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theculturedmarxist · 6 months ago

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In his book In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler’s Berlin, Erik Larson cites a cable sent to the State Department in June 1933 by a U.S. diplomat posted in Germany that provided a far more candid assessment of the Nazi leadership than the one that President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s administration was then conveying to the public. “With few exceptions, the men who are running this Government are of a mentality that you and I cannot understand,” read the cable, which was written five months after Adolf Hitler was appointed chancellor. “Some of them are psychopathic cases and would ordinarily be receiving treatment somewhere.”

I’ve thought about that passage from the cable many times over the past several weeks as I’ve been reading excerpts from a private WhatsApp group chat established last December by Erik Prince, the founder of the military contractor Blackwater and younger brother of Betsy DeVos, the secretary of education during President Donald Trump’s administration, who invited around 650 of his contacts in the United States and around the world to join. Prince, who has a long track record of financing conservative candidates and causes and extensive ties to right-wing regimes around the world, named the group—which currently has around 400 members—“Off Leash,” the same name as the new podcast that he’d launched the month before.

Among the group’s hottest topics:

• The “Biden Regime,” which a consensus of Off Leash participants who weighed in view as an ally of Islamic terrorists and other anti-American forces that needs to be crushed along with them and its partners in the deep state, such as former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley, who “deserves to burn in hell,” Lara Logan shared with the group chat.

• The shortcomings of democracy that invariably resulted from extending the franchise to ordinary citizens, who are easily manipulated by Marxists and populists. “The West is at best a beautiful cemetery,” lamented Sven von Storch, whose aristocratic German family fled the country after World War II to Chile, where their son was raised before returning to the land of his ancestors, where he married the granddaughter of the Third Reich’s last de facto head of state, who was convicted at Nuremberg.

• Israel-Palestine, a problem that Michael Yudelson, Prince’s business partner at Unplugged, which markets an allegedly supersecure smartphone, said should be handled by napalming Hamas’s tunnel network. “I would burn all those bastards, and have everything above ground, everything left of Gaza, collapse into this fiery hell pit and burn!” he wrote.

• The Houthi rebels in Yemen, whom Yoav Goldhorn, who was an Israeli intelligence officer until last year and now works for a Tel Aviv–based security contractor headed by former senior national security veterans, thinks should be “dealt with” as soon as possible to ensure they don’t grow from “an inconvenience to a festering mess [that] will eventually require an entire limb to be amputated.”

• And most of all, Iran, which participants agreed, with a few exceptions, also needed to be wiped out. Saghar Erica Kasraie, a former staffer for Republican Representative Trent Franks when he served on the House Armed Services Committee and whom, according to her LinkedIn profile, she advised on Middle East issues, urged that the Islamic Republic’s clerical leaders be targeted by weaponized drones that “take them out like flys 😎.”

Not all of the group’s members are conspiracy theorists in the mold of Logan, the former CBS correspondent. I know many people who are in roughly the same political ballpark as the average Off Leash participant, including some of the chat group’s members, who are razor-sharp, even if I strongly disagree with a lot of their opinions. I don’t know Prince other than having been in the same room with him on a few occasions, but we have mutual acquaintances who say he’s not a one-dimensional evil mercenary as typically portrayed but brilliant and funny, and over drinks greatly prefers to discuss business and history rather than expound upon the latest developments in right-wing political circles.

Frank Gallagher, a former Marine who once provided security for Henry Kissinger and who worked in a high-level position at Blackwater in Iraq following the 2003 U.S.-led invasion, isn’t a fan of Prince but offered a similar assessment. “We had issues from time to time, but I can’t deny that he’s extraordinarily smart,” he recounted. “When he came to Iraq, he’d cover 10 topics, and he had command over all of them.”

