#the stolen stars could be a separate post in itself

[thegayneurodivergentagenda]

illicit affairs (by Taylor Swift) × Bad Buddy The Series

Make sure nobody sees you leave Hood over your head, keep your eyes down Tell your friends you're out for a run You'll be flushed when you return

Take the road less traveled by Tell yourself you can always stop What started in beautiful rooms

Ends with meetings in parking lots

-

Leave the perfume on the shelf That you picked out just for him

So you leave no trace behind Like you don't even exist

Take the words for what they are A dwindling, mercurial high A drug that only worked The first few hundred times

-

And that's the thing about illicit affairs

And clandestine meetings

and stolen stares

They show their truth one single time But they lie, and they lie, and they lie A million little times

And you wanna scream Don't call me "kid", Don't call me "baby"

Look at this godforsaken mess that you made me

You showed me colors

You know I can't see with anyone else

Don't call me "kid", Don't call me "baby" Look at this idiotic fool that you made me

You taught me a secret language I can't speak with anyone else

And you know damn well

For you, I would ruin myself A million little times

illicit affairs (by Taylor Swift) × Bad Buddy The Series

BadBuddy× my Playlist 5/n

[sluggzillaa]

You Smoke?

Word Count: 3.6k

✧ Pairing: Joost Klein x GN!Reader

✧ Summary: You and Joost have been apart of the same friend group for a while now but haven't had the chance to get to know each other. Thats till they both go on a smoke break.

✧ Warnings and tags: pet/nicknames(Sweetheart and star) , smoking(cigarettes), just some fluff, acquaintances to lovers, cursing, alcohol consumption, implied smut ,  panic attack, fainting, claustrophobia, no pronouns, angst if you squint

✧ Authors note: I've recently gotten into Joost and his music. I'm usually not into blonde men but he flipped a switch for me. Enjoy this thing my brain came up with, i'm very proud of it. If I made any mistakes or missed a warning PLEASE LET ME KNOW. Also, my requests are open so please request something so I have an excuse to post more. ps, MINORS SHOO!

⋆.ೃ࿔*

“Say it!”

“Okay, okay I will”

It's a Tuesday night and everyone is tipsy. You and your friend group had spent the majority of the day helping your friend Joost with a video shoot. You then all came back to Apson’s apartment to relax and have a couple drinks. A couple drinks then turned into a bunch of shots. Now you're all sharing stories, obviously extremely dramatized due to the liquor in your system.

“So I bring this girl home after a gig at Bolwerk” Joost starts

When Joost talks, everyone in the room listens. He is constantly the center of attention. He commands a room.

“We get to my place; getting in the mood.. I leave her on the couch so I can get a rubber, but when I get back this girl is passed out!”

“What did you do after?” Apson questioned 

“Opzouten! I went to bed and put her in a cab in the morning”

The group laughed and went into separate conversations. Joost stood up from his seat and grabbed his bag. 

“Alright, i’m gonna go have a smoke” 

“Mind if I come too?” You speak up

He nods towards the balcony and steps out. You follow and close the sliding door behind you. You admire the city as you learn over the railing. Joost looked through his small bag. He let out a sigh and cursed to himself.

“You got a lighter?” he questioned

You nodded and passed him the lighter that was in your pocket. He pulled out two cigarettes , placing one between his lips and handing you the other. He lit his, taking a drag to ensure an even burn. He inhaled then blew out the remaining smoke. He held the cigarette in between his lips and leaned over towards you. You placed the cigarette between your lips and looked up at him. He cupped one of his hands to the side of the cig and turned the lighter on. You scanned his focused face but your attention was stolen by him eyeing you. You took a pull and watched as Joost moved away, still never peeling his eyes from you. You leaned over the railing and watched cars pass below you.

“I had no idea you smoked” Joost broke the silence

“Well we don’t speak much to know anything about each other”

“Which is odd since we hang out so often”

“You hangout with the group often, we don’t hangout at all” You corrected

He chuckled at your snarkiness and finally looked away from you. He admired the skyline and took a drag from his cig. He turned back to you again.

“I know everyone in the group pretty well, besides you”

“What are you getting at?”

“Maybe, we could get some drinks or go out to eat or something”

“You’re making it sound like a date, Klein”

“You’re the one whos thinking of it like that”

⋆.ೃ࿔*

You agreed to hangout with Joost but tried to find something that didn’t seem so ‘datey’. You decided on going to a local venue where a few underground hardstyle artists were playing. You knew you both had a love for music so you made your plans based on that.

You stood in front of the barricade as you watched people trickle in. You quickly took notice of a familiar blonde haired man walking in, dawning a pair of shades and an ushanka. He searched the crowd till his eyes finally landed on you. A smile pasted itself on to his face and he sped to you.

“Hallo!” He greeted

“Hey.. what's with the shades?”

“I didn’t want anyone to notice me”

“Yea, because no one is going to recognize that bright mullet and your very.. Distinctive style”

He gave you a sarcastic laugh before taking his spot at the barricade. He looked around and took in the venue.

“So do you know anyone in the line up?”

“Nee, but it's always good to support new artist”

You nodded in agreement

“I remember when I was in their position, it always feels good to know that people who are bigger in the scene are interested in your art” He continued

“Enough about me, tell me why you chose this spot”

“Well, I always come to shows like these. It's such a fun atmosphere.. Plus I know how passionate you are about music so I figured it was the perfect way to bring both of our likes together”

“You're very smart”

The comment slightly threw you off but you ignored it and tried to get back into small talk. Before you could even get a word in, the show started. The speakers immediately started blasting music and the room was now lit up by the stage lights above. Joost noticed the crowd begin to get rowdy so he quickly stood behind you and placed his arms on either side of you, hands gripping the barricade. You looked up at him and gave him a thankful smile. You turned back to the front of the stage and moved your body to the beat of the music. Joost looked down at you, ensuring you were comfortable and safe. He eventually let loose and enjoyed the music along with you. The bass and the volume of the music made it extremely difficult to communicate but you did what you could.

“Joost!.. JOOST!” You attempted to grab his attention

“Yea! What do you need?”

“Can you get me a drink?”

“You’ll be good on your own?” He questioned, you gave him a sly look and rolled your eyes

“I am a grown woman, I can handle myself”

He nodded and pushed through the crowd so he could get to the bar in the back. Once he left, you attempted to assimilate yourself with the crowd. Unfortunately, The crowd was getting even more hyped and seemed to lose any sense of awareness for others. Before you knew it, you were pushed into the center of the pit. You were being heavily shoved around and elbowed painfully. You tried to push your way out but the more you struggled, the more it became harder to get out. You’ve been in pits before but only when you intend to; you had never been forced into one. The large amounts of people and the pushing began to make you hyperventilate. Your chest was heaving and your heart was racing. There was a sudden ringing in your ear and before you knew it, black.

You weren’t sure how long you were out but you woke up to a bright light in your face and feeling insanely sweaty. You sat up and the light was moved from your face. The first person you saw was Joost, looking insanely worried. This was the first time you’ve seen him with any other reaction but happy. Once he realized you were awake, he quickly rushed to check on  you, looking all around for any marks on you or any signs you needed to be rushed to a hospital. The medics urged him to give you some space but he ignored them.

“Holy shit, are you okay?”

“Like I would fucking know.. What happened?”

“You passed out in the pit, Why the fuck would you do that after I left?”

“First of all, I got pushed into the pit.. Second of all, I don’t need your constant protection”

He donned an amused smile and looked up at the medics, ushering them away. He tucked his arm under your armpit and slowly helped you get up.

“Still just as independent as you were before you went out.. Come on i’m taking you home”

“No it’s fine, I’ll get a cab”

“I brought my car. Turn off your ego for a second and let me do something for you”

⋆.ೃ࿔*

Joost pulled up to the front of your apartment building and put his car in park.

“Do you need me to take you upstairs or?”

‘I’ll be fine but thank you”

He nodded and stepped out of the car. Right as you were about to open your own door, he quickly swung it open.

“As the gentleman I am, I should be opening doors for you”

“Joost stop making it weird”

You stepped out of the car and shut the door, snatching it from him. He rolls his eyes and walks you to the door. 

“Let's do that again”

“Maybe not THAT.. I think we should just get coffee next time” He joked

You nodded and stopped at your building's front door. Before you opened it, you turned back to Joost and placed a quick peck on his cheek. You gave him a soft smile and opened the door.

“Thank you.. Text me so we can figure out the next time we can hang out”

Joost just stood there, frozen in place. No matter what you said he would just nod in agreement. 

⋆.ೃ࿔*

You had spent the last week texting back and forth with Joost. It first started off with him checking in on you after what happened at the concert. It then turned into him just talking to you randomly. Now you two can’t go a few hours without talking. After being in the same group for so long, you finally feel like you’re actually getting close to him.

Star: I just finished all my paperwork

Moon: You’ve been working on that stuff for 2 days straight

Star: Yea but its finally over

Moon: Good good

Star: I am really bored right now though

Moon: I’m at the studio right now finishing a project

          All the guys just left so it's just me right now

Star: Are you asking me to pull up to the studio?

Moon: Maybe

Star: I’ll see you in 15

⋆.ೃ࿔*

You knocked on the door of the studio and waited for Joost to open. He wasted no time; he practically swung the door off its hinges. He greeted you with a wide smile and ushered you inside. You greeted him with a nod and walked in. You spun around, giving yourself a mini tour of the studio. It was decorated with LED lights and had few plants in the corners. You looked at one of the walls which had a comfy looking brown couch against it. Joost sat down in his chair in front of the control panel. He patted the chair next to him, signaling you to sit. You plopped down in the chair and watched him as he quickly opened his music program on his laptop.

“Listen to this and tell me what you think”

You nodded and followed his every move. He placed the laptop on the desk in front of him and quickly pressed the spacebar, causing the music to play. The song was slower than what you were used to with his music. His voice was very soft, following the beat. The lyrics were extremely heartfelt. Full of love and passion. It was very enjoyable, arguably one of his best songs. He leaned forward in his chair and watched your facial expressions. The song came to a stop and he immediately bombarded you with questions about your opinion.

“It's a very beautiful song.. I love it”

“You don’t think it's missing something, though?”

You shook your head and leaned back in your chair. Joost rubbed the back off his head, thinking. Suddenly something clicked in him. He grabbed your hand and forced you out of your seat. He opened the door to the booth.

“I need you to go into the booth and record something for me, please”

“Fine but you owe me”

He gave you an excited nod and rushed back to his seat. You walked into the booth and shut the door behind you. You looked out the window and spotted Joost ushering you to put on the headphones. Once you did, he spoke through the intercom.

“Okay, so what I want you to do is say ‘Joost, take me to the moon’ but in a soft voice.. Not a whisper though”

You giggled at his specific instructions and gave him an understanding nod. You got up to the mic and gave Joost a thumbs up, signaling that you were ready. A red light turned on above the mic, showing that it was on and recording. You gave yourself an assuring breathe before continuing with the phrase.

“Joost, take me to the moon” You attempted to put on your most calming yet slightly sensual voice

You looked over at him through the window, He just sat there staring at his laptop with an earbud in. He nodded to himself and waved for you to come back out. You hung the headphones back up and walked out of the booth.

“How was it?” You asked

“Fucking perfect.. It was exactly what the song needed”

You smiled to yourself, excited by the praise. He packed up his stuff and grabbed yours as well. He shut off the lights in the studio, The only light in the room being an LED lamp he has on the desk next to all the tech. He stood for a second just admiring the silhouette of your features. Weirdly enough, you did the same. You took notice of the way his nose buttons out and how he constantly had a dimple peeking. Though you couldn’t really see them, you felt his eyes meet yours. The two of you moved together ever so slightly. You two were already so close, if you kept going at this pace you would be directly on top of each other. He placed his hand on your hip and the other on the small of your back. You turned your head to the side and dared to lean your face closer. Right when your lips were going to slightly touch, his ringtone loudly filled the room. He let you go and rushed to grab his phone from his pocket, it was Aspon.

“Shit.. Hallo?” He answered the phone and walked to the other side of the room

You huffed and turned away from him, attempting to snap yourself out of this flustered state. He said goodbye to Aspon and turned back to you. 

“Let’s get going”

You nodded in agreement and opened the door. You made your way downstairs and waited for Joost to lead you to the car. The car ride was pretty quiet besides you helping him with directions. You didn’t once acknowledge what happened upstairs. He pulled up in front of your apartment building and put the car in parked. He got out of the car and walked over to the other side, opening the door for you. You stepped out and walked with him to the front door.

“See you soon?”

“Yea, i’ll text you when i’m home.. Okay star?”

You nodded and headed back inside.

⋆.ೃ࿔*

He didn’t

He hasn’t spoken to you in a week. He hasn’t even made any plans to meet with the friend group. You haven’t heard a single thing about Joost. You knew it was kinda awkward after what happened but you didn’t think it was that bad. You spent day and night last week waiting for any sign of him. The more time that went by with no contact, the more time you began to gave up. That was till you actually gave up. You no longer spent your mornings trying to get pretty in case he wanted to hang out. You no longer tried looking for new ideas of things you could do together. You just stopped trying all together. You had no interest in putting so much effort into someone who obviously didn't care much for you.

You laid in your bed on your laptop, doom scrolling. You hadn’t found a way to stop until your phone chimed. You turned your head to the device and saw a text from someone you haven’t spoken to in a while.

Moon: You busy?

You stared at the text and contemplated whether you should answer or not. It was like his words were a spell, pushing you to respond. You picked up your phone and quickly got to typing.

Star: No

           Why?

Moon: I’m having a get together for the release of my new song

Star: Okay

Moon: And I was wondering if you’d like to come

Star: Where is it and when?

Moon: At my place

           Tonight at 8

Star: I’ll see

He sent you one last text but you didn’t bother to check. You wondered how he had the balls to contact you after leaving you in the dark for so long. You also wondered how he had so much control over you to make you give in so easily.

⋆.ೃ࿔*

You knocked on Joost's apartment door. You had only been here once before for a get together that Ski had invited your group to. You don’t really remember it much because you started drinking as soon as you got there.

Joost opened the door. A slight smile creeped onto his face. It immediately dropped when he realized you weren’t as happy to see him as he was you. You walked straight inside and looked around to see if you recognized anyone. To your surprise, no one was even there. You turned to him with a confused yet slightly confused face. 

“Where did everyone go?” you questioned

“You’re the first one to arrive”

You scoff and walk further into the apartment. You spot the bottles of alcohol and mixers on his dining room table. You grab a cup and begin to fill your cup with a mix of vodka and cranberry juice. You took a sip, making a face at the taste of liquor. You turned back around and trailed to the couch. You plopped down and leaned against the arm of the seat. Joost walked towards you and gently sat down onto the cushion next to you. There was a moment of awkward silence before he finally decided to break it.

“I’m sorry”

“About?”

“The other night..”

“Are you really sorry about the other night or are you sorry about going ghost?”

“Both?”

“What exactly are you sorry for?”

“Um..”

There was a moment of silence again. You watched him as he fidgeted and bit the inside of his cheek. He finally turned to you. His cheeks were a light shade of pink and his eyes were slightly wider. You sat on your legs and leaned closer to him.

“Are you sorry or do you just regret something”

“Maybe I do have some regrets”

“Was it not kissing me?” You said boldly

He kept quiet but his eyes kept flickering to your lips. You leaned closer, practically being pulled towards him. He let out a desperate sigh and leaned into you. Your lips brushed against each other. You closed your eyes, preparing yourself to finally get to kiss him. Then the bell rang. You pulled away and threw your hands up in defeat. Joost got up to answer the door. You grabbed your cup and walked out to the balcony. After that, there wasn’t a moment where the door was closed. The apartment was now full. Everyone was packed in like sardines yet everyone was still having a great time. Joost pushed through the crowd and rushed to you.

“I’m about to release the song, come!”

You stood up from your chair and followed after him. The two of you stood with your group of friends. He grabbed his laptop and pressed the upload button. Once it was up, he pressed play and allowed his song to fill the room. It was a slow and sweet melody. Everything you said in the studio stood to be true. It was a perfectly beautiful song. It was full of love and passion. The song was coming to an end, a part you had never heard.

jij bent het mooiste waar ik mijn ogen op heb gericht, mijn ster

(you're the most beautiful thing I have laid my eyes on, My star)

Your mind went cloudy. The name took you by surprise. To anyone else it would seem like a random nickname, but to you it meant so much more. In the background you heard your voice closing out the song.

Joost, Take me to the moon

Everyone clapped and cheered for Joost. You turned to him with a dreamy expression on your face. He was just smiling down at you, tuning out the entire room. He made your blank expression turn into a wide smile.

⋆.ೃ࿔*

Joost said goodbye to the last few guests and turned to you. You stood directly behind him with a huge smile on your face that hasn’t gone away since he revealed the song. You threw your arms around his neck and pulled him into a long awaited kiss. His eyes fluttered shut as he melted into the kiss. He placed one of his hands onto the small of your back and the other on the back of your head. You reached your hand up and combed through the blonde’s mullet. He took a sharp breath in through his nose whilst pulling away. He gave you a goofy love struck smile. You panted as you attempted to catch your breath. You giggled at the sight of the very red Joost.

“So is that why you didn’t speak to me all week?”

“Yea.. I just got so caught up in making it perfect for you, Schat”

You pulled him back into the kiss, this time it was even more heated and passionate. He trailed his hands down and placed them on the back of your thighs. He tapped on your skin, signaling you to jump up. You did as you were instructed and wrapped your legs around his waist. He held onto you and walked you over to his room, never once breaking the kiss.

⋆.ೃ࿔*

joostklein

The Netherlands

♡ ❍ ➣

205,750 likes

joostklein “Love letter to a star” Out Now! ✨

View all 1,200 comments

June 15

bbnomula: I LOVE JOOST KLEIN

nelib0st: who’s the song about

yungpepsi: Omg is joost dating some1

missharli: Beautiful

ticetip: JOOST LET ME BE YOUR STAR

[doubleddenden]

The topic of Palworld is pretty charged, but often times I see people be shamed for liking it because the CEO tweeted stuff about NFTs and the company using AI art in a separate game. Acting as if that's the most damning thing ever for a gaming company in an industry filled with similar people.

Make no mistake, I dislike both AI art and nfts, but do you realize how many gaming companies have involvement with that?

To begin with, Pokémon used AI art in a promotional piece for Pokémon Go in September, and nobody gave a shit because uwu Pikachu. The Pokémon Company also put a job listing some months back seeking an expert in NFTs. That's not quite damning evidence, but if I were a betting man, no "NFT expert" will willingly say "yeah nfts suck are bad for the environment, man, I'll take my paycheck and fuck off now." There's also a strong argument to be made that Pokémon has stolen ideas from fakemon artists (Finizen and Palafin, Scovillain, Dipplin, etc) and other franchises (kaiju movies, Dragon Quest, Megaman, final fantasy, western cartoons and food mascots, etc), a dubious legal statement that claims they own all fan art from the remixes and fakemon made on youtube to the pikachu your kid drew at breakfast; they have yet to apologize for the state of Scarlet and Violet while charging full price to millions of paying customers for a clearly unfinished and barely functioning game (which i did enjoy, but you can't tell me it was finished baking when it struggles not to shit itself just to run), and a bunch of other things people shit on Palworld for, but A. It's Pokémon so people don't care and think it's fine, and B. That's not the point of this post.

You know who else does NFTs and AI art? (Yes I heard Muscle Man from Regular Show in my head just now, too, moving along)

Square Enix sold several of their IPs for NFTs and claims to have used AI art "a minimum amount" in Foam Stars, yet I see nobody yelling for boycotts of Final Fantasy 14, 16, Kingdom Hearts, Dragon Quest, Life is Strange, etc etc etc.

Sony has invested in both, they want to implement AI into gaming, and has a patent for nfts to be used in games and consoles, yet there's no movement to throw out your playstations.

Bandai Namco- you know, that company with a hand in pretty much most anime games on the market and popular games such as the Dark Souls games? They have a game called RYU that's essentially a virtual pet game that uses the blockchain, and its AI driven, among other projects. Yet there's no outcry to stop playing the many, MANY games they brand with. This also includes quite a few Nintendo games (btw they just partnered together to form a special studio quite recently) like Smash Wii U/3ds and New Pokémon Snap. Nobody gives a shit though.

Android, Microsoft, Google, Apple- I don't even need to explain those, they have whole teams dedicated to both. Even popular VPN companies accept crypto.

I'm just saying an awful lot of you guys that scream and shit bloody murder about Palworld's company being involved with that shit are either the biggest "It's okay when my favs do it" type of hypocrites, or you're sorely ignorant to just how evil and greedy most corporations are. You'll be hard pressed to find a game company with popular AND fun games that DOESN'T have some interest in either, let alone movie and show studios. That's the awful reality we live in.

You have 2 options

1. You basically stop doing anything involving most modern tech, including throwing out your pc and smart phone. You could probably live a comfortable life with tech circa 2010, but you have to be aware that any thing you buy may go towards a cause you don't like.

2. You accept that people can enjoy a product while not necessarily agreeing with the CEO of said product. Most CEOs tend to be jackasses anyway, that's kind of the shared trait they all have. You can also discourage companies from using them while understanding it is everywhere.

Palworld at the end of the day is just a toy, that's it. From the looks of it, it's not even actually hurting anyone, and it seems like the company at least treats their employees pretty decently- at least according to a few things I've seen here and there that seems rather progressive for a Japanese studio (with room for doubt obviously, it's a company after all and as we've established, they're all evil). At the least its not like when people supported Hogwarts Legacy and directly put money into JKR's wallet so she can openly hurt more Trans women. In fact, the only people seemingly hurt in all of this Palworld drama are obsessed Pokémon stans that can't accept a parody, or the Pokémon Company themselves, who rightly deserve some punching up tbh.

You can just say you dislike the game, that's fine, I totally get that. Even though I personally think The Pokémon Company deserves a few nut shots after the way they've treated fans these last few years with the state of their games (and you know, stealing ideas from fans without credit), I can see why someone would be turned away from a parody that's literally meant to be Pokémon with guns. I can totally understand all of that, personally I'd prefer if the game was MORE like Pokémon with turn based combat.

But if you're going to defend Pokémon because you think its perfectly innocent because of Wooloo or something like that, just be sure you're aware you're defending the World's Richest Franchise and their own attempts at AI and NFTs while calling out an indie company (a real one thats learning as they go, not the fake "We're totally indie" franchise that hasn't been indie since gen 3) for having a ceo that also seems interested in the same stuff. And remember, you don't become number 1 without hurting people somehow (we could dig up receipts about certain partners Pokémon has teamed up with, such as Tencent with Unite, but I'd rather not right now.)

