#the trials are what got him into power and eventually the apocalypse so it would make SENSE it all started with the opposite of what the

[coern]

two embers needs to release soon already so I can have a little more of an excuse to draw alef and resh as siblings and draw them to six trillion years and overnight story

[alicelufenia]

From Long Prices to Long Odds - yep, I'm starting Pale Lights

While chipping away at my re-read of A Practical Guide to Evil, and with patch 8 of Baldur's Gate 3 STILL a ways out, I've started reading ErraticErrata's next big project - Pale Lights.

Right away I can tell how much the author's improved since book 1 of the Guide. We've got two point of view characters for our journey through the subterranean, post-apocalypse world of Vesper. Tristan Abrascal - orphan, street rat, and thief, with a vendetta to settle against the nobles who've wronged him; and Lady Angharad Tredegar, a noble in exile with nothing to her name save her sword arm and unshakable sense of honor, who has sworn vengeance against her family's killers, even as she's dogged by assassins at every step.

Both from worlds like night and day (or I guess that would be Gloam and Glare in this world), they could not be more different, but fate has set them on the same path; to survive to see their enemies punished, they must first survive the trials on the island - the Dominion of Lost Things - alongside other competitors from all walks of life, in order to escape their past and join the Watch, that special band of elite god-killers that toe the line between civilization and the monsters who lurk in the endless dark beyond the points of light.

And it really isn't any big spoiler or anything to mention contracts, basically pacts with supernatural beings for power and guidance. Both our main characters have them—Tristan with a minor god of luck (he's literally her only follower) called Fortuna, the Lady of Long Odds, who only he can interact with, and is constantly snarking at him; while Angharad's contract is with a mysterious entity of few words known only as the Fisher. Many other characters possess contracts that are detailed to varying degrees, but we get the closest look at them through our main characters, both patrons being just as different from each other as their human charges.

It's only a few chapters in that the supporting cast expands immensely, with over a dozen other competitors shipped off to the same destination. Some are paid for by a sponsor, like our protagonist duo, others are here by their own expense, mainly a group of Sacromontan nobles for whom getting even partway through the trials will gain them status with their families. And some are here because they have no other choice, forced in by debtors and legbreakers to pay with their lives or their eventual service in the Watch. Think Man in the Iron Mask meets And Then There Were None.

Keeping track of so many characters early on has been a challenge, but luckily the extremely prolific @gwennafran has created visual guides per chapter of the entire cast, their origins, abilities, affiliations, and status of living or dead or mia. It also serves as a handy reference to visualize what everyone looks like, the cast being just as diverse and multicultural as in the Guide, except everyone's human this time around.

Where the Guide draws from Mediterranean Europe and North Africa for its naming conventions and cultural touchstones, Pale Lights starts us off with a very Central and South America-inspired setting. Place names like Izcalli and Sacromonte, the nobles of the latter being referred to constantly as infanzones (literally minor nobles in Spanish), are just a few early examples. Right now the scope is very limited, starting in one city before moving to a "deserted" island, which is actually totally occupied by hollows, or "darklings", the extremely indigenous-coded pale-skinned people who have completely adapted to living in the total dark of Vesper, away from any pits of Glare (the perpetual light shining through cracks in firmament above, where most civilization gathers). Especially given we're already exploring class dynamics of nobles and non-nobles, I expect we'll also find the "Red Eye cultists" to be more than they appear at first.

I'm only 16 chapters in, and already am very much hooked. Both Tristan and Angharad serve as excellent foils for each other; pragmatist vs idealist, street smarts vs noble scion, untrusting to a fault vs too honorable for her own good. It's all very delicious, and I have reasons to root for both of them even as their beliefs and methods remain anathema to each other. One of the coolest things about a primarily single-perspective narrative are those times when you can see that character from an outsider's view, and because each chapter or two flips between protagonists, we get an impression of how both of them come across to other people, giving us a chance to be out of their heads for a bit.

Dunno how often I'll post live reading thoughts on this one, but I'll certainly try, including anytime I finish a book; which right now is just the two. But hey, at least with this one I'll be catching up to current releases, which is a nice change of pace.

[war-siren-au]

WARSIRENS AU DUMP PART 3 BABYYYYY

Y'all this one got lowkey sad, I'm not gonna lie 😭

Tw for death in this little au dump, but don't worry! It's not either of the skelebros

Papyrus eventually becomes Captain of The Royal Guard

Undyne was proud but also livid

She’s also slowly become a bit mad and cold and power hungry

Still maintains a high status though

With food and shit being scarce and shit from the apocalypse (it’s an apocalypse now, I’ve officially decided), Papyrus taught himself how to cook through trial, error, and some old foraging books he found while raiding an old supply store

Undyne still technically gave him lessons in the undercave, but once they hit the surface he kinda had to forgo all of that since there’s not really any working stoves

He cooks his meals on a fire like a proper survivor, dammit!

Doesn’t really get to cook often with the war and everything, but does so if rations are low

His cooking is genuinely pretty damn good, especially considering it’s mostly from stuff he can forage

Makes a little food go a long way somehow

The war and apocalypse rages on, Asgore grows more power hungry and merciless

Finally at some point, Sans and Papyrus get sent on a big mission leading a small squad of army monsters to take out a group of humans that had been targeting innocent monsters

It doesn’t go well

Most of the squadron dies, Sans and Papyrus get injured, the remaining few squadron members flee back to the settlement that acted as their base

Sans and Papyrus live and and manage to kill the remaining humans

They’re still injured though and not really in any shape to make the trek back, the settlement is a couple days away by foot, so they camp out in the woods (still by the coast) and patch each other up as best they can

They wait at first to see if anyone would come for them

However, the last thing the few monsters who’d fled saw was both Sans and Papyrus getting injured, getting knocked down

Undyne takes charge again in their absence, figures if they were still alive, they’d find a way to make the trek back

She gives them a week

Says if they’re too weak to return, they may as well be dust in the wind

Like I said, she also became more merciless and power hungry

Sans and Papyrus are presumed dead

Sans is a bit relieved when no one comes for them, but also fucking enraged

On the one hand, they were left for dead! They were some of their strongest fighters, and they were left for dead!

But on the other hand…

This was the out he’d been looking for

They could abandon the war and focus on surviving

Papyrus feels betrayed at first

How could they? He didn’t really trust anyone other than Sans anymore, but he thought they’d at least send search parties for them!

Not that they really had the time or resources for that, but to be deemed as unimportant enough to leave behind? As just another cluster of dust floating in the wind?

The feeling of betrayal quickly turns into anger and spite

Fine then

See how they get on without him and Sans

See how long they survive without them

Sans and Papyrus don’t go back

They leave behind some of their clothes in one of the many dust piles to make it seem like they’d truly died, if anyone stumbled upon the area

They travel along the coast after they heal a bit more

They’re still strong enough to fight off anyone they come across

So they disappear from the war

They miss their old squad mates, namely the canine unit, but they don’t look back

Sans had made them both masks out of wood and looted fabric so they wouldn’t be recognized

They travel for a while, never really staying in once place long, but eventually hunker down in an old department store

They bar up the doors and windows, leaving a few as escape routs if need be

They train to ensure they’re still in peak fighting condition

They refuse to get caught by surprise

It’s relatively peaceful for them for a few months, only occasionally having to fight off human looters and/or zombies depending on what kind of apocalypse I decide to make this into

They’re found by complete accident

The canine unit had been sent on another looting mission led by Undyne, the settlement always in need of food and supplies

The department store was kind of on the outskirts of a ruined town, so of course they eventually attempted to loot it

Sans and Papyrus obviously defended it, their magic attacks revealing who they were and that they were very much alive, very much not dust in the breeze like everyone had assumed

Undyne was pissed and went mad with rage

She attacked them and ordered the unit to do the same, calling them traitors to monster-kind

And so the fight began, a battle waged against those they used to call friends

Somewhere deep down inside them, it hurt Sans and Papyrus to fight them

But this fight, just like the rest, was kill or be killed

And they refused to die

Sans took on the canine unit while Papyrus fought Undyne

The dogs got a couple hits in, but ultimately, Sans was stronger

One by one, he took them down, their bodies soon crumbling into nothing more than ash

The fight between Papyrus and Undyne took a little longer

Undyne was fueled by her rage and crumbling sanity

Papyrus fueled by his own rage and the lingering feeling of being betrayed

Undyne fell, and despite his best efforts, a few tears escaped as Papyrus dealt the finishing blow

Sans had had to kill monsters before, those deemed as traitors by order of the King

But this was the first time Papyrus was forced to kill another monster

The first time he was forced to kill someone he’d once called a friend

Papyrus kept Undyne’s eyepatch

Sans kept Doggo’s daggers

They were silent as they scattered their dust into the sea

They were silent when they went back to the department store they’d made into their base

They were silent as they ate the dinner Papyrus had managed to make, the food tasting like ash in their mouths

Neither could sleep that night

Neither were prepared when they felt a sudden tug on their souls, that being their only warning before they collided with the concrete floor of a basement

And neither were prepared when they looked up, only to find skeletons who looked suspiciously like them standing over them

Yikes, another long one-

Anyways, I hope you guys enjoy! If you have any questions, my ask box is open! Idk if I'll actually make this into a concrete story or not, but who knows atp

I'll try to make a post explaining how sirens work and how I envision the monsters to kind of look like next

(also I'm very tempted to bring in a couple ocs, so lemme know if that's something you'd wanna see)

[ryder616]

Rewatching Orientation Part One

Tired, battered and pie-deprived, the agents are abducted to a future when Earth has crumbled, what's left of the populace fears Sharknados, tacos don't exist and citrus fruits are a staple of dating culture.

As apocalypses go, this one turned out the weirdest.

Orientation kicks off the grimmest and darkest season of the show and, right off the bat, the team's circumstances are off the scale dire, to a degree they had never been in the previous season openers: forcibly transported to a strange, miserable place barely hours after saving the planet from Aida and her cadre of fascist androids, out of their time, with no resources and - as they will soon learn - the highest stakes to date.

So, naturally, it's hilarious 😂

Behind all the meta jokes and genuine comedy, however, the exhaustion is palpable. Mack's the most vocal - the man's had it and can you blame him*? - but everyone must be soldiering on by sheer stubbornness and survival instinct, because they can't have much else left in their tanks.

Is it any wonder they'll eventually crack?

For now, they crack jokes, and do what they do best, if with an extra measure of snark: work the problem as a team, trusting and relying on each other.

As the second half of the season will illustrate quite harshly, it's not something they should be taking for granted.

*yes, some people can. In fact, I’ve seen him being called whiny and unprofessional, when it’s been merely hours since his daughter vanished in his arms. Idehtw.

Too Legit To Quit:

Not one season has gone by without Mack being taken to a place where he had to re-evaluate his professional choices.

And here he is in the same place again: “I’m not comfortable at the pace at which we face new trials and tribulations” he tells Coulson, and it feels like an understatement because the pace has been nothing but brutal.

Mack had already quit at the end of S2, only to be roped back in by circumstances, and sounded pretty close to do it again after Bobbi and Hunter left.

Each time - and clearly against his better judgement - he decided to stay, for no other reason than he was needed.

In retrospect, it feels like it was the shape of things to come.

Or maybe it's just that being the responsible sort is often a bitch 😁

Take Your Daughter To Work Day:

Coulson has been grooming Daisy for his (then different) job since S1 (1x09) and already wanted to hand her the directorship at the end of S3** - he told her as much in 4x08.

Now that his internal clock is ticking a little faster and louder each day, he doesn't have the luxury to wait for her to get on the same page, or at least in walking distance of the same page - I mean, she had scoffed at the mere allusion in 4x08 - and is only looking for affirmations.

And Daisy, as is often the case, delivers, picking up where she left off last season.

There's this scene where she casually changes Coulson's orders (for the better), finishing with a somewhat sheepish "sir". And Coulson just grins with fatherly pride: there she is, my Team Captain, you can practically hear him.

Yes, there she is, Phil. But you didn't take into account how the knowledge of losing you - and so soon after she's barely started to recover from the whole Hive business and losing Lincoln - would unmoor her.

Nor that your unshakable faith in her isn't something she has for herself. For you, the idea that Daisy could destroy the world is silly. For her, it's a fear manifesting. She's feared her powers before, and she's feared herself, especially so after Hive.

And, of course, you couldn't have anticipated Fitzler, nor that in the aftermath her fellow former Bus Kids would desert her.

**and if directorship candidate at 27, with only months of experience as team leader and less than 3 years as an agent sounds a little premature, remember that her comics counterpart was level 10 at 17. In comparison, live action Daisy is a hopeless underachiever 😂

She's Got The Powers:

Daisy disintegrates a Vrellnexian in much the same way she will the shrikes. It's cool and terrifying, and really makes you wonder how much she must be restraining herself when she's fighting humans or humanoids.

By S7 she'll be comfortable enough to joke about it ("Yeah, yeah, make fun of the person who can literally turn you to dust" 7x11) but the road is still long and treacherous at this point in time.

Meanwhile, Elena has not yet learned how to bullet time, which she will sometime after S5 and gloriously show off in 6x12.

Home Is Not A Bunker:

By Thor, do I hate the Lighthouse, the dingy, underground bucket of misery 😡

The Playground had texture, (some) color, homeyness: a kitchen, the lounge with a comfy sofa to play games. What little we saw of the rooms, they felt more like college dorms than military bunks. The director's office had clutter. It all felt liveable and lived in.

The Lighthouse is just grey everywhere and all we see, once it's the present again, is empty hallways, utilitarian rooms and the occasional, impersonal bunk.

Appropriate for the overall mood of this season, and cheap for the slashed production budget, I bet, but I really wish the place had blown up, never to be seen again. Or that they had at least set some scenes in the above ground part, which looks like it could be pretty cozy.

The hangar entrance is insanely cool, though, no complaints there.

When Life Gives You Lemons...

(Fun fact: one Italian slang word for "making out" is "limonare", which can be literally translated as "lemoning" or "to lemon")

(Fun fact #2: cats detest citruses)

Mr. Lemons floated on-screen dressed like a second-hand Starlord and I should have known right there that we weren't meant to be 🤭

The self-serving scoundrel shtick of his early interactions with the team made up some for that poor first impression - I do enjoy the archetype - but things soon took a turn for the worst and then went downhill faster than an alpine skiing olympic medal, what with his admiration for amateur surgery, a knack for annoying my favorite character, incel-like gaming fantasies, and increasingly near-Gary Stu energy.

Look, Deke, it's you - it's definitely you - but it's also me. So, I will make an effort to at least take you seriously during this rewatch, and see if I can make lemonade.

Stuff:

Hey, Enoch. I had almost forgotten how creepy you came across in your debut. Nice pool.

Virgil, eh? Like the ancient Roman Poet who chaperones Dante in his travels through hell? AoS already referenced the Divine Comedy in S2, so I’m guessing the name was chosen on purpose. And take this part of the incipit: I found myself within a forest dark, for the straightforward pathway had been lost (it sounds far cooler in Italian, I have to say). Fits the team’s circumstances here and even more so their desperate scrambling in the second half of the season, don’t you think?

I'd like to know, if you don't mind, what is happening here, please. Coulson is very polite for someone who was just kidnapped to Space Station Apocalypse.

Oh, my bad. I see a dirty-looking dude hovering over you with a crazy-looking gun. I acted on impulse. Only a few minutes in the future and Mack is already and completely Done™ 😂

I don't have many details, but I do know we're in space -- Yeah, that makes sense. That's the one thing we haven't done yet. 😂😂

Several dead bodies litter the place. Simmons: oh, goodie, a puzzle! Elena: 🤨😬

Coulson's 99 % sure we're in space -- Not again. Cheer up, Jemma. At least you're not alone this time, even if the place is severely lacking in brooding marooned astronauts.

How were we supposed to prepare for this, Mack? -- I don't know. I mean, we got to be prepared for everything, apparently. Look, not a day ago, I was trapped inside a computer-generated mind prison, and now... you know what? You know what, Coulson? I'm out. I'm out. We get through this, I am packing it in. Listen to you. Seriously thinking that you can quit... oh, man, are you in for a disappointment 😂

So, wait, S.H.I.E.L.D. doesn't have a space division called S.P.E.A.R. or something? No, but it might have had a division or a sister agency called S.W.O.R.D., if Marvel Studios had let you use the name.

