynn’s throat. She had never been one of those people who could feel pain from watching others get hurt, and yet, in that moment of raw horror, she swore she could feel her own flesh being sliced open, muscles and tendons snapping away like weak thread, vessels punctured and windpipe split, slowly filling her lungs with her own blood, drowning her, restricting breathing--and then she realized she wasn’t breathing. Not while she looked at the gash. It used its severed arteries as a noose and strangled her, so she strangled it back.

Even with the hideous green and brown curtains wrapped around the wound like bulky bandages, Carrie’s neck was still so small. Lynn’s hands were so large. She felt like she was trying to asphyxiate a baby bird.

Lynn realized then that the experience in the gym was not the most horrific thing she had ever witnessed. At least she was a teenager when it happened. Being an adult and squeezing onto a child’s slashed open throat hurt in more ways than she could truly express. There was just something so fucking terrifying about being the one to pinch gushing blood vessels closed, to be the hands around a dying girl’s throat, to be the one and only defining factor to if that girl would survive the night. Even though she knew it had to be done, Lynn wanted to cut her hands off for the things they had done in those horrifying six minutes before the ambulance arrived.

Carrie’s eyes had looked so dull, so lifeless. It was a stark contrast to half an hour before she was bleeding out all over the place, when they were full of joy and life.

Lynn had never seen Carrie so happy before. She had never seen her dance, either, which made everything pre-blood dump even better. Carrie looked like a normal teenage girl, having fun at her school prom, being treated as she should have been all these years.

Lynn remembered, clear as day, those hours before the destruction.

Carrie had truly stuck out like a sore thumb in the Prom, but not in the way that any of her bullies had been expecting. The dress she wore, hand-sewn herself she had said, was soft pink and seemed to glitter in the overhead lights. Her red hair was brushed back to neatness, though that one iconic lock of bangs still dangled in front of her left eye. When they had spotted each other, Lynn was endeared to watch Carrie rip away from Tommy and run over to her in her heels. 

  “Miss Gardener, you look incredible!” Carrie had exclaimed.

  “Thank you, Carrie,” Lynn said. “You look beautiful.” As shy and modest as always, Carrie ducked her head and said, “Oh, thank you.”

Tommy had then walked over to them. “Miss Gardener, I don’t think I would ever see you in a dress.”

Lynn gave him a sharp look. “Tommy.” 

Tommy cleared his throat. “You guys want some punch? I heard Stokes and Freddy spiked it.”

  “Oh no,” Carrie said in a woebegone voice. “Isn’t it dangerous to drink spikes? What if someone chokes?”

  “Really?” Lynn said to Tommy at the same time.

Tommy had laughed, then noticed Lynn’s unamused, deadpan expression. He stopped instantly.

  “Uh-- No.” He said. “I’m joking.” He rubbed his palms on his black pants. “I’m going to get us some of that punch! Which is not spiked!”

Lynn rolled his eyes as he skittered away, then turned her attention back to Carrie. She looked so amazed as she gazed around the Prom, like it was the nicest event she had ever been to.

She and Carrie had talked until Tommy came back, but it wasn’t the last she would see of the girl. She chatted with her several times during the night, even danced with her on a few occasions. It was nice to see her smile after everything.

But of course, it had been ruined. Would Carrie ever get to experience true bliss without someone taking it away from her?

The memory of the blood dump had brought Lynn back to the present, to the blood on her hands on that moment. Every time she would lift them long enough for Carrie to get air, more would gush out, and she slammed them back into place every time, desperate to halt the flow. She wouldn’t have taken them away at all if Carrie wouldn’t have suffocated from the pressure on her neck. 

Lynn thought about Chris when she was effectively strangling Carrie. Her own will was keeping her from adding the proper weight to Carrie’s neck, so she made herself angry to compensate for the thing she really didn’t want to do.

How could anyone be so cruel? Especially to someone who didn’t deserve such treatment? Lynn imagined it was Chris beneath her hands, and that made her squeeze tighter.

She knew it had been Chris, and not just because of her gut feeling. Norma had told her.

During the panic of laughter and shock and confusion after the blood dump, Lynn had found Norma Watson, Chris’s second-in-command, in the crowd. For a moment, she didn’t know if it was even really her, as she wasn’t used to seeing her without her trademarked red backwards hat, but then recognized her snarky face and grappled onto her with her nails dug in. However, when Norma looked at her, her face was anything but snarky. It was horrified.

  “What happened?” Lynn had demanded. “Who did this?”

  “Chris,” Norma told her instantly. She looked back to the stage, to the blood dripping off the edge. “I-I didn’t know it was blood…”

  “What?”

Norma shook her head, mouth hanging open.

  “Norma!” Lynn dug her nails in further. She didn’t care if it got her fired, she had to know. “What the hell are you talking about?”

Norma looked back at her, wide-eyed and sickened. “I didn’t know it was real blood.” She said. “Chris-- she said it was red water. Just dyed with food coloring. I didn’t think she would--”

Lynn had released her, noticing that Carrie was now gone. She couldn’t stick around any longer. 

Before she rushed away, she could have sworn she faintly heard Norma utter, “I’m sorry.”

When the paramedics finally came rushing in, Lynn did not let go of Carrie. She couldn’t risk it, not anymore. Not when they were so close to salvation. The paramedics let her stay by the girl’s side until they got to the actual hospital, but then not even she could remain. She had to peel her hands back, and they were completely covered in blood.

She and Sue sat in the waiting room for what felt like forever, when it was really only two and a half hours at best. They spoke to each other in brief, choppy instances. The stink of guilt wavering off of Sue was sickening--though, that may have just been the stench of the rancid pig blood and regular human blood mixed together into a miasma upon their skin.

When the nurse finally came out and walked up to them, Lynn had been expecting the worst. Surely such a lethal wound take longer to treat. But it didn’t, apparently, because the nurse said that Carrie was stable and Carrie was going to live and they would be able to see her if they liked.

They did.

Lynn and Sue both comforted Carrie when she woke up. Her voice was very hoarse and weak, and Lynn guessed that was both because of her throat wound and from her having to strangle her to keep her from bleeding out.

Carrie didn’t seem very happy to be alive, but then Lynn realized she didn’t have much to live for in the first place. Her mother was all she had, and now even she was gone (the doctors said it was a heart attack). Lynn was hoping to take the place of that empty maternal role and give Carrie the life she deserved. She just wanted to see her happy again.

It was one in the morning when Lynn finally left the hospital. Since she had rode in the ambulance, Sue’s mother dropped her off back at the White bungalow to get her car. 

The place was already swarmed with yellow tape and crime scene investigators. A few neighbors were standing out on their porch, watching the scene. Red and blue lights lit up the dark street. A police officer walked up to Lynn while she was trying to get to her car and began asking her questions about what happened.

By the time she got home, Lynn was mentally and physically drained. The first thing she did when she pulled up in her driveway was step out of her car and throw up in the lawn. Carrie’s blood was still on her hands.

Lynn lost her complete sense of time when she took a shower. She stood beneath the spray of scalding hot water and blankly watched blood run down the drain. She dimly wondered if this was what Carrie saw That Day in the locker room.

She finally broke when she got out of the shower. Staring at her own reflection in the fogged up mirror, she crumpled. Everything she had been holding back hit her like brass knuckles and she sunk to the floor, sobbing.

The tears stopped, eventually. When Lynn dredged herself from the bathroom floor, she went downstairs, started a fire in her fireplace, and threw her blood-stained Prom dress into the flames.

She would not be getting sleep tonight.

--

Carrie was permitted to leave the hospital two days later. By then, it seemed like everyone in the whole country had heard of what happened. Apparently a few reporters had even tried to sneak into the hospital under the guise of being family members to do an interview with Carrie, but were wrangled out.

Carrie herself looked no better than the day she came in. Her hair was wiry and tangled, and her skin was very, very ashen. Her eyes were dead, sunken into two pits in her skull. When Lynn had stepped into the hospital room, her gaze did not brighten like Lynn had been hoping. She just stared at her with a blank expression.

Lynn was given strict instructions to keep an eye on Carrie’s neck, to come in if even a single stitch popped out. Carrie was prescribed tramadol, which she should take a few hours after arriving home. If Lynn’s house could even be considered her home.

The drive was silent. Lynn tried to fill the space, but Carrie never responded. Hell, she barely even looked at her. All she did was look out the window with the same dead fish look in her eyes.

Was this even still the little girl she had danced with at Prom?

  “Here we are,” Lynn said as she parked. “There’s someone waiting for you inside. I’ve told them all about you.”

Carrie tensed. Lynn realized her mistake and quickly went on, “They’ll like you, I promise. It’s nothing bad.”

Carrie’s anxiety did not go away. Lynn quickly unbuckled both of their seatbelts (had Carrie ever even ridden in a car before?), then led Carrie inside. Instantly, Carrie flinched, probably expecting someone awful to be waiting there for her, but instead a grey pit bull bounded up to them, tail wagging so fast it became a blur. Carrie relaxed slightly.

  “You have a dog.”

It was the first thing Carrie had said to her all day. Lynn smiled and nodded, scratching behind the dog’s ear.

  “I never told you?”

Carrie shook her head.

  “Well, her name is Rosebud. You can also call her Rosie. She responds to both.”