All of which makes Off Leash arguably more concerning, because the group can’t be dismissed as merely a collection of harmless cranks. Many of the participants, though not all household names, are wealthy and politically wired—which makes their incessant whining in the group chat about being crushed under the bootheel of the deep state particularly grating—and they will collectively become wealthier and more influential if Trump wins the November election. That’s especially true of the Americans in the group, but the same holds for the international figures because the global right will become immensely more powerful and emboldened if the former president returns to the White House. That prospect is a source of great hope to Off Leash participants. “Trump, Orban, Milei, it’s happening,” former Blackwater executive John LaDelfa posted to the group during a trip to Argentina on December 4, two days after Prince created it. “Around the Globe, we are the sensible, the rational, the majority. Don’t give in to fear. We will defeat the Marxists.”

His hopes were shared by many other Off Leash participants, among them Horatiu Potra, a Romanian mercenary who has recently been operating in the mineral-rich, conflict-plagued Democratic Republic of Congo. “The globalists want to control the entire planet [and] the only chance to get rid of them is a spark from a great power (the USA),” Potra wrote. “Surely there will be a strong man like Erik who will initiate it, otherwise there is no chance of regaining our freedom. If this spark is started, all countries will follow suit.… We were waiting for the signal, the spark!!”

A December 2023 United Nations report alleged that Potra owns a company that has provided combat support and fighters to Congolese government troops fighting a vicious rebel insurgency. Prince unsuccessfully sought to negotiate a deal with the DRC government to fly 2,500 mercenaries from Colombia, Argentina, and Mexico into the country to fight alongside Potra’s men, the report said.

About three-quarters of the people Prince invited to the group chat are from the U.S. or live here. The largest overseas blocs are from Israel (32 members), the United Arab Emirates (20 members), and the United Kingdom (20). There are smaller contingents, sometimes a single person, from 33 other countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East.

Collectively, Off Leash provides an informal virtual gathering place for current and former political officials, national security operatives, activists, journalists, soldiers of fortune, weapons brokers, black bag operators, grifters, convicted criminals, and other elements in the U.S. and global far right. The roster of invitees includes:

• Icons of the MAGA ecosphere such as Tucker Carlson, the most revered figure among group chat participants, with the exception of the Supreme Leader himself; Kimberly Guilfoyle, the longtime fiancée of Donald Trump Jr.; and retired Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, Trump’s convicted-then-pardoned first national security adviser. Flynn has participated, Carlson only minimally, and Guilfoyle not at all.

• Current and former lawmakers and aides, such as Tennessee Congressman Mark Green of the House Freedom Caucus; Vish Burra, who was director of operations for Congressman George Santos; and Stuart Seldowitz, a national security adviser to Barack Obama from 2009 to 2011 who was arrested last November after harassing an Egyptian halal street cart vendor in New York City for two weeks, during which time he called him a “terrorist” and said, “If we killed 4,000 Palestinian kids, it wasn’t enough.”

Prominent figures in the Off Leash crew are well known for their paleoconservative political views, but the private opinions expressed in the group chat are even more extreme and jarring than we normally see voiced publicly. Participants chirpily discussed the desirability of clamping down on democracy to deal with their enemies at home and regime change, bombings, assassinations, and covert action to take care of those abroad. The group’s overall bloodlust periodically proved to be too much for a few more judicious individual members, who in almost any other setting would be considered ultraconservatives but in the context of Off Leash sound like hippie peaceniks‎. One of the dissidents—a National Rifle Association firearms instructor who runs a weapons company—joked that he was worried about an “unsupervised” subgroup of especially enthusiastic military adventurers that formed to discuss topics too “hot” for WhatsApp, saying, “I imagine their ‘to be bombed’ list is over 49 countries and growing.”

Many other Off Leash participants have also stated that they don’t view the group chat as merely a forum to exchange ideas but want it to become a vehicle to put their theories into action. “If we band together … we can damage the other side like no one has ever seen before!” exclaimed Jeff Sloat, who worked with a U.S. Army psyops unit in Central America during the Reagan era.

