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bisexualcage · 9 months ago

Note

hey! first off, i just wanna say i love your writing and the way you write johnny! if you’re comfortable with it, would you write a johnny x reader fic where reader is asexual (can be any gender) and tells johnny one night and thinks he’s gonna be like upset or whatever by the news but he’s actually really supportive and asks about it to learn more? and maybe at some point reader or johnny’s friend (or honestly just a random stranger would work too lol) asks how reader can be asexual but romantic at the same time?

totally not based off a convo i had with my friend lmao

- Hey! Thank you so much ahhh ❤️ Took my time with this one, hope you like it and that I hope did some sort of justice for ace rep <3, p.s changed a few things up

Shades of Black, Grey, White, & Purple /

Johnny Cage x Gender Neutral!Asexual Reader

warnings: brief dialogue about intimacy, sex ect.

An: I proofread this pretty quickly lol

“You haven’t touched your food, honey…”

Johnny and you decided to attend a pride parade, with that came some hot greasy foods and just overall a good time. It was Johnny’s first time attending one with you, according to him he’s a “pride parade veteran” which made you laugh. But despite the laughs and the great atmosphere you couldn’t help but grow sour at what was growing inside of you and what’s been eating at you for weeks now since you’ve both been dating.

You snap out of your trance as you hear Johnny’s voice echo in your ear; “Oh- yeah- my bad.” you take a bite out of your corn dog and chuckle.

Johnny of course didn’t buy it, he shrugged it aside for the sake of having a good time but you could tell that he could tell something has been up lately. An occasional fan of his would stop him for a selfie or two as you both admired the different pride flags being waved in display and ate food, his arm around your waist as he pulled you against his side. Music blasted in the background and whistles went off as people walked down the street celebrating, it was such an inviting and welcoming atmosphere.

Johnny takes a bite out of your corn dog without much warning and grinned, “Hey, you ain’t eating it so I might as well.”

You chuckle back and lean your head against his shoulder as you both walked, but pause as soon as you spot an huge asexual flag being waved by a person. Your heart beat went fast, your skin turning warm. You’ve been doing research on asexuality for a while now, it’s been keeping you up at night and has consumed most of your days. Trying to figure out if that was missing puzzle piece you needed. Seeing another person identify the same way made you earn goosebumps and it gave you a contagious smile that Johnny quickly took notice of.

“Aw, what’s up baby? See something you like that isn’t me?” He says cockily but with a playful tone, his shades shining against the sun.

You roll your eyes and elbow him softly with a snort; “Shut up, Johnny.” You smile at him. His eyes follow yours and they see how you’re staring at the big flag a few feet away, he raises his eyebrow but doesn’t question it.

“Say, I’m not that knowledgeable about pride flags, care to tell me a few?”

You snort, “I thought you said you were a ‘Pride Veteran’.”

Johnny laughs, “And I am! I just haven’t studied up on all the flags yet. I mean, I know the rainbow one and the bisexual one.”

“I’d be concerned you being a bisexual man and not knowing those.” You snort loudly.

Johnny bites his lip at your teasing and leans in to kiss your cheek, “So you gonna tell me a few other flags?”

You hum, thinking about the asexual flag but quickly shove it aside seeming as you’re not ready to open that can of worms yet. “…oh there’s the lesbian flag, it’s all pinkish and reddish!”

Johnny’s eyes light up, “Oh yeah? I think I saw that one being flown early I was wondering what it was!”

You chuckle as you continue to tell him about a few other flags, like the trans flag and the non binary one. It was fun seeing him so engaged in queer culture, his eyes light up like a Christmas tree when he sees you explaining them. An ice cream vendor with a little cart comes in to view suddenly and Johnny almost jumps at the sight, running to the man and dragging you with him.

“What flavors you got?” Johnny said a bit too excitedly at the vendor.

“Coconut, passion fruit-“ the vendor went on.

“PASSION FRUIT?!” You interrupt, your mouth watering. “Can I have passion fruit please?!”

Johnny looked at you an unmistakable warmth in his eyes and shook his head at your enthusiasm. “I’ll have the same as this nerd over here.” He elbows you playfully.

The vendor quickly got to scooping passion fruit ice cream in to 2 cups and handing them over to you both, you begin licking the soft serve immediately.

“How much is it?” Johnny takes out his wallet like it was an automatic thing, he always refused to let you pay no matter how much you insisted to him so you just let him eventually.

“6 bucks.” The vendor said with a smile.

Johnny laughed and shook his head, “Look man, I only have 100$ dollar bills on me— I don’t have change but take it. It’s fine-“

The vendor puts up his hands, “No sir, I can’t do that-“

Johnny grabs the man’s hand and places the 100$ dollar bill in his palm, “Take it. I have too many of these anyways. Give out the rest of the ice cream if you want to the rest of the pride parade. Say it’s a gift from Johnny Cage, okay?” Johnny smiles warmly and pulls you to walk with him while you both consumed the icy treat in the warm summer weather.

“Man, you didn’t even let him refuse-“ you laugh, warmth overtaking your cheeks at his philanthropic behavior he always exhibited.

Johnny licked the creamy ice cream down, giving you a look, “You know me honey, I’m stubborn.”

“Well- not just stubborn but caring.” You give him a kiss on the cheek.

Johnny blushes, “Oh zip it.”

“I love seeing you red, sorry!”

As you both finish your ice cream the pride parade seems to settle down a bit and so you both take a seat on a park bench, enjoying each others company. Johnny kept looking at you every few seconds, not hiding his infatuation with you. At the back of your head you were struggling with how to break the news to him with your asexuality. It ate at you every day and you can no longer take it, it scared you how he’d react even though he’s never given you a reason to. Always been keen to learn more and never judged people on sexuality or identity but still.

You take a deep breath and look at him shyly, playing with your hands as birds flew over you both and the sun toasted your skins. “I gotta tell you something…” you trail off, not really making eye contact with him.

Johnny spotted your jittery behavior and placed a muscly arm around your shoulders; “Please, don’t tell me you like pineapple on pizza.” He jokes, trying to make you laugh while you were clearly struggling to look at him.

You snort loudly, his joke working in making you lighten up a bit. “Remember how I told you how I’d tell you whenever I’d be ready for…more intimidate things? I’m not sure that’s gonna happen.”

Johnny nodded, his expression growing serious and his eyebrows furrowing with worry.

“…been thinking a while on this and I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m…” you continue and grow red, swallowing hard.

“It’s okay, honey. Tell me.” Johnny whispers in you ear, rubbing your shoulder tenderly.

“I’m- I’m asexual.” You blurt out, closing your eyes tightly.

Johnny stays quiet thinking deeply, going through word choices carefully in his head. But he didn’t seem at all bothered to which you let out a relieved sigh, he was filled with curiosity and a small grin on his face. “Okay, can you explain more to me, baby?”

You blush and lean your head on his shoulder lazily, sighing; “It’s when you experience little or no sexual attraction to others. That being said, it’s more of a spectrum ya know? Everyone is different. There’s asexuals who participate in sex despite not really having sexual attraction, and there’s others who’d rather not want to participate in sexual intercourse whatsoever.”

Johnny’s gears turn, trying to be careful with what he wants to say; “Oh okay. That’s cool!” He swallows deeply now, a shyness overcoming his expression; “…Do you still love me despite being asexual? Or how does it work?” The actor says with apprehension, “Sorry if it’s a stupid question-“

You hug him firmly and rub his back; “It’s not. Babe, me being asexual doesn’t negate the fact that I love you with my entire heart. There’s a difference between romantic and sexual attraction and trust me I’ve never not been romantically in love with you. Someone who lacks romantic attraction is aromantic. In fact, lots of asexuals like me seek romantic relationships.”

Johnny grows red, his nose nuzzling against your neck; “Oh that makes sense, duh!” He laughs and it’s gently dies down before he speaks again; “I love you so much, thank you for trusting me with this— I know it couldn’t be easy. But I never EVER would have denied you your own experience.” He now starts rubbing your back, not caring how public y’all were with affection.

There was a warmth that overtook you as soon as he said those words, a sense of peace; “Oh thank god- I- I was so scared to break it to you. I didn’t want to disappoint in any expectations-“

Johnny leaned back a bit and caressed your jaw with his warm hand, “Shhh, you’d never. How can I shame you for something that you are? Something you can’t help, honey? Whether you want to have sex or not any sex whatsoever that’s not the core of our relationship.”

You nod, a tear trickling down your cheek, “You’re too good for me.”

Johnny kisses your wet cheek softly; “No, quite the opposite. You’re so patient and kind to me, so willing to teach me about things when you don’t gotta do shit. The least I can do is be receptive and kind back.”

The afternoon was slowly seeping in to evening, the sky was no longer too sunny and darkness was beginning to cloud the skies. The pride festival had almost nearly died down and there was only a few people walking about.

“Can I ask you something though? Earlier, you were staring at this big purple, black and white flag…was that the asexual flag?” He quirks up an eyebrow with pure curiosity.

You chuckle, seeing how easily he always read you; “Yeah, it was, I was gonna tell ya but…I got stuck.”

“Honey, I saw it all over your face. You’ve been off all these days and now…well, we know why. Hopefully you feel better now yeah?” He rubs your back and pecks your nose.

“Completely…” you breathe out with a happy sigh, “It’s like I can breathe now.”

Johnny grins at you lovingly, his smile reaching his eyes. He then brings you up with him off the bench, “How about we head home, and we can over what you’re comfortable with and not? Maybe we’ll watch a film and snuggle up too, how’s that sound sugar?”

“Magical, just…magical.”

#johnny cage #mortal kombat #johnny cage x y/n #johnny cage x reader #johnny cage x gn reader #johnny cage x ace reader #mk1 #johnny cage x you

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reds-skull · 6 months ago

Text

BLOOD||HUNGER

[PREV PART] [AO3]

This is it! The last chapter before the epilogue!

It's also the end of a sort of riddle I've been leaving between chapters... I wonder if anyone even noticed, haha

I decided against splitting this chapter, so it's extra long!

Its name is "Famous Fate"

Page 59 of the “Blooede Starvatfōre-dēde”, parable 16:

My brothers, who endured the agony of exile, Who suffered many winters in the cold cage, Were once knights, only to fall, They too, were called Beast. The young maiden, who left your companion, A pure heart, was her only sin, To not pray for a daemon’s death, only for her to live, She too, was called Beast. A man, fallen in battle, Abandoned by all but Death, but by worms of the earth, He too, was called Beast. The hunter, the knight tells, Who chases monsters, who alleges to be righteous, He calls himself, a hero. He is no better man than us, the knight says, One who declares himself justice, one who proclaims to be above the word of God, Is one we, as oath-bound knights, Must send to be judged, by the only true measurer, By the only arbiter still by our side, by Death itself.

“I know I won’t be able to understand, probably never will, but… I have to ask, Simon. Why didn’t you reach out? You knew how to contact me. I could’ve helped.”

“I didn’t think there was enough of me left to save, Captain.”

“...What changed then?”

He looks away for a moment, to blue eyes that never knew fear from him. To arms that refused to hurt him. To a man that showed him more kindness than he ever deserved.

“I met Johnny.”

Ghost watches Soap sort through the supplies the 141 brought with them, wondering what kind of new contraptions the Sergeant’s vivid mind is imagining up right now. He’s grown sickly fond of them, just like everything else Johnny does.

Compromised, a voice growls in the back of his head. You’re only worsening a future pain, only making the inevitable betrayal more torturous.

No pain would make this any less worth it, another voice answers. It doesn’t matter if their destiny only holds blood and ruin, Simon would stay with Johnny as long as he’s wanted. And even then, maybe just a little more.

He senses the presence of another person a moment before Gaz speaks up, “Ghost.”

“...Gaz.” he answers, curious.

The Lieutenant shifts in his place, shoulders taut and squared, “since we’re going to work together, for this mission at least, I figured I should… apologize.”

Apologize?

Gaz continues, his eyes finally landing somewhere on his mask, “Soap explained to me, you never tried to hurt him, after that time we caught you two. I shouldn’t have jumped into conclusions.”

Ghost tilts his head, “I’d doubt your capabilities if you didn’t.” he looks back at Johnny, huffing when the Sergeant grumbles in Scots, “I’m glad he has someone like you on his side.”

Gaz’s mouth hangs open in surprise. He shakes it off to say, “It’s- of course.” Ghost can tell he’s hesitating at his next sentence, “I still have a hard time comprehending you were Simon Riley all along… You’re a bloody legend in the SAS.”

“I suppose they had an easier time making my death seem heroic than trying to actually save me.” Ghost mutters lowly. Gaz just nods slowly, eyes dropping to the ground.

And that’s a kicker, isn’t it? That apparently, the SAS made him a myth, someone for the rookies to look up to, a glamorized shell of a man that no one, including himself, will ever live up to. The same men that left him to die, now say his name with fondness and admiration.

Funny, how those same men now fear him enough to send the 141 on him. Ghost wants to grin with the twisted satisfaction it gives him.

“What’s your name, Lieutenant?” Ghost eventually asks.

“Huh? Uh, Kyle Garrick.” Gaz raises a brow.

Soap gathers up the last of his creations, face turning to his to nod, “Garrick. I know we started on the wrong foot-”

“Understatement of the century.” Gaz offhandedly remarks.

“-But you can trust me with Soap’s six. And I hope we can trust each other on ours, as well.”

Garrick blinks, expression growing serious. He then nods, offering a hand to shake, “enemy of my enemy is my friend, and all that?”

Ghost hums, taking the hand and squeezing. He can feel, even from their short interactions, how Johnny and Gaz were cut from the same honest cloth.

He takes off his mask, “affirmative. Let’s move.”

Price’s eyes mellow, the hand on his bicep squeezing gently, “that lad is something else, isn’t he?”

Simon’s scars stretch with a small smile, “I thought he was an idiot, at first. Saving me, giving me another chance again and again. No matter what, he refused to kill me.” he breathes out slowly, the numbness of his limbs ebbing at last, “whoever discharged him was a goddamn moron.”

The Captain sighs, “I tried convincing Shepherd to let him off the hook, but the bastard was mental. He had Makarov in the palm of his hand, wanted to show off how he locked up the worst criminal of the decade, only for MacTavish to choke him out on exfil.”

It was Shepherd, then? Of course it’s that bloody wanker. Ghost can’t help the laugh that bubbles up from his chest, “and here’s Johnny, fucking everything up for the higher ups yet again.”

God, what did he do to deserve meeting this man…

Konservy warehouse is a large building, surrounded by silos and containers. At least they’ll have some cover, besides the shadows of the night. Ghost can tell the offloading garage is blessedly open, even from the road their vehicle has parked in, meaning infiltration will be easier than they originally thought.

A thunder makes them all look up to the sky. A heavy storm is brewing, threatening to cover the stars and moon. Good. The darkness is their ally.

They jump out of the truck, gathering around the trunk, doing final checks to their gears. His hands move automatically, in the same way all of them were trained in the SAS. Some part of him is unsettled, the one that labelled himself a lost cause, a monster, a sinner with no salvation.

But as he looks up, at the masked faces surrounding him, Simon can’t call the position he’s in anything but atonement.

He’ll carve forgiveness from the Hunter’s flesh, write amends with their blood. Untie the last knot on his self-made noose.

The poison in Simon’s body makes itself known at all times now – an uncomfortable buzzing tightening around his knuckles, weaving through sinews and leaving little pinpricks of pain. He looks towards Johnny, his blue eyes a silver grey in the moonlight.

Price wordlessly nods to him, a silent check. Simon schools his features and nods back.

They begin making their way to the garage door, the tall grass their only cover. The Captain motions to the left, where two guards stand under a weak light. Garrick pulls out his EBR, and not two seconds later, both soldiers fall dead with silenced shots. Their group continues pushing forward.

Soap stops walking in front of him, struggling with something. He stops besides him, watching for a moment as he tries to get something out of his pack.

He leans in to whisper, “what are you trying to get, Johnny?”

The Sergeant freezes, “I made some proximity mines with the C4 Price brought, but they’re stuck down there-”

Simon reaches into the pack, gently moving Soap’s hand aside. Their fingers wrap around the bomb at the same time, “you ought to organize it better, what would you do if you were alone?” he admonished.

Johnny’s eyes widen a little, before they crescent in a hidden smile, “but I’m not alone, am I? Ah got ye.”