I always thought you guys had people hiding on the moon. Actually, it's you and Daisy who had people hiding on the moon. We just don't talk about it because their show was a bust 😁

Geez, Mack, how hard did you hit him? -- What do you mean? As hard as I possibly could. Look, I don't half-hit people. It's a punch. That's why it's called a punch.🤣🤣

[Virgil] said that we were coming here to serve a purpose -- As food? 🤣

Who doesn't check the other side of a postcard? You know, the part that may have words on it?

So, it is a human outpost -- Yeah, and, of course, it's being overrun by creatures that suck out your innards. I should've been a fireman. 🤣🤣🤣

Don't be crazy. You're not here to save me -- who then? -- Humanity. Gotta love the guy who says "don't be crazy", before saying something crazy.

Right? Ok, first, you can't make me wait almost twenty minutes (!) into the season premiere for my girl to appear and leave me in the dark to where the hell she's been and what her first take of the future was. We're really starting on the wrong foot, here, S5. And second, Daisy saving everybody by disintegrating the ugly monster and then asking for confirmation just in case she blew up somebody's pet is delightful. So, okay, we're still pals for now, S5, but the ice you're walking on is already thinning.

Ming-Na Wen had some kind of leg injury, so May gets one too, which sadly prevents her from trashing Mr. Lemons as he would have richly deserved, for being a jerk to her just now and for all his future transgressions. The first of many disappointments 🤭

So, is there anything you want to fill us in on, Coulson? 'Cause now's the time. As usual, my dear, you're onto something, and, as usual, it's worse than what you're imagining.

Maybe someone put us back in the Framework and this is a simulation. Believe me when I say, we're all gonna wish this was still the Framework.

Oh, please. We just got zapped through space by Stonehenge, and we're trying to rule out the involvement of a flame-headed demon from east L.A.? Science my ass. Careful, there. Dr. Dr. Simmons may take it personally.

Speaking of Simmons, who has managed for almost half an hour to not mention Fitz - and honestly, that is very impressive 🤭 - she becomes super defensive about her missing half, mistaking Daisy's concern for suspicion of his possible involvement in their predicament. Whatever reservations she may be harbouring about him in the Framework's aftermath, however, they'll disappear the moment they reunite.

We should split up -- Oh, hell, no [...] Haven't you ever seen an alien movie? -- Mack, it's the best way to cover the most ground. -- Okay, you see, you see, that's exactly what they say before they get picked off one by one, and you know who the first one will be. 🤣🤣🤣🤣 This will get a call back in 5x13, when once again Coulson will suggest splitting up and Daisy will agree, but only to troll Mack.

This has to be the coolest we've ever looked. Not exactly. But it's probably the most hilarious, although there's a scene in 7x09 that gives this one a run for its money. Unsurprisingly, I'm a big fan of Daisy's epic eye roll that you can miss in the dark, if you're not looking for it (spoiler: I'm always looking for it): my dad is a dork. Yes, and you love it 😁

"Water reclamation". You were right, Jemma -- I figured it out using magic. Told you she'd take it personally 😂

And here comes the Kree, who we had first met in S1 (the dead body harvested for the GH 325), then S2 (Vin-Tak, who wanted to eradicate "Skye") and S3 (the Reapers, who also wanted to eradicate Inhumans). Still waiting for a decent, non-genocidal, non-slaver, non-a*hole, live Kree to show up somewhere.

May's resigned "copy that" at the news they are, in fact, in space, is her version of Mack's long-winded distress earlier. Naturally, May's version is just two words.

You got a name? -- Deke. First time I thought he had said "Dick". Missed opportunity for a nomen omen situation there 😈🤭

No, no, wait. You stay here. I've got two good fighters down there once I get the restraints off. I'll be fine. We can't lose our leader again. We need answers [...] find out where the hell and what the hell... sir. This is the scene I was talking about a gazillion words above. I really love the delivery of the "where the hell and what the hell" bit. Equally notable but for different reasons the "we can't lose our leader again". Daisy's not prepared for the truth of it but, also, as is often the case in these matters, I believe she is quite correct: Coulson's impending death will do a number on everybody, contributing to the team's loss of cohesion.

May gets to check "piloting a spaceship" off her bucket list (something suggested all the way back in 1x08). Given how her day started and how it is proceeding, it's nothing to sneeze at.

I was starting to picture myself with two hooks. Since I had read the comics, I was extremely uncomfortable during Yo-Yo's torture when this aired, but I relaxed when it was over, thinking they had made their nod to her comics' story and that was it. Yes, I'm a fool.

No reason to send a message back to Earth. We're already here. Well, at least it's convenient, no?

[arcadianmoonshadowjedi]

Let The Bells Ring (A Stricklake Wedding)

Good news everyone! I was finally able to motivate myself to finish this fanfic, which took me weeks due to work and weak motivation lol. Since I’ve been sick this week with not much to do, I was able to motivate myself to power through!

So this is a continuation of my Making Things Right fic, which is an alternate ROTT ending where the timeline is NOT reset and everyone lives and gets to attend the Stricklake wedding! This in general is how I imagine a Stricklake wedding going, regardless of the overall plot of ROTT. I got so much inspiration for this from throughout the fandom, including @bklily & @undeadchestnut <3 Enjoy!

~~~

In the weeks to come, the people of Arcadia and perhaps, the whole world would continue to recover from what would’ve been a large-scale apocalypse. To celebrate the end of this war and help everyone with healing, Barbara and Strickler felt that they should get married as soon as possible. Barbara nearly lost Strickler in his attempt to save Jim and stop the ice titan, and she was never more determined to tie the knot and be with him for the rest of her life. It was thanks to her excellent medical skills that both him and Nomura were able to recover from their life-threatening injuries, even though his wings were permanently damaged from the blast.

The day of the wedding arrived on a bright spring as the flowers began to bloom in the trees across Arcadia. Everyone was busy and super pumped getting ready for the big day. Claire, along with Aja, Darci, and Mary were all getting ready in her room. With Papa Skull music playing, they did their hair, nails, and makeup while also fooling around quite a bit. Aja sat right in front of the mirror back in her human form after a very long time.

“I’ve never been to a human marriage party before!” She squealed in excitement as her girlfriends did her hair and makeup.

“We’re so glad you can be with us, Aj,” Darci responded wholeheartedly as she pulled Aja’s light blonde hair into a beautiful, flowery updo with some loose hairs falling to the side. Claire and Mary both focused on getting her makeup done and when they were finally done, Aja gazed into the mirror in awe. 

“Wow! I look.. I look soo..”

“Lively!” The girls cheerfully finished the sentence for her.

“Hey Claire Bear, Darc and I are gonna grab a few things from my car. You and Aja finish getting ready, ok?” Said Mary as she and Darci left the room. Claire helped Aja get into her hot pink strapless dress, and Aja couldn’t help but squeal in excitement and twirl around in her high-low skirt. Aja quickly enveloped Claire into a tight hug.

“Oh thank you so much Claire! This is amazing!”

Both girls chuckled and smiled at each other.

“Also,” Aja started. “It’s so nice to have another girl to fight side by side with, I don’t get to do that a lot. And your shadows of magic are so lively!”

“Thanks! And yeah same. Boys clubs can get pretty annoying, haha,” Claire joked. "We should definitely hang out more," Aja nodded in agreement and they both smiled warmly at each other. 

“We’re back!” Mary said as she and Darci finally came back with more accessories. After they all finished getting ready, Mary took out her phone and they all posed for a selfie.

“Aw C-Bomb! It’s so good to have you back! We missed you like crazy when you left Arcadia! You and Aja!” She squealed cheerfully, squeezing Claire into a tight hug. Darci joined in and grabbed Aja as well. “Yeah girl! Don’t ever leave us out of nowhere like that again,” Darci said with a frown as she hugged Claire tighter. Claire chuckled and took both of their hands. “Don’t worry, I don’t plan on leaving anytime soon. It would be nice to take a break once in a while, hopefully,” She assured her girlfriends and hugged them again.

Moments later, the girls rode in Mary's car to Jim's house. When Aja got out from the back seat, the front door suddenly flew open and Steve ran out to her.

"My royal, ninja-kicking angel is here!" He yelled. 

Without any hesitation, he swung Aja up from her feet and spun her around as she screamed joyously. He kissed her so passionately that Aja eventually started pushing him.

"Steve!" She chuckled. "My makeup! You're going to mess it up!" Steve laughed and then they both pressed their foreheads together and smiled lovingly as they held each other.

Jim stood at the front door watching and shaking his head while the remaining girls chuckled and let out some "awws" from the car. Claire eventually opened the door and walked out from the front seat, and Jim couldn't help but let out a "woah."

Claire stepped out in glimmering heels and wore a beautiful, midnight dress with a slit to the side. She smiled at Jim and her smoky eyeshadow made her beautiful, brown eyes glow even more. She walked up to him and he gently took her hands in his.

"You ready to be the greatest best man?" She asked. 

"Ready as I can get," Jim chuckled awkwardly and scratched the back of his head. Claire smiled, then cupped his cheeks in her hands and leaned forward to press her lips against his. When she finally pulled back, she carefully stroked his hair and tucked it behind his ear.

"Good luck, I know you got this," 

Jim smiled and put his hand on hers, letting out a sigh of relief. 

Toby and Aaarrrgghh walked out of the front door beside them and the three trollhunters smiled at one another. It's good they were all back together. And actually happy this time! Toby walked over to Jim and Claire for an affectionate group hug while Darci and Mary walked over.

"Toby!" Darci screamed as she ran over to hug her boyfriend. With a massive smile on his face, Toby hugged her back and held her tight.

"Oh TP! It's so good to have you back! I missed you so so much!" She started, her eyes tearing up. Toby on the other hand, after everything he went through, just wanted to revel in this moment

"It's good to be back, Darc," he responded softly. 

Darci smiled at him and was totally digging his wedding look. "Looking good in a tux, TP,"

Aaarrrgghh nodded in agreement. "Mmm, Fancy,"

Toby put his hands on his hips and smirked. "Oh, well, yeah I do gotta look awesome-sauce for Dr. L's wedding, am I right?"

The gang laughed and finally went inside the house. Everyone headed towards the backyard except for Jim, who waited by the stairs. Toby and Claire looked back at him and gave him a nod of good luck before walking out the door.

Later that evening, more guests arrived and filled the seats in the backyard and Strickler waited for his bride at the altar. Blinky stood behind the stand mic with a piece of heartstone in his hand. Nomura stood by where Barbara soon would be. After all the help she's gotten and the time they spent together, Nomura became so close to Barbara that she gladly accepted her request to be her maid of honor. They were surrounded by a magical, embellished flower arch made by none other than Nari. Bright lights twinkled all around the place and soft, mellow tunes filled the atmosphere, played by both Krel on his keyboard and Douxie on his guitar. They high-fived each other for successfully setting a romantic mood.

Jim stood inside his house and then suddenly, he heard click-clacking from the stairs. It was his mother, so beautiful in her lace white dress. He couldn't help but tear up at the sight of his mom finally being happy again. She made it down the stairs and wrapped Jim in a warm hug. 

"I love you so much, kiddo," Barbara told her son as her voice began to break. "I'm so proud of how far you've come and couldn't be any happier to be walked down the aisle by my beautiful boy,"

Jim held her even tighter as he chuckled lightly, tears falling down his cheeks. Barbara then looked at him lovingly as she wiped his tears. She leaned forward to kiss his forehead, then put her arms in his as they began heading towards the back door.

The guests looked around as the beautiful bride made her way down the aisle. Strickler couldn't stop gazing and smiling at his soon-to-be wife as she walked towards him, returning his smile. Barbara finally stood looking towards him and Jim stood by Strickler's side as his best man. Blinky finally cleared his throat and approached the mic.

"Greetings everyone. We are gathered here today to join our dearly beloved Barbara Lake and Walter Strickler in holy matrimony. After everything that has transpired in Arcadia over the past few years, what a blessing it is for all of us to congregate here to cherish and celebrate this union. Despite all the trials and tribulations that have been faced by this lovely pair, well of course the unusual beginning they’ve had..." 

Strickler cleared his throat, interrupting Blinky’s speech. Jim couldn’t resist letting out a little chuckle. “Uh, Mr Blinky,” Barbara whispered. “We don’t need to go into all the details. What’s in the past can stay in the past. What’s most important is the here and now,”

“Right, right, right,” Blinky continued clumsily. “These two warriors have persevered through it all, the thick and the thin leading up to this very special moment. From this day forth, they will continue to strive and triumph together for the rest of their lives. Now may I have the rings?” 

The audience clapped while Blinky signaled for Archie to fly over and bring the cushion that bore the rings.

“Now both of you place your hands on this heartstone as you say your vows. Do you, Walter Strickler, take Barbara Lake to be your lawfully wedded wife?”

Strickler took a deep breath, then smiled wholeheartedly and answered. “Yes, I do,” Followed by the clapping in the audience, Blinky turned to face Barbara.

“Do you, Barbara Lake, take Walter Strickler to be your lawfully wedded husband?”

“I do” Barbara responded softly, with light tears in her eyes as she smiled brightly at her soon-to-be husband. They let go of the glowing heartstone, then took their rings and gently placed them on each of their left ring fingers. They finally held hands tightly in excitement and couldn’t take their eyes off of each other.

“I now pronounce you husband and wife, you may now kiss,” 

Strickler pulled Barbara closer to him and they finally leaned in for a warm kiss. Loud cheers spread throughout the audience with some sniffles of joy. Jim stood by wiping tears off his cheeks. Finally! Nothing brought more happiness into his heart than to see his own mother finally again, just as she deserved. And never did he expect that someone he once resented would eventually become someone so dear to both him and his mother. 

Claire looked towards Douxie across the front row and they both nodded. Absorbing shadows from around her, she released a couple of black and purple shimmering doves into the sky and in turn, Douxie cast out beautiful blue sparkles to light up the scene even more. A round of oohs and aahs echoed was followed by a standing ovation.

A few moments later, Barbara turned around and was ready to throw the bouquet to a competitive crowd of single ladies of all ages and… Varvatos, who’s made it his quest to be the next in line for Nancy. As the bouquet suddenly flew into the air and was falling back down, out of nowhere, a shadow portal opened and swallowed it up. The audience gasped and looked around in confusion as another portal opened and the bouquet was caught by Claire. She glanced over at Jim whose eyes widened and cheeks turned pure red. In response, she winked at him as he sheepishly smiled back and waved. All the other ladies grunted and Mary and Darci approached her. 

“Claire Bear! You’re not supposed to do that here! That’s cheating!” Darci told her with her arms crossed while Mary nodded in agreement. Claire chuckled and held the bouquet victoriously as she went to sit back down. “Um, I don’t remember there being a rule book for bouquet tosses as far as I’m concerned,” 

“Preposterous!” Exclaimed Varvatos. “It should’ve been I who won this battle for Nancy!” He heard Nancy walk up to him giggling and grabbing his arm. “Oh Varvatos, you don’t need a bouquet to marry me! I’m way past that!” Varvatos’s eyes glew up and he let out a big smile. “Glorious!” He yelled. laughing maniacally. 

Later that night, everyone got up and slow-danced to the sweet, charming tunes that Krel played. Douxie danced with Zoe, who he finally caught up with and they got to hunt niffins and grab burgers together as promised. Toby and Darci danced together and enjoyed their well-needed reunion, sharing a few kisses here and there. While Steve and Aja danced, they discussed their future plans and whether they would be together on Akiridion-5 or remain long distance.

“Well now, since we got wormholes and stuff, maybe I could come to you more often on Akiridion-5 while finishing college and who knows what will happen next?” Steve started as he held Aja and slightly dipped her. She smiled back at him and pushed her hair behind her ear. “You know, I really miss this mudball and seeing you more. I think maybe I too, should come visit and go on more Earth dates,”

Jim shared a short and sweet dance with mother then hugged her so tightly, before Strickler walked over to them and asked if could borrow his wife for another dance. Jim went over to Krel’s turntable and whispered something in his ears. Suddenly the music stopped as Krel plugged Jim’s phone to his turntable and pressed play. 

Claire sat and chatted with Mary and a couple of friends when she suddenly froze. It was a familiar melody that took her back to the night of Spring Fling, her first ever dance with Jim. The guitar strings of Eres Tu played as she turned around and saw Jim hold out his hands to her. She looked up at him smiling and grabbed his hand. She got up and walked with him further away from the crowd until they were almost alone but could still hear the song. They started dancing as the Spanish lyrics began to be sung, while Jim sang along parts of the song, just like last time. 

“Nice little trick you did back there with the flowers,” Jim joked as he spun her around. Claire chuckled and blushed a little. “Oh I bet you wanted me to be the one to catch it. But don’t worry, there’s no rushing into this. We just enjoy every moment together and take this all little by little, ok?” She assured him. He smiled back at her and stroked her cheek. It was so good that they finally got to enjoy this moment of peace without needing to defeat gumm-gumms or evil wizards trying to destroy the world. For both of them, it was a relief that neither of them felt the need to dread any upcoming battles hopefully for years to come. Without any further talking, they just danced together slowly reminiscing their beautiful memories they’ve had throughout their relationship, putting a warm smile on each of their faces. Jim spun Claire, then hugged her from behind and kissed her cheek, while Claire’s smile only got bigger and brighter.

From a distance, Barbara and Walter watched Jim dance with Claire while they too danced. “You’ve raised an amazing son, Barbara. Young Atlas has come so far in life and he wouldn’t have become the man he did without an amazing mother like you,”

“He’s also had a wonderful person like you come into his life and help him grow a lot. I couldn’t be more thankful he had you and Mr. Blinky help him become a strong trollhunter,”

The stars continued glimmering in the night sky as everyone enjoyed the rest of the wedding. A cool breeze blew through and the petals on the flowers and the twinkling lights slowly flowed along. The heroes of Arcadia have truly found an adventure worth telling for generations to come, whether it was on Earth, the caverns below, or on Akiridion-5. It was a one of a kind adventure that each hero will continue to remember and hold onto no matter what comes next. Despite all the trauma and heartbreak they all went through, they have also gained so much strength and wisdom, along with many great allies that will always stay together whatever comes next.