Carrie nodded. She reached down and tentatively pet Rosebud. Rosebud responded by eagerly licking her hand. Carrie pulled away with a tiny noise, but it wasn’t one of shock or fear, rather awe. Had Carrie ever touched a dog before?

  “Come on. I’ll show you where you’ll be sleeping.”

Lynn gave Carrie a tour of the house while Rosebud trailed after them. Carrie nodded to everything she said, not voicing her opinions about anything. Not that Lynn was expecting her to. She wasn’t like that. Even if it weren’t for her traumatic injury, she wouldn’t say anything.

By the time Lynn was done showing Carrie around, she realized it was only now turning to 12:00. They still had the whole day stretched out before them, and Lynn had no idea what to do.

It was weird, she thought. She had imagined raising Carrie herself several times before this, but she always pictured them doing regular family things like watching TV together or baking or going jogging. Now that the opportunity was finally in front of her, she didn’t know what she was supposed to do. Though, in her defense, in all of her fantasized ideas, she hadn’t pictured Carrie with a slashed open throat and severe trauma.

  “Would you like to do anything?” Lynn asked. Might as well like Carrie choose.

But Carrie just shook her head, looking as clueless as she felt. 

  “Ah-- well…” Lynn was grasping at straws here. What did Carrie even like to do? “Here, I’ll turn the TV on for you. You can watch something.”

With a small bit of coaxing, she got Carrie to sit down on the couch. Rosebud jumped up next to her. Lynn turned on the TV and opened up the channel guide, then handed the remote to Carrie.

  “Turn on whatever you want.”

Carrie looked down at the remote, then up at her, blinking.

Oh, please don’t tell me she doesn’t know how to--

  “I-I, umm…”

Yep. That was enough of an answer. Carrie didn’t know how TVs worked.

  “Oh, let me--” Lynn took the remote back and began explaining how it worked. “See these two arrows? If you press on them, you can go up in the channels. That’s what all of those little boxes on the screen are. And you can select with this circle in the middle.” She demonstrated, selecting one of the channels and turning on one of those house hunting shows where the white couple (and they’re ALWAYS white) never seem satisfied with any of the options they’re given even though they’re all beautiful houses. “So, is there anything specific you want to watch? Sports? Cartoons? Movies?”

  “This is okay,” Carrie said softly.

  “Alright,” Lynn set the remote down next to her. “You can change it anytime you want.”

Carrie nodded, then looked up at the TV. Lynn lingered beside her for a moment before walking into the kitchen.

Wow, okay. She did not expect motherhood to be this awkward. This was definitely going to be an adventure for her and Carrie both.

--

Time passed. The hours went by. Carrie didn’t say very much. There were some instances where Lynn completely forgot that Carrie was even there and found herself rushing back into the living room to make sure she was as she had left her (which she always was). 

It was a very quiet day, indeed.

At around five o’clock in the evening, however, that quietness was broken.

There was a whimper.

It was so faint that Lynn thought she was just imagining things at first. She had looked up from the soup she was making (the doctor said that Carrie was going to have a liquid/soft food diet for awhile) and furrowed her eyebrows. She strained her ears, but the only sound she got in return was the voice of one of the Property Brothers (she couldn’t tell which was which) from the TV, so she turned her attention back to stirring the noodles in the pot in front of her, writing it off as nothing.

But then it sounded again, this time slightly louder.

Lynn’s spoon clattered against the countertop when she took it out of the pot. She looked out of the kitchen. Maybe it was just Rosebud? She whistled for her pet, then heard the scratching of claws beneath her. She looked down and saw that Rosebud was already there, begging for food in the way she always did when Lynn would cook. Lynn gave into her adorable puppy dog face and tossed her a piece of meat, which she scarfed down greedily.

Well, the whimper was probably just from Rosebud pleading for food in her usual doggy way. But then there was another whimper while she was looking down at the dog, and it had most certainly not come from Rosebud.

Lynn’s eyes widened.

Remember when it was said that Lynn sort of forgot that she had a child now living in her house? This was one of those times.

Lynn hurried out of the kitchen and into the living room, where she found Carrie curled up against one of the pillows, hand on her throat. Lynn was half-expecting there to be blood everywhere and was expecting Carrie to already be dead even more. If only she had been faster, paid more attention, actually known what the fuck she was doing and how to take care of a child--

Carrie whimpered again.

Lynn knelt down beside the couch and gently touched her arm. Carrie flinched away, eyes popping open wide. She looked at her as if she were expecting someone else, someone worse. There was terror written all over her face, and Lynn could tell she had an apology sitting on her tongue.

  “I-I’m sorry--”

And there it was.

  “Shh, it’s alright,” Lynn said to her, keeping her voice low and soft as to not freak the poor girl out even more. “You’re alright. You’re not in trouble. Are you okay?”

  “M-my neck--” Carrie’s voice was strangled, caught in her throat like it was snagged by a fish hook. “I-it hurts--”

Lynn cursed herself for not knowing that. Of course that would be the cause of Carrie’s pain- she got her damn throat slashed open! Was she expecting it to be her damn elbows or something?

  “The painkillers have probably worn off by now,” Lynn said, glancing at the time projected underneath the TV. “I’ll go get you some more.” She retrieved a tablet of Tramadol and a glass of water in record time, not wanting to leave Carrie alone for very long. She helped her sit up, then set the two items in her hands. Carrie went to take a sip from the cup, but flinched away at the last second.

  “N-no--”

Lynn frowned. “You have to drink, sweetheart.” She said. “You need to take that medicine.”

  “I-I can’t--” 

  “It’ll make the pain go away.”

Carrie shook her head, then cried out in pain when she did so, nearly spilling the water. When Lynn reached out to steady her, she jerked away as if her hands were made of fire.

  “Hey, hey,” Lynn spoke softly. “It’s okay, Carrie. You’re okay. I’m not going to hurt you.”

Carrie looked at her, and there were tears glistening in her big hazel eyes.

  “Why don’t you want to drink?” Lynn asked. Maybe if she knew the cause of the problem, she could solve it.

  “Hurts--to swallow.”

Once again, Lynn mentally punched herself for not knowing that. She couldn’t imagine what Carrie must have been feeling at that moment. Was she worried that the stitches would fly out if she simply took a drink of water?

  “Oh, honey,” Lynn said sadly. She reached out and gently rubbed Carrie’s shoulder, hoping to comfort her. “I know it hurts, but the medicine will help with that, I promise. You just need to take one sip, that’s all. Just one. Think you can do that for me?”

Carrie looked at her uneasily, then nodded. She drank from the cup and put the pill in her mouth while Lynn rubbed her back comfortingly. The poor thing got an expression of absolute agony on her face when she swallowed, but she managed to force it down.

  “It hurts!” Carrie cried.

  “You did it, baby,” Lynn said, smiling warmly. She thumbed away the tears that had sprung to Carrie’s eyes. “You did it. I’m so proud of you.”

  “Hurts,” Carrie uttered again. The hand that wasn’t holding the cup grasped at her neck, as if she thought the flesh was still splitting open and she could mend it back together if she held it for long enough. 

  “I know,” Lynn said. “The medicine is going to help with that, though. You’ll feel better soon.”

Carrie nodded weakly. Her eyes were so dull and lifeless. Lynn wished she would smile.

  “I’m going to go take the pot off the oven before I burn the whole house down,” Lynn said. “I assume that you aren’t up to eating right now?”

Carrie shook her head.

  “Okay. But when the medicine starts working, you’re going to have to eat something. Doctor’s orders.”

Lynn went back to the kitchen and took the pot of soup off of the burner. She got to it just in time; it was about to bubble over the edge.

When Lynn went back to the couch, two bowls of soup in hand, Carrie was leaning back against the cushions, a glazed look in her eyes. Her hand was still on her neck. Lynn nudged her gently to get her attention.

  “I’m back,” Lynn said, sitting down next to her. “I hope you like chicken noodle. Homemade.”

Carrie blinked at her slowly. “My Mama would make me boiled chicken.”

  “I--” 

That sounded absolutely disgusting.

  “Sounds delicious!”

Carrie shrugged. Pain flashed in her eyes, and Lynn knew it wasn’t because of her neck for once.

Everyone knew about Margaret White and her weird teachings, but nobody had ever thought to do something about it. Lynn was, shamefully, one of those people. Even after she grew attached to Carrie, she still held out hope that it wasn’t as bad as everyone was saying, that the bruises that constantly showed up on Carrie’s little body were just from clumsiness.

She should have known. She should have been smarter. Maybe if she stepped in sooner Carrie wouldn’t be the way she was now.

  “It was certainly boiled,” Carrie finally said, and Lynn couldn’t help but bark a laugh. Carrie blinked at her in delight.

  “I bet it was,” Lynn said back, patting her head.

She and Carrie ended up switching the channel to some animated movie while they ate. Or, while Lynn ate. Carrie didn’t touch her bowl from where it sat on the coffee table in front of the couch.

Some time passed. Lynn noticed that Carrie was starting to blink a lot more, as if she were fighting off tears, but when she looked directly at her, she realized it was from weariness. 

That was right. Tramadol’s main side effect was drowsiness. Lynn tried not to smirk.

  “Someone is sleepy,” Lynn said.