I don’t want to disclose much about how I learned of the group chat and the nature of its discussions, but I will say that multiple sources in the U.S. and elsewhere shared information, including two journalists who I discovered had learned about Off Leash, which nearly gave me a heart attack for fear I’d lose my scoop. Participants did occasionally express concerns about security, but their worries were mostly centered on the possibility that their conversation was vulnerable to hackers. It apparently never occurred to any of them that their confidentiality might be compromised not by sophisticated cyberwarfare specialists but by old-fashioned leakers, which was virtually inevitable given the group’s size.

Off Leash was still active as of Wednesday, though I expect it won’t be, at least in its current form, for much longer, given that the conversation Wednesday included much discussion about their security being breached, which became evident after I reached out to participants for comment. Fortunately, I obtained details about a large slice of the chat group’s discussions over the past six months. Here’s some of what they discussed.

Solving the Middle East Crisis: Nukes, Napalm, and Other “Extreme Measures”

Off Leash was launched less than two months after Israel commenced its assault on Gaza following Hamas’s deadly October 7 attack on Israel, and that topic has been one of the group chat’s main concerns since it was established by Prince on December 2. Five days later, Omer Laviv, an executive with the Mer Group, a private security company with many former Israeli intelligence officials in its senior ranks, posted a story to the group that ran two days earlier in The Times of London and reported Prince had been seeking to sell the Israel Defense Forces equipment for a plan he’d devised to flood Hamas tunnels with seawater.

“I was involved,” remarked Moti Kahana, the Israeli American businessman who runs GDC, the firm where Off Leash member Stuart Seldowitz previously worked. Kahana pointedly added that at least one part of The Times’ story was false—for example, Prince had offered to donate the equipment, not sell it, he said.

“Why do you expect accuracy from journalists?” retorted Laviv, who during the Trump administration retained 27 U.S. lobbyists and consultants to run a $9.5 million lobbying campaign on behalf of President Joseph Kabila, the corrupt, brutal leader of the Democratic Republic of Congo, who used surveillance equipment supplied by the Mer Group to monitor his regime’s opponents. Among those Laviv involved were Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s former personal lawyer, fixer, and dirt-digger, and Robert Stryk, whose clients have included Saudi Arabia and El Salvador’s state intelligence agency under crypto-fascist President Nayib Bukele.

Yudelson, who also reportedly partnered with Prince in an attempt to buy weapons for resale from Belarus dictator Aleksandr Lukashenko (whom the two men praised for bringing “peace, stability, and prosperity to your country”), predicted the tunnel-flooding proposal would be shot down by the “Israeli left,” a force he labeled the country’s “biggest enemy,” ahead of Hamas and Iran, over concerns about the environmental impact in Gaza. “Who gives a shit about that,” Yudelson posted to the group. “If it was up to me … I would flood them with Napalm! I would burn all those bastards, and have everything above ground, everything left of Gaza, collapse into this fiery hell pit and burn!”

Even that was deemed to be insufficiently hawkish for some Off Leash participants. In a lengthy tirade on February 14, Tzvi Lev, who formerly worked in Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said it was rare to see a people as “twisted” as Palestinians, whose culture “worships death and bloodshed.” The only solution, he wrote, was to “completely uproot the radical Islamic Palestinian nationalism,” which was possible to do based on the historical precedent of Japan, which “went from being nuked twice to one of the world’s strongest economies within two decades.” Dropping nuclear weapons on what’s left of densely populated Gaza, which is roughly the size of Detroit, would be a war crime and kill huge numbers of civilians.

Yoav Goldhorn, the former Israeli intelligence officer, also cited “fucking nukes in Japan” as an appropriate remedy to the Palestinian problem. Sadly, wrote Goldhorn, whose LinkedIn profile says he has “a passion for strategic planning,” there was no one in the Israeli government with “the balls nor vision to go all those extra miles.”