~~~

Thank you so much for reading this fic! I know this was super long but I definitely put in a lot of stuff that I wanted to see in the TOA series, including Aja and Claire bonding and a happy ending with a Stricklake wedding! I know this isn’t the best I’ve written and that I wasn’t able to give each character but I’m glad I was able to get it done! Stay tuned for more and hopefully more focus on other characters!

[wnnbdarklord]

EDIT: so I started writing this like a week ago, but honestly the finale killed any desire in me to interact with this show in a fannish way. So have these half assed notes. I think it's obvious where I lost steam. These ideas are free for use for anyone who wants them in fic, have at you. As it is, I don't think I'll interact with this show as a fan any further than this.

How I would write a Loki show in bullet points (and a mishmash of short scenes and dialogue, let's be honest) for my sanity!

Presuming some disney exec came down from on high and forced the inclusion of EG!Loki and the TVA (because otherwise it'd be IW!Loki that survived and it'd be all about him finding his best life away from Earth, Asgard, Thor and the whole Thanos/EG situation. Or if I only had to include the TVA, it'd be IW!Loki dealing with the TVA, not EG!Loki):

Fair warning: this will likely be a mess since I'm not entirely motivated to not have it be so. 

[cut for length]

Ep1:

- Loki escapes to Nidavelir and uses the tools there to get rid of the chains and muzzle. A CONTROLLED use of the Tesseract, thankyouverymuch

- the TVA comes for him and Loki is wary and on the alert, exhausted from the whole Avengers thing so he immediately makes a clone to interact with the TVA and observes from afar

- the TVA fall for it when they try to bitchslap him like in the show, but immediately regroup when it goes through the illusion and start a search pattern. Their tech can scan for his temporal aura and they close in on Loki quickly (show the TVA as at least somewhat competent or they're shit antagonists for Loki)

- Loki, who still has hold of the Tesseract, portals out of there

- what follows is a quick chase scene across multiple planets and realms, but the TVA are always on his heels. The longest time they take to find him is during an ongoing apocalypse on a random planet that's enough for Loki to get a quick breather. but you know, disaster's on the horizon, so he has to leave eventually. but this is the first clue both we as an audience and Loki get about potential hiding places.

- when an exhausted Loki finally turns to fight, he manages to take several minutemen out�� (justifying B-15's hate on for him) before one of them gets in a lucky shot and freezes him

- "Who are you people?" [short flash of Loki's eyes flashing green and the entire scene getting a strange cast, floating energy swirling around everything. It's beautiful, but the TVA people's energy is out of sync, out of touch and strangely jagged compared to their surroundings]

- they slap the collar on him and march him into the TVA

- Loki immediately tries to pull the same illusion trick but it doesn't work cause no magic in the TVA (maybe some visual indication of what he's trying to do, but it doesn't go past his skin. You know, like Sylvie managed in ep 3 -.-)

- he doesn't wildly panic, but we see his breathing speed up and he immediately looks at his left hand and relaxes when he sees it isn't turning blue. 

- okay so the TVA have caught him, he's on their shit list, no magic, exhausted, no idea what's going on, who these people are or how powerful they are - he chooses to play nice for now and bide his time

- the whole intake process is spent in quiet observation mode, only speaking when spoken to

- discomfort at being out of his clothes, but maybe only a wry joke about them wanting to strip him naked (making him a participant in all the thirst jokes)

- he doesn't ask if a lot of people don't know they're robots like a child wanting validation and he's not visibly afraid. Instead, we see him look at his hand again and try for wry humor when asking. But he steps into the device without much hesitation. It's death vs certainty and we already know he's chosen death once before.

- the propaganda cartoon is much shorter and plays in the background so we can see Loki's incredulous eyebrow raise at it. the ticket thing gets an eyeroll, but ready compliance since it's not worth it to argue

- when he sees the other guy get "pruned", he immediately reaches for the ticket to reassure himself it's there, but doesn't wave it around triumphantly, just sighs in relief

- trial can stay mostly unchanged, just no stupid magic attempt in the middle

"It's not your story, Mr. Laufeyson, it never was" (AND THIS SHALL BE PROVEN FALSE, you know, unlike in the show where it turned out to be their fucking mission statement) also, Loki gives her murder eyes for calling him that

- in fact, instead of trying magic, Loki holds up the controller he stole from  B-15 as she was escorting him to the trial and waves as he disappears through a door backwards

After that scene is the church scene with bodies, establishing Mobius as a hunter of dangerous variants. Someone is killing TVA officers

Mobius gets called back as in canon, but arrives too late to stop our Loki from leaving

Sidenote: Loki still has the tesseract since it was in his pocket dimension during the fight the TVA nabbed him in

Ep 2:

- it's now a few days/weeks later. Loki is back in his own clothes, a simpler outfit not geared for war. He's in the biggest library in the universe, the depository of almost all knowledge, looking for information about the TVA. there is Nothing, suspiciously so

- once again, the TVA shows up and he has to run yet again. maybe he kills this team too, to buy himself more time. he steals a melt stick and more time pads and reset charges

- he needs more information and the only place he'll get it is at the TVA it seems, so he shapeshifts into his female form, dressed as one of the many paperpushers at the TVA and we see her being relieved that the spelled clothing is holding once she passes through the time door

(another aside, but ideally the female form is more like Eva Green or Katie McGrath. AND NOT BLONDE)

- acting like she belongs, Loki effortlessly manages to snoop around the TVA for a few hours

- there's only one close call with C-20, but Loki manages to deflect suspicion by parroting the motto at her, which Loki reads from a nearby propaganda poster (cause Loki is good at lying, manipulation and flying by the seat of their pants)

- eventually, she ends up at the archive area and begins researching. We see that Loki is competent at this and is quick to pick up the filing system. the variant number from the papers she signed the episode before becomes relevant to finding the appropriate files

- before she can dig too deep into her own life story as laid out by these people, just as she finds the Ragnarok Report, Mobius finds her (maybe there was a silent alarm triggered by unauthorized access or something. Slightly more competent TVA)

- there is a scene where Mobius and Loki play a game of chicken and manipulation, wordplay and lying until it becomes clear Mobius knows who Loki is (actually establishing some camaraderie)

- Loki gets a little hoisted by their own petard since they're enjoying the banter so much, the backup Mobius called for catches them a little off guard, collared again

- since info gathering is still the name of the game, Loki doesn't try to get away just yet

(during this entire scene, Mobius is the same offhandedly condescending prick he is in canon, but it's very obviously framed that way)

(also featuring confirmation of the genderfluidity thing because fuck you disney)

M: "Nice disguise. Really had me fooled for a second there."

L: "It's hardly a disguise. I am always myself."

[Loki shifts back to male, though the clothes remain the same (shifting =/= magic)]

M: "Yeah, well, next time you want to go undercover at the TVA, maybe don't choose a face we already have from several other of your variants."

[Loki twitches a little, since that wasn't a form he openly wore a lot (even when he wanted to) cause Asgard is a dick about shifting genders] 

L: "And how does that work exactly?"

M: "Got your entire life on file, buddy. But you know, sometimes Asgard isn't a complete stick in the mud the day you gather enough courage to show up to dinner in a dress. We usually have to prune those timelines quickly."

[Loki's grin is more like a snarl, frozen on his face, since he picks up the implications loud and clear (the implication being that him being too happy is not allowed in the Sacred Timeline)]

M: [picks up the files Loki was looking at] "Come on, I've got something to show you."

-cue time theater scene

-that little scene of looking out at the TVA does not feature Loki being impressed or awed at the TVA's tech. It features him being scared/uneasy because the TVA is completely dead to his senses. Loki's eyes do the same flash as before, but everything is completely dull, no energy anywhere. He can barely see some swirls on his own arms]

-Loki asks why this charade, Mobius tells him the TVA is willing to come to an agreement with Loki for his help

"You're not the only one running around messing up the Sacred Timeline. Come on, job interview time."

(it's really really not)

- Mobius tries the same schtick as before, but it's both less and more effective. Less cause Loki has had a bit more time to collect himself since the invasion, more cause he's more aware of the TVA's power and has been chased by them for a while now

- we see Loki being affected by the Frigga thing BUT he also picks up how edited the reel is

- still, he lets Mobius do the "only thing you're good for" bit until we see him look up with murder in his eyes, even through the tears

- "I am going to burn this place to the ground and I am going to start with you. That is my bargain."

"Yeah, cause your "bargains" [Mobius full on air quotes here] work out so well for you," he says, offering Loki a hand up

-cue alarm and Mobius rushing out

-Loki grabs the files Mobius left behind, and also the tape in the hologram projector and escapes

- no infinity stones scene, cause Loki still has the Tesseract and doesn't go to look for more

- cut to the TVA running around in a panic, multiple branches forming on the displays. It's the same bombing plot as in the show, but now serving as a distraction for Loki to get away

- when they figure this out, Ravonna: "You should have just pruned him when you found him. There's a reason we don't reset Loki variants. Our luck always runs out eventually with them. Fix this, Mobius. Or you'll have to answer to the TimeKeepers."

- back to Loki, he steps out into chaos as something explodes behind him. He's in another apocalypse. During his running from the TVA, he noticed it takes them longer to find him whenever there's a lot of chaos around him, death and destruction. He finds a still intact building, seems high tech. Everyone else has already evacuated

- he takes the Tesseract out and blue and green energy surges around him and engulfs the building. It's suddenly quiet and we see outside the windows are pitch black 

- Loki quickly looks away

"Finally, some peace and quiet."

He slumps down to the floor, files scattered around him, tesseract nearby and curls up, dejected and exhausted 

Side note: Loki doesn't need to worry about recharging tempads since he has the tesseract, which was established in Avengers as able to provide infinite energy

Ep 3:

- he finds out about the variants in this episode, maybe goes looking for other variants before the TVA finds them

-how Loki finds out the TVA are all variants: he'd knocked out B-15 for a bit to interrogate her

-they're found by another team of minutemen, led by B-16, who is wearing B-15's face. Several of the other minutemen we've seen Loki kill in earlier episodes as well. They attack *both* of them cause they assume B-15 is compromised. Loki and B-15 work together and kill the whole lot, staring at each other incredulously

"You're Variants! You're all Variants!"

[B-15 collapses to her knees in shock] 

End episode

EDIT: My basic idea for episodes 4 & 5 were Loki and B-15 working together and travelling through various timelines trying to get to the TimeKeepers, but realizing something was wrong the further they went. Time begins breaking down, paradoxes are all over the place and the TVA keeps pruning some specific place so much that sometimes two teams are on top of each other. Stuff like that. 

I also had a few scenes where Loki meets other variants (that aren't him), but who actually like and even love him. Men, women, variations thereupon, and one or two who would mistake Loki for their Loki. So we get bi confirmation without actually including romance in the show itself, because 6 episodes isn't enough to develop that along with everything else that's going on.

Vaguely outlined here: 

My "how to include the bi thing without the main story being a romance and also indicating that Loki is able to be liked and loved by people who aren't just variants of himself, please and thank you":

(note to self, rewrite this so it makes sense lol EDIT: lol, don't feel like it so this is all you get, folks!) 

a variant significant other, male: kisses Loki

Loki: You are clearly my type, but I'm sorry. I'm not him.

[heartbroken expression on the variant]

from another timeline Loki visits:

woman holding a sword to his head after looking at him suspiciously: Change back!

Loki: Into who?!

woman: Her!

[Loki shapeshifts into his female self]

woman lets go of the sword

"You escaped! When Odin took you away, I thought he would kill you. Why did you never come back to me, my love?"

EDIT: My "twist" ending was that the Time Keepers were dead, not that they never existed. Some sort of mcguffin exists to just break the whole TVA and free the timelines. Idk, maybe the TVA was just a test to see if it'd work, but the system just kept perpetuating itself after the power hungry losers kept it going beyond the bounds of the experiment. Either way: 

villain plot twist: the time keepers are long dead. the TVA is a terrible system that perpetuated itself on its own, only a few judges were aware that the timekeepers had ever died. The entire System Has To Go (lol like disney would ever go there)

The system is literally Killing the Universe, since the universe's natural state of being is a multiverse. But the system don't care, system don't give a shit. System only exists to perpetuate itself, system's survival is the most important, catastrophic universal failure need not apply

(this is way too on the nose for disney, but since this rewrite's motto is Fuck Disney, it shall stay)

EDIT: this was how I imagined the climax of the series.

Mobius or Ravonna (i never decided): "All the chaos, all the possibilities? How can you stand the uncertainty? How can you believe the world will be any better than it is now?"

Loki: "Because it has to be!" [smashy smashy TVA]

series ends with the timeline breaking free

we see various scenes of the variants in their former lives, happy

and AU scenes of the previous movies:

Loki gets pulled up on the bridge

Loki accepts Thor's offer during the Avengers

Loki gets up on Svartalfheim, bleeding heavily, but doesn't go to Asgard but to Thor

Loki tricks Thanos during IW

Loki as an Avenger

Loki as a kid

Loki as a girl

Loki on jotunheim, fully jotun

Loki on Asgard, jotun

faster and faster, all sorts of different AU scenes until the screen goes dark and we see our Loki, smirking

"But...well, those are stories for another time."

and he steps back into the shadows.

[aziraphales-library]

Hi! Could you recommend some fics with a self-sacrifice theme? (Would appreciate a happy ending tho). Thank you!

Hello! Here are some self-sacrificing fics with a happy ending...

I’ve Got You by caffeinefire (T)

Aziraphale felt the change in the air, a burst of power and a whiff of ozone. He spun, and jumped when he came face to face with Gabriel leering cheerfully over his right shoulder.

“Aziraphale!” he smiled as if greeting an old friend, then clapped his hands together loudly, so close it made Aziraphale flinch. “You’re early, so glad you could make it.” He began to walk around him, admiring the circle beneath his feet, careful not to cross it. It posed no real danger to him, it had already been activated, but crossing the bounds of an active circle was never a fun experience.

“Gabriel,” his voice wavered despite his best efforts. “What is the meaning of this?”

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

Hellfire didn't work, but Heaven has one more idea. And this time, they're going to force Crowley to watch.

Binary Star by TriffidsandCuckoos (T)

After abandoning the Earth in the wake of a more environmental apocalypse, humanity has taken to the stars. Crowley stayed behind to restore the Earth; Aziraphale followed the humans into space. After almost two centuries, the latest prophet arrives in Aziraphale’s archive, determined to rectify this.

Choose Your Faces Wisely by boredom (G)

Aziraphale is worried he may not survive the Holy Water at Crowley's trial. He's willing to take the risk anyways.