Just saying. I don't think you're an irredeemable person for still liking Pikachu, cuz I do too believe it or not. I've been a life long fan and still have fun with the games despite the clear scummy business practices towards their paying customers. Just maybe extend that courtesy to the millions of players just trying to have fun in this awful, putrid, shithole planet that just keeps getting worse and worse with each passing day.

Plus... you know, think about it. Do you think Pokémon would ever get around to making a gunless Palworld? Probably not. Do you think Palworld would exist if The Pokémon Company and Nintendo were the slightest bit chill about Pokémon fan projects like SEGA is with Sonic? Also probably not. From what I've read, the devs just wanted to make a fun game that happens to mostly be ARK with Pokémon adjacent monsters. That's not really a bad thing, all things considered, and it seems like the worst they've done is reference official Pokémon when making their own models.

Palworld being successful is actually beneficial to Pokémon fans, as well. It'll never really truly compete, but it has outsold Legends Arceus in terms of units sold (not as much financially because Palworld was only $30 plus a sale recently, but still impressive), and it is enough that Game Freak is aware of its existence. Let Palworld light a fire under their ass, and maybe GF will actually finish their next game before releasing it for full price (and no, we're not bringing up the tired imaginary ball and chain game devs, game freak owns 1/3rd lf the franchise and can easily take methods to get more dev time, they just haven't because money). Just saying, at least the Paldevs were honest enough to sell it in early access for half the price.

[cutieboop2000]

Lore/Info time!

Celene's medical station is meant to be a room separate from the garage or her personal room, and it's her work station for the medical care she offers. Healing can be done in 3 ways here, typically in physical and magical manners.

Obviously, Celene's waning moon magic is meant for healing, and it's the first of three methods of healing. Waning moon magic is hands-on mainly because how it's supposed to work is she has to apply her hand to whatever hurts, and then the magic does the rest. The magic would appear dark black as night, but it is efficient in healing a scratch, minor boo-boo, injuries, and it makes anything that aches a lot scream less. As waning moon magic is meant for release, releasing and banishing pain/illness is seen as a good thing.

The second method of healing, more physical, is the first aid kits kept on the desk besides the chair. It consists of typical gauzes, Band-Aids, disinfectants, and whatnot of a medical kit. However, there could be other medical tools, some of which is stored in the drawers of the worktable to the right (aka the altar space). If magic doesn't always work, she could be in need of using the medical tools and first aid kits. Where does it all come from, however? ... The best guess is that the supplies were stolen to help the medical station's development.

The third method of healing is through potion making. The table on the right serves as an altar space as well as a storage for things like herbs, flowers and use them for medical purposes. Such floral resources are mixed into the cauldron to generate potions of various purposes. The kitty witch would have to make sure it's the right ingredients for the right ailment, and a book is kept in the upper right drawer. It's a weird way to go about healing just as Celene's magic is, but damn they work too, as long as it's the correct type of potion. The only consequence it has is that it tastes weird, but that's how all medicinal drinks are like; yet it produces the best outcome of the person feeling better.

Now, for the surroundings itself!

On the left table, it includes first aids, a star projector (assumingly connected to an outlet) for relaxing purposes, and a portable laptop. The laptop can be transferred between rooms, but for this room, Celene uses it for spooky ambience purposes. The music probably doesn't help the patients/bikers who end up here feel at ease, unless they're into spooky safe room type of music. In the same side as the left table, there's a doctor's chair that has ribbons with belt buckles included either for difficult patients or for reaction reduction. The chair also has a button on the upper part for upper restriction. Restrictions are only for if it's necessary, and the fact there's restraints on the chair also isn't reassuring either. Celene can only try her best to reassure them since said restraints aren't used until it gets difficult.

On the right side is where the rest of the medical resources are. On the top there's the altar area full of stored herbs as well as a cauldron next to it, so it doubles as a workspace. As explained previously, it is used for making potions. Below it are the drawers, which either contain backup medical tools, first aid, or witchy supplies for healing. It's very useful, and she'll go to it for some of the medical business.

Oh, and that door in the middle? Well, for LBB Celene, it's not very useful... yet. At that time, the medical station's only started out and Celly's getting patients for medical appointments! It's however useful for WBB Celene because it's extra storage without getting too bloody, and it would become a testing area later on! It's kind of a experiment room later in her time as one of the Loveless Bikers, being the gang's witch and medic.

The picture itself is a rough idea, and there'll probably be more development as my brain keeps on storming. So yeah, enjoy the major lore post on what the workspace is like!

[revvethasmythh]

In response to your Fearne/Chetney song post: Consider this ask an opportunity to pick any playlists you have and ramble about them, I absolutely love discovering new music through playlists!

yes EXCELLENT thank you!!

okay to keep myself on task so I don't just ramble for like 5k words, I'm going to treat this a top 10 list and this is going to specifically be for my widobrave playlist because she is my baby and I've been working on her for a long time and you know what? the wb tag deserves a little love. I'm going to try to spotlight different songs than I talked about before, too, for diversity's sake

this is absolutely going to get long, so I'll put the rest under the cut.

1: I And Love And You, The Avett Brothers

oh boy, oh boy, oh boy. What is there to say that the song does not say itself? There are a few ways I think this song could be interpreted depending on how you're reading the lyrics, but the line "that woman she got eyes that shine/like a pair of stolen polished dimes" is so fucking good and so Veth this will always be a top song for me. Also need to shout out the "the dream's the catch/the world's the cage" line in this one, because that has always made me think back to Heart in a Cage--I consider them related in my own personal widobrave lyrical thematic universe. Verdict: The vibes are excellent. The Avett brothers always pull through for me

2. Summertime, MCR

obviously this was going to show up in wb song list for me because I named one of my fics after this song! I've always associated summer with wb anyway, but the additional layer of the summer camp and that being a time they specifically spend together in post-canon makes it even better. "You can run away with me any time you want" also follows through on the "runaway" theme that they've both had on their separate playlists (Runaway by Yeah Yeah Yeahs on Caleb's first playlist and Runaway Pt. 1 (Love Has Limits) by Colony House on the Veth playlist).

3. Who Will I Hold, The Avett Brothers

I am screaming and crying and throwing up every time this song comes on. Listen to their one-on-one talk in episode 121 and then listen to this song. The lyrics are so remarkably accurate, it's a thing to behold. "I'm bracing for loneliness, I know it's coming/Now, who will I hold when you're gone?"

4. Hand Over Heart, Gin Wigmore

Melancholy and loving and again incredibly accurate lyrics from "and promise me, day and night/you'll always be my best friend" to "you got the magic to light up the stars/it's like the world is spinning just for you."

5. Not Alone, Shawn James

Very tender song that resonates a lot with wb, and also so very reminiscent of what Veth told Caleb in the finale with the line "Listen close and hear/I want you to let go of your fear/You can find love/Let go of your strife and get what you want out of your life." Like, I think there's a gifset out there somewhere where she basically just says this to Caleb.

6. I Will Follow Him, Peggy March

Okay so this one IS from the first Nott playlist, but I don't see it talked about very much and tbh if you're listening to it from the pov of having seen the end of the campaign, this one just hits different. Shoutout to the "he'll always be my true love" lyric. Like WHAT. The way that song was on an official CR playlist and no one ever talks about it, I'm--

7. Head Full Of Doubt/Road Full Of Promise, The Avett Brothers

A third Avett Brothers song, you say?? Why yes, indeed. Their songs just really hit for this ship with me. I consider this song to mostly be a Veth song, revolving a lot around Veth's self-doubt issues, but if we're following Rosie's Lyrical Thematic Universe (RLTU), this lyric, "There was a dream and one day I could see it/Like a bird in a cage I broke in and demanded that somebody free it" stands out a lot. Like the song progression of Heart in a Cage -> I And Love And You -> Head Full Of Doubt/Road Full Of Promise is what I'm getting at here. "Oh, the heart beats in its cage" to "The dream's the catch/The world's the cage" to "Like a bird in a cage I broke in a demanded that somebody free it." The caged bird thing is HUGE thematically with me and which I think is really funny because it's literally just ME out here with these hyper specific themes and motifs going on. But I love it, I think it works great for them

8. If U Stayed, ZZ Ward

You come to this song for pure angst and pure angsty only. If you want to feel angsty about the fact that they're non-canon, this is the song for you.

9. December Song, Birdtalker (of Blue Healer fame) and Joy Williams (of Trouble With Wanting fame)

"Friend your heart has been far away from mine/There's no one to blame but that wicked stalwart time/And as the year marches steady to its end/Oh, my heart is longing to be close to yours again"

I've been wanting to write a post-canon holiday themed piece based around this song for AGES. the details aren't perfectly accurate, but the vibes are very much there.

10. Lead to Light, Nico Vega

No song list/playlist of mine is ever complete without at least ONE Nico Vega song. The themes of, well, "I will drop anything for you" ring very true, but my favorite line is the bridge: "Oh my love, you know you are a teacher/But you don't know I can be a teacher, too." I appreciate it on one level as inherently suggestive, but extremely literal in the case of late widobrave with Veth opening up her camp to teach adventurers, especially since she had said she wasn't a good teacher sometime in the early campaign.

Honorable Mentions:

1: So Sorry Mama, Whitney Duncan

The details of this song do not match up with canon, HOWEVER, I am 100% certain Veth (lover of monsters and of bad boys) has had at least one, if not more, fantasies re: Caleb that sound exactly like this. So I'm including it because I am sure that she'd had this vision at least once in a dream

2. If We Were Vampires, Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit

I'll admit this one is highly specific to me, which is why it's in the honorable mentions section, because I'm pulling a lot of the themes of this song for the post-canon wb piece I'm working on right now. It's also just a very bittersweet, tender song that is so, so good about loving someone for as long as you can and making those days count

A bonus Veth-specific honorable mention:

Whiskey Fever by Dorothy. It's not all that deep of a song rec, but it's pretty accurate and it slaps. This song fucking slaps.

A bonus Caleb-specific honorable mention:

Innocent by Taylor Swift. Never thought I'd choose a T. Swift song for him, but it so eerily accurate to his story. Could double a wb song, but I largely relate it to Caleb due to its subject matter.

if anyone was actually curious, I'll just add the full playlist here for perusal sake because there's A LOT more on there, these are just my personal favorites:

[happyselves]

Drugs ( part 1 ) { Daniel Ricciardo x reader }

" I'm a fucking mess sometimes, you needed me as much as I needed you. We were a drug for each other, but we need to heal and in order to get better I need to let you go "

You watch Daniel in the opposite corner of the room, lost in your thought.He was looking at you like he knew how much it was hurting you to be here, be there for him like you are a simple friend to him. You wanted more, you needed more and you knew he couldn't give you that, not Daniel Ricciardo. You had way too many long sleepless nights talking about it, he did not want a partner before the end of his career, yet until now you were hoping that he would change his mind,until last night. You had one of those sleepless night conversations again and it was the one that made your emotion's vase overflow. You hide so well how your heart broke in millions pieces last night. After all those years of friendship you had to let him go. He was hurting you and keeping you close " as a friend " . He knew now how much you were in love with him when you were doing so well hiding it all together. The smile, the touch, the gaze, you put your best acting for so long but you couldn't anymore. I was toxic for you when all he was, was the best friend you could hope for, always supportive, always here for you, but the more he cared for you the more he made you hope.

Last night was a mess, you both got drunk, both ended up on his room balcony in that beautiful hotel in Bahrain. You laugh for hours until the alcohol hits you both really hard and makes you confess things that you would normally keep to yourself. He starts by rambling about life outside f1, then it comes to your friendship and your brain isn't functioning properly, only your heart was able to make a decision. So when he started describing how perfect your friendship was for him and how essential you were in his life, your heart spoke for you but only in whispers.

You : You have no idea what's going on in my mind.

Dan : What did you say ?

And then you feel the alcohol effect, the one that makes you brave.

You : I said you have no idea what's going on in my mind right now ...

You waited a bit, not daringly looking at him, he was waiting for you to continue, looking at you with a curious gaze in his eyes, very intrigued that he patiently waited until you took a breath and gained enough courage to say what you had in mind.

You : You have no idea how much torture it is for me.

That where you saw his face close itself, the seriousness taking place like he just hit a wall in full force. He realised something, he realised that you weren't happy and his heart broke, you didn't need to say more he got it right away by the tears forming on the corners of your eyes. He realised that the friendship he thought was perfect wasn't, he finally saw after all this year how much you were unhappy. He was so selfish that even if he knew you by heart he didn't see the suffering you were giving him every time you too spoke during a sleepless night. Now he sees it, the pain, the hurt but most important the love and all he could feel right now was his heart aching and sinking into a dark hole.

He was losing you,

killing you,

torturing you,

helding you captive...

At this instant he hated himself so much for wanting to keep you just for him, no wanted to let you go, he wanted you only for him and it was unhealthy cause he knew that he couldn't give you what you needed from him. He felt sick to his stomach, he was toxic for you but you were a drug for him, he needed you to be well, to do well, to be happy. This man was confused because he didn't know how to explain his own feeling, he didn't know if it was love, possession, friendship, ownership, the only thing he was sure of was that without you he would be nothing. His mind needed to be clear, he needed to act fast before you left him for good, he needed to make sure of what he was feeling ...

So that night, under the stars, on this balcony, both of you were drunk. On this sleepless night, he grabbed the chair you were sitting in and brought it close to him with a firm attention to put an end to this. You got so surprised by his sudden gesture that you almost fell, he caught you with his arm like he always does when you are about to strumble. His arms having a firm grip on your waist he never let go of you, he didn't intend too even for a second until he was sure of what was going on between the two of you and you felt a tension building between your bodies. You dreamed of this for so long but living it was beyond every expectation because as soon as you ended up on his legs, it was like your soul left your body admiring this moment from afar, but you never felt more alive. Your skin was burning, your head spinning as the sight of him getting his face closer to you. He hesitates for a second that lasts an eternity for you before closing the gap between your lips and pressing his onto yours. They were soft, like kissing a cloud and your eyes shut themself automatically to make this moment captured in your brain forever cause you knew it would be a one time thing. You didn't want to think of this not right now, not when the man who was kissing you softly was here doing what you've always wanted and you were determined to show him how useless words were useless in this instant.

His lips still on yours, no moving like he was waiting for something, an approbation from you to make a move, you didn't realise that you were overthinking so much that you didn't respond to the kiss but the alcohol in his system wasn't letting him pull away just yet, and you were glad for it because you could react just in time and open your mouth to catch his lips, licking the dry spot on it, making them yours and only yours for what could last some longs minutes. His whole body relaxes and he releases a sigh he didn't know he was holding, his hands finally leaving your arm to fiercely grab your neck and making your forehead touch each other, deepening the kiss, introducing his tongue to the party. It was becoming sloppy and you were so intoxicated that your head was feeling dizzy but you weren't sure if it was because of the toxicity running through your veins or the way Daniel was eating you literally alive, like you let nobody do before. Your cold hands were finding their place at the hem of his shirt, pulling the last millimeters separating you from him. You wanted to feel him everywhere on your body as much as possible, the burning sensation was addictive and you needed more, you needed more of him ... again and again, savoring the few stolen moments.

But you had to let go, you couldn't breathe anymore, and he had too but it felt like he didn't want to. Coming back to reality was brutal for both of you as it seems to appear when you both pull away from each other, not moving your hands to lean on the contact, the fire and electricity who was roaming between your two bodies. At this point you couldn't open your eyes yet, you couldn't face him, face his terror of what you had just done, face the saddest of a lost friendship ...

His hand moves to caress your cheek, and like a fool, you lean to it, purring like a cat enjoying being petted. His thumb was stroking your skin, encouraging you to finally meet his gaze and when you do so, you've met the most beautiful brown eyes like it was the first time you were really seeing them from a close side. They weren't as light as you remember and his pupil was so dilated, yet so alive, sparkling like the sky during the 4th of July. He wasn't blinking and you weren't either, to scare to miss something , it was even more deep in the meaning that the exchange you just had, so intimate to lock eyes with each others, communicating only with your eyes, wondering what's the other is thinking, quietly battling to know which of you will break the contact first.

It end up being you when you felt your lungs lacking of air, opening your mouth to gather a huge breath of air which bring you a new clarity in your brain and made you jump out of his lap, finding yourself search for the balcony ledge, regretting right away the decision because you were already missing him. He was looking at you, his arms still up in the air where you were a second ago, still shocked from your sudden change of heart. How could you look at him and be around him after that ? You wouldn't dare to meet his eyes right now, deeply ashamed of what you just did. So you didn't and you left without a word, leaving him hanging on his own, leaving the room and probably leaving his life.

You spend the remainder of the night crying in your room, grieving the loss of the friendship you had with him, hoping to disappear from this place and not meeting him in the morning.

But that was without counting on the elevator taking too much time to come to your floor and the door of Daniel's room opening. It was too late for you to run and take the stairs plus you had too much luggages with you to carry. You pull on your best act, like nothing happened last night, hiding your puffy eyes and your miserable face as much as you can in the hood of your oversized hoodie ... his oversized hoodie. That thought made your eyes water again, you were about to betray him, leaving him alone but after like night.

That was where he called your name from the back of that room, and like an idiot you lifted up your head meeting his gaze from afar. He looked at you like he knew ... and your heart broke again replacing it with dust as the elevator's doors finally opened in front of you. You entered it, looking at him one last time.

MASTERLIST

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[anakinisvaderisanakin]

Evil Unmasked Part 4 AU (aka Vader visits Padmé’s tomb)

Darth Vader was, in a word, exhausted.

Truth be told, whatever slim patience he had had for the machinations of Palpatine’s propaganda machine and the role it had carved out for him was all but gone. He could no longer recall how many interviews he had been forced to play along with, how many holo captures he had had taken of his visage for Imperial distribution. He had figured Palpatine would use his compliance as a tool to promote the Empire as the righteous governmental installment, and himself as the rightful Emperor. Still, it was becoming both grating, and infuriating. Vader was relieved that the media circus had, for now, been foiled and was beginning to die down. He had lost count of how many times he had been pinned down to denounce the Jedi order and explain why he had turned against them, as well as why he had changed his name.

Eight months post the fall of the Republic, and the calamity of the aftermath had begun to settle into the new normalcy. Vader was no longer hounded by hoards of reporters, no longer approached solely to speak out for promotional purposes. This was his first break from the obligations of either hunting down and eliminating stray Jedi, or speaking out on Palpatine’s behalf to praise his leadership. As soon as the opportunity arose, he asked for (demanded) his first day off. Palpatine had given him a quizzical, mildly displeased look but allowed it with a disinterested hand wave. The location he’d chosen for his travel had been decided long in advance, constantly pushed to the back of his mind but never truly forgotten. Vader hadn’t been anywhere near the sector for years; the planet’s sunny skies, vast green fields of grass and tranquil environment seemingly welcoming him with open arms. The nature and its beautiful trappings knew nothing of his past, nothing of the dark deeds he had committed - nor of the fact that he had stolen one of its most favourite daughters away.

Naboo was a beautiful place, with its lush scenery and its vast crystal clear lakes. Even with the sombre intentions behind Vader’s visit in mind, he found it a refreshing and peaceful break from the insanity life had become. The serene, bedazzled home world of Emperor Palpatine was nothing short of a paradise. But it was also the home world of Vader’s beloved, lost Padmé.

That Palpatine could be the native son of such a stunning planet was irony in its highest form. Padmé was much more suited for the inviting greenery, and the richly bedazzled background most citizens of Naboo had enjoyed. The gungans, shut out from society and equality before the Separatist attack, seemed so far removed from the background Padmé and Palpatine were of. Padmé had been born a Naberrie - that in itself a prestige; elected Queen at fourteen, and then continuing to become the senator and ambassador of her birth planet. The planet’s inhabitants had adored her. They adored her valor, her beauty, and her compassion. Her childhood made such a stark contrast to Vader’s own. Padmé had been raised in harmony; with her own autonomy, with responsibilities, yes - but with the power to make lasting changes. With her inherited money and her stunning appearance, her heritage and her wit - Padmé had had all the trappings sufficient of making a just, good woman.

Vader had come from nothing, with no legacy, no father, and no autonomy. He had lived impoverished as a child slave barely scraping by, fearing either death by starvation or illness, or by extermination. Watto, as his master and owner, had threatened him into submission by reminding him of the chip in his neck; reminding him of that fact that would he revolt - both he and his mother were doomed. Padmé never had to fear for her parents’, or her sister’s lives. Not even when she was with child, was the terror of her dying in childbirth that occupied Vader’s mind every hour of every day, of any concern to her. She did not fear death, but then she had never been faced death as Vader had. Perhaps, if she too had been raised on a desert planet, no more than an item to be exploited, with only her mother as a guide and confidant would she have understood his plight. Maybe if she, too, had lost her parents and failed in her valiant effort to save them, would she have understood his fear of watching her fade away. In the end, as yet another cruel twist of fate; Vader himself had brought about her demise. In the end, all he had was himself - and perhaps, that was for the better.

The tomb of senator Padmé Amidala was a vast monument in and of itself, but at the same time surprisingly sparse on decor. Padmé had never been a woman of simplicity when it came to appearance or presentation, but her final resting place was almost humble. Solid stone encased her now, protecting her withering bones from the harsh light of day. Now, as night reigned supreme and the stars peppering the skies provided the only light; Vader thought it a bleak and gloomy sight. He would have envisioned something more grandiose. The style was simple; cream coloured alabaster pillars supported a raised, arched roof. Vader traversed down a winding path or marble stairs, resolute in his resolve despite the unwanted guilt that was constantly nagging at the back of his mind and wearing him down. It made his skin crawl, and he stopped when he came face to face with the single ornament guarding his wife’s grave. Beneath the arched ceiling, a monument had been erected in her honour. Large, lifelike and meticulously detailed; it too was cut from sandstone and alabaster. It was a magnificent statue, portraying Padmé as she had appeared in life during her years as Queen and regent of Naboo. Its face seemed to peer down at Vader, as if to condemn him for trespassing. As if to demean him for daring to disturb her eternal peace.

Ignoring the judgmental stare he could not shake, Vader hurriedly brushed past the statue. With one wave of his hand, he let the Force gently guide the heavy stone door blocking the entrance to the mausoleum portion of the monument aside. Inky darkness pooled inside the small crypt, the starlight barely spilling past the threshold. A cold breeze seemed to emerge from within, both as a plea asking him to leave; and a lull, begging him to enter. Vader shut his eyes for a moment, allowing bith the crisp chill of the night and the stuffy air from within the tomb to wash over him. The breeze ran through his hair, and for a second, he recalled the gentle touch of his wife’s slender fingers combing through the unruly curls. He remembered her soft skin, her plush lips. Opening his eyes, he knew what he must do. He held no fear of the dead, and he was convinced that Padmé’s ghost would not be enraged by his visit.

But neither would she be pleased. Vader imagined she may weep if she could see him now.