Soap pulls away, quietly catching up to Gaz and Price. Simon, for his part, stays motionless for far too long, his brain looping Johnny’s words again and again.

It strikes him then, a sudden stab to his heart, that Soap trusts him. With his weapons, with his wounds, with his six.

Johnny trusts him. Simon fights down a smile, happiness overflowing him. He trusts him.

The others send him a confused stare, when Simon doesn’t move. He finally unsticks his legs and sneaks in, eyes instantly drawn to Johnny strapping his unhinged bombs under each vehicle, his “gifts” for any hostile trying to get reinforcements in the future.

Simon can’t force down the smile that his lips form then, when the Sergeant turns around and gives him a thumbs up, almost child like and so at odds with the amount of potential destruction he just planted in the garage.

The others return from clearing the area, Price readjusting his bucket hat over the mask (which looks as daft as it sounds, but Simon can’t help but feel fond of that stupid hat), giving Simon one last look, “how are you feeling, son?”

“Solid.” he flexes his hands, testing the numbness. It’s not enough to inhibit his performance, not yet at least.

Price places a hand on his shoulder, patting it, “good, keep it that way. Our mission may officially be to eliminate the Hunter, but finding an antidote is no less important.” Price’s face darkens, “don’t take unnecessary risks, Simon. I… I don’t want to lose you again.”

Simon swallows thickly, unused to this amount of people caring for his fate. It was far easier to accept a bloody end when no one was there to mourn him, “...I’ll do my best, Captain.”

Price’s moustache lifts with a smile, “good lad. I’ll see you when it’s all over.” he gives him one last pat before drawing away, “let’s move out, Gaz! We need to clear the way for our boys.”

Gaz gives Soap a fist bump and comes by the Captain’s side, “we’ll radio in when you have a way through.”

“Solid copy.” Soap responds, finished with the mine setting, “give ‘em hell, mate.”

Garrick grins, “as always.”

“Do you think you’ll be able to fight?”

Simon scoffs, “I don’t ‘ave a choice, Captain.”

“I am giving you a choice right now. If you think you can’t fight… We can take the Hunter down without you.” Price says, expression severe.

He thinks about it. It is not only a matter of what he wants. When working with a team, he must take into consideration that his inability to fight will endanger the others.

“The poison gives me enough warnings to know a few minutes ahead when I’ll be incapacitated. If I fall while we fight, I’ll be able to secure myself beforehand.” he rolls his wrists, muscling through the pain of regaining feeling, “you’ll need every help you can get. Don’t do my mistake, do not underestimate the Hunter.”

“We won’t, I just need to know-”

“I’ll be fine, Price. Been fighting my whole life with much less.”

“...I know, son. That’s why I would prefer you didn’t.” Price’s brows pull down in sorrow, “but I trust your judgement.”

“...Can’t ask for more than that, John.”

Johnny is silent beside him, eyes glued to the exit he’s overwatching. They’ve been waiting for Price and Gaz’s go-ahead for several slow minutes now, each trickling more sluggishly than the other. The pinpricks on Simon’s hands are growing – he doesn’t have much time.

“Ye think they need backup?” Soap eventually breaks the silence.

“If they’re compromised, we won’t be able to save them now, Sergeant.” as much as he hates the idea of leaving Price and Gaz to fend for themselves, they all knew the risks of splitting up. “For now, assume they’re still solid.”

“Aye, LT- shite, uh-” Johnny fumbles through the words, turning around to give Simon an apologetic look.

He huffs in slight amusement, at how much Soap seems to care if a word hurts him or not.

“It’s alright, Johnny.” he stops the Sergeant from continuing to backtrack.

Johnny’s teeth click shut, and he frowns, sheepishly asking, “...ye sure? It seemed to really bother ye, before…”

‘I wasn’t willing to lay my life for you, before’ he wants to say.

‘I didn’t have your trust, before’

‘I didn’t have trust in myself to lead you, before’

“You’ve earned it, Johnny.” he settles on. It seems to be the right choice, when Soap’s eyes almost close with how wide his grin must be. Simon hates the mask covering his face, for hiding that smile from him.

Their comms choose this moment to start crackling, and Price’s tinny voice comes through, “CCTV room is under our control, haven’t located the Hunter just yet.”

Simon radios back, “have you been spotted?”

“We may not be the Ghost, but we’re still professionals, mate.” Gaz joins in.

“Have ye professionals spotted any potential spot fer the Hunter to hide in?” Soap asks, his eyes still squinting with a smile.

“Still looking, this place is massive.” Price grumbles, “start making your way to the machinery room at the center, take out anyone on the way. I’m seeing a lot of equipment there, but no soldiers…”

“Copy.” Simon clicks his comms off, motioning with his head for Soap to take point.

The halls of the warehouse are eerily empty, little mementos of past life barely clinging to the barren concrete walls. Not for the first time, Simon wonders why the Hunter chose this city, out of all of them.

Soap’s careful steps thump behind him, a calming presence at his back. Simon is not used to trusting, but trusting Johnny feels… natural.

Not for the first time, Simon thanks whatever brought him to Soap. Fate, destiny, a God he doesn’t truly believe in, it doesn’t matter.

He shakes off those thoughts. If it was important for him to be at his best before he met Soap, now it matters a thousand times over, because he’s not alone anymore.

Their fates are interlinked now. And Simon refuses to be the reason they all fall.

He won’t fail his team a second time.

“After all of this is said and done… What will you do?”

Simon grunts as he sits up, finally able to move his torso. He stalls his answer for a moment, the truth so simple it scares him. “...I don’t know.”

He may have been lost many times in his life, tossed between his father’s cruel hands and the cartel’s, but he always had a goal.

‘Get out’

Now, though? The only thing he wants to run away from is the shell of a monster he was before meeting Johnny. A weapon, to be picked up and discarded as needed.

Price must’ve seen a conflict twisting his expression, because he starts talking again, “I’d have you back in our ranks in a heartbeat, you know. But I don’t think that’s what you need.”

Simon frowns at the ground, hands massaging his aching legs, “and what do you think I need?”

“Someone to ground you. Make sure you don’t forget yourself again.”

“Someone like Johnny, then.”

“Another hostile on your 3, Simon.”

“Copy.”

Simon steps around another stack of crates, every move calculated and muted. The unsuspecting soldier walks right past him, arms relaxed on his weapon.

He waits for him to reach the end of the hallway, and the moment the soldier starts turning, Simon claps a hand over his mouth and slices his neck in a well practiced motion. He catches the body and shoves it into a nearby storage room. “Anyone else, Garrick?”

“You’re clear for now.” Gaz responds. He continues guiding Simon through the mess of halls that lead to the main room of the warehouse, alerting him to enemies. Soap has separated from him about ten minutes ago, taking the other rooms and making sure no one will be alive to raise any alarms.

Even if Price is keeping an eye on Johnny, Simon would’ve much preferred if he was in his sights. But he trusts the Captain.

“Any sign of the Hunter showing on CCTV?” Soap radios in, voice steady and calm.

Price sighs, “negative-”

“Wait-” Gaz cuts him off, “next to the main conveyor belt, right in the middle of the main room, is that…”

Simon holds his breath in anticipation as the line goes silent, Price and Gaz likely attempting to verify the ID.

“Skull mask, that’s them. Soap, Simon, PID on the Hunter!” Price nearly shouts.

Gaz’s voice is far more tense than before when he adds, “it seems like they know something’s wrong, prepare for combat!”

Shit, “Johnny, where are you right now?” they can’t be separated if they’ve been discovered.

“On my way to ye- fuck!” grunts and muted punches fill the comms, the sounds of struggle a sinking feeling in Simon’s chest.

Simon starts running. “Price, where is he?!” these bloody hallways all look the fucking same! He retraces his steps to the point he and Johnny split ways.

“Turn left, he’s straight ahead from there!”

He almost slams into the wall with how fast he turns, but the pain is barely registered when he spots Johnny.

Johnny, whose chest is heaving, three dead soldiers at his feet. His bright blue eyes meet his, “Simon?”

He’s capable. You can trust that he won’t die on you.

He blinks a few times before asking, “what’s your status, Sergeant?”

Soap wipes a bloody knife on his pants, “solid. Let’s move.”

“Your cover is blown. Soldiers are making their way to you!” Gaz tells them, “they’re going to the trucks to the front exit, might be trying to get reinforcements!”

He doesn’t need to see Soap’s mouth to know the way it curves into a dangerous grin, “they won’t get far.”

Simon slings his rifle around, toggling the safety off, “time to go loud, Johnny.”

Soap does the same, “with pleasure.”

The sounds of shots line up with his heartbeat. In a fast-paced melody of war, Simon and Johnny continue pushing hostiles back, headshot after headshot.

Heavy drops of rain shake the roof, thunder booming so close to them, Simon feels it in his heart.

Somewhere amidst the battle, several far away explosions rattle the warehouse, the soldiers in front of them taken by surprise. Simon thinks he can hear Johnny chuckling darkly under his breath.

Red paints the walls, brushstrokes of blood and fallen soldiers of the Hunter. It gives Simon newfound strength to push through the growing pain in his limbs, a blinding rush of adrenaline that lies to him sweetly, convincing him he could resist the poison in his heart.

One second, he’s shooting down enemy after enemy.

The next, he falls.

His gun clatters to the ground, legs convulsing uncontrollably. Simon uses the last of his powers to drag himself around the corner, to cover.

“Simon?! Fuck-” Johnny appears a moment later, attempting to scan him for injuries between shots, “poison?”

Simon groans, “affirm. Sorry, Johnny.” shame bubbles in him. He should be right beside Soap, helping him fight, and the poison decides to take it away from him.

He should be stronger than this.

“None of that, mo chridhe.” Johnny says softly, taking down another hostile, “I’ll clear this wave, and we’ll get ye to a better spot.”

How could he be so gentle while killing people? Simon lays back down with a smile, loosening his muscles and letting the poison have its way.

Soap gets the last of them and returns to his side, looping arms under his shoulders and heaving him up, “steamin’ Jesus, ye weigh as much as a baby elephant.” he complains under his breath.

Simon chuckles, hissing as the jostling shoots pain up his limbs, “you’re just short, Sergeant.”

“Away an’ bile yer heid, bastard…”

Soap drags him to one of the side rooms, a storage unit that seems like it hasn’t seen the light of day for decades. About this time, Simon wishes he had his mask on, if only to filter all the bloody dust in this room.

Johnny fusses over him for a few seconds, until Simon stops him, “I’ll be fine, Soap. Once I regain movement, I’ll come to you.”

Soap stops, hands frozen on his shoulders. He frowns like he wants to argue, but he rises to his feet all the same. “I kept yer comms open, so if ye hear anyone gettin’ close-”

“I’ll radio in. Don’t worry.” Simon smiles, “go.”

Johnny opens the door, hesitating. Simon is about to order him again when Soap unexpectedly turns around, takes three loud steps towards him, and rips his mask off.

“What are you doing, Johnny-”

Warm, shaky hands cup his face, tilt it up. Johnny bends down, and softly kisses his forehead.

In the space between them, he whispers, “I’ll come back for ye, Simon. I promise.”

He puts the mask back on, and leaves.

Simon’s heart burns, his cheeks surely bright pink. He doesn’t know if it’s from the poison, or from…

No, the tight grip around his heart is definitely from the poison. An agonizing ache wraps around his chest, heavier than 6 feet of dirt. Simon’s lungs shudder for a breath.

He can distantly hear the others talk on comms, but the blood rushing through his ears prevents him from deciphering what they’re saying. Simon understands then, that this might be the end. With the poison gripping his lungs, and the lingering warmth of Johnny’s lips, Simon closes his eyes.

His last thought is of regret, that Johnny won’t be able to keep his promise.

“-The Hunter, they’re going after-”

Simon groans, unimaginable pain thumping at his head. Couldn’t death have at least taken that away from him?

The rain beats in incessant song in his head.

“-Wait for backup, MacTavish-!”

MacTavish… Johnny….. Simon remembers the kiss, his promise, and smiles.

“-Can’t-”

“-SOAP-!!!”

Garrick sounds frantic. What are they shouting about?

Gunshots make his brows crease. Fighting someone… Where is he?

The warehouse. Price, Garrick. The Hunter.

“Johnny…” Simon rasps. A loud static is buzzing on comms. He pays it no mind.

He needs to get up. His limbs don’t shake anymore, but his lungs hurt like he breathed in sandpaper. Simon whimpers, pushing himself forward.

His rifle is laying right next to him. Trembling fingers wrap around the weapon, and with gritted teeth, Simon manages to take it with him as he gets up. He stumbles through the door, blearily noticing the trail of bodies leading deeper into the warehouse.

Simon follows the paths of blood.

He doesn’t know how long it took him to walk all the way to the central room of the warehouse, time slipping between the cracks in his mind. It’s so hard to breathe, dark spots take permanent residence in the edges of Simon’s vision.

The lights went out before he woke up, plunging the building into shades of red, the emergency lights making the blood appear black.

Only one light remains, a spotlight encompassing two figures. A crimson skull makes Simon’s steps falter.

The Hunter.

Their gun pointed directly at Johnny’s head.

It takes everything Simon has left in him to lift his gun. His lips move around a prayer, a plea to whoever is out there listening.

His fingers shake around the trigger.

He takes one last heaving breath, his eyes wide with fear.

The Hunter’s head moves from Johnny to him.

Simon shoots.

His bullet hits the Hunter’s arm, the rifle in their hands getting knocked away and sliding under a conveyor belt.

Johnny turns around, blue eyes shining in the light.

Simon smiles.

“...Simon…?” Johnny asks.

He falls unconscious not a moment later.

Several minutes earlier

Soap closes the door on the storage room. He takes a second to roughly scrub down his face. What the fuck did he just do?! Did he bloody lose it?!!

“Soap, what’s your status?” Price asks over the radio.

“Solid. Poison got Simon, left him in a storage room.”

The Captain sighs, “we will keep an eye on the door, son. He’ll be safe.” Soap exhales shakily. “More hostiles your way, keep pushing Soap.”

“Copy.”

No time to consider his fuckin’ action. He needs to focus.

He hears the rumbling steps of soldiers echoing through the empty halls, and pulls out a flash grenade. Now that he’s alone, he can start using some of his more… lethal equipment.

Soap huddles behind a filing cabinet, throwing the flash over his shoulder. Even though he covers his eyes, his vision is still painted bright red for a moment. He pops out of cover, noting the disoriented soldiers clutching at their eyes and ears, and methodically dusts them.

From here on out, it is total chaos.

Drill charges, Semtex, frags, every explosive in Soap’s arsenal gets thrown at seemingly endless waves of soldiers. He moves on instincts, hands shooting at targets his mind didn’t even register yet.

It is only when he gets to the main machinery room, that he comes back to himself.

Sentry turrets have been set up at the entrance, waiting for him.

Soap rolls away not a moment too soon, the floor he just stood on turning to shattered bits of concrete in seconds.

“Captain, they have sentries!” Gaz yells, “Soap is pinned!”

Soap scans the room he’s in, noting the snaking cables wrapping around the sentries legs. Following them, he spots a large electrical enclosure. If he could create a shock, the sentries will stop working…

A thunder rattles the windows around them, soldiers spreading out in search of him. “On your 9, Soap!” Price informs him, and he shoots two soldiers getting too close to his position.

The rain… if he can get it to drop on the enclosure…

Soap scans the roof for any weak points. There!

“Captain, Gaz, are there any hostiles around me?” he growls into his mic.

Gaz answers, “Negative, what are you-”

“Ah’m gonna drop the power to take the sentries down, might take out the CCTV.”

One beat passes before Price replies, “understood. We will come back you up if it goes.”

“Solid copy, Captain.” Soap lines up a shot at a precariously placed piece of the roofing. With only the iron sights on his rifle, it takes precious moments to aim and finally press the trigger. The hairs on Soap’s nape raise as he hears soldiers close in on him.

Time slows as he watches the water spill down, flooding the electrical enclosure.

“He’s here! Get him!” A soldier shouts to his left.

The warehouse instantly falls dark. The electric hum stops, making Soap’s surroundings eerily silent.

He ducks away, sneaking around crates and containers, moving position to the soldiers’ flank, and just as the red emergency lights turn on, he strikes.

5 shots, and they’re down.