  “Mm-mmm,” Carrie shook her head stubbornly, then let out the most adorable yawn that Lynn had ever heard. 

  “You definitely are,” Lynn set her bowl down, then picked up Carrie’s. “Think you can take a few bites for me? Just a little.”

Carrie looked at her, then the bowl, then back to her, then nodded. She took the bowl from Lynn and began taking small bites.

  “Good girl,” Lynn smiled, rubbing Carrie’s back. Maybe taking Carrie wouldn’t be so hard after all!

  “Hey, Miss Gardener?”

  “Yes, sweet girl?”

  “You wanna know what it was like?”

  “What?”

Carrie looked up at her, eyes like hollow glass, a thin line of soup dripping down the corner of her mouth, and said, “Your hands felt like they had been hanging me.”

…Or not. 

[mishastoesies]

3, 20, 27 for the ask thingy :)

(questions from this list, feel free to send me some!)

3. What’s a scene that you think is underrated?

the scene in 5x14 My Bloody Valentine when they’re in the car and cas is eating all of those burgers and dean gives him that Look and whistles... yeah i bet he’s thinking about how much cas likes meat. 

20.  Favourite villain?

ROWENA MY FRIEND ROWENA!!! she’s an evil hag and i LOVE her!! powerful witch, hundreds of years old, milf queen of hell, icon status!!!

27.  Make up an episode of spn and give specifics

okay so we’re gonna take a dip into Jessica’s Mental Cas-Centric Spinoff of SPN That Spans Everything From Pre-Canon to Post-Canon 

post-canon, very “the man who would be king”-style episode (but like, happy) where cas recounts his experiences with The Michael Sword pre-this episode. 

starts with shots of heaven’s numerous corridors. we hear whispers of the Michael Sword from multiple angels, all bustling about; the date appears on screen: January 24th, 1979. the Michael Sword has been born

camera tracks one particular angel, whispers get louder. tense music. comes to a head when the angel who we’ve been tracking flings open a door, and asks: castiel, did you hear about the Michael Sword?

“yes, you’re only the thousandth angel to inform me of his existence” says a young, sexy cas. its important that he’s sexy. they are in heaven’s breakroom and castiel is going over some papers. 

“aren’t you EXCITED?? this is everything! we’re finally gonna beat lucifer! it’s gonna be so much fun!” says balthazar. he’s confused as to why cas isn’t excited

“not everything is about the michael sword, some things are about rivers. or mountains.” cas says, and he heads back to his office. we see cas walk outside and head to a room labelled Corporeal Architecture. this is his day job. (architect cas headcanons here)

balthazar follows him. “well yknow even if you aren’t excited you should STILL show up to the Human Arrangement Department’s afterparty, this vessel was a big project for them. and also since you’re head of your department, it’s on you to give him a blessing. we’re collecting them from everyone tonight”

cas rolls his eyes. “i know, i know, i’ll be there. and here i already have his blessing, courtesy of myself, raziel, adelphi, and the rest.” he hands balthazar a piece of paper and balthazar reads it. “ethereal beauty? really, castiel? you couldn’t give him something useful?”

“i’m an architect, we like beautiful things. now go away, i’m busy” balthazar goes away. this is the first time castiel hears about the Michael Sword

the second time is when we see castiel sparring with an unnamed training partner. zachariah calls castiel, balthazar, uriel, and hester to his office. “we have a rescue mission for you” and outlines the plan to save dean from hell. they accept because they have to, and they go down to hell. 

massive fight scene of them killing demons, like, so many demons. cas sees dean, who is like, covered in blood and half feral and holding a knife, does his little “Hello, Dean” and grabs his shoulder. dean fights back, but cas is stronger than him. he calls for zachariah, who angel-teleports them all up out of hell. 

they’re in the Beautiful Room; cas deposits dean’s unconscious body onto a couch, and turns to see his garrison.

everyone is covered in scrapes, starting-to-form bruises, and cuts. cas looks worse for wear, but he starts to laugh. and so does everyone else. cas heads to a door, yells “DEAN WINCHESTER IS SAVED” and laughs his head off. dean does not wake up. 

cut to cas shouting at zachariah in zachariah’s office. “i did what you asked! i saved him!” and zachariah going “yes, now restore him.” “or what? i have work to do!” “or do you need another trip to Internal Conflict Resolution with naomi?” and cas shudders a little bit. “no, sir. i’ll restore him” 

six-day montage of cas slowly rebuilding dean’s unconscious body. one day, he does dean’s organs, the next day, his shredded-up torso, the next, the puncture wounds in his shoulders. day six, we see balthazar come in and ask castiel if he’s going to go down to earth to perform some minor miracles, and cas says “can’t, i have work” and balthazar is like “ugh you ALWAYS have work” and leaves cas alone with dean

day six is the day that cas restores dean’s soul. again, this is part of my larger architect cas headcanon system, i can’t get into it here

day seven cas is finally done (haha get it on the seventh day god rested haha [gunshot]) and he sends dean back down to earth to claw his way out of his grave; this is immediately pre-Lazarus Rising. 

cas looks down from heaven and smiles all smitten at his creation. oh fuck he’s in love

next scene: cas’ bender pre-5x17; cas fights off a kill squad of angels that were sent after him, and they throw like, every homophobic microaggression they can at him. cas drags himself to a liquor store and drinks it; we hear sam praying to him, and him mocking sam. this turns into him mocking zachariah. “raise the michael sword, castiel; restore the michael sword, castiel” cas says in a high-pitched voice as he chugs his fifth bottle of everclear. then he hears what sam is actually saying and is like “oh fuck i gotta go, dean’s in trouble”

ten year timeskip to 15x18; all told through cas’ eyes. it’s literally just his POV for the episode, except it’s retconned to include an “i love you too, cas” before the “goodbye, dean”

cut to 3 hours before present day; we see cas standing in front of a mirror, wearing a suit we’ve never seen him in before. we cut to dean, also wearing a suit; noticeably nicer than what we’ve seen him in before. dean slips on one last item - a small, glowing white vial attached to a cord. oh fuck it’s their fucking WEDDING. 

cut to present day, in the middle of a park. turns out, cas has been saying his damn VOWS this whole time. we can assume it was all very “the first time i met you, i didn’t know what to think of you, then i touched your soul, and i knew... i would do anything for you. lie, rebel, sacrifice, anything. you’re the one work i ever took pride in creating. i love you, dean” levels of sappy

dean has a Single Man Tear sliding down his cheek. he moves in for a kiss, but cas moves back; the crowd laughs because they’re not supposed to kiss yet, and dean and cas laugh too. dean reads his vows, but we don’t hear them; they’re for cas’ ears only. music swells, and the episode ends with them finally getting their kiss. 

end credits, directed by Jensen Ackles

[woshivn]

The fort is in a sorry state

The fort is in a sorry state, admittedly. Our discussion today and going forward will focus on the continuing operations of the core Finish Line business.. And her, for you’ve wounded her too. "The barefoot craze lasted much longer bottines cloutees femme than I ever expected. I guess we lived like people did a long time ago. Moped riding teenage thugs armed with an 18 inch MACHETE. The Yunkish Supreme Commander, Yurkhaz zo Yunzak, might have been alive during Aegon’s Conquest, to judge by his appearance. IX. Volleyball Greeley West Darren DeLaCroix Northern Colorado Football Green Mountain Luke Kuberski Metro State Baseball Shelbey Gnagy Garden City CC Softball Danielle Lord Biola Univ (CA) Women Soccer Matthew Ramirez Washburn Univ. It's nice that he always marries women with strong personalities to take care of him because then he can just wander around, get stoned, drink and tell stories. 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[merci-bitch]

I Can Make You Love Me

Riza’s girl part ll 

Riza Stavropol x Fem!Reader

Genre: Drama, small hint of NSFW, angst

Words: 3k

Warning(s): knife mark, small hint of smut, cursing, manipulation, angst

A/N: well, I’m surprised I even finished this. This doesn’t particularly mean I’m back but I’ve been fighting my own stuff but I’m starting to come back at least haha. I haven’t read through it so sorry if there’s any misspelling or stuff. Anyways, enjoy!

I was soaked in a pool of sweat and the heat blazing down from the sun on us through her widow didn't make the situation any better. I felt like I was in a sauna and I definitely felt tired. I could feel Riza's piercing blue eyes like the clear waters of Greece targeting me. Marking me.

"Well, how was it?" I rolled over on my side to look at her. I had two options, of an answer. One would please her very much and the other one, meh. It would piss her off.

"Terrible." I mussed sarcastically. I watched the cocky smirk on her face fade and I let out a laugh. "You little bitch!" She playfully smacked my ass. "Naughty girl, aren't you?" She bit her bottom lip and watched me carefully.

"When I want to be." I smiled. Riza leant her head down and crashed her own lips onto mine. Her teeth bitting my bottom lip for an entry to my mouth. Hesitantly, I opened my mouth and felt her tongue mix with my own. She was dominating me. When she pulled away we were both panting and she looked satisfied. "I take it back. My good girl." She pulled me close and caressed my face.

I felt content in her arms but I was still on edge. "Darling?" She loosened her grip on me and cubbed my cheek with her hand. "What's wrong?" I looked down before answering. "I-sorry, I'm just...I'm just a little worried about H."