Not surprisingly, Vader had found himself unable to attend Padmé's funeral wake. He had watched the holo screen broadcast of the procession in real time, as it was distributed to the public grieving an icon lost. The ceremony itself had been lavish; Queen Apailana dressed in the regal mourning attire. Emperor Palpatine had made it more than clear that there was no way for Vader to be present without drawing unwanted attention by his pre-Empire affiliation with Padmé as - what the public thought to be - a very close friend. Indeed, his absence may have been even odder but in hindsight Vader couldn’t have changed his lot had he tried to. And he had tried, to no avail. At the same time, it hadn’t stung as much to give into his master's wishes - knowing it was his fault Padmé would breathe no more. He had killed her. Part of him thought then, as did he now, that he hadn’t deserved showing his face in such a sacred rite. She was so far above him, and he was so far beneath her.

She was an Angel, and he was her murderer.

Entering the crypt with trepidation and reverence, Vader paused in the doorway. He had to duck to fit through the narrow entrance; the additional height of his new cybernetic legs was still cumbersome, and he hadn’t quite gotten used to the equally freshly fashioned prosthetic arms either with their larger hands and longer forearms. It was just a matter of time, really, but Vader felt it to be an unwelcome hindrance. He had been promised unlimited power by his master, instead he had been maimed and left for dead by Kenobi - and he alone bore the blame for Padmé’s demise. Padmé, whose remains were just within his reach. Padmé, whose spirit must surely despise him now. As he traversed with a solemn unease farther into the cavern; Vader became aware of two things.

First was the stone coffin holding his beloved’s lifeless body. Its lid was adorned by yet another skilfully crafted sculpture; this time a likeness of Padmé’s visage as she had been presented during her funeral wake. Her hair had been loose and wavy as she was paraded through the streets, decorated only with tiny, brittle flowers. Clad in a flowing blue gown, hands clasped over her swollen belly; face so lifelike she had seemed to be merely asleep. As Vader had made himself watch the painful holoscreening - witnessing his beloved one last time from afar - he had entertained the notion that if he’d only been present, he could have kissed her cold lips and she would have woken up. So many fairytales spoke of true love’s kiss, and of it raising a seemingly dead lover from their eternal slumber. Vader’s last kiss shared with his wife had proved to be the kiss of death. This blatant mimicry of Padmé’s visage - a far cry of her beauty - had been expected.

What Vader had not expected was the glass showcase propped by the coffin's side. Upon an indigo satin pillow rested Padmé’s japor snippet. Slightly faded with wear and tear, wooden and as intricately hand carved as the day he had given it to her. It had been granted its own separate display, and Vader scoffed at the notion that any of Padmé’s many handmaidens or realtives would have understood but a sliver of its importance to her - and, subsequently, to him. Still, it had been singled out as a token, and it had been clear even to those not in the know that the simple jewelry had been cherished by its owner.

Swallowing hard, Vader slowly approached the small cased necklace. Even in the dull darkness, his iridescent golden eyes helped him focus on the tiny trinket. A mixture of shame and bitterness welled up inside as his gaze took in every painstakingly crafted detail, and for just a moment - his serious expression softened. Gone were the harsh lines, gone was the composed and well rehearsed authority he had adapted since his shift. For that brief moment, Vader’s chest felt tight and a strangled, choked breath escaped his parted lips.

Anger was quick to overthrow the suffocating sadness. Pursing his lips, Vader forced himself to turn away. Instead, his eyes fell again upon Padmé’s stone grave. He didn’t deserve to be here, he didn’t deserve this attempt at paying her respect with meaningless, silent apologies. He had put her in that coffin, he had snuffed out her light. As if moving of their own volition, he found his legs were carrying him closer to the cold marble against his will. One gloved hand reached out to hesitantly touch the surface, but all Vader's cybernetic fingertips could detect was hard edges. Nothing concrete, no nuance. Vader was bereft of something as simple as the smooth, cool kiss of masterly crafted sandstone. The soft curves and gentle lines came off as no more intricate than the billions of grains that made up the sands of Tatooine.

Clenching his jaw shut, Vader's hand curled into a tight fist. It shook as he squeezed it shut; Padmé’s desperate, pleading hazel eyes flashing before his inner vision. She’d been so frail, so distraught, so horrified. She had never betrayed him, he had betrayed her. This was all his fault.

Padmé was dead because of him. Only him.

Squeezing his eyes shut, Vader wished for nothing but to be offered the chance to retrace his step and right his wrongs. He wished to relive the moment in which he had lashed out, if only to forgive her and believe her words. If only to take her in his arms, to heed her warnings and run far away. Just him, her, and their child. Together. The child that had perished alongside his mother, never allowed to get to know her tender soul.

An unyielding, intense burn spread like a wildfire up the bridge of Vader's nose, and bled into his cheeks. A stinging prickle settled behind his eyes, and despite his stubborn attempt at remaining calm and detached, dismissing his pain - scalding tears welled up to pool at the corners of his eyes. In one fell swoop, they disregarded his wishes and rolled in heavy globs down his pale cheeks. Vader allowed his anger and his despair to mingle with his guilt. In an act of rare surrender, he let his walls crumble to dust and acknowledged that he had made a terrible mistake. He had allowed Palpatine to twist his mind, to entice him with empty promises. But it was he who had believed those lies; he had been the one to choke his own wife in blind rage.

Covering his face with his free hand, Vader did his best to restrain his grief in a feeble attempt at maintaining dignity. Biting back sobs, he wept silently - shedding the final pieces of his past with each tear. A burden that was his alone to carry, but its weight slightly lighter to bear despite the dull ache it left behind.

When he eventually vacated the tomb; daylight had begun to spill over the fields and hills, its orange glow warming the dew lining every straw of grass and creating a thin veil of mist. The air was sweet, its scent a jumble of flowers. No trace of his secret visit did Vader leave behind, but something inside of him had changed irreparably. Something had been left behind, laid to rest alongside the lost Queen.

If he could destroy the one thing he had loved more than life itself, what mattered any other life on his conscience. If his Angel was dead, Vader was already cursed. Whoever stood in his way was but a stepping stone on his way towarda greatness.

Every citizen in the Galaxy was but an animal - and he would slaughter them as animals, if need be.

*****

I wanted to write something sad, and I figured since this iteration of Vader is quite different to the canon one - this would be yet another way for him to shed his past, and to become even more of a propaganda and political tool. Also, I felt like writing something sad and angsty and I seldom write about Padmé, so consider this a little treat for those of you who - much like I - enjoy sadness and pain.

Ao3 link below:

https://archiveofourown.org/works/32029582/chapters/79632736

[uniarycode]

Takari Week 2021 Day 5- AU

Medieval Fantasy AU: Takeru is a young boy who tames a Pegasus and goes to live in a castle in the sky, with an army of Celestials, and a young prophet.

Wordcount: 3370

Written as part of @takariweek

Takeru didn’t have many memories of being on the surface, they tended to involve either his brother, his father or Pata. The former two he missed dearly, the latter seldom left his side these days.

He’d been four when he met Pata, he’d found the foal frolicking in a field, doing summersaults over the meadow. It was against the rules to interact with creatures you did not recognize, but the Deep Ones had not been seen near his village in generations, and Takeru was couldn’t help but take the risk. And Pata just seemed so friendly. Takeru had shared some herbs he’d found, and that had been enough to earn the foal’s undying loyalty.

Pata had been his secret for a while, it may seem difficult to hide a horse, but Pata could fly, most did not look for horses in the trees or on rooftops. Some that did thought they’d gone insane rather than believe their eyes. Pata became Takeru’s closest friend, his chief confidant. Without knowing the proper name for a flying horse, Takeru had decided to call him Pata, based on the gentle sound of his wingbeat. The name stuck.

He was six when Pata had been discovered. He and his brother were gathering some goods from the market, when some bigger boys from the next town over had begun attacking them, attempting to force Yamato to hand over all their money. When Takeru had cried for them to stop, it was Pata who had answered his call, galloping straight at the boys, and scaring them away instantly.

Such a large commotion could not go unnoticed, and immediately the villager’s opinion of him became divided. Some treated him with scorn, as a devil that possessed authority over monsters, others with reverence, as a sacred omen.

The priest showed up at his door a few weeks later, flanked by two outsiders, cloaked in armor and robes the likes of which far outshone even the knights of the capital. Takeru had been scared at first, until one of the knights, a woman, had summoned her own steed and told him he was very special.

She’d explained to him that they were Celestials: the goddess’s chosen. That since he had bonded with a Pegasus, that he too must have been a Celestial. And that the Deep Ones and the celestials were fated enemies.

After that, there had been questions, they asked him how he had met Pata, whether he’d ever road the horse, what his dreams were like, if he’d ever traveled outside the village.

Far more questions were directed at his parents, they asked his lineage, where his parents came from, where his parents’ parents came from, at one time they’d even accused his momma of having stolen him from another woman.

Takeru didn’t understand it at the time, but things were very complex. Celestials did not like outsiders, but since he’d tamed a Pegasus he couldn’t be an outsider. But they could not say the same about his family.

In the end, his mother had been allowed to accompany him to his new home, and his brother and father had been left behind. Even when he was old enough to ride Pata freely, he’d been forbidden from making contact with them, and he’d quickly learned how big the world was when he tried to anyway.

Life was hard with the celestials. On the ground, they said that the goddess lived in a palace in the sky, guarded by her knights. Inside the sanctuary, the tale was similar but different. The one they protected was a prophet, who died and was reborn every one hundred and eight years. And while they had many knights, the Celestials regarded their entire race as chosen ones, the only ones worthy of serving the prophet and able to defeat the king of the Deep Ones.

Being born on the surface made Takeru inferior in the eyes of the other children. That alone earned him hardship, but he had also bonded with a Pegasus at a record age. Despite having no proper training, he was years ahead of his peers, and that brought him further scorn.

***

At eight, Pata had turned into a stallion, and that had brought a conundrum for the Celestials. By right and custom, Takeru was now a squire. The next youngest squire had recently turned twelve, the eldest squires were eighteen. Takeru was simply too young and small to perform the duties provided by most squires.

He could clean the stables and feed the Pegasi, although still at slower speeds than the older squires. But he could not carry weapons for a knight, nor was he tall enough to help them into all of their armor, nor did anyone trust him to ride Pata more than three feet into the air. He was never picked to accompany a knight on a campaign or a quest.

Then he had been given a new duty. One that none of the other squires talked about. As he’d been summoned in front of the elders, they informed him he would not talk about this duty, that it would be taken with him to the grave.

That was the first of many rules.

He was told he would be delivering food to a guest, as well as refreshing the oil on their lamps. He was not to talk to the guest he found. Nor would touch her. Nor would he touch the food, only the tray used to bring it to her. He would set the tray in front of the guest, fill all the lamps in the room, then stand in the corner until she had finished eating, retrieve the tray, and leave.

And of course, no harm would come to the guest.

After he had accepted one of the elders objected, then another, then another. They were all overruled, and a knight directed Takeru to the kitchens.

It seemed silly, to have a knight guide him around, but send a squire anyway. Takeru followed the knight into the castle, through some twists and turns, to a small door guarded by two more knights.

They reaffirmed his directions, then let the door open a couple of feet, barely more than he could fit himself and the tray through. Even then, he was not at the guest. He had to walk down three more hallways before he found her.

He opened the final door to reveal a girl who looked no older than himself, to his shock. But he was a squire now, he couldn’t show such a weak reaction. The rest of the room was fancy, if cramped. A large four-post bed, a single dresser for clothes, no chair nor desk nor anything else. On the walls hung lanterns and tapestries, and in the corner of the room, there was a lectern with paper, a pen, and a chute.

He walked over to the guest and set the tray down in front of her when his eye caught a tapestry draped across the wall. So deep in the bowels of the castle, this room had no exterior light, and he moved to get a better view in the flickering lanterns.

The tapestry itself displayed a great battle, many knights fight deep ones and a strange giant monster. On the edge of the tapestry were eight symbols he did not recognize, perhaps they were words in an ancient language? Each one held a separate color: yellow, pink, red, purple, blue, green, grey, and orange.

The lantern flickered, reminding Takeru of his duties. He turned back to the tray, remembering he’d left the oil there, only to jump in horror as he saw the guest, one hand on the canister full of oil, bringing it to her lips.

“Stop!” he cried, “You’ll get sick if you drink that.”

The girl turned to him; eyes wide at his outburst. Takeru realized his mistake, raising one hand to his mouth.

“You can talk.” She said, “I’ve never talked to anyone before, except my cat. But she doesn’t like talking back.”

Takeru felt his heart speed up. He’d already broken the rules, but the guest seemed so excited. Why wasn’t he supposed to talk to the guest if she wanted to talk? His mom would yell at him for being rude.

“Yeah, I can talk.” He thought for a second. “How’d you learn to talk, if no one talked to you before.”

“Learn?” she asked. “I always knew how to talk, like how I know how to breathe or eat or write.” She said as if it were obvious.

“You know how to write too?” he asked in amazement. All the other squires knew how to write, but none of the teachers ever bothered to explain it to him.

“You don’t?” she asked. “So you can talk, but not write.” Her face twisted into a smile. “You’re an odd one.”

That was true, he was the only celestial who wasn’t born a celestial, he became a squire at such a young age. But somehow when she pointed it out, he felt all funny.

“You should eat.” He said, “You must be hungry.”

“I don’t want to eat. I want to talk. Everyone else left when I finished eating, you will too, won’t you?”

He blushed. “I-I’m supposed to.”

“And I don’t want you to leave. If I never eat you have to stay.”

That didn’t sound too bad, but he did want to see his mom and Pata again at some point. “If I take too long, they’ll probably never let me see you again. Then I won’t be able to talk to you anymore.”

“You have a point.” She said, grabbing the utensils and beginning to shovel food into her mouth. “Whurts your name. Everyone has a name, even my cat. She won’t tell it to me though.” she said, not bothering to swallow before speaking. Takeru’s mom would have called it rude, but if it's what it took to keep her eating, he could accept it.

“Takeru Takaishi.” He said, beginning to fill the lanterns around the room. “What’s yours?”

“I have many names. Guiding Star, Eternal Shepherd, Prophet of the Goddess. I like Hikari the most, though.”

Takeru ended up spilling some of the oil, he quickly tried to recover himself. “You’re the prophet? What are you doing in a place like this?”

He could have kicked himself. The room, while cramped and locked away, was still far better than the dormitory he shared with the other squires or the cold tower they’d relocated his mother into. And she had said that both were fancier, if not larger, than their old home on the surface.

“This is where I’ve always been.” She replied. “And you? There’s something mysterious about you, I can tell.”

Should he admit it? Somehow he felt he could trust this girl, she was the prophet after all. “I lived on the surface before, unlike the others. Everyone says Celestial’s are stronger than the surface dwellers.”

That earned him a laugh from Hikari. “Do they? How quickly they forget. The only reason this castle exists is because they were too scared to fight the Deep Ones themselves. They chose to flee to the one place they could not be harmed before mounting any resistance.”

Takeru looked at her, blinking. “How’d you know that, how old are you?”

“Eight. But I just know that. Like how you know to talk or write.”

There was a clatter of metal against porcelain. “Oh, I guess I’m done.” She looked down. “I was having so much fun, I must have forgotten to go slowly.”

“It’s okay.” He said. “You were probably hungry anyway.”

He lingered like that a few minutes more, neither of them talking beyond pleasantries, before he finally excused himself.

The next day he was not chosen to bring Hikari her meal. But he was the day after. That pattern continued for a couple of weeks. Eventually, Hikari admitted that whenever someone else brought her meal, she would send a letter to the elders insisting it was him who came instead.

The elders must have gotten the hint because Takeru began to visit Hikari as part of his daily routine. No one but the elders and some of the knights knew his task, but all of them regarded him differently. Like back when Pata had first been discovered. Some looked at him with reverence, some with scorn.

He and Hikari talked about everything they could, sometimes they even talked about the same things on different days. Hikari was very knowledgeable about the outside for someone who had stayed in one room her entire life and never talked to anyone. She claimed the knowledge was natural, instinctive.

One day he’d been talking about his brother, how he’d left him behind to join the celestials, and how much he missed him.

Hikari had held out her hand in response, Takeru had hesitated at first, he wasn’t supposed to touch her. But then he also wasn’t supposed to talk to her. When he took her hand she closed her eyes and began to describe a scene for him.

A young blond boy who worked the fields by day. He stayed separate from the other kids when they gathered, but kept himself close enough to watch them play. He’d fashioned a flute out of a reed, and played it only when he thought no one else was around.

She told him that his brother missed him very much.

After she released his hand, she confessed to having a brother of her own. But as she’d not been two when she’d been moved to this room as part of her duties, and she was worried that her brother had forgotten her. However, she could scry her brother at any time and learned he’d recently bonded with a Pegasus so that in a few years he’d have the qualifications to serve her himself.

***

That time came when Takeru was eleven. He’d not known, which boy to look for at first, but when a fourteen-year-old with the same dark hair as Hikari had joined the squires and the very next day he had not been told to bring Hikari her meal, he was smart enough to figure it out.

Having someone else to feed Hikari also allowed Takeru to leave with one of the knights on a quest or two. He was still the youngest of all the squires, but he had more years of training than all but the eldest. Some knights still shunned him due to his birth, but those who were willing to take him along were also quick to ask for him again, whenever he wasn’t needed to keep Hikari company.

It was after one such quest that he’d found Hikari ranting, complaining about her brother’s seeming vow of silence. It was at this point Takeru had admitted there was a rule against speaking in her presence.

“You break the rules? Every time you visit me?” she asked.

“I like you more than the rules.” He said, “Besides, you’re the Prophet. You’re probably the most important person here. You should make the rules.”

“I did make the rules.” She said. “In my past life. The past prophet always makes the rules for the next incarnation.” She looked at him “Is that odd?”

Takeru shrugged “I don’t know anything about my past life, I’m not a prophet though.”

She nodded. “Did you break any other rules?”

“I’m not supposed to touch you.” He admitted. “But you were always the one who asked.”

“That’s because I like touching you.” She said. “You make me feel nice, like watching the clouds part, or the first sunbeam cresting a mountain to welcome the new day.”

Hikari tilted her head. “Why would I tell no one to talk to me or touch me if I want to talk to everyone and I want you to touch me?”

Takeru shrugged. “Are you sure you made the rules, maybe the elders changed them?”

She shook her head. “They wouldn’t dare. They do not know how my gift works; I don’t even know how my gift works. For all they knew I would know as soon as they tried it.”

“I don’t know.” Something caught his eye. “But if you can’t talk, that doesn’t mean you can’t communicate.” He pointed at the lectern in the corner. “How much paper do you have? Taichi knows how to read and write.”

“The paper and pen are blessed; they don’t run out.” She said. “That might work, but if Taichi won’t talk to me, why would he write to me?”

“It’s not against the rules, is it?”

His scheme had ultimately proven successful, although it had taken a few days to get Taichi on board. Soon enough the siblings were truly reunited, and Takeru had never seen Hikari or Taichi looking so happy.

***

When he was fourteen, Hikari’s demeanor changed. She became more withdrawn, more distant, even to him. He couldn’t ask Taichi directly if it were the same, no squires were supposed to know who anyone else in charge of Hikari was, but he could tell that the older squire had grown more somber as well.

He confronted her directly. It took a couple of days, but he wore through her resistance.

“Takeru, you break the rules every time you come here, right?” she asked.

“I do.” He said, “But they were your rules, and you wanted me to break them, right?”

“They were.” She agreed, “I think I understand now.”

“Understand?” he pressed “That I talk to you because I enjoy it?”

“No.” she said. “Why I would make rules I barely tolerate and enforce them on myself.” She looked at the tapestry. “I think, I think I needed someone who could break the rules.”

He reached out and grabbed her hand, “Hikari, what is going on?”

“Promise me.” She said, “Promise me you’ll break the rules for me. No matter which rules. Please Takeru, you’re the only one I can trust with this.”

“I do.” He pulled her into a hug. “I’ll break whatever rule you need me to. I swear. Just please, let me help you.”

Her tears began to stain his shoulder. “Kill me.”

His blood turned cold. “What?”

“Kill me. Please Takeru, everyone else here, they think I’m a saint. They won’t let me so much as stub my toe. Even my cat won’t scratch me. You are the only one who can do this for me.”

“Hikari, I don’t understand. What is going on?”

She took a deep breath. “I had a vision. The Deep Ones were back. I watched them conquer nation after nation, I watched as even the Celestials fall. I watched them kill Taichi, I watched them kill you.” She swallowed. “And I saw all that because I was there. I was leading them, I made it happen.”

“Hikari you would never.”

“I will.” She insisted. “I’ve never been wrong before. I’ve never heard of the prophet being wrong before. This is the only way I can think of, I need to give up on this life and hope for the next one.”

Her arms squeezed tighter around him. “Please Takeru, you’re the only one I can ask.”

“No.”

“No? No! But you promised! You promised me you’d do anything!”

This was the first time he’d seen Hikari get mad, and it scared him, but still he did not relent. “I promised you I’d break every rule for you. And I will. If you tell me not to visit you again, I will break that rule. If you decree that I must kill you, I’ll break that rule as well. If it’s a rule that the profit’s visions must come to pass, then I’ll break that rule too.”

“You’re being stupid.”

“Ahh, Hikari. I’m afraid that I must break the rules of logic as well. I made a promise, you see.”

She scoffed at him, but for the first time in weeks, she was wearing a smile.

[dancer-me]

Fic Writer Questions

@hopeintheashes tagged me (that was pleasantly surprising, so YAY) as well as anyone who wants to play (so if you want do - just do it!!!) 1) How many works do you have on AO3?

I have nine!

2) What’s your total AO3 word count?

106,461! I broke 100,000 on AO3 and didn't notice =O

3) How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

For posted fanfiction, I have written for 5 fandoms at this point. Naruto (this was my early days, around 2007 to 2015, with pretty huge gaps inbetwen), Merlin (oops), High Seas (just the one small fic because Netflix had me angsting hard enough to break my hiatus), and of course 9-1-1 and 9-1-1 Lone Star!

4) What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

1. Express to Nowhere (911 / 911 Lone Star) 2. Giving up Ground (911 / 911 Lone Star) 3. Quarter Life Crisis (911) 4. Pull me Under (911) 5. Coming Soon to a Theatre Near You (911)

5) What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

I hesitate to say this about a WIP but I'm pretty sure it's going to be Giving up Ground when it's done. Not that it's going to have a sad ending, but that it's part of a continuous series and I already have the next part planned out and partially started (titled "Overdrawn" for anyone interested) so it will leave things feeling hopeful but open-ended, which can be construed as angsty. But really, all my other stories, while they have angst for the most part, have happy endings because I'm a sucker for it. Chaotic Energy is slow burning itself to the happiest of endings.

6) What’s the fic you’ve written with the happiest ending?