“The CCTVs are out, we’re making our way to you. Do not engage the Hunter alone, Soap.” Price orders through comms.

Soap lifts his hand to press the button to answer, but a new group of soldiers appears, shots wild as they spray the area he’s in. He jumps back, searching for his attackers, tracking the glint of the gunmetal. He shoots them, bodies falling, and for a moment he believes he’s in the clear.

Pinpricks at the back of his neck make him turn.

Soap’s eyes widen as he comes face to face with the Hunter.

They stare at each other for a second, before the Hunter simply walks away.

Back towards the way he came from, towards… Simon!

“Soap?! Soap, give me sitrep, now!” Price yells, snapping him out of shock.

“Price, the Hunter, they’re going after Simon!” Soap doesn’t have time to figure out how the Hunter knows that, no time to figure out how he knows that.

“Wait for backup, MacTavish! That’s an order!”

“I can’t let Simon die, Captain!”

At those words, the Hunter snaps their gaze to him, and with near inhuman speed, lift their gun and shoot.

Pain shoots through his right shoulder, making him drop his gun. Soap bites down a scream of agony, the burning of the gunshot spreading down his arm.

“SOAP-!!!”

The butt-end of a gun comes at his head, Soap falling to the ground on his back to avoid it.

A single light turns on above them, the sharp shadows casted on the grotesque red skull mask hiding the Hunter’s eyes.

The commander circles him, Soap crawling towards his gun. If he could only-

The Hunter kicks it away, the firearm clattering when it hits one of the metal support structures keeping the warehouse’s roof up. The reverberating sound bounces on the barren walls.

“I’ll never let ye kill Simon.” Soap snarls, desperation clawing at his chest. He frantically searches for an exit, a way to stall the Hunter, before they line the barrel of their rifle with his head.

He’s going to die here, Soap realizes.

He won’t be able to fulfill his promise to Simon.

A shot from behind him makes him jump, the bullet hitting the Hunter’s hand, making their gun fly off and land under a conveyor belt.

Soap turns around, heart beating out of his chest.

Simon stands behind him, his form shaking, face even paler than usual, standing out against the red lights.

“...Simon…?”

Simon crumples, body falling heavily to the ground.

“-NO-!” Soap rushes to him, when a blade unsheathing makes him freeze.

The Hunter is flexing their injured hand, a knife held tightly in the other. Soap growls.

So this is how it’s going to be, huh?

Soap searches Simon for a moment, unsheathing his knife. The blade is long and cruel, one he’s seen take so many lives in the short time they’ve known each other. It’s only fair it will take one more.

Soap gets his feet under him, grunting at the pain from his wound.

They start circling each other, waiting for the other to strike first. The Hunter’s head moves for a second away from him, to look at Simon.

That’s when Soap rushes in, knife in his left hand, slicing at the Hunter’s other arm. He jumps away before the commander can retaliate, and they start trading blows.

Soap manages a cut at their wrist, bright red blood mixing with their uniform. The Hunter slashes at his injured shoulder, making Soap yell.

He disengages for a moment to catch his breath, watching the Hunter do the same. He feels doomed for a moment, when he realizes he’s fighting a soldier that bested even the Ghost.

How could he win?!

Another blow to his torso that Soap barely evades. He tries to go for the Hunter’s neck, only for them to block it, shoving Soap away with frightening force.

Think, MacTavish! You’ve always been shorter, weaker, younger than both your squad mates and your opponents!

Take those disadvantages, and make them work!

Soap inhales sharply, dodging another lethal attack. The Hunter is far stronger than him, if they managed to get a stab in…

A sharp grin stretches on his lips. Soap twirls around the Hunter, their knife predictably following with immense speed.

He lets it sink into his left shoulder, and he pushes towards it, snarling as it sinks in further.

The Hunter attempts to take it out, but it sank far too deep. Soap locks eyes with the red skull.

In a wide arc, Soap swings his knife, and slices the Hunter’s neck.

Blood sprays on his face, as the commander clutches at him, a pathetic attempt to keep themselves standing.

Soap freezes when he hears the Hunter talk.

Their voice is startlingly old, decrepit, as they whisper, “You are nothing but a Blind Man… a Beast… following… a Beast… you will not be more than that… you will die… monsters…..”

The Hunter’s grip slips from his biceps, and they fall to the ground, dead.

Soap stares at the blood spreading on the floor, as an unsettling sense that this has happened before washes over him.

He shakes it off when his eyes drift away towards Simon’s still form.

Soap falls to his knees, frantically searching the Hunter’s body, “Fuck, c’mon, c’mon…”

His fingers brush over a set of vials and syringes at their hip, and he yanks them off, trembling fingers slipping while he tried to get the liquid in the syringe.

Once he manages to fill one, Soap throws away the rest, crawling to Simon and tilting his head to access his neck. The poison has blackened his veins, the injection site the epicenter. Soap stabs it and pushes the liquid from the needle into Simon.

He sits back, arms pulsing pain from both of his wounds, the Hunter’s knife still in his shoulder.

“Simon… Mo leannan, please.” his eyes start to water, uncoordinated hands pawing at Simon’s chest, “please, wake up…”

He places a bloody hand over Simon’s cheek, tears now streaming down his face, “I kept my promise… I told you I’ll come back, right?” his voice cracks, “now ye just have to come back to me… Please…”

Soap feels his adrenaline waning, leaving him tired, so fucking tired. He rests his head on Simon’s chest, sobbing at the stillness of it.

“I…” Soap closes his eyes, “I wanted to tell ye…” his exhales shudder out of him, “I love ye…”

Ba-dump

Soap stills. Did he imagine…?

Ba-dump

Ba-dump-Ba-dump-Ba-dump-Ba-dump-Ba-dump-Ba-dump-

“Fuck…” Simon groans. Soap’s head shoots up, and his brown eyes soften, “Johnny?”

Soap barks a laugh, blinking away tears.

Simon’s eyes trail down, to the knife in his shoulder, “fucking ‘ell, Soap, how did you manage that?!”

“The Hunter…”

“Is he…” Simon stares behind him, at the growing puddle of blood, “fuck, Johnny, you took him out by yourself?”

“You and me, Simon.”

Simon smiles up at him, dark eyes breathtakingly deep. He sighs a moment later, slowly getting up to walk to the body of the commander. Soap follows.

Simon takes hold of the red skull mask, staring intently at it before taking it off.

Beneath it, was a face Soap feels he’s seen before, yet in the weeks following, he could not remember. The only feature burned into his memory were the four scars slashed across the Hunter’s face.

The claws of an animal.

Simon examines the mask. It looks similar to Ghost’s, but the red skull is sculpted to look furious, a permanent frown on it.

Simon offers it to Soap, who gives him a confused look.

“You’ve earned it.”

Soap stares at Simon, before taking the mask.

The two of them swivel their heads back when a pair of footsteps sound through the hallway behind them. Simon slides a knife down his sleeve, ready to fight, when the source is revealed to be Price and Gaz.

“Soap, bloody hell mate, we told you to-” Gaz’s brows slowly rise as he registers Simon, and then the mask in Soap’s hand.

Price approaches them, “the antidote…?”

“Administered.” Soap says, “it’s over.”

The warehouse falls silent as they process the words.

The Hunter is dead.

It is done.

Page 63 of the “Blooede Starvatfōre-dēde”, parable 17:

And the Beast attacked, cruel claws reaching the hunter, His eyes blinded, by blood and rage, And the Beast says to the Blind Man, you will fight as equals. The Blind Man, the Fallen Knight, Takes a sword, and strikes the hunter down, And as his blood became one with the dirt, the hunter tells, You are not but a Blind Man, not but a beast following a beast, You will not be more, you will die Monsters. And the hunter falls silent, forevermore belonging to death.

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summerwritesfics · 2 years ago

Text

🥀So Lead Me Into Denial, Help Me Forget For A While

Pairing: Hanzo Hasashi/Kuai Liang Length: 2394 Words Rating: Explicit 🔞 Warnings: Angst, Denial Of Feelings, Light Bondage, Light Dom/sub, Light BDSM, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Slapping, Loss Of Control, Rough Sex, Biting, Choking, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hanzo’s So Far In Denial He’s Practically A River In Egypt

Hatefuck Masterlist

Notes: Second give away request! Only one more left to do after this one :) This is for @mcbethins who requested more hatefuck, and tbh I am always happy to work on hatefuck content :) This one we get a little more into Hanzo’s head and then he promptly goes “no I am not addressing my feelings because fuck you thats why”. The title is from “Stay With Me (Unlikely)” by Celldweller.

“What the fuck was that?”

Seconds after those words came from his mouth, he was slamming Kuai into the wall. Kuai groaned, as his hands searched for Hanzo’s wrists.

“What are you-“

“You know what I am talking about,” Hanzo snarled, nails digging into Kuai Liang’s skin. “What the fuck were you thinking? You could have gotten yourself killed!”

“I was saving Cassandra,” Kuai replied, his face turning into a scowl. “She was in danger, what else was I supposed to do?”

“Well not running head first at the problem for a start,” Hanzo countered, feeling Kuai trying to squirm out of his grasp. He lent more of his weight against the other man. “What you did was stupid and reckless!”

For someone who usually threw a temper tantrum whenever his mission plans didn’t go well, Kuai was surprisingly blasé when it came to his own safety.

“I made a split second decision,” Kuai argued, his struggling increasing as he attempted to wrestle Hanzo’s hands off him. “The Oni was about to drive a sword through her chest, I ran forward to create a wall of ice to stop the attack. I didn’t want her to get hurt.”

“And almost got yourself hurt instead?”

Suddenly Kuai’s struggling stopped, he just paused in place and stared at Hanzo, his eyes narrowing in suspicion.

“Why are you so angry about this?” Kuai asked, voice laced with accusation. “Why do you even care?”

Every argument he could make got stuck in his throat. Why did he care? Especially this much? The question seemed to slowly worm into his mind, infecting every part of him. Feelings he tried to hide, ignore and leave in the back of his mind, surfacing in ways he couldn’t control or easily push back into the dark.

“I just do, okay,” he hissed. Maybe if he’d let himself actually reflect on his feelings, he’d be coming to some sort of grand epiphany at this moment. But fuck that, this wasn’t some cheesy film starring Johnny Cage where Hanzo told Kuai that it was because he cared about him, and then they’d kiss and make up.

He refused to play that part.

His hand snaked up to Kuai’s throat, gently clamping around it. With his fingertips he could faintly feel the thrum of Kuai’s blood pulsing through his veins. Kuai’s breathing hitched, his hands reaching to cradle Hanzo’s face.

“I am okay,” Kuai softly assured him, “I am alive, and so is Cassandra.”

“Maybe.” He pushed his forehead against Kuai’s, using the entire weight of his body to pin him against the wall. “That doesn’t mean I am going to let you off easy for this indiscretion.”

Kuai smirked at him, and replied “You know, if you wanted to fuck me you could of just asked, right?”

“Always a brat, no matter what.” Hanzo pulled away, dragging Kuai with him across the room. “You know the safe word.”

Kuai didn’t have a chance to reply before Hanzo was throwing him onto the bed. He scrambled to get up, but Hanzo practically pounced on him before he could go anywhere. With both hands, he pushed Kuai’s shoulders down until he was against the bed. For once, that cockiness seemed to disappear, and Kuai looked up at him apprehensively.

“Where’s all that usual bravado, hm?” Hanzo reached for Kuai’s wrists, holding them comfortably with one hand.

His other hand went for Kuai’s forehead, pulling off the headband he wore. He wrapped it around Kuai’s wrists, leaving a good amount of the ribbon free as he tied a knot. With the remaining length, he attached it to the headboard, giving it a quick yank to make sure it would hold the Cryomancer in place.

“Hanzo,” Kuai groaned, squirming slightly as Hanzo’s hands began to peel away the layers of his armour.

“I could stand here and lecture you on why you should care more about your safety,” he growled, pulling up Kuai’s shirt enough to revealed his chest. “But I know it’ll fall on deaf ears.” He lent down, taking one of Kuai’s nipples between his teeth and gently pulling on it. Kuai arched his back along with the motion, before Hanzo finally released it. “This seems to be the only way you ever learn.”

His hands hooked into Kuai’s pants and underwear, as he began to pull them down. Once Kuai’s legs were bare, Hanzo dipped low, biting into the skin on Kuai’s inner thigh. His hands trailed up and held Kuai’s hips, pressing them down and still against the mattress. Kuai groaned, as Hanzo trailed upwards, teeth sinking into flesh every couple of centimetres.

“It is a good job that I have enough patience to be your teacher,” Hanzo grumbled between his bites, before finally reaching Kuai’s crotch. He lightly nipped at Kuai’s balls, making the other man gasp and attempt to twist his body. “Most men would give up on account of how stubborn you are.”

Kuai actually chuckled at that, adding “most men before you have admitted defeat.”

“It makes sense that with such weak teachers, you never learnt proper discipline.” Hanzo sat up, leaning over towards the bed stand pulling open the drawer to retrieve the lube. “I, on the other hand, do not give in so easily.”

He quickly flicked open the lid, applying a generous amount on his fingers. One hand dipped between Kuai’s legs, the other reaching to Kuai’s neck to clamp around. Kuai breathed deep, despite how frustrated Hanzo was with the other man, he didn’t want to genuinely choke him.

Hanzo’s fingers traced around the rim, before he drove one to plunge inside. Kuai hissed, and he shifted slightly, although stopped when Hanzo squeezed his throat slightly. The finger went a little deeper, before pulling out, trying to coat the inner walls with as much of the lube as he possibly could. It wasn’t long until he was pressing in a second finger however.

Kuai didn’t complain however, even when Hanzo maybe got a bit too hasty and added a third. He pumped them in and out, trying to work Kuai open enough to take him without discomfort. When he was able to add a fourth finger, he knew it was ready.

“Do you enjoy being difficult?” Hanzo questioned as he slipped his fingers free. He reached down to his pants, pulling them away just enough for his cock to slip free. “Does it bring you pleasure to see me angry?”

“Well, really it depends what you’re angry about,” Kuai smugly replied, only to yelp when Hanzo responded by slapping him across the face. Kuai laughed, and replied “see, that I took pleasure in.”

“You are absolutely unbelievable,” Hanzo snarled, lining himself up with one hand while the other grabbed Kuai’s hip. “I’m starting to think you almost got yourself killed just to piss me off.”

Kuai frowned but didn’t say anything.

Hanzo disregarded any curiosity about that reaction for the moment. Instead he focused on guiding his length inside of Kuai. A small hiss escaped Kuai’s lips as Hanzo slowly breached him. Hanzo stilled for a second, before thrusting shallowly to test the water. Kuai didn’t hiss again, so Hanzo chanced a more powerful movement. That caused Kuai to gasp slightly, but more from surprise than hurt.

Confident there wasn’t any pain, at least none he wasn’t purposely inflicting, Hanzo leant over Kuai, one hand once more finding the Cryomancer’s throat, while the other hooked under one of Kuai’s legs pushing it up until his foot was next to his head.

Then he started to roll his hips, realising he was being a little more forceful than he usually would be in the early stages. He didn’t care though, continuing to thrust in and out at a regular pace. Beneath him Kuai moaned, cheeks going red as his eyes screwed shut.

“Eyes open,” Hanzo commanded, but Kuai ignored the request. He lent down to Kuai’s chest, biting his pec just above his nipple. Kuai jumped, although Hanzo’s grip on him kept him mostly still. When Hanzo looked up, Kuai’s eyes were open again. “Good, keep them open. I need you to see my anger.”

Kuai scoffed, only furthering Hanzo’s frustration. He bit down again, at the same time slamming into him with enough force that Kuai’s body jerked under him. Unclenching his jaw, he licked where the imprint of his teeth marked Kuai’s flesh.

“Now, are you going to behave and take in what I have to say, or am I going to have to take more drastic measures?” Hanzo questioned as he pulled back.

Kuai scowled at him, but for some reason it didn’t seem to come from anger or even frustration. Hanzo really couldn’t place what the emotion was, and that somehow annoyed him more.

As Kuai didn’t verbally reply, Hanzo buried himself deep and then just stilled. Nothing seemed to make Kuai more needy than denying him what he wanted. As predicted, Kuai began to squirm, trying to work himself on Hanzo’s dick but finding it impossible when he didn’t have both legs free for purchase.

He huffed, before finally muttering “yes.”