"H?" She looked angry and kinda surprised. "We just had sex and now you're thinking of H?!" She sat up.

"R-Riza, I didn't mean-"

"Oh no, my darling. You did mean it. You most certainly did. I told you he's an asshole, Y/N. I told you he's no good." Her eyes gleamed with malicious intent and I felt scared. Scared she was going to hurt me even worse then she already did.

"You still love him, don't you?" Riza was almost on the border of yelling. "Don't you?!" She got in my face and that's when I pushed her off of me.

"No! But I still care about him and he's trying his best. He's the only person I have left who's like family to me and don't I have the right to feel anyway I want? Or do you own that too." I knew that I was playing with fire but despite the fear I had for Riza, she was so beautiful when she was mad. I couldn't help but love it. How her nose would curl, adorable.

"Yes. You do but not when we're in the middle of something ourselves! For example, finishing sex! You love me, don't you?" She started to sound desperate.

"Riza-"

"You want me. The way you've never wanted anyone befo-"

"You know I do but I told you, I believe in chances and right now? You're about to lose yours. As soon as I said those words, Riza's face dropped. A part of me regretted what I had said. She looked hurt. Betrayed. She lied down again and turned her back towards me. "Riza...Riza, I'm sorry."

"I'm not speaking to you." She said after a few minutes. Her tone was cold and it made me feel uncomfortable. "Riza, I didn't mean to hurt you but I'm worried."

"Worried about him? Worried about that fucking traitor? He's a jerk. I told you that." She spun around and looked at me. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have snapped at you but I care about you, okay? I care about you more then I've cared about anyone in a while and I don't want to lose you. Her eyes turned soft.

"You won't lose me, okay? I care about you too, but I can at least have the right to know that he's alright." Riza let out a sigh. "If I tell you he's alright, will you leave the topic be?" She kissed my nose and help me tight to her. "..Yes." I breathed inwardly.

"Then he's fine. I promise." Despite the anxiety I felt, I trusted her words and slowly began to snuggle into her. "Thank you." She ran her fingers through my hair and gave my forehead a kiss. "Get some rest." I nodded my head and clutched onto her tightly. She was so warm and smelled so sweet despite all the sweat she was caked in. "I love you."

"I love you too, my precious girl."

***

"You bitch! This is the final straw!"

"We'll see about that."

H looked down at the ground, frowning as he'd seen you coming in and out of consciousness. "You hurt her Riza! Why would you do that? I told you that this is between you and me."

"But it's not though." She kicked the ground, showing off her tone legs through her silk dress. "Haven't you missed me, H?"

"Missed you? The thought of you repulses me. Especially now. You're lucky I haven't killed you after what you did." H said as he slowly started backing down the hallway and Riza chuckled. "Oh pretty boy, you forget that I can read you like the back of my hand." Riza pressed her body close to him and pinned him to the wall.

"Not anymore. I'm a changed person." She held his face in her hands and smiled. "Sure you are." Riza slipped one of her hands underneath his shirt, scratching the bare skin of his chest. His eyes rolled back and Riza couldn't help but smile. "And you say I don't know you."

"Riza-" He meet her eyes almost as if he was in a trace. "H." She mumbled. Their lips nearly grazed each other when H noticed her extra arm moving around him. "What are you-"

BAM!

The smashed barrel of her gun hit the top of his head. H looked puzzled for a moment and Riza smiled, pushing him away from her. "How did you-" He slurred his words before dropping to the ground.

***

"Oh come on, H! One more dance, please!" H winced at the high pitched voice of the woman that had her arm wrapped around his waist but tolerated it. He was hammered from all the alcohol he had been drinking but who could blame him?

It was a long dat at the agency and he needed a break from it all. "Amanda, I would say yes but I'm afraid I'm spent for the night an I must get going."

"But H-"

"No Amanda. Now if you'll excuse me-" H turned around and walked straight into the chest of two alien men. "You're the agency scum that got your hands on our girl?"

The question took him off guard. Their girl? "What, I-I! Know? Come on guys that would be ridiculous." He chuckled nervously. "Wouldn't it?"

The two men in front of him didn't seem amused. The one bulkier grabbed him by his throat and pressed him against the wall. "You calling me liar?"

"No! I-I..." H felt the blood circulating through him becoming less and less. "Let him be, Dorian. He's with me. Aren't you, darling?"

H choked on his own breath and looked up at the face of savior. It was a woman, and she was beautiful. "My apologies, Riza." She let out a humming noise and pulled a blaster out of her silk dress. H got a quick glimpse of her sheer underwear and felt himself swell up with lust.

"Sure." Riza shot him and screams of panic were erupted inside the bar. H just sat there on the ground looking at her confusedly until he noticed she had extended her hand out towards him. "Shall we?"

Despite how wrong he knew it was, he took her hand and walked out the bar with her hand in hand. "What's your name handsome?"

"H. Agent H."

"Oh, an agent. Well, I'm Riza. Riza Stavros."

"Riza, it's nice to meet you."

"Likewise." She hummed. They come across a tan, Moroccan style building and Riza smiled. "I would take you back to my place, but sadly. I'm on business."

"Of course." Riza grabbed the keys out of her bra and unlocked the door, kicking off her heels right as she stepped in the door. H was baffled by her. He was sure she had to be one of the most beautiful women he'd ever seen. "Sit, darling." Riza gestured to the couch as she rummaged through one of the cabinets of her hotel room. Pulling out a glass tumbler.

"You drink whiskey?" She looked over at H while holding up the bottle. "Yes, thank you." She poured him a glass and poured one for herself and sat down next to him on the couch and handed him his glass. H took a taste, it burned his throat at first but left a smooth aftertaste.

“So what’s an agent like yourself doing here?”

The alcohol burned in his throat but left a sweet aftertaste. He thought carefully before responding. Though he didn’t know what good it would do. It was like Riza was staring into his soul. “Looking for a good time, I suppose.”

“Good time with the wrong woman, my dear.” She caressed his cheek with the back of her thumb and smiled. “You’re such a beautiful man, aren’t you? Pretty boy.” Riza said while crawling onto his lap. H didn’t know what to do or what to say. He was shell shocked and drunk.

Riza peppered kisses on his face and down his throat and H moaned. “Lustful for me already, aren’t you?” H didn’t respond. Part of him wanted to shove the woman on top of him aside but he just, couldn’t. She was just too, goddess like. “Y-Yes.”

***

H woke up, rubbing the back of his head. Shaking his head. That’s when he realised, he was stuck to a bloody chair. After minutes of fighting with the ties, he got lose and stood up. H’s iconic smile back on his sweet baby face. “Never do know how to tie me up, now do you Riza.”

H slowly walked out the room, moving around slowly. Begging for that big blue teddy monster not to walk around the corner. Coast is clear. H walked down the long hallway and despite the years since he’d been here. He almost no trouble finding his way around. All those drunk nights with Riza. Her hands scratching up his chest, back. Her sweet lips on his-no. Not this time. Get Y/N and get out of here.

H was too deep in thought, missing a step. “Shit!” Covering his mouth quickly. Looking around. Surprise, no one was around. H shakes his head again and continued down the hallway and took a sharp left turn. There was a door, cracked open. Hesitantly H opened it.

“Oh god.” H said as he turned back around. There she was, Y/N. But naked. He’d never seen her naked before. H felt his cheeks grown hot, like some middle  aged school boy. Damn Riza, for getting them into this. H knew that Y/N was going to be embarrassed when she saw him. If, she ever got to see him of course,

H didn’t trust Riza as far as he’d known her. How the hell did he know that she wasn’t fake sleeping?

Hesitantly he walked over to Y/N and shook her, softly. H didn’t wanna wake her almost. So looked so peaceful when she was asleep. Y/N let out a small groan and opened her eyes. “H..? Oh my god! H!” Her arms flew around his neck. H tensed his shoulders. He didn’t know if he should hug her back or not, afraid of upsetting her. “Riza told me you were alright but I thought I’d never see you again!” Ever so carefully, H ran his hand through Y/N’s soft hair. Glancing over at Riza. “Well, she definitely isn’t awake. That’s for sure. Or I’d be dead by now.”

H couldn’t help the thoughts about Y/N. Damn Riza for making him think this way about her! “Look Y/N, we don’t have much time. We need to get out of here. Your clothes?” Y/N pointed to the end of the bed. H tossed Y/N her clothes and let her get changed. H helped Y/N our of the bed, that’s when Riza stirred. Both H and Y/N panicked. The balcony! They both walked out on it and Y/N pushed H to the side.

“Now why on earth would you do that?” Riza’s deep and raspy voice sent shivers down both H and Y/N’s spines. “Do what?” Y/N asked. Riza walked up to Y/N. “This.” She gestured to her clothed body. The moon was shining on her skin, highlighting the most seductive parts.

“It felt weird to run around naked.” Riza ran her hand up Y/N’s sides. Placing one of her hands on her breast. Kneading it softly. Starting to fumble with her jeans. “I can make it more comfortable for you if you like.” Y/N let out a soft moan and leaned her head back against Riza’s collarbones. H wanted to throw up at the sight of it. The smell of sex permeating off of Riza. This scene was getting almost too nostalgic for him. H tried his very best not to let his eyes wander with how Riza’s hand touched Y/N’s body. How her mouth would launch for her throat and leave small marks.