Hmm... I think it's Coming Soon to a Theatre Near You! This story was just such a fun blast of drama, hijinks, and hilarity, with our two leads getting their love story at the end of it all :) All my completed works have very happy endings, but this one resonates because there really wasn't any angst at all in the whole thing. Just good fun!

7) Do you write crossovers? If so what is the craziest one you’ve written?

The only cross-over I have ever written or been compelled to write in my life has been with 9-1-1 and 9-1-1: Lone Star, and that's my Chaotic Energy series. I don't know if it's "crazy", though it's turning out to be crazy long, since my original plan for it was 5 separate one-shots and Captain, that ship has long since sailed. We're deep at sea now, SOS. I love what it's become, though, and I hope everyone who reads it is enjoying the journey :)

8) Do you write smut? If so what kind?

Weeeeeeeeell. Here's the thing. I wrote m/f smut back in the day, on ff.net and carried my one shots over to AO3 when I made the move. I'm talking way back in the day - those two "E" stories are dated 2015 but I actually originally posted them in 2011 - TEN years ago!! I haven't written smut since (I'm not counting TK and Carlos getting frisky in chapter 2 of Giving up Ground). It's not that I wouldn't, but that I haven't been inspired and with time somehow I have also become ragingly self-conscious over whether I could still do a good job. My smut has always been emotion based though, as I've never been able to truly go PWP. That said, I'm actively open to and considering some m/m smut for my current fandom. Fingers crossed I don't embarrass myself.

9) Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

I do on all my recent work on AO3 (basically my 9-1-1 and lone star fics that I've written since coming out of hiatus).

10) Have you ever received hate on a fic?

Not on any of my AO3 work, though I have received hate on my much older work on ff.net to varying degrees of reasonability. So far the AO3 community has been very kind to me! I’ll get some comments where I think readers had hoped I’d go in a different direction, but nothing has ever been too much.

11) Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of! Imitation is the greatest form of flattery but also no, stop, don’t do that.

12) Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes, actually! I wrote my first ever published fic for Naruto called “Stand Alone” back between 2007 and 2011 (took a couple years off in the middle there to, you know, finish high school…) that someone asked me if they could translate into Russian. At the time I thought that was super cool, and it still is, but now I look back at that story and I think oof, now we can cringe at it in multiple languages. (more on that later)

13) Have you ever co-written a fic before?

No, but I’m not opposed to it! I’ve seen some excellent fic partnerships and it’s so great seeing writers leverage the creativity and talents of their friends and peers.

14) What’s your all time favorite ship?

Y’know, before 9-1-1, it was Merlin x Arthur, but Buck x Eddie have 110% of my heart and attention now.

15) What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

On the topic of Merlin… I started writing “The Quest for the Knife” back in 2015 at the peak of my Merlin fixation after painstakingly planning it out. I have pages upon pages of outlines and notes for a 14 chapter adventure… somewhere. I found a piece of it like an archeological dig when I was moving this pandemic season, but the rest seems lost to time. I’m sad because I had gotten so excited about it and loved my first two chapters, but I don’t think I’ll ever finish it. I might take it down so I can stop wallowing in guilt.

16) What are your writing strengths?

I like to think I write good action / adventure scenes and plot lines, because I love painting vivid pictures of what I see playing out in my head whenever I think through my stories. I like to incorporate subtle (and not so subtle) humour as well in my work, which is born from my very active internal narrator voice as I go through my day-to-day and try to find the humour in everything. I also like to make outlines before all my bigger stories too, which ‘usually’ means I avoid cringey plot holes and can make some fun connections.

17) What are your writing weaknesses?

*looks at the camera very seriously* writing convincing smut. Well, that, and the kind of emotional, flirty love and fluff that I love devouring in fics. I don’t think I do nearly as good a job there. Get in a character’s head and angst them up? Sure. Wax poetic in a convincing and not jarring way about how much Character A is in love with Character B without making it seem like it was a bit too much of a leap? Debatable.

Also… I tend to require my readers to suspend a lot of disbelief to enjoy my fics with elements of adventure, because I tend to do exactly 5 minutes of Google research for something before I decide I’ve had enough and go ahead.

18) What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

Here we revisit the cringe of “Stand Alone,” where I tried in the first half (the 2007 portion) to incorporate Japanese since I watched the anime in Japanese and felt this was the best way to try and have the character’s voices come off the page. It… is really just a big ol’ cringe, because I didn’t know the language, and I definitely didn’t use suffixes right at ALL. So… I tend to avoid it personally because I don’t want to cringe at how wrong my use of other languages is.

But if it fits you, your story, fits your character, and you know the language confidently enough to not embarrass yourself? You do you *carefully side steps around discourse and leaves the room*

19) What was the first fandom you wrote for?

Naruto!

20) What’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

I think it has to be “Express to Nowhere” these days. It was wanting to write that fic that pulled me out of hiatus and helped me find joy in writing and sharing my work again, and I have nothing but love for it and how it turned out.

Holy Cow I was warned that this level of introspection was going to take a minute but whew this was a good chunk of time. Fun to do and think about though!

Tagging: @221bsunsettowers, @onelonelytortillachip, @blueeyedbuckley and anyone who sees this and thinks, "hey, I have an answer for these questions." Because I am madly curious and would love to see your take!

[once-upon-a-pirate-ship]

How Restlessly the Stars Do Gleam 3/?

Chapter 3: Moments Long Remembered

read it on AO3 here | from the beginning

chapter 1 | chapter 2

story summary: Princess Emma isn't the princess of much anymore. It's been months since her parents and brother were taken, and she's been on the run with her godmother Red. When Emma and Red board a merchant vessel to sail to Arendelle, Emma quickly finds that the captain is not to be trusted. After helping two slave brothers, Emma takes over the ship and begins her journey to save and rebuild her kingdom.

what's in store for chapter three? New characters (not new new, but new to this particular world)! Some background! Pining & tension!

thank you all for reading and staying with me even when I am too busy (just for this one week and a half time period) to post on schedule

Moments Long Remembered

On the worst day of her life, Princess Emma rode out far beyond the castle walls. She was alone, as she preferred solitary rides on her trusted horse, and the cold air was nothing to her as she raced through the snow covered forest. For a few hours each day, she got to feel entirely free. All responsibilities could wait, every forced smile was just a distant memory. She had no one to try to impress, no one who expected anything from her, no one who needed her to be someone she was not.

It wasn’t the excursion, nor the weather, nor the steed that made this day so horrible. Rather, it was the enemy who had breached the castle walls in her absence.

The most poignant part of this particular memory, for her, were the moments directly before she was made aware of the events inside the castle. She was at ease, content, blissfully happy and oblivious to the screams that tore through the halls she called home. She wasn’t worrying about her parents when they were stolen and taken far out of her reach. She didn’t consider her brother, her little lion cub, as he was yanked from the joy he knew and shown the truths of the world she’d wished he’d never have to learn.

Her happiness was shattered when the Evil Queen appeared before her, the black gown cutting across the crisp white snow in her path. Terror as she’d never known it dropped into her stomach as her hands gripped the reins and her horse skidded to a stop, and the fear that sliced down her spine was colder than the shards of ice that hung from each tree branch.

The Evil Queen’s mouth was curled into a wicked smile, white teeth framed by the wine color of her lips as she moved them to speak.

“Emma.”

But it was not the Evil Queen who stood in front of her now and called her name. It was her most trusted friend, her ally, her godmother, Red. The memory, as vivid as if it had only just happened, dissolved into nothing, sizzling in the early summer air as Emma blinked it away.

“Yes?”

“Liam and I are leaving,” Red told her, “I doubt we’ll be gone more than a few hours.”

Emma could’ve counted on one hand the number of times that she’d been separated from Red in the last months, and no matter how irrational it was, she couldn’t stop her muscles from tensing as if bracing for pain. But they needed some new crew, and Red was more than capable of the job.

“Good, good,” Emma said absently. She wished she had something more intelligent to say, but her mind was still fixated on moments long gone. “I’ll be here,” she added.

“Yes,” Red grinned, “you and Killian.” She didn��t give Emma time to inquire after the tone she’d used before Red turned and called, “Liam!”

Liam stood across the deck in conference with John Terry, but at the call of his name, he excused himself from his fellow sailor and joined Red and Emma where they waited by the gangplank.

“We shall return shortly,” Liam promised his captain. “I hope Killian won’t give you too much trouble,” he added in good humor.

“We’ll be just fine,” Emma told him. The trouble Killian Jones gave her was of a different nature, and she wasn’t about to disclose those particulars to his older brother.

Emma watched Liam and Red until they disappeared into the crowd past the docks, forcing her thoughts from straying to the fear that was an ever-present buzz in her blood. Instead, she planted herself on the steps leading up to the quarterdeck, her mind occupying itself with whatever it could latch onto.

As if her thoughts had summoned him, Killian appeared from below, offering Terry a few words as he passed on his way towards her.

“Swan!” he called, and her eyes immediately met his. He’d called her that three times that morning, and it hadn’t seemed unusual once. But perhaps that had less to do with the moniker and more to do with who had said it.

Killian dropped onto a step below hers, a gentle and genuine smile spreading across his lips. “Terry’s gathering his group and then they’ll be off,” he told her. “I double checked the list with the storeroom, and it seems that everything’s in order.”

“Perfect,” she replied, willing a coherent sentence to present itself as she looked away from his striking eyes.

“Tell me, Swan,” he began, his voice low, “do you always dress in a layer of knives, or do you save that for special occasions?”

She laughed, and it made her realize how long it had been since that had happened. Her head thrown back like that, the bounding joy in her chest—weeks, at least. Probably months, probably before that morning ride that featured the Evil Queen.

Emma leaned back a little, her hand going to the edge of the vest to pull out a blade and pass it to him. “Eight in total, four on each side,” she explained. “And yes, I’ve fixed every garment I have with some sort of weapons holder.”

Killian’s eyebrows shot up, glancing up at her from the knife he had been examining. “Isn’t that dangerous? How have you not injured yourself?”

“Not any more dangerous than being unarmed and running into some Black Knights,” she said with a shrug, glancing away to avoid his concerned gaze. “But each blade has a metal casing. That’s what keeps it from hurting me or tearing the fabric, and it snaps into place to stop it from falling out.”

His dark brows furrowed, his eyes flitting from the knife to where she’d pulled it from. “The casing, is it tricky?” he wondered. “Does it get stuck?”

“Only when I forget to clean them,” she replied. Without pausing to consider what she was doing, she reached for his free hand. “Here, try it,” she said, guiding his fingers to the spot on the other side of her vest.

Killian moved slowly, hesitantly, but he allowed her to line his fingertips against the hidden pocket. His eyes locked with hers, and that familiar tug and snapping of electricity surged between them.

“Just, um, push up a little until you feel a click, and then it’ll slide out,” she explained, slightly breathless despite the fact that she’d been sitting for several minutes.

His gaze didn’t stray from hers as he followed her directions, the thin handle of the blade dropping into his hand. She could feel his body heat like this, his hand against her waist, and it seemed like he was both too close and not close enough.

“Captain?”

Emma and Killian broke apart at the sound of Terry’s voice. She stood, brushing back some of the hair that had fallen out of place. “Yes?” she asked, glancing quickly at Killian who had returned to an upright position and was currently examining the two blades closely. The tips of his ears were red.

Terry smiled, and Emma pretended not to notice anything but politeness in it. “With your leave, Captain, we’re off.”

“Yes, yes, of course,” she replied, looking between him and the several crew members gathered a few feet behind. “I look forward to receiving your report upon your return.” It was best that she maintained the pretense of captain with the crew, according to Red. Something about safety or respect or concealing her identity from newcomers. She could hardly remember now.

Emma waited until they were out of sight before returning to her previous position, and Killian had recovered enough that the blush had even faded from his cheeks when he looked at her. He passed her the knives without a word.

He cleared his throat, forcing his eyes back to hers rather than where her fingers secured the blades. “You mentioned Black Knights,” he said, “have you fought many of them?”

It wasn’t that surprising of a question, honestly, given that she’d mentioned them off-handedly before. She just couldn’t figure out why she had mentioned it in the first place. Perhaps it was the same reason she showed him how her vest worked.

“Can you define ‘many’?” she asked, her voice calm and soft and not at all befitting the subject.

Killian’s eyes widened, his jaw tightening to restrain some emotion she couldn’t place. “It’s been…months,” he murmured. “You’ve been fighting them all this time?”

“Fighting them, running from them, gathering information from them,” Emma answered. “Until I figured out that she was tracking me with magic, at least.”

“What did you do?”

“Red got her hands on some potion,” she said, trying for a smile that ended up a little sad. “So that’s why we’re here now. And that’s why there’s not a single Black Knight searching this port.”

Killian was quiet for a moment, and it wasn’t until his jaw released its tension that he spoke. “What information?”

“At first, we tried to get them to tell us where my family was, but they’re not particularly talkative,” she explained, hoping she sounded more unaffected than she felt. “Eventually, we started following them, finding their camps. We spent weeks combing the forest, tracking their movements, and making maps of their locations.”

“Did you find them?”

The ghost of a smile on her lips was revealing. “We discovered where she’s holding my father. It’s remote, not to mention protected by battalions of Black Knights. Red and I are good, but we’re not that good.”

“That’s where Arendelle comes in,” he concluded. “You’re hoping they’ll help you to free him with magic.”

She sighed, her eyes trailing away from him and fixing themselves on the gangplank. “That’s our hope,” she said. “If I can get to my father, he’ll be able to find my mother. And I have no doubt they’ll make quick work of locating Leo.”

“You and your brother,” Killian continued after a moment, “are you close?”

The question was enough to bring happier, lighter memories to the forefront of her mind. “Very,” Emma replied. “He’s like light personified. Always overly enthusiastic, always making me laugh. But he’s driven, too. Spends all day in the practice yard unless I convince him to do something else.”

“He’s probably just trying to keep up with his sister,” Killian said, the beginnings of a smile on his lips.

“Maybe,” she allowed. But thinking about her brother fighting made her think about her brother losing, and then the guilt that had lived in her chest since that day slammed against her heart. “I wish I’d been there to protect him when he really needed me,” she confessed, and the words were almost shocking for her to hear. She’d thought about it again and again, but never had she voiced it, as if keeping it to herself made it less real.

“What happened, exactly?” Killian asked. “If you don’t mind sharing,” he added quickly.

“I used to go for a ride every morning,” she began, “and that morning was no different. Until the Evil Queen showed up and outlined her perfect plan to destroy my family one curse at a time.”

“She cursed all of you?”

“No,” Emma replied, a bitter laugh on her lips, “not me. Because the knowledge that my family is slowly dying while I am powerless to stop it…that’s a curse in its own right.”

“Swan,” Killian breathed, and the emotion in his voice was overwhelming. “I don’t pretend to know the specifics of the Evil Queen’s magic, but you must know that it wasn’t your fault. If your parents, your brother, your numerous castle guards couldn’t stop her, why do you think you’re to blame?”

He paused, shaking his head as he gathered his thoughts. “I have no doubt that you will defeat her, love, but it’s not only your combat skills that are going to take her down.”

Killian believed in her. She’d known it since the very beginning, but her doubt had been strong enough to convince her it was a misled belief. But now, with his head bent in reverence and his startling eyes that wouldn’t waver from hers, she had no choice but to accept his words as truth.

The guilt and the doubt didn’t evaporate into nothing, but their power over her waned.

Emma nodded—acknowledgement, gratitude, something else, she wasn’t sure—and they ventured into safer, less dramatic topics that allowed for a lighter atmosphere to settle over them.

Watching the ship, as it turned out, was not the most interesting job. There was very little for them to do except wait for the others to return, though Emma was relieved for something unexciting for a change. She needed the respite much more than she’d realized, and though the absence of constant panic was almost jarring enough to cause panic itself, she convinced herself that she was secure for the afternoon.

The first interruption to her temporary peace came when a figure appeared on the dock a few steps from the gangplank. Killian and Emma stood, their hands reaching for their swords in a synchronized motion that made the stranger chuckle softly.

“Exactly as Red described,” the woman said, pushing her hood back to reveal a heart-shaped face and blonde hair that was piled atop her head. “Permission to come aboard, Captain?” she asked, looking expectantly at Emma.

Emma relaxed at the mention of her godmother, but she did not alter her posture to show it. She nodded sharply, and Killian stepped forward to put himself between her and the stranger. The action wasn’t shocking or offensive to Emma’s pride; instead, it asserted the rank she held and the loyalty of those who followed her.

The woman was petite, but she moved with the surety of someone who had seen hardship and battle. “They call me Tink,” she informed them once she’d boarded. “I was told I could find you here.”

It took everything in Emma’s power not to revert to her diplomatic training. She could not smile politely, could not offer refreshments or entertainment. Here, she had to appear coarse and immoveable like the captain she was supposed to be, at least until they knew Tink could be trusted.

Killian, following her lead as always, did not falter to play his part. “What is your business here?”

“Friends of yours—Red and Liam—told me you’re looking for a few additions to your crew. I’d like to offer my services,” Tink said, unshaken by their front.

“Why?” Emma asked, and her gut pinched at the rude tone in her voice.

A smile spread across Tink’s face as she paused before speaking. “Well, they’d hardly tell me, would they?” She laughed at her own joke, and then continued, “But they seemed significantly more interested once they learned about my dislike for the Evil Queen, so I suspect that’s got something to do with it.”

“You have a personal vendetta?” Killian asked, though it didn’t quite seem like that much of a question.

Tink’s arms folded across her chest, the smile disappearing from her lips. “I’m an ex-fairy,” she replied, “and let’s just say that before I met Regina, I was not an ex-fairy.”

“And now you’re looking for revenge,” Killian offered.

“Justice,” Tink corrected. “But yes, I’d like to help in the fight against her.”

Emma glanced at Killian just as he was turning back to her, and their eyes locked for a moment. Had Red and Liam been there to witness the silent conversation that passed, there would have been a hushed discussion between them later. Without them there, the only acknowledgement of the event was Tink who smiled to herself.

“Joining this crew would guarantee a death at her hand if we’re caught,” Emma warned, her demeanor nearly returning to normal with Tink’s objective revealed.

Tink cocked her head slightly, her wide eyes studying Emma with a level of perception neither she nor Killian could comprehend. “You’re not just a captain, are you?”

“No.”

“You’re someone special,” Tink added, “I may not be a fairy anymore, but I can still feel it. Who are you?”

At this question, Killian tensed, his eyes scanning their surroundings. Once he’d determined that there was no one close enough to become a threat, he looked back at Emma, another silent inquiry.

Emma moved, a hand on his shoulder to calm him as she passed, and when she stood directly in front of Tink, she almost felt like the princess she hadn’t been in months.

“My name is Emma, and I am the daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming.”

The shock on Tink’s face was less than Emma had anticipated, but the grin that replaced it eased her worries. “I knew you weren’t just running,” she said, “and I would be honored to join you in saving your kingdom and your family. Beating Regina is simply a bonus.”

Emma offered her hand to shake, and Tink accepted both the gesture and the wordless accord that came with it. “Welcome aboard,” Emma said.

--

Emma returned above deck from checking the storeroom with Terry, finding Killian speaking with Tink and the other sailor who had been sent by Red and Liam before the suppliers had made their way back.

August Booth was a man who could be charming when he wished to be, but the scowl that had overtaken his expression upon the mention of the Evil Queen left Emma with no doubt of his loyalty. He asked fewer questions than Tink, but his curious eyes were revealing to anyone who cared to look.

To any passing observer, Killian looked relaxed as he stood before the two crew members. His shoulders were back, his left hand resting casually against the hilt of his sword. But Emma could tell by the angle of his neck that he was watching the pier for unexpected visitors, and the set of his feet prepared him for a fight.

“It’s definitely a step up from the last ship I sailed on,” Tink said, her nose wrinkling at a distasteful memory.

“I’m afraid my sailing experience is limited to what I’ve learned in the last few months,” August said with a glance towards Killian, “but I’ve been told that I’m a fast learner, so I hope the captain won’t throw me off at the next port.”

Killian chuckled, “So long as you follow orders, you’ll be fine.”

Emma was pleased to find that Killian had warmed somewhat to August, as he’d been uncharacteristically sharp upon meeting him. While Emma had eased into the topic of the Evil Queen, Killian had been skeptical and quick to determine August’s exact beliefs regarding Emma’s family. August’s father had been murdered when Regina had torn apart the village outside the castle, and though Emma read his grief and anger as nothing threatening to her, Killian had bluntly asked if August found the former king and queen at fault in the tragedy.

Now she leaned casually against the mainmast, neither announcing herself nor bothering to hide to effectively eavesdrop as she watched the group while they talked.

“I’ve heard that the princess is quite the fighter,” August added, studying Killian carefully as he spoke.

It was not the sun that brought red to Killian’s cheeks and to the tips of his ears. “Aye, I have yet to see her equal,” he admitted, making no attempt to mask the pride in his voice.

“Do you suppose she’d agree to a demonstration later?” Tink wondered.

“We could prove our worth with a sword,” August offered, grinning at the prospect.

“You’d have to ask her yourself,” Killian replied. “I’d be happy to spar with you both if you’d like. I don’t pretend to be as skilled as the princess, but I can manage well enough.”

Before Emma could interrupt to agree to the demonstration, a creak of the wood and a flash of movement from the corner of her eye brought her attention away from them. Her defensive instincts sputtered when she recognized Red and Liam, though the third person to step onto the gangplank was a stranger to her.

Killian reacted as she’d expected him to, turning away from Tink and August to meet his brother. They exchanged a nod that held unspoken words, and when Killian stood before the potential crew member, his body language conveyed his reserve. Tink and August fell back, acknowledging Red and Liam without moving towards the man.

“This is Will Scarlet,” Red announced, not meeting Emma’s gaze though she was aware of her presence.

Will Scarlet had no scabbard to hold his sword, but rather a knife that was secured in a leather casing along his belt. His lips were pressed into a tight line, his gaze traveling from each person until it settled on Emma, and she had a feeling that he knew more than he should’ve with a single glance. It was the kind of thing that one learned when forced to, the ability to read a person’s intentions by their movements and everything they did not say.

“I suppose you’re the captain,” he said, causing every eye to shoot towards her. His tone was casual, unaffected, but there was a gravity in his posture that revealed something much more intense.

Emma nodded slowly, but she didn’t move from her position as she leaned against the mast. Her gaze drifted from Will to Killian in a flicker, but she focused back on the stranger before a second had passed.

“I hope our choices have been acceptable thus far, Captain,” Liam said, more a question than a statement. The tone was unfitting of the camaraderie they’d achieved, maintaining the pretense of rank in front of Will.

“Indeed,” Emma replied. She paused, testing the bounds of their attentiveness and therefore respect. No one moved, no one breathed, all waiting for her to speak as they knew she would. There were many differences between acting as a captain and acting as a princess, but commanding the attention of a room, or a deck, was a similarity.