“Yes what?” Hanzo prompted, giving Kuai’s throat a squeeze.

“Yes Master.”

Hanzo rewarded the compliance with a deep thrust, clearly hitting Kuai’s sweet spot as he felt the man clench around him.

“See, it’s not so hard to behave, is it?” He began to pivot his hips again, groaning himself as he felt the way Kuai practically clung to his cock. “Are you ready to actually listen to me and not be a brat about it?”

Kuai blinked slowly, but eventually nodded.

“Good.” He gave a grunt as he gave a particularly hard thrust again. “You mean well, I understand that.” He finally released Kuai’s leg, allowing it to fall. Hand reaching down to Kuai’s cock, he took it in hand and began stroking slowly. “But you can’t keep putting yourself in danger for the safety of other people.”

He could feel his movements speeding up and yet couldn’t seem to do anything to stop himself. He didn’t want to stop himself regardless. The hand around Kuai’s cock tightened, jerking up and down at an increased speed. There was no tease in any of his actions.

“W-What was I s-supposed to do then?” Kuai barely managed to ask, his legs wrapping around Hanzo’s waist to pull him closer.

“Think more goddam rationally for a start.” He gave a harsh tug on Kuai’s cock making the man hiccup under him.

“Says the man who acts first and thinks later,” Kuai grumbled, only for Hanzo to make him immediately regret that decision, by landing a harsh slap on his cock.

“Do as I say and not as I do.” Being confronted by his own hypocrisy wasn’t something Hanzo ever took well to. Let alone when he was trying to get someone to take their safety seriously. Especially when he was currently fucking the person he was lecturing. “You have people who depend on you, stop treating your life as if it’s disposable.”

“I still don’t understand why you care so much,” Kuai croaked out, and somehow, it made Hanzo see nothing but red. His hand took a rough hold of Kuai’s cock again, stroking at a fast pace.

“You will not die on me, Song Kuai Liang,” Hanzo snarled, his thrusts getting a little more frantic and primal. Kuai’s eyes widened, pulling on the bindings, his body trembling like he was on the edge. “If you so much as dare, I will drag you back up from hell myself.”

He could feel fire prickling at his skin, Kuai tightening up around him and driving him to go faster. Hanzo could feel his hand growing wet, but he didn’t stop. He kept driving into the other man, determined to make his point.

“B-But, why?” Kuai just about choked out. “Why do you care?”

“Because I can’t lose you as well,” he roared, feeling flames engulf him as he gave one final powerful thrust. He barely managed to take in the way Kuai’s eyes widened and his body went stiff.

The pleasure from release was somewhat hazy, as his fire began to dwindle and he realised what he had just said. He blinked, and looked down. Kuai was still beneath him, his torso covered in his own cum. When had he climaxed? Hanzo hadn’t noticed.

It was the way Kuai was looking at him however, that sent him into a spiral.

It was like Hanzo was a puzzle that Kuai had finally solved.

His ears began to ring.

Hanzo barely registered his next actions. He pulled out, untangled the headband and released Kuai’s arms, and then just sat back, staring at the wall behind the bed. Vision blurred and eyes stinging, but he couldn’t figure out why. A cold hand was on his cheek, and Kuai Liang’s face came into his view. Hanzo blinked, realising now that tears were welling in his eyes.

“Hanzo,” Kuai softly prompted, and despite everything Hanzo saw nothing but genuine concern and compassion in his eyes.

His own hands snaked forward, cradling Kuai’s face, and he couldn’t remember a time he was so gentle with the other man.

What was this? What was happening to him?

“Are you okay?” Kuai asked.

“I can’t lose you as well,” he repeated breathlessly, despising how vulnerable he sounded. He hated that Kuai Liang’s mere existence was enough to bring down his carefully constructed walls. “Please, stay with me, don’t go.”

Kuai Liang stared like he was trying to figure how to best handle this situation, before his expression softened once more and he lent forward to graze his lips against Hanzo’s.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Kuai assured him, planting a soft kiss against Hanzo’s lips. He moved Hanzo’s hands from his face and went to rest his head on Hanzo’s shoulder. “I promise.”

Hanzo didn’t say anything more, lest he say something stupid that he later regretted. His hand slipped down, brushing against the scar left by his teeth on Kuai’s shoulder. The constant reminder that Kuai belonged to him and no one else. Wrapping his arms around Kuai, he held the other man's body close to his.

Internally telling himself that, despite the mounting evidence, this man meant nothing to him.

He wasn’t entirely sure how much he believed that anymore though.

#mortal kombat #kuai liang #sub zero #hanzo hasashi #scorpion #subscorp #🥀Hatefuck

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trashcatsnark · 3 years ago

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Collapse DLC Spoilers part 2 electric boogaloo

I haven't done all the things in one run, but i have like beaten the dlc now, Wemod works for cheats, for anyone who needs them. More thots under cut

while i give some leniency to the fact that the dlc is in Joe Bro's mind, so, like his diseased little lump of gray matter is probably fucking things up. I agree that like some stuff just feels ooc for the seeds imo, and I also understand that for most of us our broad understanding of the seeds is more fanon than canon, due to the long distance between fc5, the dlc, (not gonna mention new dawn), and like the fact that in the og game you get like... 3 cutscenes per non-joe, technically 2, since Joe always stole one from each. (takes over the baptism, lectures in the bliss, and tells baby murder story while in cage) So, like, realistically... I get that the versions of John, Jacob, and Faith i have in my head are probably more from my head than from canon at this point.

Like John's little, "urges" speech is definitely feels like an oversimplification of what is a lot going on in that head of his. But I do like the idea that Joe was like ayyyyyyy jebus made you homicidal for a reason , John.

Here for Rachel slapping Joseph's glasses off. And I do find it... inchresting that Johnny Boy can put a knife to Joseph's throat and he's chill with it, but one slap from Rachel and he's ready to throw hands with the 5'2 tinkerbell lady.

I again, fucking hate this weird pseudo-incesty, was Faith/Rachel and him like... romantic energy thing they do. Like, his wife's name was Faith... really????? Really?????? We're doing that????? Really????

I did appreciate that the deputy did get something in the bunker, "the last member of his family" wanted more though. Like again, I know the siblings are the focus, but the deputy is such a weird non-entity in this dlc given their role as ya know, the protagonist in the og game.

And like... the real ooc moment for me and like I get that this is Joseph's voice showing him visions of what could have happened/supposedly would if the siblings had survived. So, it could be Joseph's fears and stuff, but... that's gonna bullshit and I'll explain in a bit. But, the most ooc moment for me personally, was the idea that Jacob would kill Joseph. I can 100000 percent see him becoming suicidal, but... he's dedicated his whole ass life to protecting his family and you're telling me a couple years into bunker life he's just gonna flip the script and kill his brother???? Jacob is the one who'd thrive the most in bunker life, lets be honest.

Now, as for why I think the "its joseph's brain, so of course that wouldn't really happen, its just his fears" is a idea I'm not giving much credence too is... Ethan's in his mind. And the reason, I say that kind of undercuts that theory is because this is meant to take place while Joe is still in the bunker with the dep, this basically confirms Joseph/voice can actually see the future. Because... how else would his brain be able to show him his whole ass shitty sequel son.

idk, like, again, I liked seeing The Seeds again, kind of got some worms wriggling for fc5 again. But... it most made me just wanna go back to the og fc5 game where the weird pseudo incest tones is limited to like one line.

#fc5 #far cry 5 #collapse dlc #collapse spoilers #joseph: collapse #joseph seed #faith seed

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therainroguefanfiction · 4 years ago

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📱 Find Me (Tooru Oikawa) #11; Triggering Kenma

📑 Table of Contents | ◂p r e v i o u s

Author’s Note: I hope you guys are enjoying this series ^^’ I’m a bit on the fence about it, honestly, and I hope you find it entertaining! You’re probably tired of not seeing Oikawa, but I promise he will be in the next chapter! Y/N and Oikawa are finally going to meet face to face!

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Your eye twitched in annoyance as you stared at the K.O flashing across the screen. ‘Maybe I don’t deserve to be Kenma’s cousin… no matter how hard I try, I just can’t seem to beat Johnny Cage! This sucks…’

“Y/N!” Your younger brother stuck his head in the door, eyes slightly wide in surprise. “There’s a boy here to see you. Says his name is Watari Shinji.”

Glancing at the clock, you were surprised that it was late afternoon. That fact made you sweatdrop because that meant you had been playing Mortal Kombat for about six hours without stopping. And you still hadn’t made any progress toward beating the one you now called your mortal enemy. ‘Ha, mortal enemy.’ You snorted, making your brother give you an odd look.

“Soo~?”

“Oh, right. Coming!” You set the controller down and jumped up, wincing when your bones cracked, your legs on the verge of sleep. You stepped out into the hall, heading for the front of the house. Watari was waiting by the door, carrying a folder full of papers under his arm. ‘Jeez, he could have at least told the guy to have a seat or got him something to drink.’ You cleared your throat. “Hello, Watari-san.”

He smiled worriedly at you, taking a step forward. “Are you well enough to be out of bed, Y/N-san?”

“Yeah, I just got a bit of a sore throat, but otherwise I’m doing okay.” You rubbed the back of your neck a bit awkwardly. “Do you want to sit down? Or, umm, water?”

“If you don’t mind, some water would be nice.”

With a nod, you turned on your heel and headed into the kitchen, him following close behind as if he was worried that you could pass out at any moment. You pulled a bottle of water from the fridge and paused, glancing at him as he took a seat at the table. “You want ice?”

“Bottled is fine.”

You handed him the bottle and took a seat across from him, feeling a bit awkward as he set the folder onto the table. “I appreciate you bringing me the work. Not looking forward to doing it, though.”

Watari chuckled, sliding the folder over to you before reaching into his bag, which he had placed on the floor beside his chair. “I can help you catch up if you’d like. I made a copy of my notes for you, I hope you can read my handwriting, it’s not the best.”

Curious, you accepted the notebook he was offering you, flipping it open to a random page. If this were an anime, the pages would be shining a bright gold, reflecting off of your eyes as you looked down at them in wonder. His handwriting was pristine, each letter looking as if it had been printed by a computer. But, alas, this is not an anime, and it did not shine like a beacon of light within the dark.

Watari watched your expression carefully, cheeks dusting with pink as he rubbed the back of his neck. “If you can’t read it, that’s fine. I can copy them to the computer, if you want.”

You frantically shook your head. “No, no, they’re perfect. Thanks…”

“You’re welcome!” He smiled brightly, tilting his head to the side. “There’s an English test tomorrow, but sensei wanted me to tell you that you can make it up next week. Even if you’re well enough to return to school tomorrow, you probably haven’t had a chance to study.”

“There’s a test?” You croaked, head lowering in distress. “Crap.”

“Ah, try not to stress too much!” He waved his hands, a bead of sweat rolling down his cheek. “I’ll help you study, but you need to finish healing, first!”

“Yeah, I guess.” You frowned, glancing over at him. How had you not realized what a nice person Watari is? You had always been so content to keep people at arm’s length, content that most people didn’t seem to notice your presence. “Thank you… it really means a lot.”

Watari nodded, chewing on the inside of his cheek. He wasn’t sure whether or not to bring up the topic of Oikawa since you were still recovering, but he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t worried about the situation between the two of you. Oikawa had gotten increasingly insufferable since you had cut off contact with him. Not only that, but he knew you had been missing school and when he found out that you were sick, he was determined to show up at your house. It took the team a while to convince him how bad of an idea that actually was.

“Y/N-san?”

“Hmm?” You sipped on your water and you leafed through the homework assignments, trying to decide which one would be easiest to start with.

“Listen, I’m not trying to pry, but… I really think you should talk to Oikawa-senpai. At the very least, tell him to his face that you don’t want to be his friend. It’s a bit cruel just to ignore him, don’t you think?” He kept his eyes on his own water bottle, watching as a droplet of water slowly rolled down the plastic.

Your body tensed up at the mention of Oikawa, the plastic crinkling under your increased grip. “That… sounds like a can of worms I’d rather not open. Sorry.”

He frowned, wringing his hands nervously. Should he tell you that Oikawa knows it’s you? He wanted to, he felt like he should but… he knew you would pull back even more if you knew. He remembered Iwaizumi’s words when he approached the older male for advice.

‘Let them figure it out themselves. Don’t get involved because Shittykawa will bring everyone down with him.’

“I respect that, sorry for bringing it up.” He smiled softly, hoping that he hadn’t overstepped. “Do you feel up to studying a bit?”

“I guess,” you mumbled, even though you definitely were not feeling up to studying.

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You glanced up when your mom entered the kitchen, tired from a long day at work. You were still sat at the kitchen table, finishing up the essay on fifteenth-century Japan, which was the last bit of homework you were going to do that night. Watari had left about an hour and a half ago, but in the time he was there, he had helped you out a lot and you doubt you would have gotten quite as much done as you had if he weren’t there.

“Welcome home,” you told her before returning your eyes to the essay.

She huffed, falling into the chair that Watari had been occupying not too long ago. “How are you feeling, sweety? Up for school tomorrow?”

“Not really,” you answered honestly, propping your hand up against your cheek and tapping the pencil against the paper. You couldn’t help thinking about what Watari had said to you. Were you being cruel? Honestly, you thought you were just putting yourself first, knowing how complicated life would be if you brought him into your life. You still weren’t completely convinced he would even want you in his life once he got to know you.

She quirked a brow, leaning across the table to rest her hand on your forehead. “Your fever is gone and you’ve regained some of your color, that’s good. I’ll let you stay home if you want, but you better fix whatever problem you’re having at school over the weekend because you’re going back on Monday. No ifs, ands, or buts!”

Your eyes widened, snapping to her as she stood up and headed over to the sink to wash her hands before starting dinner. How had she known that you were avoiding school? ‘Moms can be scary. Oh, that reminds me…’ You turned in your chair to watch her. “Mom, Kenma is having a game on Saturday. Can I go watch it?”

She hummed thoughtfully. “You can go, but make sure you wear a mask so you don’t spread any germs.”

“‘Kay, thank you.” You filed the papers back into their folder before leaving the kitchen. You wanted to let Kenma and Kuroo know that you were going to be attending the game, after all.

Rolling your eyes, you plugged your phone in and set it on the bedside table before your mom called you and your brother to dinner. You weren’t sure why, but you were feeling kind of excited to go to the game and meet Kenma’s teammates.

You completely forgot who they would be playing against.

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▸n e x t

📜 Read more by checking out my masterlist 📜

Tag List: @the-broken-halo-writer @nekoma-hoe @iishoto-chan

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marauders70s · 6 years ago

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So I just watched Crimes of Grindelwald and I have a huge rant list.

Spoilers (obviously).

Also, I did not like hardly any of it, so I’m sorry. Don’t pick a fight with me after reading a post entitled rant list and then be upset that they are all rants.

- wow AMERICA yeah jo we know what you think of us. it’s obvious in our de-tonguing geneva-convention violating (i know it’s not around in 1927 okay) inhumane treatment of not just grindelwald but apparently all the prisoners and animals we keep in cages (i know our prison system is inherently terrible i’m very aware) but to transport him like a paralyzed stroke victim drooling to a thestral carriage on a Dark And Stormy Night really just is lazy writing on why we should dislike aurors without giving anyone a plot, dialogue, or exposition

- this guy who has been posing as Grindelwald....since the beginning? since when? they cut out his tongue?? but then? it’s just forked? there’s magic? like? could they grow the tongue back?? they can regrow bones in harry’s arm but okay

- this thestral carriage chase scene is really CGI explosion heavy turned actioned film and mostly consisted of me being like what. what. WHAT. wait what. wait who is that. what. why wouldn’t he just disapparate. what happens to these thestrals. okay. what. grindelwald can just dissolve wands since when can people do that why didn’t voldemort do that why didn’t harry do that this presents problems

- okay look david yates and co. you had this incredible opportunity to create an entire wardrobe of WIZARD FASHION in THREE COUNTRIES, most notably the fashion capitol of the world and what did you do you put every single person in trench coats and random muggle garb. Also, not even cool wizard hats. No. Just muggle bowlers and mobster hats.

- Does Newt have a job. If so, what is it? How can he pay for this lovely house with magical modifications? Don’t you have to get a contractor to put that in? Did he do it himself? How does he pay Sad Girl In Love With Protagonist tm? Does he pay her? How did they meet? Why do we never see her again?