“Why don’t you come back inside, sweetheart. Hm? What do you say.” Riza’s voice was like honey running. “Riza, we just did it. There’s no need to do it again.” H could hear Riza scoff. “You can’t be serious. It’s sex darling. Something you could do a whole day. And I’ve got a very busy day in a few hours. I need something to calm me down.” H felt himself gag. He took a few steps back and accidentally made a plant fall. Riza snapped her head around. “Oh you’re fucking kidding me. LUCA!” Riza tied her rope around herself and grabbed Y/N’s arm and dragged her inside and once again, H found himself fighting with an old friend.

—

“Am I some sort of joke to you?!” Riza screamed at my face. I shaked my head. Tears burning in the back of my eyes. Riza’s cheeks burning up with anger. Riza took steps back and threw her hands on her sides and scoffed and grabbed the wine bottle on her office table. “R-Riza..?” She threw the cork across the room. “Shut up. Just fucking shut up. You humans, fucking useless.” She scoffed again and started drinking directly from the wine bottle. I sat down, pulling my knees to my chest. This could only go bad.

After 3 wine bottles, she was finally starting to get tipsy. Tipsy Riza was alright, but if it was drunk angry Riza. Run for your fucking life. Where was H when you needed him?!

“Oh drop it, H won’t come this time for you. He’d be dead before he can even spell your fucking name.” Riza held the bottle to her chest and laughed out loud. This wasn’t fun anymore. “Awh, is the little human scared? You want your mommy?” She started taking small steps towards me. Making me back away slowly, towards the stone wall. The floor cold, dirty. Filled with smashed glass. She got down on her knees and crawled towards me. Giving me a good view of her cleavage. My back was against the wall, her nose touching mine. Her eyes dark and cloudy.

“Scared little puppet? Huh? Yeah? Yes!” Her voice, getting higher and higher, and she was getting more insane. “You humans don’t understand anything. Fucking pathetic!” She got even closer. She was a living nightmare. “R-Riza...” With a shaking hand, I reached up and cupped her cheek, only for her to grab my wrist and pull me up and drag me to her desk where she grabbed a knife.

“Riza, no. Let go of it!” She held out my arm and looked at me with blinded eyes and started carving the letter ‘R’ into my skin. Screaming out in pain, pushing her away. Holding my wrist, covering it up in the paper I could find. Riza turned back around and looked at me. Seeing the tears spilling down my cheeks, the blood moving down my arm. She dropped the knife. Her own hands starting to shake. “Y-Y/N, o-oh my god.”

She reached out for me, only for me to move away. Her eyes filling with panic. “I-I don’t know what came over me. Y/N, please let me help.” I shook my head and got up. “No. I’m not letting you help me. I loved you Riza, but this, this is not the Riza I loved.” Her breath shaky. “Wait, no. Please. I can make it up to you. I can love you just as good as he can!” I shook my head. “Riza no. You can see yourself. This is never gonna work.” She shook her head and walked up to me and cubbed my cheeks.

“I can make it work. I can make you love me.”

[frogoat]

Friday the 13th: Mrs. Voorhees Had Help!

I think if you’re in any way familiar with the horror movie genre, you’ll have heard of the Friday the 13th franchise. And even if you’ve never watched the series, Scream gives away the fact that Jason Voorhees isn’t the killer in the first film; it’s his mother Pamela Voorhees who does all the slashing. Or does she?

Lets look at the instances of murder that the film tells us Mrs. Voorhees committed. First we have the two camp counselors in 1958, Barry and Claudette. They sneak away to do the nasty but are confronted and killed shortly afterwards. Note that they don’t appear surprised to see the killer and in fact try to lie about what they were doing, suggesting a familiarity with the assailant. As we know Pamela previously worked as Camp Crystal Lake’s cook, so we can attribute these two murders to her.

Next we have the super nice Annie, who’s been hired as the new Camp Crystal Lake cook. Annie is given a lift to the crossroad half to Crystal Lake by truck driver Enus at the suggestion of Trudy, a diner waitress. Along the way Annie learns of the ‘death curse’ from Crazy Ralph and is warned about going by Enus who recounts the troubled history of the Camp. Undeterred, Annie starts walking from the turn off toward the Camp, only to be picked up by a passerby in a vehicle. This is clearly intended to be Mrs. Voorhees driving as we see her ‘arrive’ in the same vehicle at the films conclusion and it still contains the would-be Camp cook’s lifeless body. 

But how did Pamela just happen upon Annie at the right moment? Was she really just passing by and saw an opportunity for a secluded kill or did she get a tip off? Notice the interior shots of vehicle show a radio handset. I suggest Pamela was perhaps tipped off by Trudy the diner waitress, as the two share a common vocation and could plausibly know each other well. Whether or not Trudy knew what would happen when she mentioned a girl had arrived in town talking about a re-opening Camp Crystal Lake is up for debate, though she is does go from sceptical to helpful very quickly when suggesting Enus drive her to the turn off.

Here it’s worth mentioning that despite Mrs. Voorhees being a middle aged woman who doesn’t demonstrate any exceptional athletic abilities on-screen, still catches up and kills Annie. I concede this was likely intended to be Pamela, perhaps without her iconic pale blue sweater and is possibly just the stuntman being glimpsed on-camera. If it is Mrs. Voorhees, then it begs the question who is lurking behind the trees watching Alice in a scene prior to Annie’s dive from moving vehicle. It can’t be Crazy Ralph because we know he was travelling by bike and couldn’t have outpaced Enus’ truck. Therefore, there must be a second person already onsite at Camp Crystal Lake, either an accomplice or Mrs. Voorhees herself. Whomever kills Annie wields the knife in their right hand and has a prominent ring on the ring finger of their left hand. We see Mrs. Voorhees has a ring on the same finger and wields a knife with the same hand in the climatic battle at the end of the film.

Time passes and the camp owner Steve Christie heads into town while the Camp Counselors take a swim in the lake, kill a snake, encounter a motorcycle police officer and meet Crazy Ralph who promptly leaves after delivering his doomsayer speech. Ned spies on lovers Jack and Marcie and is in turn spied on himself. Spotting a person in a hooded black raincoat entering a nearby cabin, Ned approaches the cabin, asking if they want help. We don’t see exactly what happens but we later see his body on the top of the cabin, his throat slit in the same fashion as Annie’s. This obscured figure could be Pamela’s accomplice, Pamela or both killers working together to lure Ned into a secluded spot to kill him.

With a heavy storm about, Jack and Marcie shelter in a cabin and get down to business, unaware that a deceased Ned is just a few feet above them on the upper bunk and a murdered lies inches beneath them. When Marcie leaves to use the bathroom, Jack is skewered through the throat as his assailant holds his head in place. This killer uses their right hand to hold Jack and strikes with their left hand. We also get another glimpse of the plaid long sleeve shirt.

Seemingly at about the same time, Marcie is followed into the bathroom block. Hearing someone approaching, Marcie calls out playfully to Jack and goofs around in the mirror until hearing more movement nearby. This time thinking it’s Ned trying to prank her, Marcie approaches the shower cubicles only to be killed with an axe blow to the head. We don’t see anything to identify the killer but shortly after when Brenda uses the bathroom, we get a glimpse of a hand behind the shower curtain, suggesting they were unable to leave with Marcie’s body until afterwards. Given that it was a downward axe swing, it’s possible the killer here was taller in height, but this one is unclear. Either way, they were stuck in there with Marcie for a while, presumably holding her upright to avoid detection.

Brenda is watched from outside her own cabin as she settles for the night, only to be drawn outside when she hears what sounds like a child’s voice calling for help. This is most certainly Pamela herself providing the voice, leading Brenda to the archery range where she is blinded by the spotlights and attacked. The left hand we see flip the spotlights on is again adorned with a ring and appears to be wearing the same black raincoat as before, which further corroborates the idea this is Mrs. Voorhees. But who grabbed her while she was blinded by the light? We’ll see Pam use the blinding tactic again, too. As is evident later, Brenda is not actually killed here, because we see her moving feebly later when she is tied up and thrown through a cabin window. More on that later.

Alice and Bill go to Brenda’s cabin to investigate a scream only to find the bloodied axe in her bed. Given the short period of time between Brenda’s scream and the duo’s investigation, I think it’s more plausible the accomplice planted the axe immediately after Brenda exited her cabin before approaching her from behind while she was blinded. Finding no one, Bill and Alice try the phones and the car only to discover they’ve been disabled. Given we know someone was already present at the Camp during the daytime and the whole group of Counselors were at the lake at one point, it’s likely this is when the sabotage took place.

Meanwhile, Steve Christie leaves the diner after a brief chat with waitress Sandy and heads back toward the camp in his 4 Wheel Drive with trailer in tow, only for the vehicle to become bogged and apparently have engine trouble. He is given a lift most of the way back to Camp Crystal Lake by Sgt. Tierney before the latter is called away to a crash. Making his way back on foot, Steve is blinded by a person with a torch in front of the Camp Crystal Lake sign before being stabbed. This is evidently Pamela herself as Steve recognizes his assailant, and we know she had worked for the Christie family back in the 1950′s before her son Jason drowned. I’d suggest the diner worker Sandy may have tipped off Pamela that Steve was returning so that she could lay in wait for him.