Galathean Omens by Elphen (M)

Loose Pygmalion AU - oh and human AU, too. Crowley is a succesful sculptor in London whose statues are renowned for their quality and their stunning realism, so that one could swear they're going to come to life any moment. One day, Gabriel walks into his workshop and 'commissions' (ie demands) a different kind of statue from him, one which is more soft and cherubic. Well, putto-like, in any case. Crowley refuses but then ends up fascinated by the rough sketch left by the berk. It seems oddly familiar and soon, he finds himself entranced by what he's sculpting, talking to it and imbuing it with personality and eventually a name. What will happen, though, when 'Aziraphale' comes to life? What will Crowley do about Gabriel who still expects a statue?

When Love Must Die by Woland (NR)

The Apocalypse didn't happen. The angel and the demon can get on with their lives, enjoying each other's company without having to look over their shoulders. Their superiors have washed their hands off them and have left them alone. ... Right?

And one open ending, just because...

Blood and Rain by Lady of Prompts (Aethelflaed) (T)

Someone is chasing Aziraphale and Crowley. The storm that drives the Bentley off the road has an intelligence behind it. A malevolence. And whoever - or whatever - pursues them won't stop until one is willing to make the ultimate sacrifice.

- Mod D

[mittensmorgul]

save me from andrew dabb and the tnt loop... hello 8.22:

Castiel: I like this bunker. It's orderly. Sam: Oh, give us a few months. Dean wants to get a ping-pong table. Castiel: I've heard of that. It's a game, right?

PING PONG. Why has this particular reference resurfaced in the last week or two just to torment me. I am tormented... but my torment is not over. This episode is full of angst about the story-- about Bad Guys™ literally using the story written by Chuck IN-STORY as a weapon and a tool.

Metatron-- having spent millennia collecting the stories of Humanity-- somehow ~missed~ the Supernatural series entirely. In addition to having cut himself off from angel radio, somehow not noticing the entire apocalypse going down a few years prior or the resurfacing of the Leviathan or Cas swallowing Purgatory and becoming the new God(stiel) for a bit. Like... none of that ever cracked through whatever warding and protection he’d surrounded himself with and pinged his danger warning systems. How isolated must he have been? Or how much had Chuck also been shielding him from discovering any of this? Keeping him on ice as a character in his Grand Narrative to let him discover everything he’d apparently missed while in isolation, only to set him loose on the story armed with the story itself?

It’s wild how many plot twists and Chekhov’s Guns Chuck managed to plant throughout the history of creation, and the discovery of Adam and Serafina in 15.17 just goes to show how well and truly seeded the narrative was, in retrospect. And Metatron, to me, seems like one of the biggest seeds-- him and his Tablets, which for me was the ONE time Chuck truly managed to manipulate Sam and Dean into breaking the universe, rather than “tricking” them into stumbling into the choices he wanted them to make. The s8 arc of the Demon Tablet Trials was the single time Sam and Dean made a cosmic-level CHOICE to break the natural order. They could’ve left well enough alone, let the status quo stand, but no... they decided that the gates of Hell should be closed and locked forever. And I’m so grateful they pulled a 180 at the last minute, even if that one bad choice, that one grand act of hubris, propelled the narrative for the next seven years. It still stands as Chuck’s own little egotistical proof that Sam and Dean are just as manipulative and corrupt as he was, that they would meddle with the cosmic order to that degree, even if they chose not to go through with it when they knew the full truth.

Poor Cas, though...

CASTIEL: Dean, I can go with you. Dean. I'm sorry. DEAN: For what? CASTIEL: For everything. DEAN: Everything? Like, uh... Like ignoring us? CASTIEL: Yes. DEAN: Or like bolting off with the Angel Tablet, then losing it 'cause you didn't trust me? You didn't trust me. CASTIEL: Yes. DEAN: Yeah. Nah, that's not gonna cut it. Not this time. So you can take your little apology and you cram it up your ass. CASTIEL: Dean, I thought I was doing the right thing. DEAN: Yeah, you always do.

And here we have the OG version of the s15 breakup arc... back then it led to Cas becoming vulnerable to Metatron’s manipulation, leading directly to Cas’s full exploration of his own humanity. Throughout s8, he’d had his eyes opened to the true nature of Heaven, and now I can’t help but see Metatron taking Cas’s grace and returning him to live a human life as a punishment that Chuck would’ve truly felt was a punishment, you know? Except... that’s not how Cas saw it at all.

And before I start getting angry that Cas was never allowed to accept his own humanity and choose the life that Chuck saw as a punishment because to Cas it would’ve been a GIFT... I’m gonna return to the discussion of villains using the story itself as a weapon...

Crowley did the same, just as the Leviathans had done in 7.06. He used the story itself to manipulate the Winchesters, in a slightly different way than before. The Levi’s used locations to set a trap for Sam and Dean, but Crowley went directly after the individuals they’d saved, choosing specific victims they’d saved that would hurt the most to lose, to convince them to stop the Hell Trials. Granted, the “villainousness” here was mostly based in self-preservation. If they slammed the gates of Hell and banished all demons from the earth forever, Crowley would’ve been stuck in hell, forever. And he would’ve hated it... So it’s hard to really fault him from taking whatever measures necessary to stop that from happening to him.

But Metatron... he took The Word, weaponized it like the Chuck Protege he was. Surely, he’d also spent the intervening millennia hiding out of self-preservation so the agents of Heaven wouldn’t tear into him to pluck out the information they needed to take over Heaven. I mean, they eventually organized the whole apocalypse deal even without the power of the angel tablet powering them up the way Metatron did. But with that tablet... well, any angel could’ve set themselves up as the new God. It was just the method Metatron used was just as manipulative and dodgy as Chuck’s own writing, since he’d used Chuck’s own stories as his template.

I just find all of this fascinating. It really is spirals all the way down, right up until the penultimate episode of the series. Then everything stops making sense and we got That™.

[bloodandpie]

Supernatural fanworks masterlist

collaborative works by @monicawoe​ and @quickreaver​

(updated 11/1/2020)

Hello lovelies, here’s our most up-to-date masterlist including our 2020 contribution to the @spneldritchbang​:

Behold the Beast, Behold the Lamb - Season 4 AU.  Sam tried to free Dean from Hell, but angels intervened and took Dean for their own purposes. Sam is determined to get Dean back and will do whatever it takes, embracing his abilities fully. The more demon blood Sam drinks, the more demons he kills, the more he changes inside and out until it’s impossible to hide his monstrous side. Ruby, Uriel and Castiel push Sam to fulfill his destiny and become his true self—the Beast of the Revelation. (gen, Sam/Ruby, 20k words)

Here is a list of all our other combined works thus far, in no particular order:

Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea

word-count:  - written for the 2012 spn-genbang | sequel to The Devil’s in the Details When Sam opened Lucifer’s Cage, the only thing he found inside was Lucifer’s grace – his grace. With the return of his grace, Sam remembered his past – his war against the Host, his Fall, and his plans to bring about the End. The thing is…he doesn’t want the Apocalypse anymore. He likes things the way they are, and tries everything to keep his identity a secret- especially from Dean. Of course, the four Horsemen, Hell and Heaven have other ideas.(gen, 13k words)

Last Drop -  Written for the Twisted Tropes event - Sam/Brady AU set while Sam’s at Stanford:  Sam is slowly adjusting to his new life at Stanford University. He’s left his life of hunting behind, and traded it for endless studying and tests, but he’s plagued by dreams of Dean and Dad in danger, dreams of blood and violence. Then he meets Tyson Brady, who’s always there with a smile and a cup of coffee to get Sam through all-nighters. Sam’s dreams start to fade, but just as he’s getting used to a nice normal life, he starts to develop abilities—powers he can’t control. Brady thinks they’re great, but Sam knows power never comes without a cost. (Explicit Sam/Brady, 14k words)

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Best Self - written for @alyndra9​​  for the prompt: King of Hell Sam meets Kale!Sam and they have many differences of opinion to work out. (aka the only one who knows what Sam really wants is Sam.) words by monicawoe art by @quickreaver​​! (~4k words, Explicit Sam/Sam)

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All Our Wrath and Cutting Beauty

word-count:  written for the 2011 spn-reversebang:  Sam killed Alistair, but not before Alistair reminded Dean of who and what he'd become in Hell. Dean knows Sam can take down Lilith, and he'll make damn sure Sam gets strong enough to do just that. They'll stop the Apocalypse -- together, no matter how many bodies stack up, or how much blood is spilt. (gen, boyKingSam, demonDean,11k)

MANY more, beneath the cut:

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The Two Ravens

word-count: ~3,500 | written for the sammessiah antichrist-mas fest: Your brother he is, and heir to my throne. He’ll feed on the damned and he'll turn them to bone.

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The Last Days in the Land of Nod a comic adaptation of the fic by the same name

word-count: ~2,000 | The year is 2014. The Devil is wearing his finest, the Angel is human, and the Brother protects the survivors at Camp Chitaqua.

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We have also done collaborations with other talented writers and artists, including:

He Who Fights Monsters

word-count: ~52,000 | co-written with nwspaprtaxis for the 2014 GenTeensyBang: Demonic-MMA-fighting AU of the summer between Seasons 3 and 4. Dean's dead, dragged down kicking and screaming to Hell. Sam's not dealing well. And Ruby’s got her work cut out for her.

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Burdens, Doublefold

word-count: ~70,000 written for the 2012 spn-j2-bigbang, art by @ileliberte​What if Dean left Sam at Stanford after the fire, hoping it would keep his little brother safe and make things better? Somehow, 'better' never seems to be in the Winchester Family cards. Sam gets tangled up with his ex-roommate Brady, tracking psychics, but dealing with demons is never honest business. Dean carries on until his father is put in grave danger. He is left on his own to deal, stumbling into Harvelle's Roadhouse for help, where Dean gets just a little more than he bargained for. Eventually, the brothers’ paths twist and turn their way back to each other, but the results could mean the End of Days.

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Impala’s Run

word-count: ~23,000|written for the SPN Gen Big Bang, art by adrenalineshots | Sam and Dean Singer (aka Winchester) aren’t your average young Kansas farmers. Their home is very, very far from Kansas, in fact. Many light-years worth of ‘far’. The boys may look human, but certain talents set them apart: Dean speaks the language of machines, and Sam can heal through manipulating energy. Hidden on Earth by their father, their agricultural lifestyle gets rocked when warring alien races discover where they’ve landed, and Sam and Dean are forced to make the run of their lives.

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and here some other illustrated, shorter fics of ours for your enjoyment:

Instinct (Prophet of the Lord remix)

word-count: ~3,000 | (Kevin's POV of the same prompt) After the trials, Sam doesn't get better. Kevin's theory is that it's cancer: the trials are supposed to purge him of all physical and spiritual impurities, so tuberculosis is out, and cancer is the only reason left for Sam to be coughing his lungs up when he's supposed to be the pinnacle of human perfection. Nope. Sam's falling apart because the demon blood is gone.

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Instinct

word-count: ~1,300 | After the trials, Sam doesn't get better. Kevin's theory is that it's cancer: the trials are supposed to purge him of all physical and spiritual impurities, so tuberculosis is out, and cancer is the only reason left for Sam to be coughing his lungs up when he's supposed to be the pinnacle of human perfection. Nope. Sam's falling apart because the demon blood is gone.

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Bliss in Emptiness

word-count: ~41,000 written for the 2013 spn-j2-bigbang |As a reward for her loyal service, Lucifer brings Ruby back from death. When Sam throws himself into the Cage, Ruby slows his fall — just enough to grab a hold of his body, but not his soul. Together, they hunt the ever-increasing monster population and uncover evidence that Crowley and Castiel might not be as antagonistic as they seem. As the situation unfolds, Eve's interest in Sam piques and she gives him a gift that changes the very essence of what he is.

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Pattern Recognition: A Hannibal/Supernatural fusion AU

word-count: ~33,000 | Sam and Dean split after River Pass, and their confrontation with the Horseman, War. Since Will’s escape from the Baltimore Institute for the Criminally Insane, he and Sam have been in hiding. They have a cabin, in the middle of nowhere, that keeps them off the radar; they find comfort in each other. But they can’t stay off the chessboard forever, especially not when Lucifer, wearing Hannibal Lecter as a vessel, is tearing the world apart around them.

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Bones

word-count: ~1,800 | The third trial sounded way too easy.

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In the Cards

word-count:~3,600| written for the 2012 spn-reversebang:  Fate wasn’t hers to change. She was an oracle — there to tell them what the future held in store. Nothing more, nothing less. And people were so desperate to know, even though it changed nothing.

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Diary of a Madman

word-count: ~3,500 | Lydia's newest patient, Sam Winchester, suffered from hallucinations, delusions, and regular bouts of insomnia. He also thought he was Lucifer.

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Unless Its Roots Reach Down to Hell

word-count: ~2,000 | written for the evilsam-spn fright-fest 2014: Sam spent months piecing the spell together—he'd crafted it himself out of slivers of handwritten, ancient journals—the ones even the Men of Letters kept hidden away in a man-sized curse-box on lockdown in room 26.

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[captainkirkk]

1/8 extended family anon: okay with one question about five you've made me flesh out this world. He's a kid. So they do have powers and Reginald raises them as per canon, five jumps to the apocalypse BUT there's no time cops in this au. Instead after a few years of slowly practising his time jumps he makes his way back to Reginald's funeral. It takes him forever to get the hang of it bc he's not exactly eating and resting well + trauma but he gets there bc he has to get back and warn his family!

Under the cut because it got it bit long. I fucking love this AU though.

2/? So he crashes the funeral but he's like 15-16 and a very unhealthy child due to the apocalypse being not a great place to grow up. Without the commission making things more difficult the siblings (eventually) figure out what's going on. There's a tense stand-off w Vanya but it goes better bc they do it earlier w/out the interference and in the end the whole apocalypse becomes a non-issue. after finding out about her powers and her ex-boyfriend's shiftiness (she's probably not

3/? the one to kill him bc i feel like that way doomsday lies. Five does it instead bc he's just as feral even without being a trained assassin) Vanya goes on a road trip to find herself. On this road trip she meets Sissy and Harlan. Meanwhile five is legally a child and all of his siblings want to make sure he's being properly looked after. Five who survived 2-3 years by himself in the apocalypse disagrees about the need for a guardian. Alison who actually has a child is doing what she can

4/? but between travelling regularly across country to visit Claire (she probably meets Ray while travelling) and the chaos of the sibling dynamic it isn’t ideal. Grace isn't doing great at parenting either bc while they're working to fix her programming it's not fully fixed yet. Pogo is also there being Pogo. Diego's around a lot bc of Grace (plus his siblings but he's not going to say that) but is not parenting. Neither is Luther bc five doesn't respect him as an authority figure.

5/? Klaus is also not doing parenting but is somewhat? around bc family and bc he wants support while he tries to get sober. (he still ends up in Vietnam at some point but through a natural or five made time portal bc no commission. When he gets back he makes five (who has some control of time travel and hasn't been taught not to fuck w the timeline) go back to rescue Dave). Ben is probably still ghosting around unless he did what he did for Vanya in s2 in this s1. Patch didn't die

6/? bc no time cops and maybe they meet Lila organically since she's their super power sibling. They both end up as vaguely part of the family. Vanya gets back from her lesbian road trip months after she left to find the Great Five Should Go to Therapy Debate in full swing. She tries to deescalate by offering to go if he does. Bc he's a vindictive asshole he says he'll only go if everyone goes, and as soon as anyone stops, he does too. This is how they all get professional help bc I demand it.

7/? The end result is thanksgivings look like 5 adopted adult siblings, 1 terrifying teenage adopted sibling, (maybe a ghost,) 1 robot mother, 1 talking monkey, 2 spouses from the present, and 1 from the 60s, 2 children/stepchildren, 1 extra sibling who didn't get adopted but found later, and 1 detective who nobody knows why she's here but they're all thrilled she is

.8/8 Also Hazel is a regular office drone or a CIA agent or something who met Agnes, fell in love, and quit his job. Sometimes they also show up. The final important detail is Sissy and Grace are good friends.

9/8 extended family anon, the other final important point is thinking about five in his late teens dealing with this very large family and his nice and nephew especially

Five spent years in the apocalypse totally alone, and now he has the biggest family ever. He not-so-secretly loves it.