- For a movie entitled ‘Fantastic Beasts’ we really gloss over looking at any of the in-house beasts, learning anything about them, or doing anything except a CGI palooza.

- Wow Queenie and Jacob are here ‘hope you don’t mind we let ourselves in’ ah yes rude american trope again. who on earth would do that. also this entire time jacob acts like a goon and newt is like let’s take the enchantment off and i’m like hi that’s hella nonconsensual you’re basically raping and kidnapping him and jacob is somehow okay with this. newt is somehow okay with this.

- ‘please don’t read my mind’ um dude you’re talking AT her???

- movie glosses over how jacob got his memories back with a throwaway line of unbelievable dialogue. If obliviate only worked on bad memories, Hermione Granger really needs to go to family counseling with her parents.

- mysterious postcard is exposition over really dumb journalism error that could have been easily fixed within seconds by sending an owl because owls don’t need addresses, something queenie conveniently forgets by not knowing how to find her sister

- queenie is a Dumb American for cheap laughs by letting a woman say something in french, laughing, and saying she doesn’t understand anything only for the droll French woman to repeat it in the exact monosyllabic voice. Apparently everyone entering/leaving a country needs to register a visa or something, which is conveniently circumvented by going through a muggle port? It’s unclear. Queenie herself does not seem to have registered.

- French Ministry of Magic is gorgeous. Has a cool roots to iron elevator. It is also probably improperly named as they put ‘American Ministry of Magic’ despite America not having ministries or ministers outside of some serious religious stuff. They put all this effort into creating MACUSA but didn’t use it.

- Is it just me or does the MoM change the interior every time I see it.

- Queenie is devastated she can’t find her sister in a city of millions despite having magic, a means of communication that is foolproof, and enough money to find a hotel and wait to meet up. Queenie is overwhelmed that other people think in their native language. Instead of finding this helpful for tuning out a crowded city (like she does on the daily in New York), she somehow finds it overwhelming even looking for Newt/Jacob.

- Random woman is Silence In Queenie’s Head. I literally never learned who she was except Hard Bitch Kills Toddler. Or why Queenie can’t hear her thoughts. (Plot twist she’s Bella Swan).

- Toddler didn’t get his own little casket in the French mourning cart. Nice of Grindelwald to give a supposedly muggle family a funeral cart when he could have transfigured their bodies into armchairs or something. (Muggle supposed after he makes the remark about a ‘thorough cleaning.’)

- No one in Paris uses French in spellcasting. Spells are still English-based.

- Dumbledore is a dramatic bitch for gloves and rooftops. It’s a very specific brand of Gay.

- Don’t kill me but I don’t...hate? Jude Law as Dumbledore. He was still kind. But he wasn’t auburn and that was dumb.

- Unclear why Jacob and Queenie have to live in shame and secret when they could move to another country especially when Jacob loves bread and would like Paris. This seems to be Queenie’s motivator which is thin as hell and I didn’t follow her ‘logic’ at all. LAZY WRITING.

- Queenie immediately doesn’t disapparate upon seeing Grindelwald. Queenie somehow gets into this rhetoric. Later Queenie does not get disgusted with apropos wizard-Hitler being like ‘they are lesser beings’ and she, who wants to marry one, is like ‘yeah they totally are because I’m basically Jacob’s mom.’

- Grindelwald, in addition to being played by Johnny Depp, is albino, has one mutilated eye with a bad color contact clearly visible in multiple scenes, and is British when it is specifically stated he went to Durmstrang and was expelled for Dark Magic (at Durmstrang, which is noted for its Dark Arts program). As an allusion to wizard-Hitler, I always inferred that Grindelwald was German or Austrian.

- Wow Paris street magic carnival gave me LIFE and WOW and MAGIC feels. I loved the ducking through the barrier.

- Weird freakshow circus gets blown apart but Newt only manages to catch one creature that is helpfully foreshadowed it can leap Paris in a single bound. It is a Chinese creature when no mention of Chinese magic, Chinese handlers, or any sort of Asian magic is referred to (except in the cringe-worthy case of the ‘South Asian blood curse of Nagini’ which is a whole other can of worms). In all likelihood, as China is one of the oldest civilizations, their magic and dragon worship would be more paramount. China cat’s serious Great Beast’s weakness is a cat toy.

- Why is Nicholas Flamel....like that. Sure he’s like 600 years old but (a) is Jacob literally breaking his hand what the hell, (b) as much money and life as you could want does that mean he has to be like 100 years old forever that sucks that’s not even worth being immortal. (c) Where’s his wife. (d) When he goes to battle I thought he’d drink some elixir and be young again but...no.

- Nagini has no purpose in this movie other than to be snake slave and love interest and run around in a circus outfit with tits out bra off. She did not do a single useful thing.

- Wait I’m sorry WHAT you can like...fuck house elves now?? There are half-elves? How....you know what no thanks I don’t want to know.

- Credence, despite the last movie setting up an obscurial as like a suicide bomb, can relatively control mega destruction now and get back into his body fairly easily. No one even wonders why this lacemakers roof apartment exploded.

- Are he and Nagini in love? Are they escaped carnival freak bros? Why isn’t Nagini heading for the hills? She literally has no personality of her own at all.

- Paris is suspiciously white in this film. Especially for the 20s art renaissance.

- I don’t know why Credence falls into Orphan Must Know Parentage Trope because it’s really overused and boring. And frankly the superfluity of ravens was really beating me over the head. Credence can like...do anything. He could get some money and go to a wand shop. He could just...disappear. I don’t know why he has to be so easy to track.

- By the way who is this weirdo tracking him for Grindelwald/the ministry. It’s very unclear. I never got his name. It’s probably one of the many death eater names they throw in to make sure you know these families great-grandparents are also running around being evil instead of, you know, regular people doing it. So he could be Travers. I guess. LAZY WRITING.

= Now is a special segment on Hogwarts =

- The layout of Hogwarts changes every time I see it. Why are the classrooms always different. Why would the wood still have carvings. Why is there a bridge over this lake which is different than the covered bridge leading towards the Forest that Harry and Lupin have a Serious Chat on.

- YOU CANNOT APPARATE IN HOGWARTS GROUNDS. And don’t you try to tell me Dumbledore instituted that because it’s directly stated in Bathilda Bagshot’s Hogwarts, A History as being a longstanding charm with muggle repelling.

- Everyone apparates onto the bridge and walks through the castle without anyone bothering them into the correct classroom right away?? Like did they get a copy of the teaching schedule? Did Peeves show them?

- Dumbledore did NOT teach DADA. Dumbledore taught transfiguration. He was still teaching Transfiguration when Tom Riddle went to school. So if Dumbledore is teaching Transfiguration, Minerva McGonagall would not be at Hogwarts because she taught transfiguration after Dumbledore. Pretty sure mcgonagall was too young in 1927 to be a professor. LAZY WRITING.

- Just looked it up. Pottermore (official JK writing, btw) states that Minerva McGonagall was born in 1934. So she’s officially negative 7 years old and a professor. That’s GOT to be a record. Poor Rowan Khanna will never beat preconception tenure.

- Despite me being ecstatic to hear/see a young McGonagall, the camera never held still long enough for me to see a young McGonagall. Any far away shots only demonstrated despite this being 1920s, she was still dressing in the 1890s. McGonagall, despite the obvious laughs it was going for, would never use magic against a student.

- Haha this dumb neanderthal student is Grandpa McClaggen.

- Dumbledore, being known for wearing really flamboyant robes, dresses in conservative three piece suit.

- Why would you not go home for the holidays when you have to take care of a baby raven you can just put it in a box or your pocket for christ’s sake you’re carrying like 6 niffler babies at one time but you never even show them again

- Will say that young Newt’s casting is A++

- WHY ARE THE UNIFORMS NAVY BLUE. WHY DO THEY WEAR RED TARTAN SKIRTS. WHY DO THEY HAVE PHD EMBELLISHMENTS ON ACADEMIC REGALIA? Why do they have colored hoods when the original films (and books to boot) say all black robes. Why are these robes not even proper wizarding robes but just like...cambridge robes.

- To be honest this boggart lesson is like?? insane?? how did it last for 70 years it’s honestly so unethical and cruel. I’ve ALWAYS thought this even reading it for the first time in POA I was like “people’s worst fears are spiders and mummies?” like my greatest fear even at 12 was people I love dying. The fact that Newt is more scared of a desk than Theseus dying is weird.

- “I don’t want to talk about my boggart” Leta LeStrange means there was an Incident where Dumbledore realized that some students don’t have Great Home Lives and yet persists in this lesson for the next 70 years knowing that multiple kids are going to have their parents abusing them as their greatest fear.

- Corvus, as a name, just means Raven. How stupid. “Is your house crest a raven?” “Yes. Also my brother. Like if you were named Badger McHufflepuff.” “Oh don’t worry my name is just Lizard Lizard.” “Cool."

- No background or even hints at future background (e.g. they haven’t written it yet) on why Leta gets with Theseus even after the first film where he has a picture of Leta in his suitcase.

- Theseus and Newt have no screen time interaction. They do not behave like brothers. They have no flashbacks. Even young Newt never interacts with his brother. There is no realism here that Newt says they have a complicated relationship or is annoyed by his brother. This exposition is just lazy writing with nothing on screen to back it up.

- So you’re telling me Dumbledore had the mirror of erised for SEVENTY YEARS and yells at harry for looking in it for three nights. How did Dumbledore not go mad? Where did he get it? I feel like 70 years is a long time to have it.

- I guess when you think about it yeah being 40 in the 1920s does put you on the mark to be 110 when Harry meets you but fuck the books did NOT explain HOW OLD Dumbledore was to me I always thought he was like hale and sprightly 70s/80s

- Okay so you’re looking in the mirror and going to just BRAZENLY FLOUT CANON and say his deepest desire looking in the mirror is to relive the memory of the blood oath? That’s exposition. That’s a memory. That’s a pensieve not a mirror. Your greatest desire has ALWAYS BEEN saving Ariana. And even if it was loving Grindelwald this is your GREATEST DESIRE like being together not reliving a blood oath just for the sake of audience explanation. LAZY WRITING.

------ Back to other rants

- Most of this movie was me squinting being like ‘what’s the plot??’ and if there was a whiff of plot (”we all have to find credence’s birth records!”) most of it was me being confused “why does this matter?” “how did they all get there?”

- The confession of Newt trying to talk to Tina in the records room was painful. Not cute. Not even funny. Just so painful. It was like secondhand embarrassment but like...pity embarrassment.

- I don’t know why Grindelwald has a map of a Parisian cemetery. I don’t know why he had to give it to Credence except as a big reveal. I don’t remember how Queenie got there. I genuinely DO NOT understand how Jacob got there much less passed through to the secret wizard place as a muggle.

- No idea why the records lady was attacking them when Leta checked in twice (once as Tina). NO CLUE why they were the worst animated cats of all time or why they became multiple cats or even why when taken out of the French records they became even worse animated ‘real’ cats when they could have just used real cats. The entire chase scene was baffling and unnecessary. The records lady was not an agent of Grindelwald so no idea what’s up with her bee in the bonnet sorry for wrecking all your shit bye.

- I saw this movie less than an hour ago. I’m still confused how Leta, Newt, and Tina all teamed up or why they were cool teaming up or what.

- This mausoleum has a Greek hellenistic statue of a man reclining for no apparent reason and these shelves are supposed to bear ashes right so why are you putting a dumb pop up book there. Why would Grindelwald’s agent remove the record in drag as an old lady? It was weirdly unnecessary.

- Yosef’s exposition on how a white man literally imperiused and raped his mother was like WOW NO ONE IS GONNA EVEN TOUCH THAT???? and then for her to die in childbirth it’s like...my dudes wizards have cured so many diseases muggles haven’t you know they’re up there inventing the c-section with Julius Caesar and accio’ing babies out of utero like ‘gimme that catcher’s mitt she’s fully dilated.’ This whole “oh it was the 1900s” nonsense does NOT apply to magic. LAZY WRITING.

- I immediately forgot what happened to Corvus’ mom. but whatever right? she’s just a disposable woman! this movie does NOT care about consent! much less women! haha they’re just flowers!

- ‘I killed my brother’ yeah i mean we saw that coming she was REALLY SURE he was dead. But I was 90% sure it was going to be a child accident like dropping him down the stairs or shaking him too hard to get him to stop crying and then swapping him with a live baby but no? so i don’t know i feel like you didn’t really kill him.

- this steamer going down is confusing. is it a muggle ship? if it’s a muggle ship than is Credence swapped a baby with...a muggle born wizard? Are their other wizarding families on the ship? If so then why did they drown? you can all magic out of there? your lifeboat wouldn’t go down? why even take a steamer ship to america? you can...apparate or portkey or floo or fly like this titanic nonsense makes NO SENSE. And if Papa LeStrange hates muggles so much why put his only children on an all muggle ship with a half elf (again why) who can’t do magic to protect them

- Finding Credence’s identity REALLY doesn’t need to revolve around the LeStrange’s sordid past. Steamer ships keep passenger logs. So. We really should leave the mausoleum now to go find that.

- Yosef took an unbreakable vow to kill this white baby and it’s dead so is he released? He was released like...20 years ago. Why does he continue to hang out with these people? Your endless vengeance has rested? No need to team up with the sister you never knew? apparently (their family dynamic was also poorly/not explained).

- Why is this mausoleum an underground amphitheater. Literally why it makes no sense. Is it supposed to bring up the first David Yates film OotP? I don’t know. It also has a lot of blue fire and people rapturing the fuck out of there (literally when did apparating involve staring up at the sky and blasting off in rocket smoke). Also in re this movie how can you be tracked after apparating (Newt/Dumbledore’s tail).

- So if you touch this curtain do you automatically teleport to this amphitheater. Also what if you touched it by accident and were like OH SHIT HOW DO I GET OUT. Like wow this guy wasn’t kidding when he said there’s no wizard that can match him magically. This is like Charles Xavier Magneto Level 1 Mutant Power kind of shit. Not even Voldemort could do that. Big Power Too Big trope. Again. How did Jacob even GET there.

- Johnny Depp wears leather pants. Costume department, get your act together.

- Grindelwald, continuing to be British, shows clips of the Great War, approx 1914-1918. While the tanks and biplanes were appropriate, there were also lines (assumingly?) to concentration camps and the nuclear bomb of Hiroshima, which wouldn’t take place until 1945. So is Grindelwald also a prophet? Is he a seer? They kept referencing this book of poems and prophecy but without letting us see it? it went along with my general ‘I’m getting the gist of this but not really the why because it doesn’t make sense.’ And then Grindelwald rumor mongers and uses fear tactics when one of the police aurors straight up KILLS A WOMAN like wow can we cool it with use of force/police brutality is this guy going to get written up or is he fire now?

- Ethnically ambiguous Grindelwald supporter (only person of color) gets immediately incinerated for not being 100% sure of his side. When Credence feels the same way, he gets a couple of gifts.

- Look, I didn’t start this way but I stan Leta LeStrange. She was honestly one of the only people and the only woman in this film with a personality.

- Queenie stands still as weak, silly, expositional, dumb American. For those of you about to be like ‘She’s spying on Grindelwald! She’s the greatest legilimens that ever lived!’ I just want to beg you to reconsider because if you’re right and if the writers get wind of that you know they’re going to have her like teach little Tom Riddle something just BECAUSE everything has to connect.

- Poor Jacob he seems okay with being stranded in another country. Is his bakery okay? Do his friends know he isn’t dead? He is super super super brave throughout this movie despite his main comedic strength in the other movie being nervous. But this time he’s like meh firefights and large monsters.

- Credence I understand going over. Nagini continues to not be a character and did not go with Newt and Crew.

- Wasn’t even sad for Theseus because again, Theseus had little to no character development except being a Whipping Boy to authority. Theseus and Leta never interacted in any meaningful way. Their relationship didn’t even seem real. I wasn’t even sad.

- I feel like Leta isn’t dead though because who the fuck else is carrying this LeStrange line to give birth to Rabastan and Rodolphus.

- At this point everyone apparates AGAIN to Hogwarts. This time I guess a ghost went and alerted Dumbledore because he’s waiting. But yeah like come on in for tea Newt but fuck all those kids they can wait here.

- What is this plot?? Is there a plot?? What is going on??