“I was about to consent to a sparring exercise—a demonstration, if you will—for our new recruits when you arrived,” she continued. When her eyes landed on Will, she made a show of studying him. “I assume that you carry no sword because you have no need of one,” she added.

The corners of his lips twitched, his hand patting the leather case that held his knife. “They’re a waste of metal, if you ask me,” he told her, “I prefer to keep things simple.”

She hummed, gauging his expression to determine if he boasted a skill level that he did not possess. “And you believe that you deserve a place on this ship?” she asked, pushing his temper, his pride, to see if she could find a weak spot.

“What I do or do not deserve isn’t important, is it?” he replied, a grumbling sound that came from his throat that revealed either a mild irritation or anger directed towards a third party. “The way I see it, it’s what the Evil Queen deserves that really matters,” he nearly spat, though there was no lack of control in his voice.

Emma, though she couldn’t admit it without first determining Will’s loyalty, was impressed. His eyes burned with a familiar enduring rage that she had seen each time she’d looked in the mirror.

“I’m guessing you’re aware of the risks you’d be taking should you join us?” Emma asked, measuring each shift in his expression for anything alarming.

“I’d hardly be here if I couldn’t face the consequences,” Will said. “And you’re not the first crusade against the Evil Queen that I’ve joined, although Red seems to think you’d give me a better chance than that lot ever did.”

“We beat her or we die trying,” Emma told him as she pushed herself off the mast and moved a few steps towards him, all the ferocity she’d been attempting to hide away behind the sadness and the guilt leaking out in her voice. “Are you ready for that?”

Will grinned, his eyes darkening. “You can count on it, Captain.”

Emma didn’t wait more than a moment before she turned to face the others. “Red, fill him in. Liam, make sure Terry’s ready to set sail and get us going. I want us in the wind before sunset, and we’ve got a prisoner to hand over before we can leave,” she ordered, though her tone had dropped the unforgiving command as she surrendered her facade. “Killian, show our newest allies to their quarters once Scarlet has been briefed, and then I’d like you and your brother to join me in escorting Silver off this ship.”

No one hesitated to obey the second she finished speaking, and though Killian lingered to hold her gaze for a long moment, he said nothing. Emma could not regret this, because there was no lack of communication in his sparkling eyes.

--

Violence had always been a part of her life. It was a byproduct of her existence, a necessity, a simple truth. But before her last ride from the castle, she had never considered herself a violent person. True violence was always accompanied with a driving force beyond rationality, perhaps a hatred, a passionate fury, or bloodlust. Those particular feelings did not promote impartiality or decorum, and they had certainly never been a part of her training. But as Emma walked behind the Jones brothers, watching Silver stumble and fight against his restraints and the firm hands of Killian and Liam, she felt at least two of those three feelings.

He hadn’t come quietly, neither physically nor verbally passive, and the bit of cloth preventing him from speaking had been a necessary addition. He had swung at her and at the brothers, he had tried to kick and scratch at them before the rope had limited his movements, but none of that had affected her the way his words had.

It was not his insults towards her that had stirred the violent feelings she felt now, but rather it was his cutting remarks aimed at Liam and Killian that had led to the swelling cheek he now brandished.

She had known cruelty—hell, she had looked it in the eye and watched its wine-colored lips smile at her—but she had never known it quite like this. Because Silver held no power. He would hang, he would die, he would never be seen by any of them again, and yet he still attempted to slice at the brothers and prod every wound he believed they had. He was a desperate man, she knew. He was a coward. He was a fool.

Silver was defenseless, hopeless, powerless, and yet Emma still wished to draw her sword and cut him the way he’d tried to cut the Jones brothers.

Her hand curled around the hilt of her sword, her grip so tight that it nearly hurt her to hold it. She focused on her steps rather than the anger that swirled in her chest, the hatred that shuddered in her stomach and traveled up to her shoulders and made them tremble as she restrained herself.

Liam spoke quickly and efficiently with the jailor when they arrived, and Emma kept herself three paces behind them to prevent her violence from pushing her to interfere. There were a few formalities that took some time to sort out, some documents to sign verifying witnesses, and the only thing that held Emma back was the look on Killian’s face.

It didn’t lack the anger she felt, but his was the expression of a man resolved. He accepted Silver’s fate and wished for nothing more. His fists did not clench in preparation of beating him, his lips did not part to issue his sentence or even a parting taunt that bragged of flipped roles or lost and gained freedom. If Killian could watch the man who had carved lines into his back with near equanimity, what right did she have to act on her desires?

She signed her name Emma Swan, gave Silver one last pointed glare, and then she led the brothers back towards their ship, eager to put as much distance as possible between them and this port.

[queerchoicesblog]

Ghost of You (SC Titanic, Zetta x Adele)

So this is my very first SC Titanic fanfic: I am excited to post it and well I suppose I should warn you that probably Zetta x Adele fictions will be rather long as this love story features themes that are very dear and meaningful to me, such as 1. well, obviously the Titanic story, 2. references to beginning of the century cinema (love very old and b&w movies), 3. sapphism and 4. femminism/suffragette movement. It’s basically everything I could have ever asked for. The Gentleman Jack fans out there might find a reference here...

So here I tried to imagine what brought Zetta to write that little note to Adele after basically disappearing. Loved that scene and I had to try and portray her turmoil, her missing Adele but also, as any historical lesbian (maybe not only historical), fearing the strings of society and their effect on their love and her beloved suffragette. Hope you enjoy it!

Disclaimer: I quoted some pieces of dialogue from the original book

Word Count: 2555

Zetta x Adele Tag: @marmolady @animus-and-anima @hayley-carter19 @escako @everlastingchoices @andrxrneda @aestheticsayeed @eleanorwaverrley @indescribablechoices @ahrielstuff @lvcley @nazario-sayeed

________________________

Two rapid knocks on the door then:

“Are you there, doll? Can I come in?”

Richard’s voice abruptly brought Zetta’s back to reality, involuntarily making her jump in her seat.  She blinked twice as if wakingg from a dream and took a quick look around. She couldn’t recall how long she had been sitting at her vanity lost in her thoughts with a brush in her hand. She just couldn’t focus that day as she was haunted by memories of the past. But Richard didn’t have to know, mustn’t have to know. She put down the brush and quickly fixed her hair before adjusting her robe to limit the skin exposure to the minimum: after all, they weren’t married yet…and her heart didn’t belong to Mr. King. Only after that, she answered loud enough to be heard on the other side of the ebony door:

“Sure, darling”

She resumed her interrupted makeup session, pretending to be fully taken by that routine that didn’t bring her the usual joy anymore. She looked at herself in the mirror and put on a practiced smile: it would have been enough to fool her fiancé.

Richard entered her boudoir and theatrically opened his arms as a seasoned professional: he mentioned that he started as an actor before becoming a stellar director.

“My love, every time I see you I’m completely blinded by your beauty. You’re the brightest star in the sky, even brighter than Venus itself” he said moving closer and kneeling beside her chair.

“…And you’re gonna be the most radiant woman at the party tonight. The belle of the ball, la plus belle” he added, courtly taking her free hand and placing a kiss on her knuckles.

He looked up at her with a dashing smile.

“Trés charmant, Richard…but are you done with poetry?” she smirked, retrieving her hand and resuming her previous core.

“Ah, la belle dame sans merci!” Richard exclaimed before falling back to the floor holding a hand on his chest.

“Silly” Zetta laughed and she was soon joined by Richard who stood again and leaned on her table.

“I can’t help it around you, doll, apologies” he shrugged, flashing her another smile.

Zetta had to summon all her acting expertise not to cringe at “doll”. She hated it when every fiber of her being when Richard -or any other men- called her “doll”. Even her first director called her so, even her husband…doll, as if that was all she was to them: a beautiful toy, maybe a collectible but not truly a woman. Not truly Zetta.

Instead, she mirrored his smile and threw him a quick look before methodically applying some rouge on her cheek.

“So, what are you dying to say that can’t wait?”

“Seeing you isn’t a reasonable excuse?”

Richard was a charming man, without doubt. He wasn’t a bad man or so it seemed to her but she had been deceived by men who swore to only want the best for her that it was hardly possible for Zetta to fully trust any of them. And a man could have never won her heart.

As she flashed him just one of her enigmatic smile, he spoke again:

“Fine, you got me: I just wanted to see you and to remind you that our producers are expecting us at Rao’s for dinner in an hour. We should leave soon” he gave an apologetic smile and lowered his voice to a whisper. “Will we be there in time?”

“We will, I promise you” Zetta confirmed then made a show of shooing him away. “Now shoo, call Sabine and let me get dressed or else we will be late”

Richard raised his arms in surrender, laughing. Then he pressed a kiss on the crown of her head.

“I’ll get off of your hair, doll”

Zetta resumed her makeup as Richard moved towards the door. He was halfway out when

“Oh I almost forgot! I spoke to Alan yesterday and he loved the movie: the story of the two sisters reunited in the midst of chaos on the sinking ship is just perfect, so heart-warming-“

“Yes, it truly is heart-warming” Zetta commented, losing focus again.

“The story is real, right? You met at least one of them on board, didn’t you?”

Zetta’s voice lowered as memories started surfacing back.

“Yes, we were…rather close”

“If they survived, we should track them down and invite them at the movie: it would be great if they could talk to the press. Journalists love stories like this: I can see the headlines alrea-“

“We’ll see, Richard. Now please go call Sabine”

She tried to keep her voice from betraying her feelings, but she could feel a rush of anger surging. She would have never handed the Carrem sisters and such a private and tragic moment of their lives to those shameless sharks who go under the name of journalists. The subtle hint of heartbreak and they prey the unfortunate victims like vultures over a corpse: they wouldn’t stop until they had dissected those aching hearts, leaving them to bleed out. No, she would have done everything in her power to prevent this.

The story she wrote down when asked to bring the grim fate of the Titanic on the big screen was fiction: inspired by true facts but fiction. Zetta was smart enough to know that life and fiction are two separate things and that an edulcorated tale of those most tragic hours was all the world could take: the people of New York, who weren’t there that night, would have been overwhelmed by the real story.

Still, when she sat at her desk and started writing a draft of the script her mind immediately turned to…Adele.

She didn’t even notice Richard leaving the room as the silhouette of Miss Carrem clouded her thoughts. Finally alone, her face fell and she shut her eyes as if to prevent the memory from fading away.

Adele, most gracious, fearless Adele…

Her lips curled into a sad smile as she reminisced their first meeting. She was sitting in her suite smoking and listening to James making some pointless speech when the door opened and Teo stepped in followed by Adele. She had the beauty of a Greek goddess and the look of someone who was going through a lot. She clearly felt out of place among finely dressed first-class passengers in the lavish room but she kept her head high. Zetta remembered feeling the urge to know what troubled her but she put on her mask, the sardonic film star ever out of reach. And then…was it a brave move or just an insane one? Adele told her of her arrest, of prison. Everyone else would have hidden from her, a new employer and Zetta Serda…not Adele. She handed her everything she needed to destroy her life as if it was no big deal. Zetta was taken aback and searched her green eyes for any sign of mockery but find none: the stranger girl truly trusted her with her life. That’s when she realized how unique Miss Carrem was.

Adele found a way to her heart effortlessly as if she had the map from the very start. When she placed her hand over hers in the projection room, she startled Zetta: whenever she had made the fatal mistake to show her vulnerable side to anyone, they would have used it against her to make her feel weak or small…clearly in need of someone who would tell her what to do, to guide her. They would have refilled her glass with wine again and again instead of going for the simplest gesture: taking her hand into theirs and comfort her. Making her believe with that touch that everything would have been fine, and she was stronger than whatever life threw her.

For a moment, as Adele held her hand, she felt safe, pacified, something she had never experienced with any of her supposed lovers. She couldn’t even be mad at her secretary when she revealed her James’ plan and the true reason behind his bailing her out of jail. She was shocked, obviously but she also couldn’t believe that Adele, brave foolish Adele, had put her life into her hands again. “I’m perfectly aware of the risk I’m taking by revealing this to you but you deserve to know. I cannot keep this from you” she said, looking her right in the eye.

Those eyes…they took Zetta’s breath away whenever they ignited with the fire sparking inside her. She could have lost herself in their green depths when they gleamed with pride and mischief as she proposed a toast to the vote to women or whenever their eyes met. She got lost in them when their lips touched, and they grew dark with desire. How daring and foolish they had been in the Turkish baths…but she couldn’t bring herself to regret that moment of ecstasy when she felt free and truly loved, for once. She could still shiver remembering Adele’s touch, the way her lips traced down her body with reverence and adoration, the soft moans the tender girl in her arms suffocated hiding her face in the crook of her neck as she melted under her caresses. In those stolen embraces she knew happiness.

How happy she felt whenever Adele was around: just exchanging a brief look across the room would make her heart flutter.

Then other memories surged and Zetta felt tears welling her closed eyes. Her birthday night, that cursed birthday night…Adele and her sneaking away from the party to find a private spot on the deck. The wine, the cold breeze of the ocean, Adele’s silvery laughter at her tipsy enthusiasm, how she craved those sweet lips all night.

“If I’m honest, I don’t even want to reach shore, I don’t want to go back to the party…I just want to stay out here with you. Forever.”

Adele’s tender smile in agreement.

“Let’s just make a tent of this blanket – we can live off seal meat and rainwater”

Her tipsy proposal made the two of them laugh again.

“What about your acting career?” Adele inquired, a smile lingering on her face.

“We’ll make our own plays. Whaddya say?”

God, how those words sounded different now…how she would have given everything to have Adele there to cup her face and give her a slow, deep kiss. But Adele wasn’t by her side anymore…she lost sight of her when her agent and Richard dragged her and James away from the crowd at the New York pier.

She hadn’t written her ever since that day and she felt so impossibly guilty because of that: Adele must have thought she had forgotten about her after all her words of love on the ship. Maybe she felt used, maybe she hated her by now and cursed the memory of her. She would have reasons to hold a grudge to her…the truth was that happiness and love are hard to accept if you have never truly had them before and if they came from a woman loving another woman.

Zetta had tried to write her a thousand time but every time she had made an effort to put her feelings into words, her lines rang hollow. Yet the words that got stuck in her throat when Adele pulled her into a corner and confessed that no matter what happened that night she needed to tell that she loved her were clear in her mind.

The months spent parted from you are the saddest time of my life. I’m haunted by you, the ghost of you. You’re everywhere: even if I’m silent, not an hour passed where I haven’t thought of you. I tried not to, but whenever I closed my eyes, there you were. I love you and I can’t live without you, without your smile, your wit, your touch. I just can’t but how can I ask you to be with me in the dark? I can’t step back from this wedding and I don’t want you to be a secret mistress: that would squalid and offensive when you are the one I want to give all of me. To marry, if that was even a possibility for us so that I could spend every single day of my life with you, waking up with you by my side, taking care of you…making you happy. Your absence makes even breathing hard, not to mention smiling to strangers, “capitalist pigs” as you would say…I even try and talk like you do, you see? But I find myself wondering: will I make you happy if I have to hide our love from the world? Kiss you only behind closed doors? Let you see me marry a man? You’re a free spirit, my love, I don’t want to put you in a cage because our love, our pure love would be a scandal and a scandal would ruin everything I worked for since I was even younger than you. I don’t want you to spend your life as a ghost yet I find myself craving to see your face one more time as living without you is barely surviving but all the light has gone as I lost you.

Suddenly she felt someone placing their hands on her shoulders.

“Let me help you here, Madame”

She opened her eyes and saw Sabine, smiling sympathetically down at her. She tried and failed to mirror her smile as her mascara was now running down her cheeks.

Sabine helped her to her feet and took care of everything. Zetta let her washed up her face and helped her into her shiny evening dress: she felt like a child in the hands of a loving mother. When she was putting on her earrings, the final touch, Sabine handed her a small stack of envelopes.

“The invitations to the movie screening and party” she explained. “It’s October first, I would suggest to send them first thing tomorrow to ensure that everyone get the invitation within reasonable notice. It wasn’t easy to find all the addresses, but I did my best”

“I’m sure you did, Sabine. Thank you for taking care of it.” Zetta said as she checked the succession of familiar names of former passengers and famous colleagues. “I will sign them personally when we come back from the party”.

“Excellent” Sabine nodded.

Then as Zetta placed the stack on her desk, she presented her a single envelope.

“I hope you don’t mind if I requested a faster delivery for this one” she added before bowing her head curtly and leaving the room. “Have a nice evening, Madame”

Zetta read the name handwritten on the last envelope where a different stamp had been appointed.

‘Mademoiselle Adele Carrem’

A lump formed in her throat but she forced herself not to cry and just smile, mentally thanking Sabine: she had found her. Following nothing else but her instinct, Zetta picked out the invitation and signed it with her fountain pen. Then, as Richard called her name, she grabbed a slip of paper and wrote a brief note:

“Please come, my love. I must see you again. Yours, Zetta”.

She folded everything back into the envelope and finally left her room as a newfound hope kindled inside her.

[xhaotixaesthetica]

Property of the Pirate King

 Starlink Intergalactic Navigator 

READ THE TRIGGER WARNING: This post contains abuse, abusive relationships, threats, violence, major character death, kidnap, human slavery, emotional manipulation, disturbing sexual themes, and profanity. The behaviors and relationships depicted below are abusive and unhealthy. These are not examples of healthy relationships, it’s actually the opposite. This is meant to imagine the members of Ateez in a popular anime trope and it in no way represents their real-life personalities and characters. Real-life ATEEZ are actually known for being some of the kindest, most respectful idols in the industry. It’s fiction, it’s for fun, PLEASE DON’T READ IT IF YOU KNOW YOU WON’T LIKE IT OR THIS KIND OF STUFF DISTURBS YOU!

Author’s Note: @zafira-profundis​ Thanks so much for requesting and liking my work, you’re my second ever request and I love you :3 I didn’t feel qualified to make the reader fully blind, because I’m not and I don’t know enough about it. So I compromised and gave them really bad eyesight, but it doesn’t come up much in the story. I’m not particularly happy with this, but I really tried my best and I hope everything else is in line with your request and you enjoy the story!

Genre: Angst

Word Count: 3.1K+

You are in: The Golden Wasteland Star System 

Every second that you spent at Lord Yang’s side was like agony to San.

He hated the way he would touch you. Hated the way he put his disgusting mouth on you and give you sloppy, wet kisses full of tongue that you obviously didn’t want but were unable to refuse.

Ever since Lord Yang bought you two years ago from a group of sketchy, no-name traders on the eastern border of his sand land, all San wanted to do was lock you up and have you for himself.

Like him, you were born a slave. Beaten and weary from everyone who’d ever owned you and all the people who’d tried to take advantage of your impaired eyesight. San was trained to kill and fight for his master since before he could walk while you were a personal slave, bound to serve the needs of your master, whatever they may be.

The desert lands that you were born into were scorching, exhausting, and ripe with death, evil, and danger, things that San was well familiar with.

But you...you were like the moon to him. Like a cool oasis in the nighttime. Just seeing you calmed him down and gave him the strength to survive another day.

You never talked to him. There were few words you ever said and few people you ever spoke to. And somehow, you still managed to be the object of San’s obsessions. The thing he’d chosen to latch onto in his mind’s last-ditch effort to stay sane in these hellish sand-dunes.

San stands ram-rod straight, a posture that was beaten into him long ago, in the doorway of one of Lord Yang’s many parlor rooms while you sit in Lord Yang’s lap, both of you bored and stiff after so long of hearing the old men converse with one another on various sordid business affairs.

Your eyes are glassy and far away as you try to ignore your master’s fingers rubbing slow, sickening circles onto the bone of your hip.

San stares at you out of his peripheral vision, something he’s gotten very good at in the last two years.

It’s any other day: hot, stifling, and miserable until San hears the words fall from his master’s lips.

“Gentlemen, I’ve come to a decision that it would benefit me to sell some of my pets. As a token of my respect to our close business relationship, I’m offering you first pick.”

You showed no movement. You’d been sold many times before and you were used to owners growing bored of their playthings and exchanging them for newer, more amusing ones until the cycle would repeat itself again.

San, however, was very on-edge.

He’d feared these words since the day his master bought you. But you’d been here for two years. Longer than any of his other slaves.

He’d just assumed that, like him, you were there to stay.

Surely, Lord Yang couldn’t mean that he was selling you?

Oblivious to the dilemma of the killer in the corner of the room, the five other men hummed appreciatively. “Which ones are you looking to get rid of?”

It was rare for you and San to ever make eye-contact, but it happened at that moment. You both knew. You could feel it in your bones.

“Ah, the older ones. Momo, Aisha, Yunho, Y/N, and a couple of others.”

With those few words, San could feel his heart sink to the pit of his stomach. If it hadn’t been for his years of training in mastering his facial expressions and body language, he would have crumpled to the floor and cried.

You were leaving him. You were being sold and you would leave him.

“They’re still young, very pretty. They’d fetch a fine price. They’ve just been with me for too long. I’ve grown tired of them.”

San decided right then and there that he’d kill every single man in this room.

No one would ever buy you again.

He’d kill them all and take you with him.

He couldn’t be without you, he just couldn’t.

Without his oasis, he’d die. He’d burn to death from the inside out in this wretched, wicked wasteland.

San had always been Lord Yang’s favorite. He was faithful and loyal. His duality amused him, his normally smiley disposition masking a hidden dark persona that was released when he fought and sometimes at random throughout the day. Plus, the boy had grown up by Lord Yang’s side, learning to protect his master and guard his life before he could even speak.

San was simultaneously like his favorite dog and the son he’d never had.

And San savored the look of betrayal in his eyes when they shot open in the middle of the night, right after San had taken his blade to his throat.

The same blade that had been the demise of so many at his master’s bidding, was now his undoing.

The night air was cooler, the sand still warm under your feet from the heat of the day as you trailed behind San.

You didn’t know how he’d managed to do it. To kill not only your master, but five other powerful men without any of their bodyguards being alerted and still find time to steal water, provisions, and equipment for the long journey ahead.

San’s first priority was you and he knew he might not be able to sneak you out if he tried to wake and free every single slave. So he settled for freeing you, Yunho, Mina, and Aisha.

Mina and Aisha went in separate directions at the beginning. They, like Yunho, were stolen and were not born slaves. They had families to return to and mouths to feed.

Yunho trailed alongside you and San for about an hour before he, too, had to diverge his path from yours.

Yunho had been a slave for three years and you hoped with all your heart that he reunited with his mother and younger brother, Jongho, even after so long.

You and San were the only ones with no home to return to.

You didn’t know where he was taking you and you hadn’t asked, but you suspected he was trying to escape the desert.

Few people had ever made it that far, but there were plenty of tales to tempt them. Tales of lands with an abundance of water and plants. Where there were no sand lords like the late Lord Yang and people were free, without being slaves.