About Hazel: he’s the CIA agent (or something alone those lines) that got assigned to investigate all the weird shit the Hargreeves stirred up, like maybe energy disturbances with Five/Vanya’s powers. Five spends a lot of time at Griddy’s, so maybe he even kind of helps him and Agnes get together. Either way, when Five kills Leonard, Hazel is able to make it look like self-defence so it doesn’t go to trial (which it sort of is, but Five is still kind of... vicious about the whole thing and loses himself). He sends a Christmas card every year reminding Five not to get into any more trouble. Not that Five would listen.

Also I need to see Sissy, Patch, Dave and Ray meeting everyone in this AU, good lord. Klaus might not really know what to do, parenting wise, but I bet Dave would try his best, even if he’s wayyy out of his depths. Same with Sissy and Ray. Thankfully, Five has more patience with his in-laws than his siblings, simply because he knows he has to be semi-polite to them to avoid chasing them off. 

[monicawoe]

spn fic masterlist

(updated 5/29/21)

I’ve written over 100 spn fics (ranging from ficlets to 70k big-bangs). Most of them are Sam-centric, largely featuring powers!Sam. The whole collection can be found here on AO3

newest fics:

Between Hell and the Hunt - Dean's deal is due, but Sam has found a way to save him. He's made a deal with someone else - someone Lilith can't touch. (2k words, Wild Hunt season 3 AU)

Closer Than You Think - Five times Sam’s eyes were demonic, and one time they weren’t. (3k words, boyKingSam AUs of multiple eps)

Behold the Beast, Behold the Lamb - Season 4 AU.  Sam tried to free Dean from Hell, but angels intervened and took Dean for their own purposes. Sam is determined to get Dean back and will do whatever it takes, embracing his abilities fully. The more demon blood Sam drinks, the more demons he kills, the more he changes inside and out until it’s impossible to hide his monstrous side. Ruby, Uriel and Castiel push Sam to fulfill his destiny and become his true self—the Beast of the Revelation. (gen, Sam/Ruby, 20k words; featuring art by @quickreaver​)

Prayers Answered - written for the boy king Sam discord server prompt: Sam has grown up in a very religious environment. He's devoted, he goes to church, he prays. He knows that God is with him, because he listens to his prayers. But as Sam grows older, he realizes it's not God that's been listening. And he realizes that he's not asking - he's been ordering, and his loyal servants would never deny their King. (2k words; gen)

Sin Eater - Sam has a different plan to cure demon Dean, but Dean doesn't want to be cured. (Sam drinking blood from demon!Dean, written for @quickreaver​ for her artwork Bitumen Kiss)

On His Head a Crown - written for the 2019-2020 SWBB, art by @slytherkins​ Hunters drug Sam, force-feed him demon blood, and bring him to where they’ve captured Brady. Brady tells Sam he knows how to stop the Apocalypse, and Sam, despite his better judgment, hears him out: Sam himself is the horsemen Conquest—aka the Antichrist—and he alone can bring Lucifer’s apocalypse to a grinding halt. Sam resists, but when he discovers the good he can do with his new powers, he decides to use them to atone for all his past mistakes.   (21k, Sam/Brady, gen, AU of 5x03-5x04)

Many more under the cut

Best Self - written for @alyndra9​​  for the prompt: King of Hell Sam meets Kale!Sam and they have many differences of opinion to work out. (aka the only one who knows what Sam really wants is Sam.) words by monicawoe banner by @quickreaver​​! (~4k words, Sam/Sam)

All You Have Is Your Fire - written for @quickreaver​ for the 2020 Supernatural Spring Fling Dean has known fire all his life. Sometimes it sounds like his brother. (~2k words; gen)

Tear You Apart - written for @wetsammywinchester​ who wanted Soulless!Sam/Brady & Soulless!Sam taking on the mantle of King of Hell:  Sam doesn’t want his soul back. He resurrects Brady who helps him figure out a way to outsmart Death: by damaging his soul so it can’t be reintegrated. With Brady’s help, Sam reclaims his power, and takes his soul apart one piece at a time. (8k words; Soulless!Sam/Brady)

Hellbound - Sam is in Hell, and then he isn't. He's standing on a sidewalk with a stranger looking back at him—a stranger that has his face. My 2020 spn-summergen fic! Featuring soulless!Sam, disembodied soul-Sam and amnesiac Dean. (gen, 8k)

Lakeside Fishing - written for @denugis​ - After defeating Famine, after days of suffering through demon blood withdrawal in the panic room, Sam needs time to clear his head. Early in the morning, he heads to a small lake seeking solitude, but instead finds an unexpected ally. (4k words; Sam/Patrick; set after My Bloody Valentine; witch!Sam)

His Soul to Keep - art by @sketchydean​​ - written for the SPN Eldritch Bang horror event - Dean’s deal is coming due soon. When he finds out from Ruby that Hell will turn him into a demon, he refuses to accept it, even though he can already feel pieces of his soul starting to crumble away. Sam is his only anchor to the world, and Dean finds it harder and harder to leave his side.    After Broward County, after watching Dean die a thousand deaths, Sam decides he’s not going to let Dean go to Hell. He’ll do whatever it takes, even if that means allying himself with Ruby and using the darkness inside of him. Sam casts a soul-binding spell on Dean; they might not be able to break the deal, but they can change who Dean’s soul belongs to. (13k, Sam/Dean, hard-gen, AU of season 3))

Last Drop - art by @quickreaver​ -written for the Twisted Tropes event - Sam/Brady AU set while Sam’s at Stanford:  Sam is slowly adjusting to his new life at Stanford University. He’s left his life of hunting behind, and traded it for endless studying and tests, but he’s plagued by dreams of Dean and Dad in danger, dreams of blood and violence. Then he meets Tyson Brady, who’s always there with a smile and a cup of coffee to get Sam through all-nighters. Sam’s dreams start to fade, but just as he’s getting used to a nice normal life, he starts to develop abilities—powers he can’t control. Brady thinks they’re great, but Sam knows power never comes without a cost. (14k, Sam/Brady)

Make Angels of Us All - art by @amberdreams1960​  - Sam has a guardian angel. It’s been with him his whole life, trying to keep him safe. The angel gives Sam power he can’t control: power to move things with his mind, power over fire, and wings that nobody else can see—bony and jagged with scaly feathers. Dean says monsters aren't real, but Dad thinks they are. Sam's power scares him, and he’s not always sure what's real, but what he does know is people keep trying to kill the three of them, and he won't let that happen. (~20K, gen)

Burdens, Doublefold - cowritten with @quickreaver​, art by ileliberte What if Dean left Sam at Stanford after the fire, hoping it would keep his little brother safe and make things better? Somehow, 'better' never seems to be in the Winchester Family cards. Sam gets tangled up with his ex-roommate Brady, tracking psychics, but dealing with demons is never honest business. Dean carries on until his father is put in grave danger. He is left on his own to deal, stumbling into Harvelle's Roadhouse for help, where Dean gets just a little more than he bargained for. Eventually, the brothers’ paths twist and turn their way back to each other, but the results could mean the End of Days. (67k, gen, AU of seasons 1-2)

Before the One You Serve When Dean comes to get Sam at Stanford, he finds him living with Brady. And Dean doesn't trust Brady, even though he can't quite put his finger on why. Not at first. (5k, Sam/Brady)

He Who Fights Monsters - cowritten with nwspaprtaxis, art by @quickreaver​ AU of the summer between Seasons 3 and 4. Dean's dead, dragged down kicking and screaming to Hell. Sam's not dealing well. And Ruby’s got her work cut out for her. (52K, Sam/Ruby)

John Winchester is Dead They say those Winchester boys're crazy. Drive around in a big black beast and drink too much and laugh about mean things. They say their daddy's worse, but you never see him. He's just a voice on the other end of the phone or a darker shape in the back seat of their dark car. They say John Winchester died two years ago. (2k, gen, horror)

Breathing, Talking, Dead Man Walking   -  John Doe, male, approximately thirty-seven years old. Subject was found by EMTs in close proximity to the site of a sizable explosion in Lebanon, Kansas. (2k, gen, Sam & Dean)

Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea - featuring art by @quickreaver​ When Sam opened Lucifer’s Cage, the only thing he found inside was Lucifer’s grace – his grace. With the return of his grace, Sam remembered his past – his war against the Host, his Fall, and his plans to bring about the End. The thing is…he doesn’t want the Apocalypse anymore. He likes things the way they are, and tries everything to keep his identity a secret- especially from Dean. Of course, the four Horsemen, Hell and Heaven have other ideas. (13K, gen)

The Last Days in the Land of Nod - comic adaptation by @quickreaver​ The year is 2014. The Devil is wearing his finest, the Angel is human, and the Brother protects the survivors at Camp Chitaqua.

The Two Ravens - art by @quickreaver​ Your brother he is, and heir to my throne. He’ll feed on the damned and he'll turn them to bone. (4k; fairy-tale)

Counteroffer About two weeks after Sam gutted a hellhound, completing the first trial, he started acting weird. (5k, psychological horror, gore)

Pattern Recognition: A Hannibal/Supernatural fusion AU  -  Sam and Dean split after River Pass, and their confrontation with the Horseman, War. Since Will’s escape from the Baltimore Institute for the Criminally Insane, he and Sam have been in hiding. They have a cabin, in the middle of nowhere, that keeps them off the radar; they find comfort in each other. But they can’t stay off the chessboard forever, especially not when Lucifer, wearing Hannibal Lecter as a vessel, is tearing the world apart around them. (33k, Sam Winchester/Will Graham)

Impala's Run - cowritten with @quickreaver, art by adrenalineshots Sam and Dean Singer (aka Winchester) aren’t your average young Kansas farmers. Their home is very, very far from Kansas, in fact. Many light-years worth of ‘far’. The boys may look human, but certain talents set them apart: Dean speaks the language of machines, and Sam can heal through manipulating energy. Hidden on Earth by their father, their agricultural lifestyle gets rocked when warring alien races discover where they’ve landed, and Sam and Dean are forced to make the run of their lives. (23k, gen)

All Our Wrath and Cutting Beauty - art by @quickreaver - Sam killed Alistair, but not before Alistair reminded Dean of who and what he’d become in Hell. Dean knows Sam can take down Lilith, and he’ll make damn sure Sam gets strong enough to do just that. They’ll stop the Apocalypse – together, no matter how many bodies stack up, or how much blood is spilt.(11k, horror) 

Diary of a Madman -Lydia’s newest patient, Sam Winchester, suffered from hallucinations, delusions, and regular bouts of insomnia. He also thought he was Lucifer. (4k, gen, horror)

Some other bundled links, for your convenience

Demon-blood Sam

King of Hell Sam

Powers!Sam

Horror

Crossovers & Fusion ‘verses

Hannibal|SPN

SPN/Preacher

SPN/Hannibal/MCU

[katehuntington]

Title: All I Want - part three Fandom: Supernatural Characters: Reader, Dean Winchester, Sam Winchester (Bobby Singer, Castiel Mary Winchester and many more mentioned) Pairing: Dean x Reader Series summary: Sam and Dean come across an object that could be the solution to Michael. The Pearl of Baozhu grants the beholder’s deepest desire. Once Dean focuses on his wish, the archangel remains caged in his mind however. Instead his former girlfriend Y/N shows up, who was killed in 2010 in Detroit, by no other than Lucifer himself. Summary part three: Still in shock after Y/N’s unexpected return, the Winchesters fill her in on what has happened in the past ten years. Learning about all the ones they have lost, is a little too much for her to take in. Warnings part three: NSFW, 18+ only. Spoilers season 14 episode 13. Angst, fluff. Swearing, alcoholism. Descriptions of flashbacks and memories. Mentions of character death, time in Hell, torture and nightmares. Anxiety, grieving over lost loved one. Confusion that comes with time travel. Word Count: 5377 words Author’s note: Part three of a multi part miniseries, based on the 300th episode “Lebanon”. Beta’d by the lovely @kittenofdoomage​, @winchest09​, @girl-with-a-fandom-fettish​, and @thinkwritexpress-official​​. Thank you all so much for your feedback!

All I Want Masterlist

     “So, long story short,” Y/N summarizes, “Sam jumped into the pit with Lucifer riding piggyback, Cas pulled him out but forgot his soul. There was a civil war in Heaven. Cas declared himself God and released the Leviathan and when those ugly suckers were defeated, our angel buddy and you--” she nods at Dean, “- got sucked into Purgatory, which is a place that actually exists, apparently.”

     They are in the kitchen, seated at the four-person table. The hunters raided the liquor cabinet, all in need of a drink after the rather unexpected and staggering turn of events.      Y/N takes a shot of whiskey and puts the tumbler down on the varnished wood with a bang, shoving it across and motioning the older Winchester for a refill.

     “Meanwhile, Sam hit a dog and you escaped Purgatory, but Cas didn’t. Then there was this whole deal with the tablets and the trials, which almost killed your brother. You let an angel - who actually turned out to be a different angel - possess Sam in order to save him. There’s a second civil war upstairs…” She knocks back her head, downing the glass in one go. “I mean, what is it with those halo idiots? Haven’t they learned anything from watching humanity slaughter each other for centuries?”      “Y/N, I know this is a lot, but you need to slow down a bit,” Dean advises, but she snatches the bottle from his hand and pours herself another.      “I’m nowhere near done. Where was I?” She looks up at the ceiling of the kitchen for a second while thinking, until it comes to her. “Oh, right! The angels fell, you took on the Mark of Cain, beat that Knight of Hell chick Abaddon, then got yourself killed. Again. But, oh wait, it gets better! You woke up a demon and had a fun summer with Crowley.”      Her voice pitches a little higher, a hint of panic audible now. Dean watches her process the information which is so clearly overwhelming her and eyes Sam, who is fixing her something quick to eat behind the kitchen counter. Their gazes lock on each other, both men wondering in silence if telling her the whole truth was a good idea.

     “Sam cured you, but you still carried the Mark. You killed Death.” She laughs, cynically. “I mean, c’mon! Death! It’s ironic to say the least. Anyway, the Darkness was released, which - I kid you not - is God’s sister. Oh, and God? Turns out that horrible tween girl novel writer Chuck is actually the almighty creator! Ha!”      “Why don’t you eat something? You’re probably hungry,” Sam suggests, putting down a plate in front of her.      But Y/N isn’t interested in the sandwich and instead picks up her crystal glass again, having another royal amount of the brown liquor. Holding the tumbler to her lips while letting the whiskey linger in her mouth, she points her index finger at the younger Winchester now, who sits down opposite of the woman from their past.

     “Your mom is back from the dead, the British Men of Letters turned out to be stuck up dicks. Lucifer was sprung from the cage, became President of the United States, and knocked up an intern. He had a son, his name is Jack. How am I doing so far?” she rants, setting down the empty glass in front of her.      Dean looks at her, a worried frown drawing lines on his forehead. He knows her well enough to sense she needs to blow off steam. Interrupting her might not be his best move, but that doesn’t stop him from growing concerned about her current state of mind.

     “There was a rift between our world and this - this Apocalypse world, you called it? And Mary and Lucifer ended up on the wrong side before it closed. Luci killed Cas, Dean was sad, Cas came back. You guys went on a rescue mission, Sam got killed. Again!” She sighs deeply, burying her face in her crossed arms on the table. “Seriously, the amount of times you two have died is giving me a fucking headache.”      “Yeah, sorry about that,” Sam says, shooting her a sheepish smile before she continues.

     “So Apocalypse!Michael possessed you in order to kill the Devil once and for all.” She looks up again, focusing on Dean. “But he didn’t check out like he promised - shocker, by the way. He wreaked havoc here, then out of the blue let you go. And now you guys live here in this Men of Letters bunker with a Nephilim, an angel and your undead mother.”      “That’s about right,” Dean confirms.      Y/N lets a breath slip from her lips and stares past him absently, the gears in her head still on overdrive.      “I need another drink,” she eventually mutters, not even bothering filling up her tumbler, but taking a swig directly from the bottle.      When she sets it back on the table top and lets her fingers slip from the glass, Sam is quick to get up and take the bottle back to the kitchen, putting it away in one of the cabinets; she has had enough for one day.      “And I died…”

     The younger Winchester turns around and leans over the counter while observing his friend, his knuckles white on the surface. He studies the breadcrumbs that litter the stainless steel surface after he cut her sandwich in two, having difficulty addressing that topic. When Lucifer flung her into that wall with such magnitude that it killed her instantly, Dean lost the woman he loved, but Sam lost his best friend. He didn’t realize how he felt about her demise until after he got his soul back, which somehow made it even worse. Like he didn’t do her justice, didn’t mourn like he should have. He doesn’t have to reply to her words, though, because Dean beats him to it.      “On May 10, 2010,” he states, averting his gaze and focusing on his folded hands in front of him, still wrapped around his own whiskey glass.      The date is forever etched in his memory. Her mirage haunts him on a regular basis, but on the 10th of May she’s all he can think about, like a fog that refuses to lift at daybreak. It’s one of the hardest days to get through, the day that he misses her the most. Dean’s jaw flexes and he tries to swallow down the pressure that’s gradually building in his chest.