- Who gives someone a wand like this hi I hid it up my sleeve touch me my boy I long for your touch.

- This is a phoenix, not a Raven. Newt is a sad ordinary bird but you’re a bright beautiful phoenix. Apparently phoenixes can grow up in ONE DAY. Foreshadowing Dumbledore is foreshadowing. LAZY WRITING this is so stupid. The books would have been EXPLICIT about a fourth child.

- Maybe he’s a cousin. Close relative, perhaps? *Pleakley voice*

“He hasn’t got a brother?”

Dobby shook his head.

Literally where I’m at right now.

- ABRUPT ENDING IS ABRUPT I didn’t even realize this was the end of the film because the score, cinematography, and writing did NOT cue me that this was winding down. I literally was like ‘how long does this last’ and then it was like DAVID YATES. Okayyyyyyy.

- Anyway my sum feeling upon the lights going on was: what the fuck. was there a plot. there were so many loopholes. i was confused about many things almost the whole time because nothing was fleshed out and if they threw enough CGI at me I’d be patched up.

Final rating: It matches up pretty well to the middle film of The Hobbit trilogy.

#crimes of grindelwald #spoilers #ftbcog

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royalrastafariannaynays · 7 years ago

Text

Fiddler Not On The Roof (that short davekat superhero au ficlet i said i would write)

((also for @davekatweek 2017 day 2!))

“Shut your mouth,” you hear, before the first hit comes.

It’s dark, and dank, and the ceiling is gently dripping from the rain outside.

Oh man, if only some savior could come get you. Kidnapped off the street down by the pier after a movie with your friend. Maybe the Ghost will find you. Fucking superhero he is, gone for like three weeks now with no sign. Crime has spiked again lately. But hey. Maybe he’ll come back, just for you. Or maybe even… what’s his brother’s name? Fiddler?

Even in your shock at the whole situation, the thought makes you laugh. It gets you a nice foot to the gut. Thanks.

“A big iron cage? Really? Get some originality,” You find yourself snarking, even as warm blood drips from your nose. You’re punched again in the side of your head and. Ow.

That one hurt.

Ears ringing, you have to give it a second before you can keep talking. “What’s next, one of those hamster drip water feeders or whatever?”

The words come out with flecks that land on your bare knees and feet. They took your shoes when you got in here, and they took your hoodie to search it. Every pocket was ripped out before they gave it back to you, and half of the lining was ruined.

Cell phone smashed, wallet gutted and burned, even your shades were ripped and crushed underfoot to the tune of noiseless laughter amid the whimpering of the other people in captivity.

You’re tossed back into the cage, wrists sparking at the pain of the landing. Your knees are scraped, and your teeth hurt, and when you try, you find it hard to even lift your head.

“Stay quiet, worm,” the ugly head honcho snaps at you. “All the other animals manage somehow.”

The gated door slams shut. It vibrates the floor, shakes your soul, and makes half of the women scream.

They’re so scared. And they should be.

Women have so much to fear from strange men.

It’s a wonder they even like any of you.

It’s all women in here, except you.

From what you saw when you first got here, before they started putting the hurt on you, all young women, with decent figures and longer hair.

Women looking battered, looking scared and hungry and sleepless.

You know by now that this is slavery.

You’re going to be trafficked.

You knew you were a nubile young thing with a pretty face, but. This?

Dirk said you shouldn’t have been out alone tonight, that people were disappearing slowly in the city. Not abnormal by itself, but he has a cop friend. She said it was strange. For whatever reason.

You really wish you hadn’t been out alone tonight.

Just before you pass out from the pain in your skull, you try your best to catalog the area. Look for escape. Something, anything. Dirk always taught you to look for a way out if this happened.

But you fail him. All you manage is the ceiling.

And then you’re gone.

Fear washes up your nose and into your heart just before the lights go out.

~~~~~

-Four Hours Earlier-

“Hey, Dave, what the heck are you doing?” John laughs, pulling up behind you and slinging his arm over your shoulder.

There’s a brief pause before you reply as the Popsicle is knocked out of your mouth and onto the ground. Aw shit. You paid like two dollars for that shit. Ice cream truck special and everything.

“Dude,” you reprimand, as he guffaws and pats your back.

“I’m the one who should be scolding you,” he says, leaning down to pick up the fallen warrior, and toss it in the trash. New bird poop sprinkles and all. “You’re the one eating ice in the middle of January! When it’s raining!”

You shake your head. “That’s the best time, Johnny my boy,” you say, and turn to give him the absolute best noogie you can. He’s just stepped off the bus, backpack over his shoulder, selling attire exactly what he needs to do his job and not get caught. He just doesn’t look shifty enough, somehow.

Christ, you never expected John to be the type to sell pot out of the back of a van. Well, not out of the back of a van, but in his few little haunts. He doesn’t do any of the really bad shit, but with all the rich kids he knows, he tends to make a killing at parties.

“You ready for this movie?” you ask him. He nods, pulling you toward the theater a block down.

“Yeah!” he replies, heading that way. Squeaky new shoes, too. “Thanks for coming to this part of town, I didn’t want to get stopped by any customers while I was out.”

“No prob, John,” you say, waving him off.

He looks at your basketball shorts and snorts as you round the corner and go inside the theater. “Did you roll out of bed or something?”

“Laundry day,” you tell him. And he laughs again.

John is a fucking breath of fresh air.

“Can I help you two?” comes a growly voice from in front of you, and you have to do a double take when you see that it’s come from a short dude with a bush of dark hair on his head and the prettiest eyes you’ve ever seen.

Oh sweet Jesus he’s cute.

Buried most of the way in a sweater and a uniform that’s a little too big, with stout fingers and mouth curled in the worst impression of customer service you’ve ever seen. And he looks… familiar, somehow. His eyes are gray, and it’s very clearly the working of some fancy colored contacts, and he has what looks like a scar through his pouty lower lip.

John shoves you, and when you fail to pull your eyes away from the adorable gremlin, he orders the tickets first.

“Yeah! Two for the new Bourne movie!” he says, and you just nod dumbly.

The ticket guy’s name plate says “K” on it, like his name has been scratched out the rest of the way. Maybe people have a hard time pronouncing it?

Man and he’s the perfect height to tuck under your chin. But his arms, when he rolls back a sleeve to retrieve a fallen ticket from the trash, are… Holy Fuck. He’s… he works out. Holy Mary, Mother Of GOD.

It’s the express line to full facial blush town as you enter the movie theater, eyes matching just one more time with the fake-grey ones of uh. “K” before you follow sweet oblivious John.

And you swear the guy smirks at you as you move away.

Anyways, all that said.

You remember the thunderous scowl on his face a little more.

Since it was the last thing you saw as you waited at the bus stop, and a bag went over your head.

And you could have sworn his piercing eyes glowed red from that far of a distance.

Don’t the Ghost’s eyes glow red?

~~~~~

Present

Of course, maybe you just imagined that, since the next thing you remember was waking up being held by your elbows, getting frisked in literally every possible place, and then your shit getting destroyed.

Now, though, you’re opening your eyes to the feeling of long hair tickling your nose.

Three different ladies huddle around you, one of them with your head on her lap, gently forcing open your mouth and checking for. Whatever she’s looking for. Broken teeth? Bitten tongue, maybe. You feel like you’re on your back, and a few blinks confirms it.

The woman who’s cradling your skull speaks to you, softly. It’s Spanish, thank everything, so you know some of it. You think she’s asking if you’re alright, and you nod.

You attempt to say something you remember about your head hurting, and she nods, looking into your eyes. Checking for concussion? The other two women hover, remaining silent. The woman holding you has black hair and a comforting aura. She speaks softly, and looks like she’s been crying. A lot.

You’re able to sit up, however woozy it feels, and you look around. Thankfully the lighting is low, and thankfully the tough guys seem to be out of the room. There are a few different types of girls in here, you see. But that’s not important.

“How long have you been here?” you ask.

“Six days, for the earliest. Four for the latest,” a soft voice answers you.

You rub your head.

“You get food and water, yeah?” you ask, visually inspecting yourself. Your face hurts, your knees are bloodied but the bleeding has stopped, and you touch your eye. Okay, black eye. Cool. And… sprained wrist. Great. Toes and fingers all there? Alright. But a broken ankle, you find, when all you get is excruciating pain trying to twist it. Not so alright.

“Twice a day they give us enough food and water,” the woman who’d had your head in her lap answers.

You look at the gate of the cage. You look at the floors. You see a corner with some kind of bucket, you assume for waste, and a drain. It smells awful, like piss and shit and vomit and stale body odor.

“They come with guns,” the woman adds. “They have shot one who tried to escape already.”

Fuck.

So you’re not getting out of here.

Not without a miracle.

~~~~~

Present, at the hospital downtown

“Karkat, we haven’t worked in weeks,” Kankri sighs. “And I can’t be there to help you.”

Your brother adjusts his intravenous drip next to his chair, looks down, and reopens his mouth.

“I can’t be there to keep you safe.”

You clench your fists on the arms of the chair you’re sat in across from him. His hospital room is cold, and you’ve always hated hospitals. Your father and mother died in a hospital. Your inheritance is paid from the hospital they owned, a piece at a time.

Kankri is withering in this hospital while he waits for a heart transplant.

Nothing good comes from these places for you.

He doesn’t want you to go into this dangerous place by yourself. But. It’s not a question of him being there with you anymore. It’s a question of how soon you’re going to leave. You saw someone get taken. And you have to fix it.

You’ll need to stay alive for Kankri, but also…

“This is the human trafficking ring we thought we lost because they left town,” you tell him. “They’re good, but I’m better.”

Kankri sighs.

It feels like you’ve been arguing this for hours. It may well have been hours. He’s your brother. You need to keep him alive, and to keep him alive, you have to work that awful job at the theater. The inheritance only covers so much, and the theater manager owed the ‘other you’ and let Ghost convince him to hire your sorry ass for twelve dollars an hour.

That’s the ‘other’ you. Ghost.

But you haven’t been out and running the streets for nearly a month.

Kankri has a hole in his heart, the rare kind. And he’s waiting just a little bit longer for a donor for a new one. Bright and shiny and strong.

He was your partner before this. A good partner. He would scope out the buildings with his clairvoyance, always best on the full moon, and then he would let you do the dirty work.

Saving people. It’s what you do.

And you had needed to leave it to others so that you could live a normal life, just for a bit. But people had been disappearing. And then when you saw one disappear, right in front of your eyes?

It was that cute guy from your temporary job. He’d been at the bus stop, and you were going to ask him for his number or tumblr or whatever normal people do. And then…

He was pulled into a van.

You chased the van all the way to the factory district, keeping to shadows and rooftops. And you lost it.

“I was already going to go,” you tell Kankri, snapping and earning an alarmed look from the nurse as she comes in to drop off a tray. She leaves, huffing, and you flip her the bird.

“I just wanted you to help me sense out which building it was in,” you continue.

Kankri looks like he wants to tell you know. His brow furrows, his cheeks puff out, and he opens and closes his mouth a few times.

And then, the unexpected happens.

He sighs, his eyes go red, and you know he’s looking. He comes back to you sooner than you think.

Looking down at his hands, he says, very softly.

“The docks, warehouse 40013. I believe.”

You leap from your chair, wrapping him in a hug. Careful not to pull any wires, you hold him in your arms, and he weakly pats your back.

“Come back alive, Karkat,” he says, in that naggy way he does.

You ruffle his hair as you stand back, and run from the room.

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” you say.

You hear him laugh.

~~~~~

Three hours Later

Sollux managed to score some blueprints for you, coming through again. He lives with you without rent, so he does the chores and helps you on missions. It’s good shit.

Then, of course, this time, he had to do more than usual. Through his VPN and several proxies, he was able to disable the security cameras in the warehouse in question. He also managed to shut down the power in that block, temporarily.

It won’t last too long, but he’s done you a huge favor.

The blueprints creak as you push them into the pocket of your pants. And it, like all of your attire and body, turns to liquid with you.

In solid form, you can’t get through the pipes. But using your abilities? It’s almost too simple.

That’s why they call you “Ghost.”

You disappear into pipes and vents without a trace.

Even though you turn into blood.

The men you encounter at the entrance don’t get the chance to shout about the blood dripping from the ceiling until it’s too late. You land at their feet, black mask pulled over your head and symbol flashing on your chest, and knock them out.

It’s mercy, sure. Even when you drop them into a dumpster, it’s mercy.

There should be eight guards. A portion of a bigger operation, you’re sure. But you can only do so much.

Two down.

By the time you get to the doors of the main room, where the captives should be kept, you’ve removed seven obstacles from your way. You hit their break room, using your training to take care of them without killing. Bullets clink on the ground as they fall from your malleable flesh, having been caught just in time. And under the light of the moon, with your powers activated?

Most physical wounds just run right off.

The doors before you slide open slowly.

And there they are. Nine women, and one man. That guy from the movie theater.

You’re so glad you were right.

He’s badly injured, unable to stand it seems, and you feel yourself fill with anger. He’s only been here less than twelve hours. The anger turns into rage as a hand claps down on the front of the outside of the cage, and the women shrink in fear.

They look terrified.

“So, you found us,” the owner of that hand drawls, and you glare up at him. From the shadow of the door, you must just look like a pair of eyes. The building is dark. The cage sits in a shaft of moonlight, and the man stands in another. Warehouse windows.

How fucking cinematic.

“So you’ve taken out my men. It’s admirable,” he says.

You frown. “Can we skip the evil villain speech?” you ask.

The guy from the theater, in the cage, snorts.

A gunshot rings out.

The man by the cage has a gun out, and the women are screaming, and the guy from the movie theater is crying out, clutching his leg. It’s bleeding clean, fresh blood now, from a hole in the thigh.

Fuck.

“How about you shut up while I kill your hero so I can get my paycheck?” the man sneers, and.

Oh.

Was it a trap for you?

Shit.

Shit shit shit.

You should have listened to Kankri. You should have listened.

Before you can think, you’re shaking uncontrollably.

A taser has been fired at your stomach, judging by the location. And it’s a strong one, too. You can barely move.

SHIT.

If you liquefied right now, you’d get turned to sizzling garbage. And you can barely think to do anything. All you can do is fall forward. You can’t let them paralyze you. God, you can’t.

So you get what might be the worst idea in the world.

You haven’t ever done it before.

But somehow, it works.

You sprout goddamn blades from your chest.

“Holy shit,” the guy in the cage says, apparently the only one that hasn’t been broken, as the taser lines tether and you burst forward in a flash of speed.

The man who tased you is dead before he hits the ground, your arm pierced straight through his chest. It feels awful, feels monstrous. But it’s what had to be done. Better him dead, than all of the people in the cage.

You hear police sirens outside before you have the cage opened.

And before they burst through the doors, you’re through a grate in the floor and gone.

Outside the warehouse, you yank the hook out of the front of your suit. Shit. That’ll need a repair. And you’ve got a few new bullet holes, too. You’re out of practice.

You throw a sweater on over your “super suit”, and pull on the pair of pants you stashed outside, and remove your mask.

The guy from the theater is sitting on the back of an ambulance when you round the building. One of your brother’s friends is there, doing a report on the incident. She’s a detective. She’s on your side. It’s a long story.

She waves as you pass her, going over to the guy you saved, and waving a hand to get his attention past the paramedic.

He’s going to be taken to the hospital whether he likes it or not, judging by the stern look from the woman examining the bandages around his leg. The bullet passed straight through, apparently. And he’s got stitches, by the look of it.

How the fuck is he not already on his way to a doctor?

“Look, lady, I can’t afford the box car, so I’ll hitch a ride with a cop.”

“Sir, you’ve bled entirely too much for–”

“I insist. I’ll walk out of here on my own if I have to.”

She throws her hands up in the air, somehow taking this answer, and he’s looking at you.

“What happened?” you ask him.

“Like you don’t know,” he answers, and it’s.

What?

It’s so difficult to hide your surprise and apprehension that you almost forget to deny what he’s talking about.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” you echo his thoughts.

He raises his eyebrows at you.

“Yeah okay, ‘K’,” he says. And you.

You forget to be under cover.

“How’d you put it together?” you ask him.

“Lucky guess,” he says. And if he didn’t have a black eye already, you’d give him one. Frustration swells up in you, and you bare your teeth.