You doubted that there even was anything beyond the sand lands, but you were willing to try. You had a better chance of surviving with San than you did by yourself, and it’s not like you had anywhere else to be.

Days passed with the consistent cycle of sleeping during the day and traveling at night with meals and water in between.

It was tough getting used to San being so close to you. You were used to his bright smile and bubbly disposition and random fits of anger and silence from two years of serving the same master, but it was different experiencing it up close.

You were the only ones you had to talk to now and San’s chatter never ceased, you didn’t even know what he had to talk about, you were both in the desert for god’s sake.

But as annoying as he could get, you much preferred this San to the one that would make an appearance sometimes. That rarer San was quieter, yes, but he stared at you with the hunger of a predator, licking his lips like you were something to eat.

As the days dragged on, you were beginning to think you were right.

You and San passed sand land after sand land, not seeming to be any closer to getting out of this scorching hell-hole.

But the more towns you passed and the more black and white flags with orange stripes that you two saw, you were beginning to have other things on your minds. There wasn’t a single person in any part of this desert that didn’t have their blood turn cold at the sight of those flags.

They’re the mark of Ateez and the Pirate King.

If there was anyone’s territory you didn’t want to be caught in, it was the Pirate King’s.

“It’s ok,” San said one day as you both laid in a sand cave to get some rest. You were too far from a sand land to find an inn and even though you were very exposed like this, there was no other option. This was better than getting second-degree burns under the hot sun.

“I’ll protect you,” he told you with a bright smile and a giggle before turning over.

You weren’t so convinced, lying awake for at least a couple of hours before you finally managed to fall into a restless slumber.

There was a bounty on San’s head for the six important men he killed, and most likely one on yours too for running off with him. If the Pirate King decided to turn you both in for the money, you didn’t stand much of a chance.

San was an outstanding fighter, but he was still just one man. Every man has their limitations.

San, as you would come to find, did not know his.

“How many kids do you think we’ll have?” he asked one day at one of the rare oases you’d been able to find.

You paused from where you were washing off some of the sand and grime that was quick to build upon your skin.

Had you just heard him correctly?

“I....I don’t want kids,” you said quietly. Not here, in this cruel desert wasteland. You’d never bring a child here to have them ripped away from you and sold off, as so many were. And you certainly wouldn’t have one with San.

The minute the words escaped your mouth, you could tell that his entire demeanor changed, even without being able to really see much more than the blurry blob of his frame at this distance.

His eyes seemed to be darker and his movements a bit jerkier as he looked at you blankly before a smirk slowly spread across his lips.

“We’ll have three. Yeah, three’s a good number. And the first son will be named after me.”

You said nothing as San switched modes again, voice soft and melodious once more as he went back to washing his hair.

You knew that whenever you two reached your destination, you had to find a way to get away from him.

The longer you stayed with him, the more delusional he seemed to become.

The first time you see the Pirate King’s face is a few days later when you wake up and see him leaning over you with a smirk.

It’s hard to make out any of the details of his face when you pair your fear with your strained and impaired eyesight, but the one thing you so recognize is his hair. It’s an intense blue, the color of the ocean it’s rumored he sailed on from the island of his birth.

“Hello kitten,” he drawled.

You looked frantically around the sand cave that you and San had decided to camp out in for the night.

He was nowhere to be seen.

And neither was the cave. Or the clothes you’d been in.

You were in a lavish room, your body decked out in fine silks and sparkling jewelry. Things you’d wear when you were in the presence of your slave owner.

How long had you been asleep? How had he done all this without you noticing? What had he done to San?

“S-San,” you sputtered out to him, unable to see the way his expression darkened at the name. “Where’s San?”

“Don’t worry about him, love,” he said, the underlying tone of malice and warning in his voice made you tremble.

“I’ve been watching you for the past couple of days. I know who he is and what he’s done. If I left you with him, you’d be running in circles the rest of your life, sleeping in caves and wondering where your next meal was going to come from as you tried to avoid the bounty hunters that want to bring the sand lords San’s head on a silver platter.”

He was closer now, so close you actually see how dark his eyes were as he caressed your cheek.

“You deserve more than that, kitten. Now that you’re mine, you’ll have everything that you could ever want.”

Everything but being away from you, you whispered in your mind, not daring to speak the words aloud.

Being a sand lord’s slave was one thing, but the Pirate King...You’d heard of the things this man has done, the atrocities he’s committed. The Pirate King is a monster.

His world was a lawless, bloody web of death, chaos, and misery that you could never escape from.

You thought escaping from Lord Yang was a good thing, but if this was where it landed you then you desperately wished you could take it all back.

And what of your traveling companion?

He was a mad man but he’d risked his life protecting you on multiple occasions and you were scared of what would happen if you were left along with the man in front of you for even a second longer.

“I want to see San,” you whispered with all the courage you had welled inside of you, eyes squeezed shut and already flinching away from Hongjoong’s reaction.

It was silent for a beat before he scoffed, ignoring your yelp of shock as he hauled you to your feet.

“OK, kitten. Let’s go see San.” he laughed, a cruel sound that made you feel like hail beating against your ears.

You were halfway out of the door when a force suddenly slammed you against the doorway. It was Hongjoong, eyes glaring at you, dark and cold and furious. His hand was locked around your throat, cutting off your oxygen supply, his grip so tight that you felt your feet start to lift from the ground.

His voice was sugary sweet, words far too slow for the rate at which your lungs were starting to burn.

“I’ll let you have this one thing, kitten. You don’t know me and I haven’t trained you yet, so it’s ok.”

Your nails dug into his skin, a fruitless attempt to get him off of you but he just kept going like he didn’t feel it. The sweetness was gone from his voice now. It was cold and monotoned as he slammed you against the wall, your body going limp for a moment at the pain that exploded in your skull.

“I’m your owner. You do what I tell you, understand? From now on, you only want what I say you can want. Do you understand me, kitten?”

You nodded frantically and he let you go, looking at you in disgust as you collapsed in a heap on the floor, gasping for air and whimpering at the pain in your head.

Hongjoong just nudged you impatiently with his foot.

“Get up. You wanted to go see San, remember?”

Hongjoong made you hold his hand as you walked down the many corridors of his palace and you obliged out of fear of both him and all the vile, suspicious characters he seemed to have lurking around his otherwise immaculate architecture.

Minutes passed before you and Hongjoong entered a courtyard in the center of the palace. It was dark and cool, a dome of black glass overhead shielding you from the beaming sun and plants even grew here.

But you didn’t like the way everyone leered at you, whispering about Hongjoong’s new Pirate Queen as he marched you both up to a stone dais where an immaculate golden throne sat on the far side.

It was only once the Pirate King had seated you on his lap and you looked around a little that you realized San lay in chains on the other end of the dais.

Instantly, the thought struck you that the man before you, probably about to be killed, was undoubtedly the one you were better off with.

San knew it too. You couldn’t really see his face, not at this distance, but you could just tell in the way his dark-clad blurry figure moved.

He chuckled darkly as Hongjoong’s guards shuffled him toward the center of the dais. The silhouettes of the tons of people in the room were moving wildly, your ears ringing with cheers as people clapped for the most action they had seen in a while.

They didn’t care that a man was about to die. Death seemed to be the status quo under Hongjoon’s rule, not only an everyday occurrence but a pleasure.

“I love you!” San cackled wildly.

No, you don’t, you wanted to say as tears streamed down your cheeks. You don’t know how to love anything. But you don’t know hate either and that’s why I’m scared for you to leave me here with him. You’re the lesser of two evils.

But nothing would come out.

You were acutely aware of the man whose lap you sat on. You knew he was watching you and you knew you would be already be punished for shedding tears for another man.

As the cheers rose, you were infinitely glad for your terrible vision. You already wished you couldn’t hear, not because of the crowds but because of San’s terrifying laughter as he was pushed onto his knees and surrounding by jeers for his death.

You’d never heard a laugh that sounded so little like a symptom of happiness. San’s laughter was something that could bring the end of days and for a moment you wished it did.

And then it was over.

Not really, they hadn’t killed San yet. It seemed like they were planning on drawing this out as long as possible.

No, the laughter was over. San was crying now. Sobbing. Begging.

“Y/N, I don’t want to leave you!”

“Please help me, it hurts!”

“Don’t let them hurt me, you’re supposed to love me!”

You felt like you couldn’t breathe as you heard his voice, so soft and sweet and sad. So different to the bone-chilling laughter that had just escaped him moments before. He almost sounded like a child. Like someone that even the most cold-hearted of people should never be able to hurt.

But Hongjoong can. And he will.

You didn’t love San and you never had, but he was about to be killed because of Hongjoong’s obsession for you and he was begging you to save him and you just can’t.

“No, no, kitten,” Hongjoong’s hands are rough and not gentle at all as he snaps your head back into position, forcing you to look at the blurry sights of a tall man standing over San’s hunched, chained figure with something long and and shiny.

“You’ll see every detail of his death that you’re able to. After this, you’ll really be mine. The property of the Pirate King.”

The Golden Wasteland Star System 

Starlink Intergalactic Navigator 

[zipegs]

i’ve been toying around with the idea of posting a fic rec list for a while, and finally decided that if i do, it might be nice to focus on newer and/or underrated fics in the fandom! some of my absolute favorites are on this list, and i highly suggest checking them out (and leaving the lovely authors some comments and kudos!)

this got pretty long, but it’s organized alphabetically by ship name (including gen) and then by length inside each ship!

blanky/little

Trysails by saltstreets  /  2k, t

“I know I can’t do much,” Blanky said, “but you can always talk to me. If you’re so inclined.”

A (very late!) offering for Tender Tuesday, "a friend in need".

okay!!!!!! okay!!!!! hear me out on this one!! this fic is wonderful. i’m a sucker for fics dealing with edward’s suffering during the worst of crozier’s captaincy, and this one is so good. blanky is so wonderful in this; i feel like his tender, kind side frequently gets overlooked in favor of his bigger, bolder attributes, and this fic truly delivers on everything i’ve been missing! it’s really gentle and sweet and i urge you to give it a read!!!!

bridglar

in the low lamplight by stelleri  /  338, g

It’s endless freezing rain outside, but the house is comfortably warm.

short and sweet! a really lovely little slice-of-life modern au

state of grace by aes3plex  /  860, m

He doesn’t mean to see it. He never does.

bridglar may be the most featured pairing, but this is told from irving’s pov and also contains irving/little and references to hickey/gibson. really sad, conflicted little peek into irving’s mind (and some nice, soft bridglar as well!)

passer iagoensis by greenery  /  3k, g

Night falls on the Beagle and Henry Peglar has just finished reading his very first novel.

Set in 1832.

this piece is so good!! it has some really beautiful (sad) foreshadowing of the franklin expedition, and is just... so soft, with some wonderful romantic tension!! and it’s funny! darwin and fitzroy are wonderful in this, and i’m always here for fic that deals with peglar learning to read (which this does!!!).

cracroft/crozier

the beggar’s opera by pyotr  /  990, e

for all of his usual anger and surliness it was almost fun to fluster francis, to rile him where he could not retaliate. sophia had spent all her life under the thumb of some man or another; she loved francis in part because she always had the upper hand.

sophia is my queen and that’s all i’ll say about that. seriously though, this piece is just... *chef’s kiss*

fitzconte

A Cheetah Never Changes His Spots by onstraysod  /  1.2k, m

Being the particular friend of James Fitzjames has its drawbacks, as Henry Le Vesconte learns during the expedition's first carnivale. But it also has its advantages, as Henry learns once the carnivale is over.

Written for Day 1 (A Special Disguise) of the 12 Days of Carnivale.

on beechey island, fitzjames reveals clio’s cheetah to the men. or... something like it! this piece is really a blast; fitzjames is in rare form, francis is glaring form the sidelines, and le vesconte is an absolute champ. and the ending is wonderfully witty and racy!

fitzier

wake me up, wake me up my darling by norvegiae  /  1.4k, g  /  mcd

James Fitzjames feels like a new man.

The old James Fitzjames lies on the cot in front of him, cradled by the man he wishes he could have had more time with.

set during 1.09, this fic is a really poignant, heartwrenching piece in which james comes to terms with the reality of his death, and of his life, as he watches francis grieve. very sad, and wonderfully written!

what the stars give us by WetSammyWinchester  /  1.7k, t  /  implied death

"They may know space, James, but you know what it means to truly fly."

70s scifi (space program!!!) au. really great translation of the terror; the mood in this is so good!!! and the little flashbacks are fantastic. it’s pretty sad, but it hurts in a good way.

fitzrossier

Take Your Turn, Take A Ride by courfairyac  /  7.5k, e

Francis agrees to accompany his friend to a masquerade, and stumbles onto something quite unexpected.

In short: Festivities! Voyeurism! James in a dress!

listen... fitzrossier is my new weakness, and this is a really fun, hot, canon-universe (pre-expedition) au.

gen

salvation by scribomania  /  250, t

The Concordia brings them survival, but not salvation.

featuring hodgson and little, and jopson. for a survival au, this little piece hurts!!! it’s so short, but it packs a punch. really, really good.

but no one remembers yet by disastermovie  / 885, t

“From the mutilated state of many of the corpses and the contents of the kettles, it is evident that our wretched countrymen had been driven to the last resource—cannibalism—as a means of prolonging existence.”

—excerpt from Dr. John Rae’s report on the fate of the Franklin Expedition to the Secretary of the Admiralty (written from Repulse Bay on July 29, 1854)

sad little epilogue concerning sophia and lady jane dealing with their grief

the weary world rejoices by disastermovie  /  1.3k, t

Fitzjames goes to his first Christmas party after the survivors are rescued. It doesn't go well.

this!!!! fic!!! i can’t even do it justice, it’s just so good. the slow build of james’s panic, the caroling and gaiety as a backdrop... it’s just so painful in the best way. i’m incoherent; pls just read it,

la belle dame sans merci by drowninglovers  /  1.7k, g

Nobody is quite sure who the first one to start making her clothing is, but one day she scampers over the shoulders of the ABs as they line up for lunch wearing a tiny shirt to match her pants. It’s nothing special, no fancy detail, navy blue like most everything else they wear. Whoever made it must have cared a great deal, to make sure it fit her perfectly.

this is incredibly fun!!! just some good, wholesome fic about boys dressing up their favorite lady. 10000/10 would recommend.

Come Here, Fellow Servant by whipstitch  /  1.9k, t

The sea is dangerous, but so too is the open sky. And in that case, Cornelius determines, a friend is an unexpected boon.

okay, i made a rule that i wasn’t going to include wips on this rec list,  but i had to put this guy on here. it could be read as a stand-alone, actually, which is what i used to convince myself to include it. peglar realizes that hickey has no fucking idea what he’s doing, and tries to help him, kind, caring sweetheart that he is. this is a really, really nice little piece—i love everything about it.

lie alone by greenery  /  2k, g

He turns the page. And maybe this is it. Maybe writing a letter to young Tom Hartnell is reason enough to leave the berth.

really nice oneshot featuring two good boys (hodgson & hartnell) and their wholesome status as pen pals

the crooked kind by darrenjolras  /  2.3k, m  /  non-consensual voyeurism

“You and I, Jopson,” Hickey says, and Jopson startles at those words alone, turns an affronted gaze his way. Hickey bathes in the glacial blue of it. Like being thrown overboard. “You and I aren’t so different, you know.”

Based on that Hickey/Jopson scene. You know the one.

the terror bingo fill: court martial

not totally gen, but also not really hickey/jopson? twisted, but very much in character; hickey is his delightful self in this, and his verbal sparring with jopson is very well done and quite fun to read!

gibson/hickey

Touch Her Not Scornfully by skazka  /  2k, e

Stolen moments down below.

this fic is just... really fucking good!!! it’s a fantastic look at the very early days of gibson & hickey’s relationship, and an intriguing little venture into billy’s head.

goodsir/mcdonald

And That is How it Starts by Intrepid_Inkweaver  /  1.2k, g

It starts with a handshake and a warm smile at their introduction at Greenhithe.

a really sweet, lovely canon-divergent piece. written in 2nd person pov. these two are just such a good, wholesome pairing and this fic really does them justice!!

hartving

let loss reveal it by disastermovie  /  1.6k, t  /  mcd

Tom could never quite see himself taking a wife.

this shit fucking hurts!!!!!!! it’s a beautiful glimpse at irving & hartnell’s relationship, told through hartnell’s introspection, and is written really, really well. also did i mention that it fucking hurts???

Lookout Blues by ClockworkCourier  /  2.1k, g

John and Tom Hartnell talk about the future while they wait on a new shipment.

hello??? 1920s au??????? the world-building is so tangible in this, even in such a relatively short piece. it’s a really lovely little conversation between the brothers, and i absolutely loved their little discussion of irving.

we’ll tak’ a cup o’ kindness yet by drowninglovers  /  6.3k, g

If this is to be the last time they interact (and it likely will), Tom wants it to be memorable.

survival au survival au!! tartnell runs into irving at john’s grave, and convinces him to stay with his family until new year’s. it’s kind of bittersweet, with some really great flashbacks (and discussions of said scenes!), and oh man is it soft!! just! really beautiful and tender, and the ending is just so cute!!!!!

hodgson/hickey

the chaos moves by itself by bluebacchus  /  1.3k, e  /  violence, mcd

Hodgson's mind cracks and the heavens flow in.

(Written for Day 7 of Halloween TerrorFest: A disquieting metamorphosis and posted separately because I don't want to taint my main post with borderline vore)

fair warning... this fic is fucked up, but in the best possible way! the religious imagery!!!! the philosophy!!!! just!! god.

hodgson/little

Allegro, B Flat Major by whalersandsailors  /  5.3k, g

George is freshly moved from his childhood home, ready to tackle the school year and his newfound independence all at once.

Too bad he's lonely, miserable, and homesick.

He turns to music when adulthood becomes unbearable, and when someone knocks at his door and leaves an anonymous note, George discovers another music lover not too far away.

have i mentioned i love george hodgson? because i love george hodgson. this fic is a beautiful modern au featuring our own georgie playing his way through his feelings (literally). the buildup to the reveal of george’s secret admirer is wonderful, and had me rooting for them from the start! really sweet, stunning fic for a pairing i’d never considered before!

joplittle

get out of the wind by Cicadaemon  /  1.6k, e

Edward Little is smitten with a certain bartender.

modern au. really lovely, wholesome, and happy; just what these boys deserve!

The Thylacine by Gigi_Sinclair  / 1.7k, t 

"Thylacines. That's what Sophia called them, all those years ago in Van Diemen's Land. Dogs with tiger stripes, cats with pouches. They stretch their jaws at him, as Francis struggles to sit. The movement makes his head spin. He pushes the discomfort aside. He has no time to entertain it; he must escape."

also features cracroft/crozier. this is a really clever, funny piece set during francis’s withdrawal; poor francis is a bit muddled in the throes of his fever, and gets caught up in a memory from van diemen’s land. i absolutely loved little and jopson’s reactions in this, and especially jopson and crozier’s conversation the next morning.

Prelude in D Major by scribomania  /  2.7k, t

Hodgson is very fond of the musical apparatus in Terror's great cabin; Edward is not.

For the Terror Bingo square "denial".

i’m a big big lover of terror lieutenant nonsense, and this fic absolutely delivers! just absolutely delightful.

When the Lights Go On Again by Gigi_Sinclair  /  4.1k, t

"Edward Little's ancestors were Naval officers, almost to a man. Nevertheless, from a young age, Edward's eyes turned to the sky rather than the sea.

He longed to fly, as high and as frequently as possible. In the Royal Air Force, he got his wish. He was happy there, thriving, rising in the ranks apace and doing what he always wanted to do. Then came the first of September, 1939."

wwii au. edward is a squadron leader in the royal air force, and jopson is a corporal working for group captain crozier. i’m weak for wwi and wwii aus to begin with, and this one is done beautifully. while it doesn’t hand-wave the trauma and heartbreak of war, it doesn’t hit you over the head with it either, and the result is a really soft, bittersweet, hopeful piece.

lozer

a lily for my love by whalersandsailors  /  3.7k, m

Solomon never thought that soul-signs were real, and the stories he heard about them made soulmates sound more like a prison sentence than any fairy tale romance. It is not until he finds a soul-sign on the skin of a very dear friend that he realizes their importance, as well as their undoing.

this piece is!!! beautiful!!! very poignant, and really had me feeling for solomon. i love what’s been done with the soulmark conceit—it’s not just a simple “we have soulmarks, we’re soulmates!!!’ au (which i’ll admit to enjoying too), but a really thoughtful take on the trope. the slow way tozer puzzles everything out is wonderful, and i love the glimpses we get into several of his friendships & relationships. 

morfin/weekes

to help you remember by whalersandsailors  /  1.2k, g

An anniversary, during which Weekes presents Morfin with a gift, and Morfin struggles to remember why.

do you ever just get clotheslined by a pairing you’d never even considered before? because that’s what this fic did to me

[edorazzi]

Well, here we are again! Twitter said yes to a review post for a Miraculous magazine that suddenly showed up in my local area. ‘Tis the season after all, and by that I mean someone bought it for me as a joke birthday gift and I was way too happy about that.

I’ve done previous reviews of the Miraculous Christmas calendar, Easter egg set, superhero fashion dolls and action figures, so let’s dive into the unknown world of merchandising yet again!

(As always, if you enjoy my posts, please consider checking out my Twitter page or supporting me on Patreon for lots of bonus content!)

4 FREE GIFTS! PACKED WITH ACTIVITIES! MEET THE KWAMIS! PRANKS & LOLS! CUT-OUT MEMES! FANGIRL ALERT! NAIL ART! 100% OFFICIAL! I’m overwhelmed! It feels like I’m having a seizure just from the packaging!!! 

I should preface this by saying I haven’t bought a magazine like this in years. Possibly ever. I read things like the Beano, Animals & You and the odd Disney Princess zine when I was a kid but I have no idea what to expect from a free-gift-packed kiddie magazine in 2019. If the outside is anything to go by we’re in for a wild ride.

I’m noticing that it says “Miraculous #20″ on the back. Does this mean I’ve missed 19 previous issues? I’m genuinely a little upset by that. My local area is a complete dry zone for Miraculous so I haven’t had the chance to pick these up.

First step: let’s separate everything out and get a look at these freeeee giftssss. Except they aren’t free, because this magazine was like £3.99. This does seem to be the current trend - it’s kinda rare to see any kids’ zines without the excess packaging crammed with ‘free’ stuff. Is it really too expensive to just produce the magazine? Probably, in this economy.

Chat Noir is revealed on the cover! He was on the back of the plastic jacket, but it’s still nice to see the kids as a front-cover duo. Apparently we’re going to learn to draw Pollen, too, which sounds fun. I’m actually liking the look of the gifts as well, but we’ll get into those in a minute.