     “That’s - that’s in a year and a half,” Y/N stammers, after quick calculation. “At least in whatever time I’m from.”      “Yeah, just before the big title fight between the Archangels,” Sam confirms.      Y/N glances up at him, then back at Dean, who still can’t force himself to look at her.      “Who killed me?”      “Lucifer,” Dean recalls, venom in his voice.      Her brow lifts up at the reveal. She was killed by the Devil himself? Well, at least that would make a cool inscription on her tombstone.      “You guys salted and burned me, right?” she double checks, even though she cannot imagine the Winchesters giving her anything but a hunter’s farewell.      Dean pulls at his lip with his teeth, the memory of the burning pyre flashing before his eyes. He remembers it as if it was yesterday. The funeral that made sure her death would be irreversible, permanent. The sight of her body set alight. In order to stop the Apocalypse from happening, he lost his brother and his girl. Sam was suffering endless and horrific torture in the pits of Hell while she was going up in flames before his eyes. God, he was a mess. His brother came home, but looking back now, deep down Dean knows he never really recovered from losing the woman who will forever have his heart.      “I did,” he confirms.      I did, he said. All of a sudden, Y/N realizes Sam was gone too at this point; Dean didn’t even have his brother to lean on. Pitiful she watches the hunter, who has endured so much already. He lost the two most important people in his life in a day’s time.      “Then… how am I back?” she wonders. “You said something about summoning me?”      “We found a magical artifact called the Pearl of Baozhu. It grants your biggest wish, basically,” Sam begins to explain. “Apparently, it’s so powerful it doesn’t need remains to resurrect someone.”      “And I am your biggest wish?” She chuckles. “What? Not winning the lottery? Peace on Earth?”      A small smirk pulls at the corner of Dean’s mouth; oh, he missed her wit.      “No, it’s you,” he states after a moment of quiet, finally meeting her gaze.

     Astonishment silences her as she stares at him, the pain of having to go through life without her still evident in his eyes. He looks so much wearier than she remembers the tough hunter, the soldier who always marched on and kept grinding. Even after he came back from Hell, the experience that tore open wounds which bled even worse than those inflicted the night the hellhounds took him. Honestly, there were plenty of times she thought he would never recover, whenever he woke up screaming from another nightmare and she had to hold him until he calmed. And yet, he didn’t seem as burdened as he does now, and that is saying something. It’s as if time broke him down bit by bit as he grew older, until there was nothing left but a ruin. 

     Dean said it’s 2019, which means he’s forty years old now. His frown lines lay deeper, so do the crow’s feet by the corner of his eyes. There’s a scar on his chin that wasn’t there before, covered by his stubble. His hair is a little longer, but only by a quarter of an inch. Age has not done a number on him, because he’s still handsome, but trauma and loss surely have. Knowing that her own death had a substantial part in the neverending sorrow and guilt she knows the hunter carries breaks her heart, because if anything, she would never want to cause him such agony.

     “We were together,” she says, ending the silence. 

     It’s more a realization than it is a question, but Dean nods either way. Her jaw lowers slightly, her mouth opening, but she has no idea what to say. She was frightened when she heard she was on a collision course with death. But now she’s made aware that her future self and Dean are going to face evil as one hell of a power couple, that fear diminishes. She was a teenager when she first started developing feelings for the oldest Winchester brother. She never acted on it, the hunter’s life always getting in the way of their romance. But somehow, despite destiny, despite the horror show that is their reality, they found their way to each other. 

     Seeing just how much her departure wrecked him, she reaches out, moving her hand across the table to take his. She squeezes softly, running her thumb over his skin, rough from the many fights he’s faced. He visibly relaxes, cherishing the moment he never thought he’d have again.      Y/N forces herself to avert her eyes, aware they aren’t alone. She glances at Sam, who watches the two, smiling, but his content expression dissolves when she inadvertently turns the conversation in a harrowing direction.      “What about the others? How’s Bobby?” she wonders, oblivious to the painful reply that is to come.

     Dean’s face falls, closing his eyes in apprehension. Shit, he wishes he didn’t have to break the bad news to her. Bobby Singer was like a father to all of them, but Y/N spent the majority of her childhood under his wing. After her parents died, he took her in and raised her as his own, made sure she could go to school, that she could be a kid. Hell, he was her father, maybe not genetically, but he was the wise man who taught them that family doesn’t end in blood.

     Sam stares back at her, then swallows thickly, letting his head hang. Analyzing his stance, the smile on her lips dies down, frantically searching for an indication that says it isn’t so. When the tall hunter is unable to return her gaze, she fixates on Dean, tears already glazing over her eyes.      “Y/N...” He takes her hand in his now, trying to sooth her and cushion the blow, but he knows there’s nothing he can do that would take the pain away that is about to hit her like a freight train.      “No...” She shakes her head, unable to accept it. “No no no no...”      “I’m so sorry,” he says softly, his heart breaking as he breaks hers. 

     Her bottom lip begins to tremble, her face contorting as she fights the emotions that quickly overpower her. Shimmering pathways of anguish find their way down her cheeks, eventually falling to land on the wooden surface. Y/N wipes her cheeks dry, but it’s no use, new tears forming faster than she can erase. And so she brings her free hand up to cover her mouth, holding back a sob.      “W-when?” she stammers, her voice shaking. “How?”      “In 2012. He... he was shot,” Dean explains, trying to get the words across as gingerly as possible.

     She shuts her eyes now, her throat closing up and she bites her bottom lip, trying her hardest not to break down in front of the boys. She has so many questions of which the answers terrify her.      “Did he die alone?”      She barely dares to look up again, meeting Sam’s gaze this time. He shakes his head, offering her a comforting smile.      “No, we were right there with him,” he assures.      “He’s in Heaven,” Dean consoles, rubbing the pad of his thumb over the back of her hand. “Cas double checked.”

     Y/N nods slightly, sniffling as she digests the news. Knowing that he’s in a good place right now doesn’t stop the grief from tearing her apart, because she has no idea how to go through life without her mentor to council her, but at least he’s not suffering anymore. A shuddering breath escapes from her lungs as she collects herself.      “What killed him, is it--”      “- dead. Yeah, we made sure of that,” Dean guarantees.      “Good,” she says, her voice having gained some strength. “What about Rufus? Ellen & Jo?”      Sam sighs and looks down, painfully confronted with how many people they’ve lost over the years.      “They’re all gone,” he states, still leaning heavily on the countertop.      Shocked, Y/N stares at him, unable to believe how many have perished.      “So, of the original crew, you two are really the last ones standing, huh?”      “Yeah, I guess we are,” the younger brother confirms. “But we met some great people along the way, I’m sure they’ll be excited to meet you. We’re not fighting the good fight alone, by any means.”      “Glad to hear that. Just, not today? I’m not sure how much more I can take,” she almost pleads, her voice raspy from crying.

     Dean watches her closely, guilt constricting in his gut. Unknowingly, he has pulled her from a time where things weren’t all that bad. If she’s from October 2008, he has just returned from Hell. Bobby was alive, Sam was okay, so were the other people she considered family. They were growing closer, on the verge of giving in to the attraction they felt for each other. But now it’s just the three of them and a ten year gap between her lifetime and theirs. She must be feeling completely out of place, disorientated, exhausted.      “Why don’t we go pick out a room for you, so you can lay down for a bit?” Dean offers, squeezing her hand gently to get her attention.      She agrees and gets up from her seat without another word, mentally too tired to argue. The alcohol is coursing through her system, and although she doesn’t feel highly intoxicated, combined with the range of emotions she just went through, it’s doing a number on her. Honestly, she’s down for a nap, preferably one that lasts a day or two.      Dean lets her go up the two steps first, ready to catch her might her coordination fail her after all. He glances over his shoulder at his brother, who picks up the untouched sandwich and carries the plate to the sink.      “Go ahead, I’ll clean up,” Sam offers.      Thankful, the older Winchester forces a small smile before he leaves the kitchen. 

     Quietly, Y/N follows the broad shouldered hunter who leads the way, her arms crossed in front of her chest, the coolness from the stone walls chasing chills up and down her spine. It’s not just the cold, though, it’s everything. Too much information to process, too much heartbreak to endure. Her brain is overloaded, fatigue hitting her like a ton of bricks.      She watches Dean turn the corner and stroll into a long hallway with doors on either side, gold plated numbers below the Men Of Letters emblem. They stop in front of room 12.      “You can take this one,” he suggests, opening the door for her and flicking on the lights. “I’m right next door if you need anything. Sam’s in room 21.”

     Y/N steps inside, taking in her new accommodation. Despite the use of mostly brick and concrete and the lack of windows, the glow coming from the ceiling light and the lamp on the nightstand feels warm and welcoming. A large mahogany bed is situated against the far end, a matching desk on the left with an old typewriter and a radio sitting on top. Directly behind the door there’s a sink and a medicine cabinet with a mirror on the lid, and a wardrobe next to it.      “We can put a rug on the floor, if you want. I remember how you always had cold feet,” Dean suggests.      She turns in the middle of the room, a small smile on her lips; he’s not wrong.      “I’d like that,” she says, grateful.

     A little uneasy she lets her gaze linger over the still empty cabinets and bookshelves again, feeling foreign in this future that didn’t include her, before Dean wished she was. She realizes there’s nothing to fill them with, no clothes, no books, no picture frames.      “Could I maybe borrow a shirt and some sweats from you? I’m gonna have to buy some new clothes later today,” she asks, a little flustered.      “Sure, but actually, uh…” He rubs the back of his neck, the way he always does when he’s nervous. “I never threw away your stuff. It’s been in boxes in the storage room, so your clothes are probably gonna need to be washed--”      “- Wait, you… you saved my stuff?”

     She stares at him in awe. It’s been almost ten years since she died, and he still held on to all that she owned. Sure, it wasn’t much, since they were on the road most of the time, but still. They didn’t find this bunker until a couple of years later, which means Dean had stored it in a locker somewhere, or maybe at Bobby’s, and picked it up again when they found a permanent home. He had moved her things around for almost a decade, yet never threw them out, even though he knew there was no purpose left for the items that once belonged to her. Just painful reminders of what was and what was lost.      “Yeah, I - I couldn’t really bring myself to throw it out,” he claims, as if he was dodging a task that should have been done long ago.      He isn’t lying. Even though he knew she was never going to return to him, that her life was lost and his love was hopeless, he kept everything she held dear. Her books, her mixtapes, her photos, her jewelry. The clothes she wore, the guitar she played. The stack of coasters she collected, picking one up at every bar they ever had a drink at, from every town they ever crossed. The old school Polaroid camera she brought everywhere, snapping pictures of everything that caught her eye along the way. Sunsets, funny road signs, captivating landscapes, interesting people. There are a few of him, of the Winchesters together, some more portraying the three of them, all squeezed into the shot. She even caught Bobby on camera, ignoring his grumpy mutters when she had fulfilled her seemingly impossible mission.      There’s the music box she got from her mother when she was little, her parents’ wedding album. Lore books, weapons and crystals that Bobby gave her when she first started hunting. The enchanted good luck charm Dean gave her for her birthday. He held on to it all, because he couldn’t bear the thought of having to let her go completely.

     Sympathetically, Y/N observes him. His tough exterior only lets a hint of embarrassment over something so sentimental seep through. But she knows him, she has seen the knight without his armor. She knows how badly he’s hurting.      “Anyway, I’ll - uh, get you some clean clothes and dig up your stuff from storage.” He points his thumb over his shoulder a little awkwardly, excusing himself.      She nods. “Thanks.”

     With a faint smile on his lips he disappears, leaving the door ajar. Y/N breathes in deeply and allows the air to flow out, trying to calm herself down. It’s her first moment alone since she found herself in the year of 2019 and she cannot begin to comprehend what is happening to her. How she time-jumped a decade into the future, having history with Dean she cannot even recall. It feels like she’s in a bad daytime television show, where one of the characters has hit her head too hard and suffers from amnesia, not remembering her lover.      Rubbing her forehead she turns around, trying to massage away the headache. Her eyes glide through her new bedroom again. This is going to be her home now. After moving out of Bobby’s place, she never really had that kind of stability. The closest she came to a roof over her head was her minivan, her little house on wheels. 

     Fingertips grace the covers of her bed, the material soft under her touch, when she hears Dean’s boots echo in the hall. She turns around as he comes through the doorway, holding two boxes with a bundle of clothes laying on top of the stack in his arms. He lowers the neatly taped carton containers to the ground, her name written on them with black marker. Dean made sure to file on the label what’s inside them.      “There’s one more box, your clothes are in that one. I can put them in the washer now, so you’ll have something better to wear than my oversized stuff,” he offers.      “You don’t have to do that, Dean,” she objects, but he shrugs it off.      “It’s no problem.”      His voice is kind, but he’s not taking ‘no’ for an answer. It’s the first time he has moved her belongings without having to fight the tears, without having to pause in order to stop himself from breaking down. He wants to make sure she has something clean and fresh to wear when she wakes up later, finally being able to take care of her again. 

     Dean turns the corner and heads to the storage room, his heart finally calming with the simplicity of being able to do something as domestic as washing her clothes. After picking up the last big box, he exits the storage and pulls the door shut behind him, making his way to the dorm where the washers and dryers are situated. He sets the box down in front of one of the machines, pulls his pocket knife from his belt and cuts through the duct tape. The first item he pulls out, however, steals his breath; it’s the leather jacket she wore that night in Detroit.      Two days after they lost her, Dean wrapped her in linen before he laid her down on the pyre he and Bobby built, her lifeless body still in the jeans and band shirt she had on when she was killed. He took off her favorite black leather jacket, though, wanting to preserve it, even though it was a part of Y/N - or maybe because it was. Traces of faded crimson still stain the collar. Dean shakes his head, trying to ban the image from his mind. The image of the blood running from her nose and mouth as she hung from his arms, dead weight, the spark of life in her eyes long gone.

     After a deep breath, the hunter collects himself and lays the leather jacket aside, then begins to carefully pick out some of her clothes. He makes a selection that fits in the drum, adds a laundry pod and turns the machine on. He hopes the old thing does a better job at washing away the memory of her death than he’s doing.

     When he enters Y/N’s room again, she has changed into the black shirt and grey sweatpants he offered her. She spins when she hears him, an amused grin adorning her face.      “Nice socks,” she chuckles, showing off her novelty footwear with burgers and milkshakes on them.      “Shut up. Sammy gave them to me for Christmas,” he utters, a blush on his cheeks. “Your stuff’s in the washer.”      “Thank you,” she returns, grateful.

     A silence followers as Dean lingers in the doorway. This would be the moment to give her some space and retreat to his room, but somehow he can’t make himself step outside. He has spent too much time without her by his side already, he doesn’t want to waste a second not being with the woman he’s still unmistakingly in love with. She’s his girl, afterall. But that’s where it gets confusing, because he’s not sure how she feels about all this. Y/N was zapped from a time where they weren’t in a relationship yet, so where do they stand in this messed up mayhem?      “Y/N, about that kiss earlier…” he starts off hesitant. “I, uh - I didn’t know you were from a place where we weren’t… y’know, together.”

     The smile on her lips dies down as she watches the hunter, skilled in the field when fighting evil, but now stumbling over his own words. It’s only now that she realizes how surreal this must be for him. His mind probably has archives full of memories she has no clue of, simply because in her time, they didn’t happen yet.      “What I’m trying to say is…” Dean takes a breath, trying to get his message across. “If I came on too strong, or made you feel uncomfortable in any way, I’m sorry.”      He glances up now, watching how she slowly approaches. Gently, she takes his hand in hers, their fingers entwining. After studying their hold for a few seconds, she tilts her head and restores eye contact. The look she gives him is so warm and kind, it mends the broken man that he is.      “I’m not,” she responds, her voice soft.