“Are you kidding?!” you ask, and he laughs and holds up his hands.

“You show up out of nowhere right after Ghost disappears?” he says, like it answers everything. Yeah, that was a bad move on your part. “And those arms would be hard to forget.”

At this, you balk.

“Excuse me?”

“Do I get to kiss the hero?” he says then, and.

“Are you sure you’re not concussed?!” you demand.

He laughs.

“Yeah I might be. But you’re also cute.”

It’s. God.

“No,” you say, and turn, preparing to leave. He’s clearly fine. You’ll get to his hospital room tonight and convince him not to blab about you. You’re pretty good at that.

“Hey, what?” he asks, and he almost sounds sad.

“Maybe a date first, douchebag,” you say, taking a few steps toward Latula. Her eyebrows are up as she looks between the two of you.

“How will I find you then?!” he calls after you, and you turn to look over your shoulder.

“I’ll find you.”

…………………….

((i didn’t get everything but i did my best! hope you enjoy!))

#i tried to keep it short and failed #im sorry if it seems awkward or rushed im very tired!#i hope you enjoy it #and you have a wonderful day!#davekat fanfiction #homestuck #hs #dk #my short fics that i write #davekat week #superhero au #yeah this is about as much as im contributing to davekat week im sorry guys hahaha #love you all! <3 #violence #human trafficking cw

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anywayyoucan · 8 years ago

Text

first kiss

The sun cast a caramel glow over the sleek curve of the Mustang in the driveway. Clay ran light fingers over the paint, and the sun-warmed metal bit at the new callouses just beneath his nails. His therapist had said the guitar lessons might help him process some of his emotions, some of his pain. Most days, she was wrong. But Clay kept showing up and strumming out new, awkward chords for those days when she was right.

With a squeal, the screen door opened and Tony stepped into the receding light. His boots were scuffed and loosely laced, coming up over his jeans. A leather jacket weighed on his shoulders. He’d gotten his hair cut a little shorter after his breakup with Brad, citing new beginnings.

New beginnings, Clay thought. We could use some of those around here.

“What are you doing here?” Tony tilted his head, brow furrowed.

Clay scrunched up his face. “Kinda need a ride.”

Taking a step closer, Tony narrowed his eyes. “Where?”

A grin plucked at the corners of Clay’s mouth and he gave into it. “You could give me the keys and I’ll show you.”

Tony chuckled, shaking his head. “Nice try.”

Clay sighed, his grin replaced by flat-lined lips. “I don’t need a ride, Tony. I just want one. Out of town…”

For the most part, Clay managed living in this world, in this painting of a town, where difficult memories stacked on top of each other like thin coats of acrylic. Some days, like today, he let Tony pluck him out of that painting and turn him three dimensional again.

Amusement leaked out of Tony’s face. His brows drew together, and his eyes went soft but focused. “Okay. Yeah, okay. Let’s go.”

He clapped a heavy hand on Clay’s shoulder. Motor oil ringed his nail beds and Clay fought an urge to rub the dark lines away. Tony dropped his hand and opened the Mustang door. Clay, still held in place by a phantom touch, shook himself free of it, then took his place in the passenger seat. As he buckled his seat belt, Tony backed the car out of the driveway. The cassette in the tape player fizzled out a Led Zeppelin guitar riff Clay would never be able to play even in his wildest fantasies. He’d only recently managed a slow, grim “Walk the Line”. Johnny Cash would be embarrassed. Clay would be embarrassed himself if he cared at all about what Johnny Cash would think of him.

When Tony revved the engine, the Mustangs’s vibrations shivered through Clay and he looked over at Tony, who was staring out toward the curve of cracked asphalt ahead of them.

Gas station sunglasses sat on the bridge of Tony’s nose, not that they looked like he’d gotten them at a gas station. Clay only knew he did because he had been there at the time, on another day like today.

They’d burnt through the Mustang’s half tank and coasted into a one-pump gas station. Stomach growling, Clay had pilled his arms with beef jerky, Pringles and powdered donuts. Tony stopped by a rotating display and pulled off a pair of aviators with dark lenses and gun-metal frames. He slipped them over his eyes.

Tony pivoted toward Clay, an uncertain smile tilted on his jaw. “What do you think?”

That moment, that simple, two-cent moment— Tony in sunglasses, in a gas station that smelled like spilled diesel— took this friendship, this thing between them, and, for no discernible reason, stretched and pulled it like melted sugar, into a question mark. Or maybe, Clay thought, it wasn’t their friendship the moment had remolded. Maybe it was Clay that was changing… no, not changing. Revealing.

“Did I ever tell you about the time I went to Yellowstone?” Clay blurted. Where am I going with this?

Brow furrowed, Tony shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

“Well, when I was like eight. My parents took me to Yellowstone. I was really into animals for a couple years…”

“I remember.”

“Right…um.” Heat diffused across Clay’s face, and he went on ignoring it.

“Anyway, we got there in the middle of this huge storm. Kept us inside the lodge pretty much the whole weekend. My parents tried to get me to play board games but mostly I just sat by the window, counting lightning strikes.”

“How many?”

“What?”

Tony smiled— a small thing, all lips. “Lightning strikes. How many were there?”

Clay looked down at his lap, ran a thumb over a hole in his jeans. “Enough I lost count.”

There had been a point to that story, but the Mustang had become too small for him to remember what it was. How could Clay have ever believed there was enough room in here. For him, and Tony—and Tony’s arms and Tony’s hands and Tony’s lips.

“Pull over,” Clay choked out. “Sorry, please. Pull over.”

Tony’s brow pulled together and he gave a curt nod. When the shoulder of the road widened, he wedged the Mustang onto gravel, leaving a tight sliver of space between the mountain. Clay opened the door and squeezed his way outside.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Tony said, his voice even.

Clay shook his head and swallowed, forcing the knot in his throat further down. Tony sat down on the hood of his car and cast his gaze to the empty space beside him— an invitation to join. Clay hesitated, but gave in, walking over to the Mustang and hopping onto the hood. He could do it in one motion now but it hadn’t always been that easy. Practice makes perfect.

Tony said nothing, just sat there, braced back on his hands. Clay kept quiet as well, though there was room for him to say what needed to, if he wanted. Tony always left him that room. But silence had become a part of their friendship, like negative space in a photograph, bringing out the true lines and shapes.

Clay let out a shaky breath and looked over at Tony. He’d clipped his sunglasses to his shirt, exposing wide, open eyes. Not open like windows though, not like a cliche, they were like doors. Wooden doors with scratched paint and crayon art and a thousand stories for each hand that touched the bronze handle—

“I stopped counting,” Tony whispered. “In class, I used to make marks in my notebook every time fifteen minutes would pass. I’d think all I have to do is get through four fifteen marks and then it was lunch and then I’d just have to get through twelve marks. Ever since… well, ever since Hannah, I stopped doing that.”

Clay nodded. He knew what Tony meant. Seeing death not as this far away thing that happened in movies or to other people or to old people, but as something that hovered close all the time. Coming to grips with that didn’t translate into notebook pages full of blue-ink bucket lists. It made everything move slower. At least, it made you want everything to move slower. Tony said it best. You stop counting.

Tony reached over, laid a hand on Clay’s shoulder. Something he’d done many times before felt different that night. Like skin touching skin for the first time. Like every other time Tony had touched him before he’d been placing his hand over three inches of dry, caked-on dirt. And now…

That had been the point of the story, Clay realized.

On their last day in Yellowstone, the rain had stopped, the clouds cracking open to reveal creamy blue. And eight-year-old Clay had burst out of the lodge and into big drifts of soaked soil. He spent almost that whole last day trudging in it, plucking out worms and building mud castles. By that night, the dirt had all dried out, and he’d sat on a log under this same caramel light and cracked the shell off his body, bits of gravel and mud and twigs, piece by piece, until he was a boy of skin and flesh and freckles all over again.

That was what he and Tony did for each other— cracked off the old hard shells they’d formed, after years of trudging through the muck and mud of living. There was a word for that kind of thing. There was a touch for that kind of thing too.

Taking a deep breath, Clay scooted closer to Tony so they touched shoulder to knee, their thighs running like parallel train tracks. Clay bit his lip, leaned his head down to Tony’s, cheek to forehead.

Tony hissed, his eyes fallen shut as he leaned closer. “Clay.”

Clay nudged Tony’s nose with his own, then moved in slowly, a fragment of space at time until their lips met and that question mark became a full stop, an exclamation point.

Tony whimpered into his mouth, then kissed Clay back as he slid a warm hand over his cheek and into his hair. Drawing closer, Clay gripped Tony’s jacket, sliding guitar-string callouses over soft leather. His heart rattled, a canary in a cage at the bottom of a coal mine.

There was a word for this kind of thing, and this time, it would go differently. In the soft space between one kiss and another, it did.

I love you. I love you too.

#clony #clay x tony #clay jensen #tony padilla #fanfiction

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let-the-music-take-c0ntrol · 8 years ago

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TV shows and movies I remember from my childhood

Cheaper By The Dozen: I remember the first time I ever saw this movie. I was at my dad’s for the weekend and we were eating spinach pizza with ranch (don’t judge me) and I was so in love with the kid that played Jake.

Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2: I remember this one the most because Mickey D’s forgot to give me honey mustard for my nuggets and my dad tried making me some. Also I thought Sabrina Bryan from The Cheetah Girls was in this movie, but it was Skyler Shaye,who kinda looks like Sabrina Bryan.

The Cheetah Girls: I know all these songs by heart and I remember fighting with my sister and cousin over who would be which Cheetah Girl

Bring It On: I mean who hasn’t seen this and again fought with my sister and cousin over which side we were on

Spy Kids: I was obsessed with the Spy Kids movies. I remember my dad taking me to see all the movies in the theater and he would fall asleep halfway through and snore.

Hotel for Dogs: This cheesy ass movie stayed with me because Jake T. Austin was in it and so was Emma Roberts

Wizards of Waverly Place: I might still like wizardry, knowing full and well that it’s not real but who cares

Unfabulous: Spending the weekend at my grandparents and just watching this show was the best. Also I could never see why Addie liked Jake. I liked that one dude she dated. The one who had all those allergies. . .she kissed him after eating a peanut butter cookie and he had to leave for the hospital

Zoey 101: EVERYONE ASKING CHASE IF THAT WAS HIS REAL HAIR!

Ned’s Declassified School Survival Guide: This was my show and I would like to think it helped me through middle school

Invader Zim: THIS SHOW IS COMING BACK. I have no idea why I liked this show but I did

Danny Phantom: Yo Danny Phantom, he was just fourteen when his parents built a very strange machine” I can rap that whole intro. This was my favorite show

Fairly Odd Parents: After the years I’ve lost track of this show. . .last I heard of it Timmy got a fairy god dog. I loved this show.

Jimmy Neutron: When I say I sat watching this show 24/7 I MEAN IT! I loved this show and then Fairly Odd Parents and Jimmy Neutron did a whole mashup

The Suit Life of Zack and Cody: My mom enjoyed this show, so you know it was genuine!

Proud Family: I miss this show. Like I really really miss this show. They should make a live action one

The Wild Thornberrys: Okay if you did not cry during the movie when she lost her power you are lying

Lazy Town: Imma leave this here cause I saw the memes

Pb & J Otter: “Do the noodle dance”

Big Comfy Couch: This show made clowns less scary

Between the Lions: This was a fantastic show. Like PBS Kids had some pretty great shows. Also did Cliff Hanger ever get rescued from that cliff?

Liberty Kids: I think my interest in history comes from this show because without it I would take naps in history class

Cheetah Girls 2: Need I say more. All the best songs came from this movie. I also remember trying the hostess Ding Dong cakes while watching this

Shark Tale: All the references to other movies in this one movie was great, but I also want to know what possessed them to make this movie?

As Told By Ginger: About two years ago I looked this show up on YouTube and reminisced

Out of the Box: “So long farewell to you my friends. Goodbye for now until we meet again” This show was so creative and wholesome

Bear in the Big Blue House: That moon gave me nightmare

Scooby-Doo: I remember the old Boomerang cartoons, the movies, the spin-offs, which they still make, Scooby-Doo was life

Maya and Miguel: This show was amazing. I mostly remember the chupacabra episode

Cyber Chase: Fucking Christopher Loyd was in this show. How can you not watch it!

Clifford the Big Red Dog: Mack was such an asshole of a dog sometimes, but another wholesome show

Zoom: “Come on and Zoom. Come on and Zoom, Come on and Zooma zooma zooma ZOOM!” When I was younger whenever I made myself ice cream I would pretend I was on the cooking segment of this show

Titanic: I recently went to the Titanic Exhibit and it was amazing. According to my mom I had an imaginary friend named Jack and because of my love for Dicarpio I’m pretty sure that character was my imaginary friend

Zeke and Luther: I can’t explain why I liked this show but I remember the guy that played Cookie from Ned’s Declassified was on here.

The Powerpuff Girls: THE REMAKE IS HORRIBLE!

The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy: I enjoyed this show so much. I think Netflix once had it, but now it’s gone

Dexter’s Laboratory: DeeDee is a deceiving girl and you know it!

Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends: I still watch this show on Hulu and it’s still amazing

Ed, Edd, and Eddy: I was in love with Double D case and point. Though these boys were stupid

Courage the Cowardly Dog: Why did I haunt myself by watching this at night?

Rugrats: I remember all their movies and eating a philly cheese steak while watching their first movie

Code Name: Kid’s Next Door: This was my all time favorite. I was really into spy stuff and even during book fairs got to by like a “how to be a spy” book

Johnny Bravo: As I look at this show now all I can say is he is in fact a Fuckboy.

All That: I vaguely remember this but it was good

Good Burger: Kennan and Kel man. These two were funny as heck

Hey Arnold: Football head and then he found out Helga liked him in the movie

Recess: This was an amazing show and my mom’s favorite thing to watch at that

Rocket Power: Woogide woogide woogide

Kim Possible: Again I loved secret agent stuff and when Kim and Ron ended up with each other at the end I was so happy. “Hicka hicka boo” “Whoosha”

Legends of the Hidden Temple: Those gate masters scared the hell out of me but I loved this game show!

Not Another Teen Movie: When I realized Chris Evans, the same guy that plays Captian America played Jake Wyler I lost it!

Hoodwinked: I’m proud to say I know every song in this movie too

The Haunted Mansion: Eddie Murphy is so funny to me and this movie was scary

Minute Men: *clears throat* I may still be in love with Luke Benward

Mostly Ghostly: kjfaljfladsjkf I saw they made a remake and I can’t bring myself to watch that movie

Halloween Town: I love Halloween and this movie was my all time favorite. I still watch this now.

Twitches: Okay Disney Channel had a knack for making great movies

Quints: ajfdkllkj can you imagine that many holy crap. This was a good and out of the box movie

Luck of the Irish: I like this movie and every year Disney Channel plays it plus I was in love with the main character which leads me to

Smart House: I would obsess over this movie because again I was in love with that kid. . .what is his name?

How To Eat Fried Worms: This movie was crazy from start to finish but I liked it

Inkwell: I refuse to discuss this movie

National Treasure: oh yes. I remember eating some subs and garlic fries, sitting on the floor of my mom’s room while I watched this movie

The DaVinci Code: I’m still upset that Tom Hanks played the role of Robert Langdon and not Nicholas Cage

Pirate of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl: I’m obsessed with Pirates and these movies!

Smallville: Okay this show was so great. I love when the make different stories around the superheros

Gossip Girl: I own all the seasons. I remember the first time I ever watched this show. I was like eight or nine and for some reason it intrigued me

All My Children: My grandma got me into soap operas

The Color of Friendship: If you have not seen this beautiful movie go watch it. Thought the original story is super sad

Tuck Everlasting: This movie was really interesting. I remember watching this at my friend’s house in Nebraska and swooning over the guy that played Jesse

I’m gonna leave it here but I hope everyone else could reminisce with me and add on if you feel like sharing. These are all the ones I can remember off the top of my head though.

#okay this was a long list #what happens when I take a shower without music #I get lost in my thoughts and this happens #hope y'all enjoyed it #my life #my childhood #me

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am-flying-solo · 8 years ago

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OOC Week: Day Five

I'll mostly focus on english-spoken media, for the sake of convenience here.