This hairbrush............. is adorable. Oh my god. It’s pretty cheap and flimsy but it functions the way it’s supposed to, and the Ladybug design has been taken into account in a better way than “it’s red/black, that counts” (lest we forget the UTTER BULLSHIT of the Christmas calendar, and YES I’m still mad about that). I don’t know how well I expect the outer sticker to last, but if it can take a bit of wear and tear this would be an adorable little travel brush. Nicely done, lads!

These nail stickers? Also adorable. They remind me of the kiddie makeup sets I had when I was little, back in the early 00s when plastic stick-on nails and decals were all the rage. Are they still a thing? That’s nice to know.

There are 13 designs (that I can count) - a Queen Bee mask, Chat Noir pawprint cake, macaron, cupcake, heart-print cookie, Ladybug stud, flower, lightning bolt, love heart, Marinette heart, bee, fox tail and star. The majority are directly related to the show and that makes them feel special. No Carapace though? :(

I’ve put a little Marinette heart on my furthest finger. At the time of typing this up (about a day later) it’s still firmly in place. I haven’t really knocked it around, granted, but it’s not flimsy enough to fall off after five minutes either. It’s also really cute to look at. Guess I’m still a decal-loving 2004 girl at heart......

These stickers though!!! Wow! They’re those holographic and slightly-puffy kind and they feel like pretty good quality, and the designs are so cute! I can’t fault these, they’re absolutely adorable. I immediately want to stick them everywhere.

So I’ve stuck them everywhere. I’m especially proud of the light switch pun. My room looks GREAT.

I saved these “mystery stickers” for last because I’m weak for the thrill of mystery bags, and there wasn’t anything on the packaging to indicate what kind of designs to expect. And OH!!!! OH, IT’S MY BOY!!!! Look at him!!!! 

I made jokes with the Christmas calendar about all the Chat Noir items being stolen ahead of time, but that’s definitely NOT the case with this magazine. I have been SPOILED with the presence of my cat son.

These stickers are similar to the sticker sheet (and the Chillin’ Out design is reprinted), but they’re puffier and non-holographic. I’m deeply allured by the “decorate your phone or tablet” suggestion on the packet, but I’m going to see how the previous stickers withstand the wear-and-tear of my laptop lid before adding any more. If I damage these beautiful Adrien stickers I’ll be devastated.

Those are our free gifts! They’re actually very fun and cute, I’m really happy with them! I guess now it’s time to get into the magazine itself...........

I genuinely almost forgot the magazine was the main part of this package. I figured I was done, but we’ve barely even started! Here’s a splash page of the kwami. Kwami with a capital K? Kwamis? I still feel like it should be singular-lower-case-k-kwami. I’ve never been happy about this “miraculouses” business either.

But is that--

It IS!!!! It’s Nino!!! 

I guess this is the new flavour of Miraculous tie-ins. Now they’ve broadened out to a full team we’re seeing a lot more of Adrien alongside the girls, and Nino is the elusive hero who shows up once in a blue moon. At least this time his name isn’t in the title of the gotdam show.......

Anyway, I can see I’m supposed to draw my “fave Kwami”. Better get to it.

Felix just wants a break. Just one break. But not in this magazine.

Speaking of seeing more of Adrien (and, tragically, less of Nino), this is the kind of splash page I want to see! Both kids are here! The banner themed with Marinette’s signature flowers is a nice touch too; that’s associated with her arts ‘n’ crafts in the show already and it makes sense to apply it to the creative portion of this magazine too.

I LOVE the promotion of Chat Noir nails as something the little girls buying this magazine will definitely want to try. I’d expect them to do Marinette vs Ladybug nails, but instead we get a boyish option! Hell yeah!

I’m a little confused by the Queen Bee masks apparently going on the Chat Noir nails though. I guess they’re friends? Is this secret AdriChlo confirmation? Watch out, Marinette, Kagami’s not the one to be worried about.

SURE WOULD BE NICE TO HAVE SOME TURTLE STICKERS FOR AN ALL-BOYS THEME BUT I GUESS NOT HUH

Next up is a short merch catalogue (why would you put the big bold arrow pointing right to the underoos.....). Would those Chat Noir socks come in my size? Asking for me.

Then there’s......... this page. FANGIRL ALERT. God. It’s like the Ladyblog, if only the Ladyblog ever gave a heck about reporting what Chat Noir’s up to.

THE SPELL WAS BROKEN AND THE FANDOM IMPLODED WITH JOY.

I really have to wonder what age range this is meant for. Do kids know what a “fandom” is? Do little girls consider themselves “fangirls”? I guess most kids have enough internet access to figure it out these days (all the hashtags and LOLs and memes speak volumes), but I can’t imagine being young enough to fit the target range of this magazine while also knowing these terms. I dunno.

(Also, the definition of ‘implosion’ is ‘an instance of something collapsing violently inwards’, so I’m not sure that’s the word they’re looking for. Unless the return to the status quo in Dark Cupid and the continuing stagnation of the love square was enough to make people quit in frustration? Probably.)

I’m filling it in, of course. Because I must.

I gave up on the pre-approved ratings system pretty much right away, but I think this is an accurate rating of my LadyNoir opinions. 

I might be kinda cynical about it here, but I am actually pretty fond of how this magazine sells Ladybug and Chat Noir as a couple. The show’s portraying it as very onesided lately, with Chat pining over Ladybug who has absolutely no interest in him (Glaciator was a TERRIBLE episode and I’m still hurting from it), but reading this zine I’d guess they were already dating. It’s cheesy, but in a nice way.

I have to laugh at “the most amazing thing about this super duo is that they always look out for and protect each other” though. Chat’s usually pretty focused on LB, sure, but there are endless instances of LB using Chat as cannon fodder and just generally abandoning him to get mauled by akuma while she carries out her personal private plan to save the day. Maybe we’re just focusing on the better-written episodes, huh?

Moving ahead. I’ve been dreading this page since reading “Plaggs Pranks & LOLs” on the back of the packaging. I feel hatred in my very bones just looking at it.

I like that there’s ONE instance of the term “ladybird” in the joke column. This is a UK-based magazine and that IS the word we tend to use over here - “ladybug” is an Americanism - but it’s like they’re worried kids could have got to the middle of this magazine about a superhero named Ladybug and then not understand the bug jokes. Maybe whoever was writing this page slipped up?

OH NOOOOO. MARINETTE, NOOOOOOOOOO.

THIS IS WHY FELIX GOT RID OF YOU, PLAGG. THESE ARE ADRIEN’S PROBLEMS NOW.

(mmm whatcha saaaaay)

I mean........... YEAH, I guess, but we absolutely did see Plagg destroy Felix with an entire shelf of heavy books. I guess he’s nicer with Adrien. It’s all fun and games until someone has a nervous breakdown in the library.

I do love the concept of Tikki getting glitter-bombed by Plagg through the mail. She just curiously opens up the little letter which got slipped into Marinette’s purse, and-- WOOSH. One entire wall of Mari’s room is glittery except for a little Tikki-shaped silhouette. 

Next up is a two-page comic which is absolutely adorable! Look at those little chibis! The warm and soft colour palette! This is nicer than most of the official Miraculous comic book art I’ve seen, I hope they keep giving this artist work.

Nino’s here too (and he looks great!), and I like the touch of Marinette and Adrien playing as each other’s superhero characters. Adrien even wins the match, though I guess there’s something to be said about Ladybug beating Chat Noir (again)...... 

It does raise the question yet again of where this tie-in merchandise is coming from! They’ve had action figures, a movie, music video features, now an arcade game... Who’s getting the royalties here? Who’s profiting? Is this how Fu can afford to buy all those rare ingredients for the magic potions?

Over the page we have an activity to Design your Secret Lair! Right away I love the Marinette theme of the page, the soft pink and flowers, and the drawing space looking like a page in a binder with marker tabs and everything.

I have to design my secret lair, of course: 

What do you think? I’m very creative. I’ll need an adult to send in the drawing of my hideout but I think I’ve really got a shot at those unicorn headphones.

Now we’re on to puzzles and character pages. I don’t know what ol’ Gabe is doing trying to meet a 13 year old girl in the dead of night without telling anyone, you’d think if he’s got that much free time on his hands he could be spending it with his son.

I don’t know how those points in Ladybug’s power profile are awarded or what they mean, but you can tell this is a fan magazine. Official sources would have put her at a 10.

Standard House of Villains page! Most of these were good episodes but I’m deeply offended Riposte isn’t on here. Maybe her motives weren’t dramatic and cartoonish enough to be up in the ranks with Glaciator and Gorizilla?

“Cat Noir’s dad is also the evil Hawk Moth”, huh? I mean that’s not WRONG, but is it really something to put in his power profile when Adrien doesn’t even know yet??? Feels like we’re kinda jumping the gun on the poor boy. What if he picks up this magazine?

Apparently he’s one point weaker than Ladybug (seriously???), two points faster, equally as agile, one point less skilled and two points less cool. Despite all those lesses he still comes out at an equal 9, which is a relief! These kids are a team, putting either of them below the other would have been a big no.

I did the colouring page too, naturally. Je suis un artiste.

Now we’ve got a page fresh from the Ladyblog, a Miraculous quiz! Not a lot of excitement, but it’s nice to see Alya getting her own section.

I like that the qualifications of “you could be Ladybug herself!” are knowing what city Marinette lives in and what school she goes to. Well done, Mari! You’re doing your best!!!

TEACHER I AM SO HUNGRYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY

I gotta say, I’m not so sure about decorating donuts with fondant. I’ve never tried it so I could be wrong, but it feels like rolled icing instead of frosting(?) would be too heavy for an entire donut. The texture is totally different.

I mean I guess if you’re going to load your kids up on sugar you might as well go all the way. They’re going to look like they’ve eaten something horrible with all that black fondant, but they’ll have fun. Adrien would love these.

WHERE’S NINO. THIS IS JUST UNFAIR. You’ll have four out of five heroes, then a double of Marinette and Tikki? Maybe this just goes to show how little memorable dialogue Carapace has.

Though if “Spots On!” is Marinette’s dialogue and not Ladybug’s, why are the other transformation phrases attributed to Rena Rouge and Queen Bee instead of Alya and Chloé? Surely they could have picked something better for Marinette to justify having her on this list twice instead of Nino.

The next page brings us one of those flowchart quizzes! And ouch, yet again the absence of the other heroes is obvious. I can understand not including Chloé here since she’s technically not a “friendly” character yet, but no Nino? Alya and Marinette are close friends, but Adrien doesn’t really hang out with them without Nino around. Having the three of them together just seems strange.

I do like the little fashion page! They’re all cute and affordable and easy to find on the high street here. I’d love to see how other issues of this magazine are structured; is there a different fashion spot every time? Styles to channel each individual hero would be adorable.

Moving on to a tutorial for a Ladybug notebook! I would have made this, but I didn’t have the time nor a notebook to stick it to.

Between this and the donuts, it seems weird that these designs are based on, like... an actual beetle, eyes and antennae and all. Shouldn’t it be Ladybug’s symbol? These come across more like “fun animals” arts ‘n’ crafts instead of themed after Miraculous specifically. I think if I made this (or decorated the donuts) I’d miss out the head and match the spot pattern to Ladybug’s symbol. 

The hidden message design is adorable though. I can see this being a craft kids are super proud of.

Another activity page! I didn’t have a go at these but they’re pretty standard. It’s cute that the coded message designs are the same as the stickers and nail decals!

Also, apparently Ladybug’s ‘secret’ is “LB mask + heart + CN mask”, which was (somehow) stolen by Volpina. Is that the secret Hawk Moth was talking about earlier in the magazine? Is he blackmailing Ladybug with revealing she has a crush on Chat Noir? How did Volpina ‘steal’ this secret? Is LadyNoir finally reciprocated???? THIS IS A WHOLE EPISODE IN ITSELF, I NEED ANSWERS--

Next page we have an ad for another girly magazine (Quizzes! LOLs! Celebs! Cringes! Puzzles!). I think I’ll pass, no matter how appealing that giant microphone pen is. 

And a “Miraculous Identity” quiz! Tikki’s apparently super fickle with her wielders, three seasons of relentlessly praising Marinette and now she’s telling us we’re the Chosen Ones. You can’t fool me with those big ol’ eyes.

My inner superhero is Marvellous Fox, by the way. Though yet again I’m noticing we don’t have turtle options...................

And on the back cover... the memes. Oh, sweet lord, the memes. They’re hashtag-SoRelatable! And I can cut them out to keep! Oh boy!!!

Is this what kids do when they have limited internet access? Cut fresh memes out of magazines and carry them around? I need to know.

That’s a very sinister Ladybug at the bottom of the page though. What’s-- What’s she going to do to me if I don’t cut out and keep these memes. Ladybug what are you going to do if I d--

Well that brings us to the end of the magazine! And yet again I’m surprised by how much time it takes to just put a bunch of photos together and write about them.

This is a neat little magazine all in all! The ‘free gifts’ are pretty nice, there’s a fair amount of content and the whole thing is pretty cute for young fans of the show. I could see myself buying this again - if it ever shows up on shelves, Miraculous is so scarce around here that I fully expect it to disappear again after this one issue - just for the free junk, but it would be interesting to see how they’d structure different issues too!

I notice we never did get that promised tutorial on how to draw Pollen; the one advertised on the cover. Was the “draw your favourite Kwami” activity supposed to cover that? I’m not sure that really counts.

If you got this far, thanks for joining me on this Miraculous journey! We’ll meet again whenever I get another piece of weird ML merch to cover. Bien joué!

[moonsabr]

Disney Fever Rant

Let’s be honest with ourselves, the Family Friendly Disney©️™️ Corporation became nothing but another soulless, creatively bankrupt, money hungry business that has a board full of greedy — potentially and allegedly (don’t sue me Disney) potentially criminally so — directors who, according to Abigail Disney allegedly underpay their employees, and only put in any sort “effort” (READ: spending half of their film’s marketing budget buying up opening night seats to make sure that every single one of their films makes $1 Billion dollars because God forbid Disney have a single flop), believed they didn’t need to market Galaxy’s Edge because Chief Executive Asshole Bob “I know we’re having a bad quarter & our PR is in the shitter but imma take a book tour for my autobiography real quick” Iger thought it would market itself (this is the same Disney CEO Bob Iger, by the way, who keeps raising prices because he’s so confident in the brand created, built, and embedded permanently within previous decades of Americana due to the hard work and creative genius of Walt Disney that he believes he can peddle out absolute garbage without consequence. CEO of Disney Lil’ Bitch Bobbie “My salary is 1,000x Greater Than the Average Disney Employees Even Though My Decisions Are Causing a Cutback in Hours and Even Getting People Laid Off” Iger really got his head up his ass because he believes he can say shit insanely out of touch and greedy shit like “[I can’t imagine] a maximum price guests will pay for a ticket to [our] theme parks” and keep hiking up the prices until one day, big surprise, this foolish, smug turd charged too much or didn’t market enough or maybe, people are just not blinded by the now-defunct and decades-long neglected Disney Magic™️ because the man in charge is more focused on a single-minded and extremely concerning-to-artistic-integrity-and-the-very-concepts-of-free-speech-and-fair-trade-and-anti-monopolistic fair business practices of purchasing every potentially lucrative IP known to man in a move so anti-competitive that they were forced by the fucking U.S. Justice Department to sell off some of their news properties — oh, but it’s okay, guys! The extremely hardworking and under-appreciated employees of Disney World will finally be making a baseline amount of $15/hour, so at least those hardworking folks can have the chance of affording a shared apartment less than 40 minutes away from the park! And hey, at least we’ll inevitably get a Summer Blockbuster X-Men trilogy, which I’m sure won’t be a bland and extremely superficial set of films more concerned with entertaining a general audience than preserving the heart of X-Men and why it was created and what it continues to symbolize. Good Ol’ Bobbie Buy-ger’s “Hello, Fellow Children” Disney will absolutely not make a mockery of the integrity with which those contemporaneously radical set of complex and volatile cultural and sociopolitical issues of the 1960′s were addressed via the humanization of both the protagonistic X-Men, who were peaceful advocates for the (then-primarily racially coded) mutants’ integration and equality within a society that is terrified and disgusted by them, in contrast with the slowly developing and unexpected depth of character and humanization of the members of the Brotherhood of Mutants, who are constantly portrayed as an antagonistic but not wholly evil foil to the X-Men as a much more violent group of radicals with a more extreme and militant approach to gaining mutant’s rights (coded heavily at the time, of course, as the Black Panther Movement) which fought for an apartheid with a zealous “Mutant’s First” slogan, believing themselves superior to humans without the X-Gene. And because of the appropriately addressed and carefully handled themes, mutants occasionally even switched sides because after all, they were all fighting for mutant rights. Baring in mind the intricacies and mature themes of X-Men and the MCU’s masterfully sophisticated and tactfully manifold take on sexism which can be succinctly summarized as “WOMAN GOOD; MAN BAD” (which strikes me as particularly unusual narrative composition to frame the villain, who has assaulted a stranger and stolen his property because he gave her a cheesy pickup line that wasn’t particularly sexual or intimidating, as the hero of the story — clearly, if the Disney MCU is willing to create such an experimental piece of avant-garde cinema verité wherein the reality of a cruel, spiteful, and sadistic person is constantly thrust into the spotlight and incessantly touted as a heroic figure is put on display. None of this would have been possible, however, without a courageously flawless and unconventional choice to hire Brie Larson via the application of typage casting, allowing Boden and Fleck to shine a  b l a c k  m i r r o r , if you will allow me to be so edgy and bold as to use such a trite phrase in this post Netflix world, on our own flawed society, they will be capable of producing a mere three trivial films on something so relatively simplistic as translating the extremely volatile and divided zeitgeist of race relations in the height of the civil rights movement into a modern, appropriate, and respectful piece of representative fiction.

I’m sure Disney CEO Bob “Galaxy’s Edge Only Severely Underperformed Because People Were Worried There Would Be Too Many People There and This Has Nothing to Do With the Fact that I Thought My Dick Was Bigger Than It Actually Is and So I Thought I Could Get Away Without Marketing it Whatsoever Until Like 3 Months Before it Opened in Disneyland Because I Realized (but will never, ever admit) that I Fucked Up After they Low Crowds in Disney World and Over-Estimated the Current Value Of the Star Wars Brand After Green-Lighting A Film Wherein All the Original Characters Left Were Bastardized and Shat On So Now Everyone Who Wants to Watch TV Will Have A 35% Chance of Being Assaulted By Our Incessant Ads for this Bullshit Because I Bought a Bunch of Shit with No Creative Vision in Mind and Am So Incompetent and Think So Lowly of My Own Customer Base that I Signed Off on a Plan for This Park that Didn’t Include Most of the ‘Immersive Experience’ as Advertised Because I Truly Believe Most Consumers are So Stupid That They Will not Notice or Care that They’ve Paid ~$400-$500 per Person to Get Access to a Glorified Shopping Mall with Extremely Overpriced Toys that You Can’t Even Use within Park Grounds” Iger will make sure these concepts are addressed via internal, philosophical dilemmas such as “What level of respect do we owe to our oppressors?” and “How much humanity should we offer to those who don’t offer us the same courtesy in return?” that were written and drawn by a couple of Jewish WWII-Veterans who had fought violently on enemy soil for their right to live and be seen as human and were, twenty years later, observing an uprising against a disturbingly similar “Separate but Equal” system that was reminiscent of the insidious and dehumanizing relegation of German Jewish communities into ghettos implemented early during the Nazi regime. I’m just feeling so fucking positive about this Fox acquisition guys, because I’m just so sure somebody whose very goal is to buy up all his competition and suppress even the most constructive of criticism is truly concerned about honestly and properly representing a title with so many counter-cultural and anti-establishmentarian ideals that aren’t already commonly accepted in today’s political climate, right? At least we get the X-Men in the MCU, right gamers?!?!?!?!!!!!!

Regardless of how you feel about Disney, you can’t deny that the company’s board atm is entirely creatively bankrupt and out of touch. For god’s sake, they created a hyper-realistic CGI remake of The Lion King that perfectly represents the state of the Disney Corporation today: bland, boring, forgettable, and completely lacking in any sort of creative vision.

[psychosistr]

Prince Nori- Chapter 1

Summary: Kakyoin Noriaki, a homeless, asexual, stand-using high schooler in the kingdom of Morioh, does the best he can to get by on his own in life. One day the course of his fate shifts drastically when he meets another teenage stand user- a boy named Jojo on the run from his own family.

Notes: So, this is actually an Aladdin!AU I came up with some time ago. I debated about posting it since I don’t have a ton of chapters ready for it yet, but my best friend encouraged me to go ahead and post what I had for asexual awareness week...which, unfortunately, I missed by a day because I spent the entire week moving to a new apartment and dealing with the headache that entailed -_-” Anyway, hope you enjoy!

Life goes on as it usually does for the residents of the bustling, busy kingdom of Morioh. Stores and stands are opened for business, selling food and trinkets to anyone who passes by. Kids are playing in the park. Students are on their way to school. And, overlooking the entire busy town, guards and police stand watch around the lavish castle that houses the kingdom’s royal family: The Kujos.

Yes, it is another fine day for all who call this town home.

Well…                                                            

Except for one particular boy currently being chased down by the police…

Skidding around the corner, a boy who looks to be in his late teens narrowly avoids crashing into a takoyaki vendor. At the last minute, a ghostly figure appears behind him- a strange being with a green body that quickly unravels itself into several tendrils that lift the boy up into the air and allow him to swing over the frightened vendor. The ghostly figure is invisible to all except for the boy himself, though, so to everyone else it just looks like he took an impressively large jump over the obstacle.

The boy lands a few feet away and continues running, ignoring the angered calls from the police officers to stop. His body and most of his face remain covered thanks to the long, tattered, hooded brown coat he wears, but his hands- one of which is holding a plastic bag of stolen food (the reason for the police chasing him)- are still free, which allows him to flip off the already enraged officers.

The lower half of his face is visible, allowing a smirk to show just below the edge of the hood’s shadow. “This is almost too easy.” He rounds another corner into an empty alleyway and the green figure from earlier appears behind him at his call. “Hierophant Green!”

The Hierophant splits itself into several green tendrils once more. A good portion of them wrap around the boy’s free hand while the rest shoot up towards one of the surrounding rooftops. This allows the boy to be easily lifted up onto the roof quick enough that, by the time the police arrive, he is already out of sight.

“Where’d he go?!” One police officer shouts furiously.

“He can’t be far! Keep looking!” Another replies.

The hapless officers run off down separate alleyways to search for him, unaware that their target is watching them from above with an amused smirk still on his face.