     She leans in, tiptoeing, and presses her soft lips against his. For a good moment all his grief, the endless regret, the physical pain that became chronic, is forgotten. He closes his eyes and melts into the touch, returning the kiss without hesitation. The voices in his head are silenced, his anxiety calmed. After eight years, eight months and twenty eight days, he has found his missing piece. If her departure from his world didn’t make him realize how much he loves her, this moment surely does.

     The kiss lasts a few heavenly long seconds, but then Dean parts from her, resting his forehead against hers. He sighs deeply, the air leaving him with a shudder. Still high on the ecstasy that the undeniable connection induced, she opens her eyes, but his remain closed. Wondering why, Y/N squeezes his hand. When he does look back at her, the tears bring out his green irises, like holding an emerald gem against the light. Compassionate, she cups his face, tracing the lines of his jaw.      “You really missed me, didn’t you?” she perceives.      He huffs; she’s putting it mildly.      “You have no idea,” he breathes.

     Y/N does, though. Last thing she remembers is how Dean just returned from Hell. In the four months that he was gone, she was completely at a loss. Wildflowers blossomed on his grave from her tears alone. Knowing he was enduring unimaginable torment only made it worse. But when he returned and she was able to close him in her arms again, it magnified everything she had ever felt for the man who went to Hell and back. The rollercoaster he’s riding now is one she’s been on herself, but she doesn’t tell him that; it’s not about her right now.

     She kisses him again, shorter and more sweetly now, smiling at him afterwards until he returns her expression. His eyes are still shimmering, but it’s not sorrow she finds in the depth of his pupils, not anymore. It’s gratefulness, appreciation, love, for her, the girl he lost so many years ago.      “You should get some sleep. You had one hell of a morning,” he says after a quiet moment, unable to look away.      She scoffs. “Understatement of the week.”      He nods grinning, admitting she’s probably right.      “I’ll leave you to it.”      Dean is about to let go of her hand, when her grip on him grows a little stronger, causing him to glance up at her, questioning.      “Could you…” she pauses, not sure if she’s asking too much. “Could you lay with me, just for a while?”      He reads her carefully, pained to see the hint of fear; she doesn’t want to be alone.      “Sure,” he agrees, the single word soothing her.

     Y/N allows his hand to slip from hers now and circles the bed, folding back the covers as Dean sits down to take off his shoes. When he leans back into the pillow, his upper body still slightly elevated against the headboard, tiredness overwhelms him. He hasn’t had a good night’s sleep in forever, Michael always waiting in the shadows when he dares to close his eyes. But when Y/N crawls into his chest, filling the vacant place that has been cold for so long, he sighs content, letting the worry fall from his shoulders. Who knows, maybe with her by his side, he might actually be able to rest.

     She pulls the sheets to cover the both of them, feeling Dean’s sheltering arm wrap around her and pull her in. The kiss he presses to her hair has her bite back the tears yet again. She tries to hide it, not wanting to come across as weak or emotional. The man who has always cared for her, doesn’t fail to notice, though.      “Hey…” he says, softly. “You had a lot on your plate today, huh?”      She sniffles and nods, not brave enough to test her voice.      “It’s gonna be okay, we’ll figure this out,” he promises. “You got me, Y/N.”      “Yeah…” she whispers. “I got you.”

     Dean holds her close, giving her the security and the comfort she is desperately seeking, hoping she might forget about the world she’s in now and the one she was ripped from. Absently, he rubs his fingers up and down her arm, the slow, soothing rhythm lulling her to sleep. Within minutes she’s out, the warmth she radiates slowly melting away the tension in the hunter’s stiff muscles, tired and worn from endless battles with both monsters and himself. Exhausted, he lets his cheek rest against the top of her head, allowing his own eyes to flutter shut as well. The last thing that crosses his mind before he falls asleep is a promise. Past, present, or future, Dean will always be there for the woman who makes him believe in their little slice of apple pie life. A decade of time difference will not change his word of honor.

It took me long enough, didn’t it! Stay tuned for part four, I hope I have gained some momentum now and will able to finish this series sooner than later.

Anyway, thank you for reading. I appreciate every single one of you, but if you do want to give me some extra love, you are free to like or reblog my work, shoot me a message or buy me coffee (Link to Kofi in bio at the top of the page).

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[scarletta-ec]

Original Sin Story: Re_Crime

CHAPTER FOUR: ~SETH'S PROJECT~

Scene 1

When Seth talks about Adam disappearing, he refers to him as “my adorably foolish child”.

Scene 2

Seth only ever saw Gammon’s rebellion as being a result of desperation. Apparently it was unexpectedly successful, though, as the senate (including Gavriil) had grown too complacent. Seth doesn’t mind— he’s gotten tired of messing with Gavriil, and Adam (who he was curious over) has fled the stage.

Scene 3

The revolution is underway. Seth is waiting for Gammon in front of the Levia-Behemo temple. Gammon arrives in the garden with pitiful Gavriil in tow, throwing him in front of him. He’s a mess but he’s still breathing, murmuring Alice's prophecy. Gammon dismisses him as a mere drugged-up madman now. Seth, as ever, is calm and a complete troll about it, despite the fact that Gammon knows Gavriil is like this because of Seth.

Gammon approaches him with a revolver in hand. Seth, hands up, asks him to explain what his research found out— so that he can correct him if Gammon got anything wrong.

Seth isn't taking anything seriously, and laughs inappropriately.

Gammon’s theory: Seth became Gavriil's servant over twenty years ago. Along with Gavriil, they developed a drug to brainwash Maria with— except in truth, it wasn’t Maria that was being drugged, but Gavriil himself, so that Seth could rule through him. As for Maria— she was already dead; Gammon’s not sure if she just died or was murdered. Gavriil has been having purple dreams, and passing them off as the queen’s prophecies. However, he’s been brainwashed into thinking that these prophecies are really coming from the queen, and that she’s still alive.

Gammon has no proof of his theory, though, so that’s why he’s come here to see her corpse for himself, demanding to know where it's being kept if it hasn't been disposed of already. Seth happily tells him Alice is where she always has been.

Gammon pistol whips Seth out of the way and heads inside the Hall of Glass. Seth, with a black eye, collapses with a smile.

Seth wonders what Gammon will see in the temple, and what will become of him once he’s come face to face with the “queen”, suggesting that Gammon’s theory is correct in some regard but also missing some key information. Seth pulls himself off the floor, retrieves his glasses (which had gone flying), and goes to a corner of the garden and opens a secret passageway buried in the dirt.

Right as he enters, he can hear someone's scream echoing from inside the Hall of Glass.

Scene 4

Seth reflects on things.

Adam is not Maria's child, but he also is.

To be accurate, he is not one of her twins, as Adam thinks. Yes, Seth "disposed" of them, but instead of tossing them into the river, he left the girl in the hands of a temple for her inheritor abilities (not that they knew he was the one to leave her there), and kept the boy in cryostasis.

Because the twins were irregulars, Seth found them invaluable for his research, but held the Ending Boy's value in higher regard than the Genesis Girl's. Still, he ensured both were alive for later reference.

He first met the real Adam when he fashioned him in his very own laboratory. It was partially to increase his “allies”, and partially on order by Maria. Through Gavriil he met Vaju, and through him became the head of the research institute, where he began to build his “ally” network. He would sometimes apply Venom for this purpose, though as the drug had several failings he tried not to rely on it too heavily.

Maria essentially gave him the okay to use the institute to further his efforts in creating artificial humans. After the disposal of her twins, and her resulting infertility, she desired an heir and privately requested Seth's assistance.

Adam was fashioned out of Maria's provided DNA. Seth has several stores of different racial DNA so he used foreign DNA to obscure Adam's resemblance to Maria.

Genetically speaking, Adam is the son of Maria and some unknown man. With the father identity-less and irrelevant, one could say Adam is her second virgin birth.

Adam was different from other Ghoul Children, having a mix of DNA, which improved his longevity. He's really no different from a normal human, the only difference is having been grown in a glass chamber than inside Maria. Seth doesn't really count him as a Ghoul Child.

After Adam's creation, a rogue Apocalypse attack destroyed part of the laboratory and Adam went missing.

Around the same time, Raijoou had left Apocalypse due to their increasing violence, and during an excursion, Seth as Horus met her and separately, her wife, Inanna. Seeing their disappointment at her inability to have children, Horus offered to her an ideal solution: use both the couple's DNA to make them a child. Of course, he added in something extra.

The result was a normal human child born from a glass vessel, like Adam. Seth had only recently learned Inanna told Raijoou she found this child in the river rather than it being their truly biological child. That was the logical decision, despite the irony.

As such, the child created from Held inheritor DNA exhibited the same abilities, which piqued Seth's interest in the creation of artificial inheritors.

Seth had wanted to see what came of the irregular twins, and track down his missing experiments once things calmed down, but he had a problem: his health was just beginning to decline, so he couldn’t just be running all over the place. Luckily, he didn't have to go too far to go find Adam, who had washed up on the shore nearest one of the exits of Lunaca Labora. Seth was also a bit surprised to run into Catherine there.

This was Seth’s first time raising a child— he tried to raise him by fostering his intellect, and his intellect solely. The emotional starvation he employed wasn't entirely deliberate, he simply wanted to create a mind similar to his, and Seth's warped view on his own childhood stopped him from seeing the issue with this.

It was a busy time— he was building his network, running the institute, drugging Gavriil, and had to solve the issue of his health going downhill. For the last problem, he researched this in Lunaca Labora, where he was “born as a human”. His current body was inferior to human ones— it aged at a much faster rate.

As he’s a genius, he was soon able to make a new, longer lasting type of body he could use using a similar method to the one he used for Adam and the Zvezdas. Pleased with his success, he made two other Ghoul Children (clones of himself) while he was at it, as another test in increasing his allies, giving them personalities based on his own. One was a failure, which he put in refrigeration in case of an emergency, as a backup body, and the other was a success. This Ghoul Child became Pale Noel. He entrusted Apocalypse, now abandoned by Raijoou, to Pale. Pale is still active to this day.

… Of course, Pale is such a terror that Seth’s own position could have been put in jeopardy, so he ordered Pale to keep from showing himself publicly and instead work behind the scenes. He then expunged all the information on Pale from his info network. After that he went to Raijoou and erased the memories she had of his appearance with Venom.

Of course, this didn’t really erase the mistrust that Raijoou had towards "Horus". Just memories of what he looks like.

His body was starting to fail then, so he decided to retire the Horus identity. He went back to Lunaca Labora and transferred his mind into the new, complete body. He could have changed the face but apparently it was just too handsome to mess with. As for still looking like Pale, he figured he could just tell people they were twins.

He decided to drop the false identities and go by his real name, Seth Twiright. He spent some time in Lunaca Labora while he waited for the excitement regarding Pale to die down, making more Ghoul Children. But he also didn’t want to make the same problem with Pale being identical to him. So he decided to make some that were completely new, different in face and gender— clones, but also not clones. This makes him think of Behemo, comparing himself to his work.

Seth says something profound— even geniuses have failures. Rather, being a genius in the first place is because you learn from your failures. Several attempts to create an inheritor Ghoul Child failed, so he had their organic compositions melted down.

After several trials, he made a Ghoul Child (he lists this as his official third) that was a different person, finally succeeding at installing an “inheritor” power in her for good measure. The moment he gave her a personality, she became rebellious, and as soon as he took his eyes off her she escaped Lunaca.

He was unable to find her for a while, but eventually received word that Pale had found her. She is also apparently very attached to Pale, which stupefies him because Pale is a clone of him despite her being rebellious towards Seth himself. He decides to leave her with Pale.

The way he talks about Adam sounds almost like he views him as a plaything. He gets tired of making Ghoul Children, freezes his current projects, and then goes to meet with Adam again as Seth. He recalls having fun the time Adam tried to kill him at Merrigod, though he was a bit flummoxed that Meta genuinely attempted to kill him along with the other researchers.

Seth was very intrigued by Adam, due to their similar upbringings and yet different personalities, and even sought to make him like himself. But Adam has quit the field— though in a way, Seth views that as “evil” like him, too. As for Eve— Cain and Abel’s deaths were not his own fault. He in fact would have preferred they were born alive, because they contained Seeds of Malice. But it's not a major loss of his either way. They died because Eve's blood was too diluted with Venom, which reduced the twins' survival rate.

Seth had fibbed a little bit when he told Adam that he derived Venom from a dead Gilles inheritor. In truth, he synthesized it from those melted down Ghoul Children, all failed Gilles inheritors before the success of Meta. 

Eve, as the Held inheritor child Seth created, was immune to its effects. The mind manipulating power of Venom has no effect on one capable of the same sort of power, especially one with the blessing of Held himself. Seth is relieved she never indulged this power to Adam or else he could have pieced that together.

While a single use of Venom does little harm to someone, many uses can hamper their cognitive ability. One immune to this would have no worries— unless they tried to have children.

Overuse of Venom had the tendency to cause severe deformities in the children of those drugged, so severe it often killed them in the womb. This was why making a Gilles inheritor was so challenging. The twins must have been dead for a while to be in that condition at birth.

Unlike Gilles inheritors, Held inheritors are capable of turning their mind manipulation powers onto themselves. Seth isn't sure because he can't read minds, but he's certain Venom did not break Eve at her stillbirth, because she was immune. Instead, Eve's power was attempting to keep her from breaking by preserving the belief that Cain and Abel were still alive, as a subconscious defense mechanism.

Of course— he doesn’t feel obligated to tell Adam all that. After all, Adam used Venom behind his back. It took no effort at all for Adam to piece that much together. Seth may have made it, but Adam has only himself to blame.

[black-wolf066]

AU where Five dies young in the apocalypse part 3

[Part 1] [Part 2]

[A03 link if it’s easier to read]

Our Place to Call Home

Being homeless had never truly bothered Klaus after he had left the academy behind him. Especially not when he had chosen it of his own free will.

At the ripe age of seventeen years, four months, and twelve days old (“Yes Ben, I remember the exact date I left. No one can forget that week of utter fun; no matter how hard one tries.”), Klaus hadn’t had very many choices laid out for him to pick from. It had been either leave everything behind for the streets (where he had a better chance of making it on his own) or stay and deal with a cruel man who had never cared for him—or any of them for that matter—and never hesitated in reminding him of his uselessness in that household.

Sure, leaving would have entailed wandering into the unknown, with food, shelter and his next fix not ever being a solid guarantee, but staying hadn’t exactly been an option for him either (not after Five, and certainly not after Ben—still so very fresh in his grave at that point in time). Staying would have required him to accept the knowledge that Reginald would end up killing him—or his remaining siblings—with the missions the old man continuously forced them on.

In the end, the streets were the lesser of two evils in Klaus’ opinion.

(As he crept out late in the night with nothing more than a knapsack, three hundred some odd dollars pilfered from Luther’s shoe box hidden under the floorboard beneath his bed, and the clothes on his back; Klaus spared one fleeting thought to the rest of his brothers and sisters; hoping they too would be smart enough to leave before it was too late.)

Once out there, he—and by extension, Ben—had finally been free to do whatever he had damn well pleased. To go wherever his feet led him, without a single care in the world. Sure it hadn’t been easy; some days worse than others (a fight here, a drug deal gone south there, the lack of food or a warm place to sleep when the nights would get too cold), but he had finally been handed the reigns  of his own destiny and nothing anyone could do or say would have stopped him from enjoying that high (not even a concerned Ben dogging his every step).

It took plenty of trial and error on his part (but Five wasn’t the only one capable of adaptability in the family), and plenty of months honing the skills he had learned for a different purpose then what they were originally intended for. Nevertheless, Klaus had made his new lifestyle work.

And for seven blissfully, foggy years, it did work.

Then Five up and died, came back from the future (“Called it!” “Congratulations, you’re not a complete idiot.” “Hey! I could deal without the sarcasm, Five-y, but I’ll still take the compliment!”) to haunt him, and suddenly Klaus’ blissful little world went up in figurative smoke and flames.