Favourite band(s): Sons of Perdition. I've yet to listen to something by them that I dislike. Death country is my jam, y'all. But also: Reverend Glasseye and His Wooden Legs, The Peculiar Pretzelmen, Tiger Lillies, Nicole Dollanganger, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Tom Waits, The Goddamn Gallows, Dresden Dolls, Evelyn Evelyn (and, alternatively, Amanda Palmer), The Brothers Bright, Lana del Rey, The White Buffalo, The Exploited and Johnny Cash.

Favourite song(s): Hurt, by Johnny Cash. I know it's a cover, but it's probably the only song that has ever left me a complete weeping mess after first hearing it. It was such an intense experience. Johnny Cash speaks to my soul.

Favourite book(s): Germinal, by Émile Zola. It changed my life. It was in this book that I've truly learned the meaning of revolution. It shaped me to believe in the things I do today. Some other favorites: Skippy Dies, by Paul Murray, Flowers in the Attic, by V.C. Andrews. The Phantom of the Opera, by Gaston Leroux.

Favourite quote: "Do not go gentle into that good night; Rage, rage against the dying of the light." by Dylan Thomas.

Favourite movie(s): Freaks, by Tod Browning (yes, the 1932 romance-horror classic that's still banned in Texas. Shame on you, Texas). Brothers of the Head, by Keith Fulton and Louis Pepe. Gummo, by Harmony Korine. Literally, everything by Harmony Korine.

Favourite tv shows: Carnivàle aka the HBO show that no one else has watched. The Walking Dead, my pointless, nihilistic mess of a zombie soap opera, The Netflix Marvel Trinity (Daredevil, Luke Cage, Jessica Jones), Preacher (have you seen it? GO SEE PREACHER), House MD, Westworld, Downton Abbey, Stranger Things, The Get Down, Inside Number 9, Over the Garden Wall, Steven Universe, Avatar: The Legend of Aang.

Are you active in any fandoms right now? Not really - I check the tags of things I like every now and then, or check fanfiction and the such, but I'm always just lurking.

What fandoms were you active in? Avatar: ATLA was my first fandom, and I was very active in it, being one of the mods of the biggest Avatar community in Brazil, and even lending a hand in subtitling the new episodes back in 2006 (god, I'm old). Since then, I haven't been particularly active in any other fandoms, but I've got a handful of Marvel and Hamilton fanarts that I'll eventually share with the world.

What tv shows or movies did you watch as a child that were fundamental to how you grew up? Ok, I grew up with that fucked up stuff from 90s Nickelodeon, and boy, was it weird. Ren & Stimpy, Catdog, Rocco's Modern Life. Plus Cartoon Network's really weird shit, like those little short episodes they aired at night, including Tales of Worm Paranoia and Malcom & Melvin. Apart from that, some 80s classics like Mad Max, Rocky and Robocop, that were gritty and violent in a way shows aren't allowed to be anymore, and horror movies like The Exorcist (I was ten the first time I saw it, it scared the fuck outta me), Poltergeist and Evil Dead.

What’s one thing you collect(ed): Pins and needles. I was a weird kid.

Spotify or youtube? Spotify is a hell of a lot more practical, but Youtube is free.

Netflix or those sweet, sweet illegal downloads? Don't get me wrong, I LOVE Netflix, but my generation was all about free internet, sharing content, and illegal downloads, and it's so ingrained in me that It often frustrates me when people say they haven't (and won't) watch something because it's not on Netflix.

Have you ever been to a concert? If so, whose? Yes! I haven't been to many because they're usually very expensive and it hasn't been a priority, but I've seen Steppenwolf, Yes! and Esperanza Spalding. My favorite was Bad Religion - it was a free concert and I swear half the city was there. I got a place very near the stage and sang Infection at the top of my lungs. Actually got kicked in the face that day by some dude on a mosh pit. Adrenaline was so high I barely registered it. It rained like hell through most of the night and we were all just screaming with mud up to our calves, soaked to our bones and as happy as we've ever been.

OTP: The infamous Stony (Steve Rogers/Tony Stark), Cersei/Jaime and Sandor/Sansa (don't judge me) from A Song of Ice and Fire (let's stick with the books), Thomas Barrow/Jimmy Kent from Downton Abbey, Sirius Black/James Potter (yes, the less popular marauders power couple), Daryl Dixon/Happiness from The Walking Dead.

NOTP: Bruce Banner/Natasha Romanoff. BRUCE BANNER/NATASHA ROMANOFF. Clarke/Finn from The 100. I don't think I've ever hated a pairing more than I hated Clarke/Finn. God, I STILL hate Finn.

Currently watching: The Walking Dead, Westworld, Sons of Anarchy.

Currently reading: Hollow City by Ransom Riggs, Abarat by Clive Baker, Nimona by Noelle Stevenson and Pride, Prejudice & Zombies by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith.

Currently listening to: "Lonely Man" by Those Poor Bastards.

If you could make everyone read one book, which would it be? Germinal, by Émile Zola or Kropotkin's "Anarchy".

#ooc week #in which i get political #talk about how much i hated finn from the 100 #and talk fondly of my favorite punk concert

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josephkitchen0 · 6 years ago

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9 Common Homesteading Supplies and Hacks

Nifty gadgets have their place on the homestead but sometimes you just can’t go down that often-pricey path. Don’t get me wrong — I’m a hopeless fan of wonky inventions (think egg flashlights and nut wizards), but even if you have the cash, you might not feel like cramming yet another single-purpose item into your barn or basement. Enter common homesteading supplies and the hack. A time-honored tradition!

Inexpensive and creative solutions to everyday problems might be the most important tools in a backyard farmer’s toolbox. Here are a few of my favorites gleaned from several years raising vegetables, fruits, and animals on our suburban farm.

1. Zip Ties: Worth Their Weight in Gold

On our property, plastic cable ties are homesteading supplies that have been put into service in countless ways and, despite their low cost, typically last several years, even after very hot summers and sub-zero winters. From building cages to thwarting squirrels and all the many tasks in between, the lowly zip tie steps up to a starring role in various homesteading productions. They come in several lengths, colors, and styles but my go-to model is the 8-inch commercial electrical model — heavy-duty and rated to operate in temperatures ranging from -40 to 85 degrees Celsius, well within our Northeastern United States parameters.

How many will you need? Probably more than you think.

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Zip ties are strong but can also be employed for short-term uses. For example, if you don’t tighten them all the way, you can easily cut them off when they’re no longer needed. Or you can turn them around and use the non-tightening side for loose closures where you want to get in and out, for example, a door flap. Be careful, though. Zip ties are not toys, keep them out of reach of children! They can be very difficult to remove once fully closed.

Sample uses:

Create quick fences and covers – Attach poultry wire, netting, hardware cloth or any material you can stick a tie through to sticks, poles or pipes. I use a hole-punch to create openings when necessary.

Hang objects – Leave a gap in the zip to make a loop. You can make chains of zip ties to add length.

Attach objects – Signs, varmint deterrent lights, etc.

2. Cardboard Box: A Farmer’s Best Friend

All sizes can be handy but whenever a really large cardboard box comes my way, I stash it in the garage with my homesteading supplies for guaranteed future use. I prefer to employ the basic brown, made in the United States version and try to remove all plastic tape when feasible.

Cardboard can be called on for all kinds of quick and lightweight duties.

Temporary walls – Along the lines of cheap fencing ideas, cardboard is really useful to separate or corral poultry when evading capture. (The ducks take one look and know it’s pen-up time!)

Instant weed/lawn suppressor – You could dig it up but wouldn’t you rather get a head start by covering that pesky vegetation with sun-blocking cardboard first?

Animal carrier – With bedding in the bottom and holes for air, a sturdy cardboard box makes a great lightweight container for moving small animals. Whenever we have an injured duck, it’s easier for her to be transported in a box than to have to navigate the openings of a typical pet cage.

3. Sticks: Not Just for Poking

Over the years, I’ve collected scores of sticks in various lengths, widths and wood types. As a newbie, I figured that all sticks were equally durable but a few harsh summers and winters destroyed that fantasy. I still use the faded, split and splintered pieces of hardwood that I first bought for bean teepees and tomato stakes but this spring I graduated to long-lasting locust for what I hope will be the last veggie poles I ever need to purchase. Those locust stakes are now screwed into the sides of our cedar planters where they support our homemade poultry wire cage attached with (what else?!) hundreds of zip ties!

You can also use homesteading supplies like sticks for temporary fencing, trellising, keeping doors ajar for ventilation, digging holes and excavating hard-to-reach coop muck, securing string for edging, flagging objects underneath the heavy snow, hanging covers or shade cloth and many other uses I have yet to discover. Keep a range of weights from bamboo light to locust hefty and lengths up to the famed 10-foot pole. You can always trim to size as well as repurpose broken pieces for many years of service. Your farm dog will thank you for keeping an extra stick around the place, too!

4. The Never-Ending Straw Bale

Many articles, blog posts, and even a book have been written with straw bale gardening instructions extolling the virtues of the ordinary straw bale for small-scale vegetable gardening. I’m here to tell you about its special advantage for poultry owners as well. Every autumn before most folks have even finished their back-to-school shopping, I start scoping out the local farm stands, hoping to be the first to score as many straw bales as possible. Why? Straw (not hay, different item altogether) makes a fabulous slow-release fertilizer that when gathered into a bale (or pieces of a bale) forms the perfect container for next spring’s edible plants.

But that’s not all! My main reason for buying so many bales in the fall is to place them around the edges of the poultry pen for instant winter protection for the ducks. As the straw decays, the bales heat up. They get warm enough that you can feel it when sitting on them in the middle of a snowy yard. That means that not only do they block the sharp wind but they also add a little extra cozy to your coop.

In the spring, the bales will then resume their slow organic breakdown, inviting tasty worms, fungi, and other organisms to join the party. My ducks love to forage in between the bales, especially when the ground is still a bit hard for digging. Then, once the first brassica seedlings are ready to go, I either move the bales in one piece or, much easier, move them in slices to where I want to grow my vegetables that season. It takes all summer for most of the bale to feed the crops and if there’s any left, it goes on top of the harvested plots to protect the soil for next year’s planting.

5. Poultry Fencing

Whether you’re talking hexagonal opening (AKA poultry) or square (commonly known as hardware cloth), netting materials from heavy-duty metal to the lightweight fabric are common homesteading supplies that are enormously useful on any sub(urban) farm. Just like the sticks I can’t do without, I keep a wide selection of everything from raccoon resistant heavyweight wire with tiny 1/4 inch openings to plastic poultry netting, mostly useful to keep out ducks, not rodents. Here are some styles and uses.

Plastic hexagonal – Use this for temporary fencing or veggie cages for anything squirrels don’t like. (Rodents can chew holes in plastic.) It’s lightweight, inexpensive and easy to work with.

Metal hexagonal – Use this for veggie cages, temporary dome covers, aprons for cages where large varmints are a problem. It’s lightweight, inexpensive, and can usually be cut with scissors.

Plastic hardware cloth: Use this for all the same uses as hexagonal but it has smaller openings so it can be used as shade cloth. It’s easy to cut, but rodents can chew through.

Metal hardware cloth: Buy the one-inch and one-quarter-inch squares. Smaller opening hardware cloth for chicken coops is useful to protect sides of pens from raccoons. The larger openings in heavy gauge can be used for overnight accommodations when thoroughly secured and with at least an 18 inches of apron rim around the edge. The interior floor can be dug out and hardware cloth run underneath it as well. Wire-cutters are needed.

6. No-till Composting

Okay, so I realize this is heresy and it all depends on what you use and how you use it but I’ve stopped getting compost from a composter. What?! Yeah, it’s true. Partially it’s because I’m lazy, partially it’s because I never get enough compost from those fancy rotating set-ups to feed my huge vegetable habit. So, two years ago, I began directly tossing kitchen plant scraps (not meat, eggs, oil or cooked foods) into a new garden bed I had been trying to quick-start. In the fall, I then added some very weathered straw bale material and the next year, voila, super successful Brassica, and later that autumn out-of-control squash.

Last winter, I took it to the next level by choosing two off-the-ground planters and trying the same thing. Before the snow set in, I tossed a thin layer of veggie scraps onto the top of the soil and in the spring, gently turned them under, adding a little more potting soil to supplement what got lost in the previous season.

Take a look at the photos. The plants grown in the two no-till beds are going gangbusters. The compost-less beds, not so much. Are there other reasons? Sure. Each soil system is different but I think I can reasonably say that using a little veggie scrap without waiting for it to break down completely into crumbly compost is not a terrible way to get rid of your dinner trimmings. Do not go overboard, mind! You don’t want to create an anaerobic environment; you just want to protect the soil in the winter and add a little nutrient with very little work.

7. Incredible, Bendable Wire

You would think I’d have learned from my experience with zip ties but no. I started with a couple of crop covers and eventually realized my farmer ambitions outstripped the coverage supply. I sought out an agriculturally rated material and serendipitously discovered handy heavy gauge wire that’s sold along with it. Johnny’s Seeds offers varying amounts, weights, and lengths so of course, I bought the largest box of the longest length (100 pieces may, in fact, be a lifetime supply for a quarter-acre property but contact me in a few decades and I’ll let you know!)

Like the practical wooden stick and other homesteading supplies, a bendable wire can be useful for building lightweight structures such as cages or domes to fit odd-shaped plants (think bush variety pumpkins) or for hanging objects, crafting doors or flaps, flagging items under snow, and, of course, holding crop covers, shade cloth and the like. Best of all, they are made of seriously long-lasting, reusable galvanized steel. Super easy to store, I tie them into bundles and stack in the garage. Who knew a common homesteading supply like a skinny piece of wire could be so useful?

8. Strange Uses for Your 1990s Pantyhose

I’ll confess here that although I’m rather a fanatic about not using synthetic pesticides or fertilizers in my home or garden, my tomatoes do get some help from a store-bought friend. That said, there’s very little I won’t do to produce a bumper crop of pizza and pasta sauces. Among the weirder strategies I employ is a tip I gleaned from the classic reference tome, Carrots Love Tomatoes: Secrets of Companion Planting for Successful Gardening by Louise Riotte. In that book, Riotte talks about how lightning adds nitrogen to the soil when it strikes the ground. This is not to say that I think you should go all Ben Franklin in your tomato patch. Riotte’s suggestion is a much milder and safer method of harnessing electricity by using pantyhose tied both to the plant’s stalk and also to a supporting structure, such as a tomato cage. The static electricity generated by this connection is said to promote a bumper crop. Your neighbors may look at you funny but I’ve blogged about this and used this method for several years and have raised many delicious fruits to show for it.

9. More Purposes for the All-Purpose Rubber Bowl

You know ’em, you see ’em everywhere, you probably own a few of these plentiful homesteading supplies; the ubiquitous rubber pans that come in sizes from two quarts to fifteen gallons. These durable workhorses are indispensable for anyone raising small livestock. Great for food, water, bathing and carrying everything from eggs to straw and beyond.

My favorite rubber bowl hack, however, is the Instant Staircase. I guess you could really call it a coop hack since there are very few duck-specialized houses on the market. This means that to get a duck into a chicken coop you usually have to pick it up and place it inside because those cute little entry ladders are not well suited to waterfowl feet. I considered a wider, longer board but that would be heavy and unwieldy with no guarantee that the girls would want to “walk the plank.”

One cold day in February, I decided to use a couple of large rubber bowls instead. I picked each duck up and placed her on the secure surface then shooed her inside. It took no more than two nights for the ducks to get the drill. Now I leave the coop door open each afternoon so the girls can go inside when they’re ready. Thank goodness for no-slip rubber!

Quick & Easy Tips Using Common Homesteading Supplies

Your store-bought crop covers seen better days? Tear off the material and reuse the hoops underneath with row cover cloth.

Don’t have room to store another trellis or bean cage? Make a teepee out of sticks and burlap string. At the end of the season, pull it apart for other uses.

Need an entry flap for a veggie cage? Cut a flap slightly larger than the opening and attach one side with zip ties. Reverse a few zip ties (the non-binding direction) and use those to close the flap. This will not keep out super-wily rodents but may slow them down a bit!

Tomatoes grow better fruit when they’re buzz-pollinated. Grow lots of bumblebee-friendly flowering plants near your tomato patch and get ready for the most delicious “love apples” ever.

What are some of your favorite hacks using common homesteading supplies?

9 Common Homesteading Supplies and Hacks was originally posted by All About Chickens

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