The generator is turned off, causing Bill to venture out to investigate and restore power while Alice tries to get some sleep. Evidently some time passes between Bill’s departure and Alice going to find him, as he is found hung on the outside of the generator room’s door with his body filled with a number of arrows and his throat slit. As Bill leaves his raincoat in the generator room, it would appear he too was lured out by Mrs. Voorhees before being attacked and killed. Given the sheer strength required to suspend a man on a door in such a way, I believe we can attribute at least some of this task to Pam’s accomplice. 

Now in a panic, Alice returns to the main cabin and attempts to secures the door from within and arms herself. At this point, the still faintly alive Brenda is thrown through one of the windows, presumably killing her. Brenda appears to have ropes wrapped around her and is covered in blood. Moments later, Alice sees the headlights of Mrs. Voorhees vehicle approaching from the front of the cabin, causing her to remove her barricade and pleas for help. While it’s only an assumption on her part, Alice remarks ‘Please don’t leave me! They’ll kill you too!’ The obvious question here is if Pam did all this herself how did she manage to throw Brenda through the window (or swing her on a rope pulley, perhaps?) and also drive up in her vehicle from the opposite direction within seconds? 

After her mental flashback, Pamela draws a knife from her left hip with her right hand. Here we can see what appears to be the plaid shirt beneath Pam’s sweater. When brandishing her knife at Alice, Pamela makes erratic stabbing motions, rather than the clean slices we saw on some of the victims. Alice discovers poor, sweet Annie’s body in the car, apparently having been left there since her murder. Next, Alice runs into Mr Christie who’s body is suspended from a tree upside down with a knife still lodged in his chest. Clearly a passionate slaying.

With Alice now running and hiding from Pamela, we move into genuine Final Girl territory. Notice that Mrs. Voorhees struggles to break down the pantry door and swings her weapons wildly as though without skill. Compare this with the early more methodical and precise throat stabbings and we paint a clearer picture of the second person. Finally we have the iconic decapitation of Mrs. Voorhees which also gives a clear shot of her ring. 

Notice that several of the attacks have involved luring the victim to a secluded location alone before attacking. It’s also noteworthy some of the victims have been moved after death to delay their discovery, often in elaborate ways involving both physical strength and planning. Finally, note that there were primarily two mechanisms of injury: slit throats and far more messy stabbings. I would argue that this indicates a second person present at Camp Crystal Lake that June 13th. Two personalities and two types of attacks. One is more cold and calculated, the other more emotional and aggressive. It could be argued that this is just an indication of Pamela’s psychosis manifesting (and that’s a perfectly acceptable answer) but I think the sheer amount of physical strength, the timeline of events occurring around the camp, the presence of someone hiding at the camp while Annie is being killed and the sheer amount of moving and planning needed to pull this all off indicates an accomplice on-site at the camp. This is in addition to the far more passive assistance from certain members of hospitality industry who likely had no idea what Pamela had planned.

The movie presents at least two occasions where the assailant is forced into hide after a killing, preventing them from moving on immediately to the next victim, leaving us to wonder how they could have possibly moved about so quickly. We also have several elaborate set ups for the victims to be revealed in a dramatic fashion which clearly require time not afforded to a lone killer. The evidence of violent strength only seen on some of the victims, particularly those lured aware and killed off-screen indicates a second participant, one with greater physical prowess than that seen from Pamela in the film’s finale. The real question shouldn’t be was there a second killer. Rather, it should be who was the second killer in Friday the 13th?

But that’s a discussion for another time. 

[365days365movies]

January 3, 2021: Cliffhanger (1993)

Sylvester Stallone.

The Italian Stallion here is one of the most prominent action movie stars of the ‘80s and ‘90s, coming to prominence with Rocky in 1976. And before we even start this review, here’s the deal: I refuse to make fun of the man’s iconic voice. Yeah, I get it, we’ve all shouted “YOADRIAAAAAAH!” at some point, but his voice and face is due to a botched birth, which pinched a nerve and caused permanent facial paralysis. We all got something, and I’m not gonna target him for it. It’s been done enough.

I also can’t really comment on his acting ability. Why? Well...OK, some confession time. I’ve BARELY seen Stallone in a film. That’s going to be fixed this year, as I’ve added many of his films to the list for 2021. So, what have and haven’t I seen? Let’s start with haven’t, shall we?

I haven’t seen:

Rocky (1976): Sports November

Rocky II (1979): maybe Sports November

First Blood (1982): later this month

Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot (1992): Please. Please don’t make me.

Cliffhanger (1993): Give it a minute.

Demolition Man (1993): Science Fiction September

Judge Dredd (1995): maybe Science Fiction September

The Expendables (2010): later this month

I have seen:

Tango and Cash (1989): Dumbass buddy cop movie with Stallone and Russell; 2/5.

Antz (1998): Sub-par Dreamworks rip-off of an already kinda sub-par Pixar movie; 2/5

Spy Kids 3: Game Over (2003): Yeah...I saw this in theaters, on my birthday. I saw everything in red and green for, like, an hour afterwards. Worth it. 2/5.

Rocky Balboa (2006): Somehow, this is the only Rocky movie I’ve seen, Creed included. And from what I remember, it was fine. 3/5.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017): The ONE good Stallone movie I’ve seen, and it isn’t even a Stallone movie. 5/5.

So, yeah, I haven’t seen any good Stallone movies, sans the one. But now, some of you are probably asking another question: “Why Cliffhanger? You literally haven’t seen any major Stallone movie, so WHY CLIFFHANGER?”

First of all, I think everybody’s kinda slept on this movie. It was a big success back in the day, but people have basically forgotten it at this point. You’ll see in this review that there aren’t even many GIFs from the movie made, and it wasn’t easy to find enough clips to make my own, honestly. Does it deserve to get slept on? I mean, we’ll see, right? 

Secondly, I just watched a Tom Cruise movie where he dangles off of a rope, and I liked that, so why not do that for the next one, I guess! And third...honestly, I saw this on the list, and it kinda just spoke to me. It called to me, like a boxer calling to his love. Hey, look, a reference to a movie I’ve never seen. We’ll get there. We’ll get there. Oh, and SPOILERS from here on out, by the way.

Recap

We start on a cliff. Surprise.

Michael Rooker (y’know, Yondu from Guardians of the Galaxy) is hanging out (HA!) with his girlfriend Sarah on a cliff called the Tower. Y’know, third date kinda stuff. First date is dinner, second date is dinner and a movie, and third date is free-climbing up a cliff to your near death. Well...near is a strong word…

ANYHOOOO, We meet Gabe, played by the big man himself, Sly Stallion, who’s a rescue ranger in the Rocky Mountains. So, Rocky, the Rockies Rescue Ranger is sent to save Yondu and Sarah. Unfortunately...someone forgot to check the equipment before the rescue mission…

Not gonna lie, this scene is actually heart-wrenchingly tense. And the ending...well, if you’ve seen Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls...you know what happens here. And it’s actually somewhat traumatic, for Gabe and for me. Seriously. It’s a roughie.

Cut to almost a year later, and Gabe is...NOT OK. He and his wife, Jessie (who is a pilot for the Rescue Rangers, and was there when Sarah fell), have been separate, and Gabe just can’t do it anymore. And I get it, honestly. That was a hard experience, losing someone and blaming yourself. And no, it wasn’t Gabe’s fault. But to add insult to injury, he has NO SUPPORT SYSTEM. His wife doesn’t seem to understand, his former best friend Yondu hates him (getting GotG Vol. 2 flashbacks), and he’s basically all alone. Geez. You guys are jerks.

Meanwhile, a plot is afoot! And hey, it’s Tripp from CSI: Miami, AKA Rex Linn! I always liked him, so it’s cool to see him in other roles. Turns out, though, that Tripp is working with a group of thugs to steal from the US Treasury. This villainous group of 8 thugs is led by John Lithgow, AKA Lord Farquaad from Shrek, who is channeling Hans Gruber from Die Hard, and trying super-hard on that British accent. Anyway, after a pretty great mid-flight action sequence, the group of thugs loses 3 suitcases of money, amounting to millions. In the process, they also lose Expendable Thugs #1 and #2. This will be a trend. 

The thugs crash their plane into the mountain, killing Expendable Thug #3 in the process. They stage a rescue situation to get some expert mountain climbers to help them find the money. Jessie, after having just told her hubby to suck it up like a big boy (I don’t really like Jessie, by the way), begs him to help find these people. Reluctantly, he agrees, and has a tension filled reunion with his former best friend, who blames him (unfairly, in my opinion). That animosity disappears as soon as they find themselves held hostage by the thugs. And so, the money hunt begins!

First suitcase is on a cliffside, and Stallone goes to get it. Some shenanigans quickly ensure, and the thugs shoot at him. An avalanche occurs because these dumbasses have never seen a movie, and in the process, we lose a suitcase of money, Expendable Thug #4 goes the way of Sarah, and Gabe is presumed dead. Farquaad tells Yondu to tell his coworkers that everything is fine, and he’s gonna stay on the mountain to ride out the storm. Which is #5 in the list of “moments in this movie where I would 100% die” I grew up in a warm climate, this is not a comfortable hypothetical situation for me.