With the coast clear, the boy sets down his bag of ill-gotten provisions and begins taking off his coat. Removing the concealing garment reveals a boy of average height with a slightly muscular build to his slender and fit body. He has short red hair with an interesting stylized strip of bangs hanging down along the side of his face, purple eyes, and is dressed in a green school uniform and two cherry shaped earrings dangling from his ears. Two of the green tendrils from the Hierophant are seen wrapped around his waist, holding a brown school bag in place.

On the front of the bag is a tag with a name written on it- “Kakyoin Noriaki”.

Kakyoin takes the bag once the green tendrils release it and pops open the clasp so he can carefully fold and tuck his coat into the bag for later. “Not a bad escape, I suppose.” He comments to Hierophant Green while picking up his bag of food. “Now then, we should get back before Iggy throws a fit.”

The green specter nods silently and lays its tendrils out over a gap in the rooftops for Kakyoin to easily walk across.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As he reaches a run-down, boarded up factory residing in one of the much poorer neighborhoods of the city, Kakyoin uses Hierophant Green once again to lift him up to a broken window on the second floor that he can easily fit through.

Landing on the other side, he hears a familiar growl followed by a series of barks that he recognizes as something along the lines of “It’s about time!”

Kakyoin looks at the small black and white dog approaching him along the scaffolding of the high-ceilinged building. The dog barks and a strange looking being that seems almost half-animal and half-machine appears behind him. The being then turns into sand that the dog jumps on top of and easily slides down as it forms a loose ramp connecting him to the platform that Kakyoin is standing on.

Kakyoin chuckles slightly at the impatient glare the dog gives him and reaches into the plastic bag. “Don’t worry, Iggy, I didn’t forget.” He pulls out a pack of coffee flavored gum and tears a few pieces out of their wrappers before handing them down to the dog.

Iggy gives him a smirk and snatches the unwrapped pieces out of his hand with his teeth before the animal-machine specter from earlier reappears and takes the rest of the pack from Kakyoin’s other hand. Feeling proud of himself, the dog runs off and jumps up on top of a dusty stack of crates to enjoy his treat in peace.

Kakyoin gives him a look that is only mildly annoyed by the dog’s antics. “Really? You could have just asked.” He sighs and shakes his head as he walks off towards one of the rooms- one of the few that actually has a lock on the door with the faded outline of the previous foreman’s name still visible on the frosted glass. “I’m going to lie down for a bit before school.”

His only response from the dog is a muffled grumbling noise as he continues to chew his gum that Kakyoin takes to mean “Whatever.”

Kakyoin summons Hierophant Green once more and has it reach through a tiny hole at the top of the door with one of its tendrils, loop it around to the lock on the other side, and open the door. Only once the door is closed firmly behind him does Kakyoin allow his passive expression to melt away into one of weariness.

He leaves the Hierophant out as he sits down on the ratty old mattress lying in the corner of the room. It wasn’t much of a bedroom, but he had claimed this office as his own since it was safer leaving his stuff in a room that could actually be locked while he was out or sleeping, so it was the best of a bad situation.

“You’re getting bored of this too, aren’t you, Hierophant Green?” He asks without looking at the green figure floating in the air beside the bed. He knows it won’t respond, verbally or otherwise, so he focuses instead on taking a small container of cherries out of the bag of food. “It’s just the same thing, every day. Day in, day out.” He pops one of the cherries into his mouth, playing with it on the tip of his tongue and making quiet “rero rero” sounds until he grows bored enough to actually eat it. “There has to be more to life than this..” He sighs after spitting the pit into a rusted-out metal waste basket near the bed.

He eventually ends up lying down on his back, staring up at the ceiling with a frown. ‘There has to be more to life than this..’ He repeats in his mind before closing his eyes and settling down for a well-earned nap.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Later that day, on his way to class, Kakyoin hears voices shouting in a familiar manner.

“Stop!”

“Get back here!”

He instinctively tenses up and prepares to run, thinking the police are after him again, when he remembers that he’s not wearing his coat and hasn’t done anything since changing his clothes, so why would anyone be after him?

Looking towards the voices down the street answers Kakyoin’s question pretty easily: The cops are chasing someone else for a change.

Kakyoin has a good vantage point from his spot on the sidewalk, as it’s at the top of a small hill. He can clearly see a man in a hooded cloak running down the street with a few men chasing him. The men chasing him are dressed in uniforms, but they look a bit different from the local police uniforms- military, perhaps?

Kakyoin grows increasingly more curious, as it doesn’t look like the man’s stolen anything. Then, the man does something that firmly grabs Kakyoin’s attention- he summons a purple spirit behind himself with a shout of “Star Platinum!” The man uses the spirit to knock over objects and stalls behind him as he runs, making it more difficult for the officers to follow him.

Kakyoin watches as the man turns down an alleyway and frowns. “That’s a dead end..” He mutters to himself as he watches the officers start to follow him.

He should ignore this…

He should head to school before he’s late…

He shouldn’t get involved…

Even with all of these things considered, he still ends up summoning Hierophant Green and hoisting himself up onto the rooftops.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The man in the hooded cloak reaches the end of the alleyway and curses when he finds himself trapped between a few buildings. “Damn it..” A scowl is visible on the lower half of his face as he starts looking for a way out, the sound of the officers’ footsteps approaching quickly. Then, suddenly, a series of green tendrils drop down near him. “What the..?”

“Hey!” A voice above him calls. He looks up to see who it is, but the sunlight over the top of the building only gives him a silhouette. “You look like you could use a hand! Grab on!”

“……” The man contemplates it for a moment, obviously hesitant to trust the stranger calling to him. However, he seems to realize his lack of options as the footsteps and voices draw nearer and reluctantly grabs onto the strange green things with both his own hands and one of the purple hands of his Star Platinum. “Yare yare..” He grumbles, but holds on tight as he’s quickly yanked up onto the roof.

At least it was better than letting the officers catch him…

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Kakyoin uses Hierophant to pull the man up onto the roof beside himself, then grabs his arm to pull both of them out of sight of the officers below. There are confused shouts as the men down on the ground try to figure out where he went. Once the officers run back the way they came, thinking maybe they got the wrong alley or something, Kakyoin finally releases the man’s arm with a sigh.

“Well, that was certainly a close one.” He looks at the man beside him with a calm smile. “First time running the police, hm?” He asks in a slightly teasing tone.

“…They’re not police.” The man responds after a moment. Kakyoin could tell the man was eyeing him suspiciously, even with his eyes covered. “Who are you and why did you help me?”

Kakyoin shakes his head with a “tsk tsk” sound. “Don’t you know that it’s rude to ask for someone else’s name before giving your own?” When the only reply he receives is silence and a continuous covered glare, he relents and decides to answer anyway. “Kakyoin Noriaki. And this-” He has his green guardian reform from the tendrils behind him and points at it with a thumb over his shoulder. “-is Hierophant Green. I suppose you could say that’s why I decided to help you- I haven’t seen too many people who have these spirits like you and I do.”

“..!” Even with his eyes covered, the look of surprise on the man’s face is easily visible. His head tilts down for a moment, as if he’s thinking about something, before he looks up again and finally raises his hand up to remove his hood. “You can call me Jojo.” He summons the purple spirit from earlier and it floats behind him with its arms crossed. “And this is my stand, Star Platinum.”

Kakyoin is surprised to see that the man he’d saved is actually quite young. In fact, he appears to be about the same age as Kakyoin, so it may be more apt to refer to him as a boy. He has dark hair and exotic blue-green eyes. He must be part foreigner, Kakyoin thinks, which means they have something in common besides their..what did he call them? Stands? He seemed to know a bit about them, as well, which certainly interests Kakyoin even more.

“Nice to meet you both. “ Kakyoin says with a polite smile. “Now that the introductions are out of the way, why were those men after you? Did you steal something? Are you a wanted criminal?” He asks, partly curious, partly teasing.

“They were trying to drag me home..” Jojo answers with a scowl before looking around. “So, how do we get down from here?”

“Do you want those guys to catch you?” Kakyoin inquires with a raised eyebrow.

Jojo shakes his head. “Of course not.”

“Then take my advice: Avoid the ground.” Kakyoin snaps his fingers and Hierophant Green unravels itself once more, creating a rope bridge for them between their current rooftop and an adjacent one. It’s wider than what Kakyoin would usually summon for himself, but it’s apparently still small enough to make Jojo look at it cautiously. “Don’t worry, it’s safe- I do this all the time.” He steps onto the bridge to demonstrate and even jumps on it a few times to show how stable it is.

“……” Jojo still doesn’t look convinced.

Kakyoin sighs and holds out his hand towards Jojo. “Fine. Here, take my hand. If you’re worried I’ll try something like dropping you, then you can just hold on and take me down with you- fair enough?”

“……” Jojo finally sighs in annoyance and walks up to the bridge. He grips Kakyoin’s hand firmly with his own larger one and doesn’t seem too keen on letting go anytime soon. “If you try anything, I’ll break your arm before we hit the ground.” He warns with a glare.

“I’m already trembling in fear.” Kakyoin replies sarcastically as he leads Jojo across the Hierophant’s bridge. When they reach the end, he has Hierophant form another bridge to the next rooftop, starting a pattern as they walk with their hands still connected. “Was that your first time running from the law?” He asks in an attempt to help the other teen calm down.

Jojo grunts in reply at first, clearly trying too hard not to look down as they walk across another Hierophant-bridge. He answers once they’re on the rooftop of the next building and he relaxes his grip slightly. “No..but it was my first time getting this far.”

Kakyoin chuckles, loosening his grip marginally as well since Jojo seems to be calming down slightly. “I could tell- you clearly don’t know the streets that well. Were you running anywhere in particular, or just trying to escape?”

“Hmh..second one, I guess.” Jojo answers before they cross another bridge. His grip is still firm, but nowhere near as bruising as before. “I just wanted to get out for a bit.”

“Running away from home, then?” Kakyoin smiles calmly as they talk. Talking with Jojo feels pretty easy, compared to how most of his conversations with his peers tend to go.

“…Only for a bit.” Jojo answers after a pause.

“Well..if you want..” Kakyoin isn’t sure what possesses him to ask this, but he finds himself compelled to do so. “You are welcome to stay at my place ‘for a bit’.”

Jojo eyes him, a toned-down version of his earlier cautious expression. “Would your family be okay with that?” Ah, a roundabout way of asking if he lived with anyone. Smooth.

“I don’t live with them, so I suppose not.” Kakyoin offers him a reassuring smile over his shoulder. “I live by myself- well, with a dog- but neither of us are going to say anything.”

Jojo glances away for a minute or so, apparently weighing his options, before he finally shrugs. “Fine. Not like I have anything better to do.”

Kakyoin smiles more and gives the other boy’s hand a reassuring squeeze. “Hopefully the mess won’t scare you off.” He says with a chuckle.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“This is where you live?” Jojo asks when they reach the old factory that Kakyoin calls home. He looks confused and more than a little out of his element. “How the hell do you even get in?” He questions when he sees the boarded up doors.

Kakyoin points to the window he uses every day for entry. “Up there.” He summons Hierophant green and offers Jojo his hand. “Don’t worry, I won’t drop you.” He says with a slight smirk while offering his hand once again.

Jojo takes it with a bored expression. “You’d regret it before either of us hit the ground.”

“I don’t doubt that at all.” Kakyoin chuckles as he uses Hierophant green to bring both of them up to the window. He gives Jojo some help settling on the platform on the other side before looking around for his “roommate”. “Hm..he should be around here somewhere..” He brings two fingers to his mouth and uses them to whistle. “Iggy, you here?”

Jojo looks at him curiously when he hears the name. “You have a dog named Iggy..?”

Kakyoin looks at him with a shrug. “I wouldn’t say I ‘have’ a dog named Iggy, it’s more like I LIVE with a dog named Iggy.”

Jojo narrows his eyes while looking around, presumably for the dog in question. “Is he black and white with blue eyes and a stand that turns into sand?”

Kakyoin gives Jojo a surprised look at the completely correct assumption. “How did you-?”

He is surprised once again when Iggy suddenly jumps down from the rafters with a snarling growl, his stand acting as a paraglider before transforming into a spear made of sand pointed directly at Jojo’s head. He growls and snarls in a way that clearly means “DIE!”

Jojo summons Star Platinum, fully prepared to defend himself as the stand reels its fist back for a vicious punch. This time, however, it is Kakyoin’s turn to surprise both of them when he steps between the two stand users with his arms outstretched. He has his back to Jojo and is facing Iggy & his stand head on, effectively shielding Jojo with his body without even trying to call out his own stand.

“?!!!!” The protective posture surprises both the boy and the dog and makes them stop in their tracks.

Star Platinum disappears behind Jojo while Iggy, thankfully, has his stand drop its spear-form mid-air just before it reaches Kakyoin.

Once they’ve both recalled their stands, Kakyoin looks between them calmly. “I’m going to assume you two know each other?” He looks over his shoulder at Jojo for the first explanation.

Jojo nods, keeping a wary eye on Iggy but not making any moves to call out Star Platinum again. “Yeah. My grandpa brought him here from overseas when he found out he had a stand, too. He stayed with us for a few months before he got out and didn’t bother coming back.”

Kakyoin hums thoughtfully when Jojo finishes his explanation. “I see. I understand why he ran away, though- he clearly hates being kept around like some sort of pet.” He looks down at Iggy next. “And I’m going to assume you attacked him because you thought Jojo was here to take you back with him?”

Iggy looks off to the side and sits on the floor, keeping Jojo visible in the corner of his eye. He gives a huff and a short growl that Kakyoin takes to mean “Yeah…”

Kakyoin drops his arms but does not move from his spot. “How interesting..” He smiles in amusement as he glances between the two of them. “It seems I’ve attracted two runaways from the same household.”

Iggy looks Jojo up and down with a raised brow that seems to be asking “Really? You too?”

Jojo sticks his hands in the pockets of his cloak with a shrug. “Just for a little bit- needed some fresh air.” He looks back down at Iggy. “I won’t say anything.”

Iggy seems to accept Jojo’s promise and walks off with a nod.

Kakyoin finally steps away from where he was standing and gestures for Jojo to follow him with a hook of a finger over his shoulder. “Now that that’s cleared up, we can hang out in my room. It’s not much to look at, but it has a place to sit and there’s food if you’re hungry.”

Jojo quietly follows him towards the locked room, looking around at the dilapidated factory with a vague sense of interest. “…How long have you lived here?” He finally asks while waiting for Kakyoin to open the door.

Kakyoin thinks the answer over while using Hierophant to get the lock like usual. “Lets see..it was just after last winter- this place is nice, but not well insulated against the cold, so I’ll probably move out once the temperature drops again- sooo..a few months, I suppose.” He hears and feels the lock click so he opens the door, entering before Jojo and taking a seat on the bed inside. “Iggy was already living here, so we worked out a deal- he lets me live here and guards my stuff while I’m out, and, in return, I give him a share of any food I find.” He pulls over his bag of food and digs around inside while waiting for Jojo to join him on the bed. “Do you like melon bread? Or rice balls? I also have some instant noodles if you’d rather have something hot.”

Jojo sits next to him, looking at the bag. “I don’t see a receipt in there..”

Kakyoin chuckles and pulls out some melon bread for himself before setting the bag down closer to Jojo. “That’s because they don’t give you a receipt for money you haven’t spent.”

Jojo eyes the bag for a minute more before finally reaching in and pulling out a rice ball. “You stole it.” It doesn’t sound like an accusation, merely a statement.

Kakyoin shrugs while tearing open the packaging around the bread. “I can’t exactly spend money that I don’t have.”

Jojo looks down at the rice ball in his hand with a serious, contemplative expression. “……” He looks back at Kakyoin with the same expression. “You seriously can’t afford a place to live or even feed yourself without stealing?”

Kakyoin takes a bite of his bread with another shrug. “Hmh..” He takes his time savoring the taste before he swallows and answers Jojo’s question. “Not really. It’s fine, though. I have a roof over my head that doesn’t leak too badly and I can get enough food to survive. I’m doing better than a lot of people in this city.”

Instead of looking appeased by his answer, Jojo just looks down with that same expression- as if he’s trying to learn and accept something he’s not used to. “…Are things..really that bad out here?”

“Kind of.” Kakyoin speaks between bites. “Some people are just better off than others- that’s the way things work, no matter where you go. There always needs to be a bottom rung in society so the rest can prosper by feeling better about themselves and striving not to end up like us.” He looks back over at Jojo with a sympathetic smile. “I’m guessing you haven’t really had to see any of this before, have you?”

Jojo shakes his head, finally peeling the wrapper off of his rice ball. “My family’s…pretty well off.” He takes a bite, looking down at the meaty filling inside of the rice. “Always been busy with lessons and shit..never really thought about things like not having enough to eat or where I’d sleep..”

Kakyoin finishes half of his bread and pulls the wrapper back up around it so he can set it down on the bed before leaning his weight back onto his hands behind himself. “I don’t think that’s a bad thing at all- it means that the system is working.”

Jojo looks at him with skeptical expression. “Seriously? You live in a dump and eat stolen food and say it’s NOT a bad thing?”

Kakyoin chuckles as he holds up one hand with his index finger extended. “First of all, that was rude- calling the place I live a dump.” He raises a second finger. “Second, the whole system ends up feeding into itself at some point or another: Sure, my occasional petty theft causes the local stores and vendors to lose out on a few yen. However, the fact that I always get away reinforces the idea that we need police officers around to try and catch thieves- meaning that people are encouraged to continue paying their taxes. It also raises awareness of the current poverty level and causes those with more money to feel guilty just long enough to make donations to charities.” He holds up a third finger beside the other two. “And, finally, there are problems in EVERY social class. My level deals with things like not having enough money for food or shelter or buying things I want, and people from what I’m assuming your level to be deal with more social-based stresses.” He lowers two of his fingers, leaving one extended pointedly at Jojo. “Otherwise you wouldn’t be out here. Am I right?”

Jojo sighs and finishes off his rice ball, tossing the wrapper towards the waste bin. “Yeah..” He watches it bounce off the rim with a bored expression. “You’re right…”

Kakyoin watches the other boy with a sympathetic but slightly amused smile as the ball of trash falls off to the side of the basket. “You in the mood to talk about why you were out on the street running from the not-police?”

“……” Jojo summons Star Platinum and has the stand pick the wrapper up off the floor to throw it away properly. “My family wants me to get married.”

Kakyoin raises an eyebrow at that. “Really? Already? You don’t look like you’re even done with high school yet.”

Jojo waves a hand dismissively with a grunt. “Not yet. I just turned seventeen. But..” He reaches up with one hand and scratches at the back of his head with a frown. “I have to find someone to marry before I turn eighteen. If I don’t, then I’ll have to marry our family’s advisor. It’s some shitty old law we have to follow..”

“Your advisor?” Kakyoin asks curiously. Jojo’s family must be pretty high-class to have one of those. “How old is he?”

“At least a hundred.” He says casually, as if it’s normal. “He doesn’t look it, but the guy’s been our family advisor since my grandfather’s grandfather was a kid. He got mixed up in some weird magic or something and now he doesn’t age- he can’t go out in the sunlight, though, so at least he’s easy to get away from.”

“Are you serious?” Kakyoin is beside himself with confusion and awe. A man who’s over a hundred years old that doesn’t age?! That’s remarkable! Yet Jojo says it with all the calmness and sense of normalcy of someone discussing the weather!! “He sounds fascinating.”

Jojo shrugs and leans back in a manner similar to Kakyoin. “I guess..still don’t wanna get stuck marrying someone like him- he’s creepy, loud, and always talks about himself in the third person..”

“Hm, not to mention the age factor has to be more than a little off-putting..” Kakyoin nods along sympathetically as Jojo speaks. “Then are you running away because your family keeps trying to introduce you to girls and you’re not into women?”

“I’m not really ‘into’ anyone..” Jojo tips his head back to look at the ceiling. “They don’t care if I end up with a girl or not, I just..” He sighs in irritation, a look on his face somewhere between a frown and a scowl. “I dunno..I think I’m just weird..I can’t get into the idea of dating someone I don’t know, but I don’t get out much..they set me up on dates with anyone close to my age that fits their idea of what I need, but they’re just…”

“Strangers.” Kakyoin finishes for him with an understanding smile while looking up at the ceiling too. “At the end of the day, they’re strangers. No matter how physically attractive they are or how they try to sell themselves on how great they are and why you should like them, you still don’t know them and they know nothing about you besides what they see on the surface.” He turns his head to look at Jojo’s slightly surprised expression and smiles more when he sees he hit the nail on the head. “I may not have the pressure of needing to get married within the next year, but I’m still seventeen, just like you: I’m expected to find people attractive and lust after them and want to go on dates with them and get excited when someone cute or popular in my class hands me a love letter..but I don’t.” He shrugs and leans back further so he can lie down on the mattress and stare up at the ceiling with his hands beneath his head to act as a make-shift pillow. “They claim they like me, but how can they?” He briefly summons Hierophant Green above himself and looks up at its unblinking eyes. “This is a part of who I am- if they can’t even see it, how can they actually know ME?” He closes his own eyes, recalling the many love letters and confessions he’d started receiving after hitting puberty. “It sucks being alone, but I’m simply uninterested in dating someone who doesn’t understand me just on the sole-merit that they’re attractive and we might have sex one day. That thought isn’t exactly tempting for me…so…maybe I’m weird, too.” He opens his eyes and looks up at Jojo with a calm smile. “But I don’t think that’s a bad thing, either.”

Jojo stares down at him for a long time, just silently looking over Kakyoin with that same contemplative expression from earlier. “……” He eventually lets the corner of his mouth raise ever-so-slightly into what, for him, is probably the closest he gets to a smile. “I think I agree with you this time.”

He leans back further, not quite lying down like Kakyoin is, but enough that he can recline back against the wall next to the mattress. They sit together after that in a peaceful silence, one where awkward small-talk and conversation is not needed to understand one another. Kakyoin finds he likes this feeling of contentment, something he’s not used to feeling around other people.

He also finds that he likes seeing Jojo’s smile quite a bit…

Next Chapter->

End Notes: So, I came up with this idea one day when I was babysitting one of my cousins and texting my best friend. My cousin and I were watching Aladdin (the animated one, thank goodness) while my best friend and I were talking about JJBA. One thing led to another and soon I came up with the idea of making an Aladdin!AU with this cast set up: Kakyoin as Aladdin, Jotaro as Jasmine, Joseph as the sultan (married to both Suzie Q and Caesar x3), Iggy as a combo-role for Rajah and Abu, Polnareff as the genie, Abdul as a magic fire spirit that controls a flying carpet and is Polnareff’s boyfriend, DIO as Jafar with his servants/henchmen in the story, and Hol Horse kinda filling the role for Iago as the assistant/servant that gets away with being sarcastic/acting as comedic relief occasionally.

Depending on the responses I get from this first chapter both on Tumblr and on AO3, I’ll see about writing more chapters for it :)