His lifestyle, he knew, was no longer a viable option; not with his resolve to stay relatively clean for Ben and Five’s sake. Not with the streets being a vixen of temptation he would succumb to the longer he was out there, and certainly not with the end of times looming like a distant gale in the background of what his life had apparently become.

God, no one told him being a responsible adult would suck quite this much.

(***)

“Sorry, occupancy is full.”

With a tired sigh, Klaus turned on his heel and left the shelter for the park.

“You could try another one rather than just giving up, you know. It’s not even that late out.” Five griped.

No, it wasn’t late at all, but Five didn’t know the streets like Klaus and Ben did. Five didn’t know each and every shelter within the city limit or that that particular establishment didn’t have a very reputable reputation to begin with. Herman Housing was usually the homeless’ last pick; the staff habitually rude and ill-tempered, the food border-line questionable, and the water from the showers leaving one feeling dirtier then when they first walked in. So, if Herman Housing—of all places—was full at this early hour of the day, then there was no point in wasting his time and energy trying for a bed somewhere else.

He was too tired and grumpy to communicate any of this information to Five.

Ben—bless him and his knack for knowing just what he’s thinking—voiced this for him.

“Well, you still can’t just sleep out here on the bench, Klaus.”

“Watch me.” He flopped back dramatically in his seat for added effect and grinned as Five looked for all the world like a riled cat.

“Klaus,” Ben cut in sharply before the argument could start. “You saw the news at Griddy’s. A blizzard’s coming and it’s going to be bad. Just go to Diego or Vanya, please—you know they won’t turn you away.”

No, they wouldn’t (not with the incoming threat of four feet of snow looming on the horizon), but his wounds were still fresh from their blatant dismissal when he tried to tell them Five had finally showed up to haunt his pathetic ass. It shouldn’t hurt, not when none of them every really believed him to begin with (even before Ben), but it did and still does. Ghosts were his thing after all, it shouldn’t have been that hard to believe. Sure, the drugs fundamentally nulled his powers almost completely, but his siblings should know by now that nothing he put in his system would stop Ben—or Five or any of them—from manifesting if they wanted too. His siblings were just that right side of stubborn pain in the asses that Klaus hoped none of the other spirits ever caught on too or he’d really be in trouble.

As the temperature continued to drop, and his brothers continued to pester and hound him like the mother hens they freaking were; he threw up his hands in defeat with a frustrated “Fine, I’m moving, I’m moving, you happy?”

He went to Diego.

(***)

The next incident, was just two weeks before Vanya would begin writing her book (not that Klaus would know that). It was just a normal night, the chill not as biting despite it being the dead of winter, when Klaus’ past actions finally came to bite him annoyingly in the ass.

He fought as hard as he could—he can honestly say that he did try—against his ruthless ex-drug dealer, but hand to hand combat had never been one of his strong suits growing up, and even if it had been; eight pitted against one simply wasn’t a fair fight (and a little over kill if you asked him). Being nimble and light on his feet also didn’t help when his exits were being blocked at every turn.

He managed to take out one fellow and roughed up two more before he was down for the count; knocked out cold and still being beaten and shaken down for what little money he had left in his pockets.

Ben and Five watched it all happen fearfully and angrily; helpless to do anything but be silent witnesses as their brother was beaten black and blue in the alley he was chased into.

When he eventually, and thankfully, awoke the next morning, he didn’t go to the Emergency room despite their concerned prompting (“You could be bleeding internally, Klaus!” “Don’t care, Ben, still not going.” “You’re a dumb-ass, you know that?” “Why thank you, Five.” “That’s not a compliment asshole, go to the damn hospital!” “Nope.” “You are insufferable!”). Hospitals were as bad as graveyards, and Klaus avoided them both like they would give him the plague.

Instead, in the early hours of the morning, with the streets and sidewalks still quiet with the sun not yet out to wake the living; he shuffled and limped his way slowly and blurrily towards Vanya’s home; her apartment being closer than Diego’s place of current residence or an emergency room either way.

Vanya took him to the hospital anyway.

(***)

Within a span of five months after the incident, bouncing from homeless shelter to endless homeless shelter (occasionally crashing at Diego’s or Vanya’s when the nagging got to be too much) and applying for whatever aid the government would be willing to give him; found Klaus with his very own studio apartment to call home.

The building was washed out and unkempt, the neighborhood he was located in looking as though it had never seen what better days even looked like. The apartment itself made even his old room seem bigger, but it was affordable with the temporary grant given to him (and would continue to be affordable once he found a job to better sustain himself) and that was enough for him.

No matter how small, it was his, and between the three of them, they filled it with everything their father would have hated. With bright colors, tacky furniture (that was cheap, and well used, but still comfortable to sink into) and wacky patterned curtains, pillows and throws, that shouldn’t normally go together but somehow Klaus had made work (despite Ben’s and Five’s obvious doubt before seeing it themselves).

Ben finally had the library of his dreams. It wasn’t nearly as big as the one back at the mansion, but it was an ever growing collection that Klaus continued to enable (sure he had to hold open the books for Ben to read, but if it made the book-worm happy, he was willing to do it; a small price to pay for all the shit he’s put him through over the years). There was even a section for Five’s theory and mathematical volumes and an even smaller section for Klaus’ own collection (nothing noteworthy, just a few comics and fictional works of fantasy and romance).

The rest of Ben’s knick-knacks were just as random and odd as Klaus’, but the Polaroid camera and the photo albums Klaus began to fill up for him; were definitely among Ben’s top favorites.

In the beginning it was hard to figure out what Klaus could bring home for Five to make him feel included. Five’s interests geared more toward having to be tangible to do them (much to his displeasure). That still didn’t stop Klaus from buying the chalkboard easel he later found at a second hand store, and on days when Five would get restless and fidgety, Klaus would humor him for a few hours and write whatever complicated and convoluted equations he wanted written out on that very same easel (“No Five, I’m not writing on the walls.” “I don’t care if there isn’t enough space left on the chalkboard, you aren’t gonna be of any help when I have to paint over it now will you?”). He ends up buying another chalkboard and a white board to appease the irritable gremlin.  

The dart board he had found not long after, had also been a nice addition as well; it wasn’t as nice as the one Five had back in his old room, but it still played a melancholy homage it (to the fonder memories Five had of challenging Ben or Diego or Klaus during their down time between training—more so Ben and Klaus, since Diego’s power was essentially cheating).

Ben and Klaus also learned—along with Five himself it would seem—that the forever stuck thirteen-year-old held an interest for anything nautical or tropical in nature; having seen him eye certain pieces every time they’d walk into some of the antique stores Klaus liked to frequent.

The spyglass, the random colorful sea shells, the oceanic themed paintings, and the little anchor shaped paper weight— the metallic object situated on Five’s side of the bookshelf—went without much fanfare, but that was okay, the smile on his brother’s face when he placed them in their home was reward enough.

Their place might not be much worth noting—maybe even a little crazy, and a little over-crowded with nonsensical junk to the outside looking in—and though his brothers really didn’t need the space or any of the knick-knacks Klaus continued to buy for them; it was their home regardless.

It was the home the three of them were making for themselves and it was enough.

(Oh, and they bought a coffee machine that Klaus honestly has no idea he will even use, but said why the hell not anyway ‘cause fuck you dad!)

[sepiadice]

DiceJar 0 END: what could have been...

Being completed ghosted for a scheduled session once again, I suppose I should finally face the facts and call the campaign. Which is, of course, very disappointing.

-

Let’s review the experiments I attempted in this campaign.

Experiment 1: Using a published module/adventure.[1]

I thought I might gain some valuable insight by analyzing a ‘professional’ product. By using an adventure I’d previously played myself, I’d hoped my experiences would smooth out my figuring out how to run it. Eventually, I learned the value of bullet pointed action plans, because the formatting of Crypt of the Everflame was not good for skimming, as vital information was hidden in the middle of information texts so I’d miss it during the game if I didn’t make sure to call, say, dice roll mechanics for going down a slippery hillside. It also meant I could look ahead and edit out rooms and mechanics that didn’t move the story of dungeon.

So, this experiment was technically a success, even if the lesson I took away was ‘modules don’t work well with my improv style, but provides inspiration sometimes.’ More on that later.

Experiment 2: Get a group to meet regularly.

So I’ve been wanting to do an actual play show since… well, before Critical Role and The Adventure Zone made it cool. For that, I need players willing to collaborate and also respect call time. As you can easily conclude from the time stamps, I couldn’t manage that, even when a freaking pandemic swept in and made being home for online sessions theoretically easier![2] Admittedly, my work schedule is not exactly ideal, as my Saturdays are permanently called for, and my Sundays are a wild ride of inconsistency, while my peers are moving to more conventional work life.

So, the experiment failed, and to a degree that I doubt a career or just schedule change would help. I did learn that a biweekly schedule works well for me, since I can spend the off week on planning, and still have time for my pre- and post-performance need to separate thoroughly and enter a neutral state.[3]

Experiment 3: Finish a dang narrative arc.

Ha ha. This also failed! Couldn’t get to the end of the dungeon. Welp.

Other lessons learned

I don’t online play well! Just get distracted by other internet tabs. It’s not as bad when I GM, since the stress of running the game keeps me more focused, but both the Curse of Strahd campaign I quietly quit[4] and IndigoDie’s Troika session[5] showed that I’m a garbage player online. Possibly an adoption of webcams and faces would assist, but I can’t ask for that.

People still hard! Still haven’t figured out how to get anyone invested. Can’t really be upset at the silent cancellations because I’m technically doing that with Curse of Strahd, and thus would be a hypocrite.

-

What was planned!

It’s only fair I give some amount of closure.

Session three ended with Bean dying, and there wasn’t a narratively consistent way to introduce a new party member…

Well, I guess if NavyDie consented to playing a bandit, or rewriting the scared dungeon prepper the party skipped…

What I decided was thus:

Bean's eyes open. The sharp pain of the punctures and tears, and the slow ache of liquid passing through those openings are gone, as is much of the world's color. The torches and other sources of light shine blue.

His companions are gathered around him, their mouths moving as if speaking, but Bean hears nothing.

For some reason, Bean feels at peace with this. This is correct.

Footsteps echo from the stairs, growing louder. A figure emerges from the floor below. When it enters the light, at first it is blurry, like many images projected upon the same space. Within the time that Bean's now still heart would have beat, the many silhouettes fade, leaving one form: Bean's father, though not the frail man Bean saw before he left Kassen, nor how bean's father looked before he was ravaged by illness, but the impossibly tall, strong, noble figure that Bean remembers his father being.

Though this man's smile has none of the warmth, and his eyes glow with an eldritch light.

"Seems you've come to some misfortune, Bernard Dipp," says this Mr. Dipp-who-is-not-Bean's-father. "Would you like some help with that?"

This mysterious fiend would become Bean’s patron for a level of Warlock, and ride around his head for the foreseeable future, threatening death if Bean didn’t do as ordered. You know, an excuse for Bean to continue adventuring instead of taking over the family farm.

As for where this fiend came from… well, I easily adapted that into the dungeon’s lore.

Kassen, whose visage is all over the crypt, is not the only one entombed within. There are also those who perished alongside him during his final battle, as well as those who perished facing him in the final battle. This includes Asar, who once adventured with Kassen until the two became bitter enemies or whatever, ending when Asar lead the charge against Kassen.

Anyways, an amount of time ago, bandits stumbled upon Kassen’s Crypt and started looting, and disturbed the coffins, looting a pair of medallions.

Here’s my adjustment: the medallions are now artifacts sealing away a fiend, and reuniting them freed him, whose presence radiated enough necromantic energies and roused Asar, who was deeply offended to be interred in a shrine to his enemy. Stupid, egotistical Kassen. Let’s channel this necromantic magic laying away and get some skeletal minions and kill those who bother me.

Which wasn’t great for the bandits, then later the advance party from Kassen, sent to make the trial safe for the youths. Blood was spilled. It wasn’t great.

Then our heroes arrived, and (hypothetically) resolved matters. Kassen’s ghost would then appear, thank the party, probably convey embarrassment at how the place is decorated, and grant boons to the party[6] before sending them on their way with a lit lantern.

Back in town, a grand celebration would turn somber as word of what happened in the tomb occurred, by it would be mixed and a feast would still be held.

The module ends with someone inviting the party to join the Pathfinder Society, but I’d cut that.

As for the fiend? Well, he’s transferred his tether from the amulets to Bean, so now he can ride the boy to wherever.

Unfortunately, I didn’t have anything particularly exciting planned for the others, as Bean was the only one who I got the opportunity to saddle with a commitment.

IndigoDie quit anyways.

Delilah I could motivate with eagerness to be free of her parents.

Yot… is a mercenary, so maybe Delilah could’ve paid him.

I could’ve figured something out if the players insisted on continuing with their characters. That would’ve been a discussion for after the module was completed.[7]

-

Moving forward!

So DiceJar waits evermore. I don’t want to admit that it’s an implausible goal, but I’m not in a great headspace about it. I still crave role-playing, but I think I’ll wait for someone to start their own campaign, or I guess see if I get a turn-over of my friend group.

NavyDie mentioned wanting to try a Powered by the Apocalypse system, and it’s only fair I actually try the mechanics before completely writing the rule set off.[8]

The next experiments I want to run when I return to behind the GM screen relates to system: Savage Worlds (once the most recent edition is back in print) as I search for a generic system that fits my needs, and Ryuutama, because Ryuutama just looks fun.

But… I don’t know what to do from here.

Until next time, may your dice (and whatever dice governs me) make things interesting.

-

[1] The correct terminology isa matter of pointless debate. [2] Charisma and Constitution are obviously my dumb stats. [3] Not sure my meaning is conveyed correctly. I’ll probably nail it down in a future write-up. [4] The group was too large, and after IndigoDie quit there were insufficient participants I knew and was comfortable performing with. [5] Which didn’t get a write-up because I didn’t have anything of substance to say. [6] Which, in the original Pathfinder, was something the each player can evoke for a temporary stat bonus, but in 5e I was going to change to a free Inspiration recharge. [7] Though I would not send them to Last Wall. It would’ve been time for me to spin off to my own stuff, and Last Wall… is not something that needs to be repeated. [8] I’ve never heard an Actual Play where Powered by the Apocalypse wasn’t either a hindrance or irrelevant.

[aziraamane]

What would it take to make Aziraphale, Principality, Angel of the East Gate, fall from grace?

I would hazard a guess at it being nothing to do with God at all. She's never seen, never spoken to, except through the Metatron and Her Archangels.

Picture this: God having shut Herself away after Jesus' resurrection, and then ceasing to interact directly with Heaven. Angels are slow creatures by nature, so they're content to convey Her messages for, say, several thousand years, but eventually the higher-ups start to think,

"Why are we doing all the work here for no true reward?"

"Why does She get to sit back now, while we grovel under Her feet and do Her bidding?"

"After all we've done, we deserve a little more than this."

They want to rise up. To be better. To be awarded a higher station for their efforts. We've seen how the Archangels handle punishments - without so much as a sniff of a trial, just a tornado of hellfire and a smile. They carry themselves with perfection, with ineffability, but sometimes they could be mistaken for the monsters they claim Hell's demonic hordes have always been. At least Hell gives a trial, final words, witnesses.

(And let's face it, Gabriel has such an authority complex that he would be champing at the bit to get his hands on some extra power)

So there's another uprising, another rebellion. The Archangels against God. Despirited and resigned, God puts up what little resistance She has left, and She is pushed from Her holy seat, cast down to Earth and locked out, Her powers stripped away as a mortal.

The tyrants, comfortable in their new seat over Heaven, decide to celebrate the occasion...

...by striking down the one who fucked them over during the Apocalypse-That-Wasn't. The one who asked too many questions, got in their way, even defied their commands to shut his stupid mouth and die already.

After all his transgressions over millennia, consorting with a demon and thwarting Armageddon out of a selfish desire to carry on reading books and drinking cocoa...he gets to survive?

No, they have their chance to change that now. And so they do.

Nobody sees it coming.

One moment he is himself, blissfully unaware and unashamedly happy in his husband's arms, wrapped in his love...

And the next, he is tumbling downwards, skin burning, wings aflame, and his screams shatter the sulphurous air.

Crowley grabs him just in time. Together. They would always be together. Hurtling at terminal velocity towards the depths of Hell won't change a thing.

Demon or no, Aziraphale will always be his angel.

(Tl;dr - Gabriel is a Cunt™)