Anyway, our intrepid team of criminals takes Yondu to find the next suitcase, while Jessie and Gabe separately make their way to the cabin that Yondu was talking about. They catch each other up, and they can’t contact the main office because...Jessie’s radio died in the cold? You...you work amongst mountains as a rescue officer for stranded hikers. That’s the best excuse the writers came up with? Why the hell didn’t she bring a better radio? They HAD to have spares, right? RIGHT? Geez, no wonder you needed Gabe’s help.

The tracker, with its marvelously outdated computer graphics technology (IT’S A UNIX SYSTEM IKNOWTHIS), leads the thugs to the next package, but not before Gabe and Jesse get there! Gabe leaves a ransom note for the money, holding it hostage. This eventually leads to a nighttime chase in the snow, leading to Expendable Thug #5 going The Way of Sarah.

By the way, it’s also at this point that I notice that it is VERY bright...for being in the middle of the mountains at night. And I get it, you can’t exactly have your movie be shot in darkness, but...look at this.

Like...wow. That’s the fakest outdoor shot I’ve ever seen. I guess I’m glad it isn’t a day-for-night shot, but...yeah. Wow.

Jesse and Gabe find themselves in a cave full of the cutest goddamn bats I’ve ever seen. This is supposed to be a harrowing experience, but simply makes me jealous. They’re fruit bats, by the way, and they’re also WAY too high up, altitude-wise. At least, that’s what I assume. I’m a bird-guy, not a bat-guy. Eventually, they make it out of the cave after Stallone does some free-climbing...loudly. Loud enough for the super-violent, sociopathic, knife-and-gun-loving Expendable Thug #6 to hear them. And that’s when Gabe ICE-PICKS HIM IN THE LEG DAMN

Understandably pissed, and not as understandably still walking around without crying (#6 in that list of me-dying moments), the thug finds and beats the SHIT out of Gabe, handily.  But then, he calls Jessie a bitch, and Gabe is, above all things a feminist. Which leads to him, and read this CLOSELY:

This leads to Stallone, bloodied and beaten, PICKING THE THUG UP OVER HIS HEAD, AND IMPALING HIM ONTO A STALACTITE. Not a stalagmite, a STALACTITE. HOLY SHIT!.

Well, Expendable Thug #6 is dead, there’s a bomb on the mountaintop, Jesse almost goes The Way of Sarah, and Frank (another guy who works with them, don’t know if I mentioned him) gets lured into a trap where he gets killed. An “Aww” moment from me; I liked Frank, he seemed like a really nice guy. This eventually leads to Farquaad and Tripp out-crazy-ing each other, and Farquaad winning by killing Expendable Thug #7, who does not go The Way of Sarah (blessed be her fall).

Gabe finds the remaining money, while Tripp, Yondu, and Expendable Thug #7 get there just after. Tripp leaves, and Yondu then delivers my favorite line of the movie:

Oh, sorry, no, it’s, “In a minute, I’ll be dead. You will always be an asshole.” Thug #7 beats the shit out of Yondu, I get flashbacks to GotG 2, and Thug #8 goes THE WAY OF SARAH, BLESSED BE HER FALL. Tripp finds the tracker without the money, and officially loses it, outing himself and Farquaad to the government officials who FINALLY get here.

Tripp finds Gabe, they make their way to a frozen mountain lake, and Gabe SHOOTS TRIPP FROM UNDERNEATH THE ICE. That shouldn’t have worked for many reasons, but that was cool, so fuck it. Now, it’s just Farquaad, BUT HE HAS JESSIE! OH NOOOOOOOooooooo.

This whole thing culminates in a tense, cool chase sequence between Gabe and Farquad in the helicopter. The helicopter crashes into the mountainside, and the two fight while on the helicopter, which is now hanging from the cliff.

Oh. Oh, I get it.

This inevitably leads to Farquaad and the helicopter going, of course, The Way of Sarah. Blessed Be Her Fall. #BBHF. 

And that’s it. Our three heroes are, themselves, rescued by the government agents, and we pan away from the cliffside, as the credits roll. Boom. Cliffhanger.

Stay tuned for the epilogue, which contains the review!

[tlbodine]

A Brief History of the Slasher

Is there a more iconic face for the horror genre than the knife-wielding psychopath? Many would say no. Although the tried-and-true slasher formula is so played out as to be a cliche -- and fresh examples played straight are tough to come by in the modern age -- for many, slasher films are the heart and soul of horror movies. 

How did that happen? What do they say about us on a cultural level? And where should you start when it comes to a formal study of the topic? Let’s delve deep and find out! 

Murder and mayhem are evergreen topics of fascination for humans, and we’ve been telling stories about murderers since Cain killed Abel. But these stories didn’t become what we would formally call “slashers” until the 1970s. 

So what is a slasher? 

Slasher films are defined by a few shared characteristics: 

A high body count (multiple victims) 

Murders are shown on-screen and often from the POV of the killer 

The murders happen one by one, incorporating pursuit, struggle, and finally death

The killer may have a supernatural influence, but it will have the physical appearance of a human (and may often simply be a human)

In almost every instance, the killer is portrayed as being insane or rendered deeply troubled by a past trauma which had triggered the murderous impulse. The killer is frequently dehumanized, and the victims are usually young. 

Slashers often adhere to their own sort of moral logic, more closely resembling Medieval morality plays than perhaps any other modern genre of storytelling. By utilizing a cast of archetypes, various virtues and flaws can be represented among the victims. 

These traits are what differentiate slashers from other murder-focused horror, thriller and mystery tales. 

Consider, for example, the narrative structure of an Agatha Christie murder mystery like And Then There Were None. In this book, a group of strangers are brought under mysterious circumstances to a remote location, where they are systematically murdered as an act of vengeance. In concept, this seems like it should be a slasher -- but its execution is quite different. In the book, the murders are a backdrop; the characters (and reader) are confronted with bodies rather than scenes of overt violence. 

The First Slasher

In 1974, two films came out that gave birth to the modern slasher. 

The first, released in October, was Tobe Hooper’s Texas Chainsaw Massacre. The second, released in the USA in December of that year, was Bob Clark’s Black Christmas. 

Texas Chainsaw Massacre tells the story of a group of friends who run afoul of a family of cannibals living in a rural farmhouse. Black Christmas is about the systemic murder of sorority girls during Christmas break. And both left an indelible mark on horror history. 

It’s important to put some context on the world these films were created in: 

The recent dissolution of the Hays production code meant that movies could be more graphically violent and morally depraved than ever before

The Vietnam war was raging, and for the first time in history, televised footage of the battle was piped into living rooms on the evening news

Multiple serial killers were active in the country, and their exploits also graced the daily newspapers and nightly news to sow terror 

Richard Nixon’s presidency was marked by an as-then unprecedented level of corruption and scandal

Gender politics provided both sexual freedom and career ambitions to a generation of women, and the 1973 landmark Roe v. Wade case legalizing abortions played a massive role in both gender relations and the way we would think about life and bodily autonomy. 

The 1970s provided, in other words, a perfect storm of circumstances that collided to give birth to slashers, and neither Hooper nor Clark are shy about citing these as their inspiration. Texas Chainsaw was billed in theaters as a true story as an act of political defiance against newscasts that spread misinformation; Black Christmas is at its heart a film about abortion and a woman’s right to leave an abusive relationship. They were undeniably films of their time. 

Texas Chainsaw inspired a wave of sensationalist "ripped from the headlines" murder movies loosely based on real killers, such as Wes Craven's The Hills Have Eyes (1977), which was based on the Sawney Bean legend or Charles B. Pierce's The Town That Dreaded Sundown (1976), which was based on the Texarkana Phantom Killer.

And Black Christmas, of course, served as the thematic springboard for a little film called Halloween.

Halloween and the Final Girl 

In 1978, a little-known small-time director named John Carpenter was hired to make a movie with the working title, The Babysitter Murders. It would be about -- you guessed it -- babysitters who got murdered. The idea was later adapted to take place on Halloween, likely for commercial reasons: People like watching scary movies in October, so setting a film on Halloween night would surely help with popularity.

John Carpenter certainly did not wholly plagiarize Black Christmas with his holiday-themed slasher, but the earlier film's influence is visible all the same -- from a shared lineage of "the call is coming from inside the house" babysitter folk legend, to the perspective work on establishing shots of the house and the ambiguously bleak ending.

But compared to Black Christmas, Halloween is horror with its edges filed down so it'll be easier to swallow. Both films have predominately female casts, but the sorority girls in Black Christmas have sexual agency and outspoken opinions that are nowhere to be found in Carpenter's work. In fact, Halloween so aggressively fails the Bechdel Test that it seems to do so on purpose -- there is not a single scene with two girls where they are not talking about a boy. And while Black Christmas deals with complex topics like abortion, domestic violence, and the unreliability of the police, Halloween simplifies its formula down to the utterly basic: Michael Myers kills because he is pure evil, and that is simply what evil does.

Despite its flaws -- or perhaps because of them -- Halloween became an immediate and enormous hit. It also introduced several clever storytelling techniques that were crucial to the advancement and development of the slasher genre:

The introduction of a Final Girl, the lone survivor who holds out against the onslaught of terror. (Carpenter denies that Laurie Strode’s virginal innocence has anything to do with her survival, but “final girl as virgin” would persist as a trope for a very long time) 

A masked killer. Although we’d seen masked murders in many films before (I’ve talked in the past about the trope of the mask-wearing murderer, and the way it is both thematically and logistically useful in storytelling: https://tlbodine.tumblr.com/post/189658195609/the-masked-knife-wielding-psycho), the “look” of Michael Myers is so iconic that it inspired a need for future killers to have a similarly thoughtful design, decking them out almost like comic book superheroes. 

Franchising opportunities. Although earlier movies had spawned sequels, Halloween exploded as a franchise thanks in large part to the iconic design and the simplistic good-vs-evil storytelling formula. Future slashers would latch onto this killer-centric franchise formula for over a decade. 

Halloween became the most profitable independent film, holding the record for 16 years, which goes to show just how successful the formula truly was. 

The Golden Age of Slashers 

As the 1970s gave way to the 1980s, the advent of VHS and Betamax formats created a market for low-budget straight-to-video films. Because slashers are so cheap to make (you don't need any famous actors, can film entirely in one location, and practical effects can be as simple as a few gallons of stage blood), they were ideal candidates for the job. On the big screen, horror was enjoying an unusually high level of popularity, a proven money-maker, simultaneously commercial and subversive in a decade of opulence and social conservativism.

So onto that stage walks Sean S. Cunningham's gory slasher, Friday the 13th, where a group of teenage camp counselors are brutally murdered, frequently wile having sex. The film spawned a widely successful franchise, which swiftly began borrowing elements of Halloween -- a silent and indestructible masked killer, a signature musical score -- to become a pop culture mainstay. The 1983 Robert Hiltzik film, Sleepaway Camp, cashes in on the "death to camp counselor" plot in the same way that Fred Walton's When a Stranger Calls touched on babysitter murders in 1979.

A whole slew of less-successful films would follow, most of them lost to the history books but still living in dollar-bin DVD collections. Some, like Prom Night and My Bloody Valentine, would earn a cult following. One noteworthy cult favorite is Slumber Party Massacre, directed and written by women (Amy Holden Jones and Rita Mae Brown, respectively), which turns some slasher tropes in their head.

A glut of films, most of them instantly forgettable, led to a decline in slasher popularity -- until Wes Craven's A Nightmare on Elm Street in 1984.

Cracking Wise and Slashing Teens 

A Nightmare on Elm Street introduces Freddy Krueger, a different sort of horror villain than audiences had seen before. Krueger is a supernatural killer who stalks his victims in their dreams, bringing a fresh supernatural twist to the slasher genre. And, unlike Michael Myers and Jason Voorhees, Freddy is anything but silent. Thanks in part to the charisma of lead actor Robert Englund, the character's darkly comedic personality became utterly riveting.

Plenty of dream-related horrors would follow, none of which would make much of a splash. But one film franchise did latch on to a similar formula: Child's Play, directed by Tom Holland in 1988, introduced another supernatural wisecracking killer in the form of Chucky, a murderous doll possessed by the soul of as serial killer.

These major film franchises -- Halloween, Friday the 13th, A Nightmare on Elm Street, and Child’s Play -- would go on to spawn numerous sequels and become such a thoroughly pervasive part of pop culture that you can find their likeness everywhere. But despite the many imitators, there was little in the way of innovation in the genre until the mid 90s. 

Do You Like Scary Movies? 

Wes Craven toyed with the idea of self-referential horror in New Nightmare, a Freddy Krueger film that was itself a meta-analysis of Freddy Krueger films. But he would revisit the idea with far greater success in 1996 with Scream. 

Created by horror lovers, for horror lovers, Scream is designed to be the most quintessential slasher film ever created. Relying on a hip, young cast to draw in a fresh audience, Scream works by combining nostalgia, meta-analysis, humor, and buckets of blood into a single film. The opening scene is a direct homage to When a Stranger Calls, and the masked killer is a deliberate call-back to earlier films. 

Unsurprisingly, Scream was a huge hit that ushered in a brief but furious wave of slashers, like the star-studded I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997) and Urban Legend (1998), and Scream itself had several sequels and even a TV series. But the 1990s were something of a dark era for the slasher film, seeing the release of some spectacularly lackluster franchise installments. One exception to that was the fan-favorite Freddy vs Jason, which pits the two killers against one another -- a delightful premise, but one that had strayed far from the slasher roots. 

Modern Slasher Films 

The 1990s slasher reboot was short-lived and mostly forgettable, and by the 2000s filmmakers had mostly turned away from the genre entirely, except for a slew of nostalgia cash-in reboots of every popular franchise. 

The one exception was meta-analysis -- building on Scream, these films began to deconstruct the genre in a way that would combine horror, humor, and criticism. 

The Final Girls (2015), directed by Todd Strauss-Schulson, takes this sort of meta approach. The Cabin in the Woods (2012), directed by Drew Goddard but bearing the fingerprints of co-writer and producer Joss Whedon, takes it to even further excess, providing both a thorough deconstruction of horror gropes and an entirely new mythos to give it a fresh framework.

But the problem with deconstructions is that, once a few truly successful ones have been made, it becomes essentially impossible to create the original thing in earnest anymore. And so the slasher as a sub-genre has reached its bloody end. 

Where Did All The Slashers Go? 

With dozens of slashers spanning more than 40 years of film history, it’s pretty hard to create something new with the format. Which is not to say that people aren’t still making them -- they are -- but there is less room to innovate within the notoriously rigid and simplistic slasher formula. 

Culturally, we’ve moved on a lot from the 1970s as well. For one, serial killers are no longer the threat they once were. Babysitters and camp counselors are rarely teenagers, either -- in fact, teens aren’t leaving the house as much in general. And a rise in information technology, communications and surveillance has made it harder to isolate victims and commit murders over a long period of time -- our mass murders tend to happen in shooting sprees instead these days. For another, that same information technology has made us extremely jaded and hard to impress with gore. 

The 2000s delivered violence at levels utterly beyond anything in history. The rise of the so-called torture porn -- a genre that dispenses with the stalking and killing of multiple victims in favor of lingering on the painful mutilation of a small handful -- delivered gore unlike any seen in earlier slashers. Cable television series like The Walking Dead deliver graphic violence with unprecedented regularity -- you no longer need to pick up a “video nasty” to indulge in some gruesome gore. 

And, well, unfortunately, the internet has made it easier than ever to see real violence, from terrorist beheading videos to medical gore to live-streamed murders. 

Gore for gore’s sake is simply not as compelling in the 21st century, and that takes away much of the slasher’s appeal. 

Slashers have had to morph and adapt to find a foothold for survival. In the 2000s, we saw their metamorphosis in real time: From torture porn to home invasion to a cornucopia of more innovative horrors dwelling on fears both large and small. 

We’ve probably seen the last of masked knife-wielding, babysitter-killing psychos...but the horror genre is richer for it. 

[leonidas-writes]

how about... 33 and 167? some angst. also, how about 107 bc i'm 99.9% sure that's from twilight and how iconic

33. Josh was shaking her awake. Josh was free, wrists worn to bleeding, and she started crying. Her hands came free as he moved behind her, and she pulled him into a gentle kiss. When he pulled away after a moment, he spoke.

"I'm gonna clear us a way out of here. Keep your hands over your ears, even when the noises stop. Don't listen." She nodded, pressing her hands to her ears, watching as he grabbed a left behind knife and walked out. When he came back he was bloodied, knife in his hand dripping. He cleaned it in his pants, puts it in his pocket, and held a hand out to her. She took it, letting him tug her into his arms, shaking. But it was fine. He was back, and they were safe.

167. Josh didn't know her father. Didn't know what he was asking when he wanted to take her place. She tightened her grip on his arm, world blurry through her tears.

"Please, Josh... I know what will happen, just let me do this..." He turned to her.

"You've suffered enough. Let me protect you, please." Her heart broke a bit, knowing that he would send himself into hell for her. And she hesitated, and then let go. She couldn't stop him, she knew that. He walked over to her father, hands in his pockets. And then her father was reaching for him and his hand latched onto his wrist, he yanked him in, slammed his head into his nose. Her father shouted in pain, holding his bleeding nose, and then Josh was on him. She looked away as his knife plunged into his chest, shaking badly. When his arms wrapped around her, blood on his hands, she sobbed in relief. Her Josh was alive, and her father was dead. He held her as she broke, humming softly. Maybe she really had suffered enough. Maybe she could believe that, eventually.

107. "Does it ever worry you?" Anna looked at John, humming curiously. "The way he looks at you. Like he's ready to take a bullet for you." Anna smiled, studying Josh. She knew exactly what John was talking about.

"It that a bad thing?" She cuddled into her poet. "He doesn't want me hurt. He's done so much to keep me from getting hurt. And I wish he wasn't so reckless sometimes, but... I can't blame him." John's hand ran through her hair, and she closed her eyes. A moment later, there was another warmth against her, and she opened an eye to find Josh, draping an arm over her and cuddling closer. Her eye closed again, and she couldn't fight sleep even if she wanted to, not knowing Josh was there, not knowing what he would give to protect her.