Iran: Off Leash’s Public Enemy No. 1

It was hard to keep track of all the wars, invasions, covert operations, coups, and assassinations Off Leash members favored. One region ripe for a bit of good old-fashioned Western intervention was Africa, which was described as a “pot about to boil over” by Emma Priestley, who posts as “Customer” in the group chat and is the CEO of GoldStone Resources Limited in Jersey, the English Channel island that is one of the world’s most popular offshore secrecy havens. China would have to be taken down a peg as well, particularly as Biden wasn’t going to stop the country “from doing a damn thing,” and indeed he would pave the way for it to do “whatever it is they want to accomplish,” posted Randy Couture, the former UFC heavyweight champion and actor who had the role of arsonist and killer Jason Duclair in the TV series Hawaii Five-0 and starred in the 2011 movie Setup with 50 Cent and Bruce Willis.

But the No. 1 target on Off Leash’s hit list, by orders of magnitude, was Iran. “Follow the source of evil,” wrote Montana Congressman Ryan Zinke, who served as interior secretary under Trump. “Hamas. Hezbollah. Houthis. Iran is the center of gravity.”

“Zinke is right,” agreed Tennessee Congressman Mark Green of the House Freedom Caucus.

Yemen’s Houthi rebels were most immediately in the group’s crosshairs, due to their attempts to halt arms shipments to Israel. Finishing them off would be a cakewalk, but time was of the essence as the Houthis were “relatively limited in strength” at the moment but could become a major problem if swift action wasn’t taken, wrote Yoav Goldhorn, a former Israeli intelligence operative.

To Goldhorn’s way of thinking, the Houthis were best compared to “rot [that] stinks a lot more than the flesh it ate”:

As we’ve seen countless times in the Middle East, if you don’t treat rot it will grow and spread and turn from an inconvenience to a festering mess, and will eventually require an entire limb to be amputated. The Houthi threat has to be dealt with now, while they’re still relatively limited in strength. Otherwise it’ll become a problem too big to handle without extreme measures, or worse yet—remain a problem for future generations to come.

As for moving against Iran itself, the leading cheerleader in the group chat for military action is Kasraie, who worked for Representative Franks of Arizona until 2017, when he resigned amid charges of sexual harassment by two female staffers. “The IRGC is the head of the snake,” Kasraie wrote in one post, referring to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. “It’s time to cut the head of that snake.”

An Iranian American who converted to Christianity after her family moved to the U.S. following the 1979 Islamic Revolution, Kasraie has worked closely with fellow exile Amir Abbas Fakhravar, the co-founder of the Confederation of Iranian Students, which claimed to represent a worldwide pro-Western movement in support of domestic opponents of the Islamic government.

Fakhravar was hailed by the neoconservative think tanks American Enterprise Institute and Foundation for Defense of Democracies—which were leading advocates of the 2003 invasion of Iraq and are currently leading the drumbeat for regime change in Iran—as his country’s 2.0 version of Ahmed Chalabi, the CIA-backed Iraqi exile whom the Bush administration promoted as a beloved figure among citizens of his native land during the run-up to the 2003 invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein. That didn’t pan out as promised when Chalabi 1.0 led a political coalition in parliamentary elections two years after his triumphant return that won less than 1 percent of the total vote.

Now Kasraie, who organizes congressionally hosted “global conferences in Washington for activists to plan the constitutional future of a free, democratic Iran,” according to an online bio, is touting Reza Pahlavi, the shah’s oldest son and crown prince of Iran, as “the only viable opposition leader” and the man the U.S. should install in power after seeing to the formality of dispatching the current government.

“I assure you, the Iranian people want nothing more than to be free from the bloodthirsty mullahs,” Kasraie wrote in the group chat on January 27, and added with equal certainty that younger Iranians were “pro-Israel and pro-America” and that millions in the country felt a deep “sense of nostalgia” for the former royal dynasty. If Reza Pahlavi received strong international support—he would merely be a “mouthpiece” to be handled by a team of “good advisors,” Kasraie stated—the internal opposition “would be much more inclined to rise up and we would see far more defectors.”

For his part, Reza Pahlavi, who hasn’t stepped foot in Iran for 45 years and lives in a lavish estate in the Washington suburbs, said in an interview last year he wasn’t sure he wanted to have an official role in a future government if the current one was overthrown, or even live in the country. This didn’t dampen the ardor of Kasraie, who in one post labeled the mullahs a “cancerous venom that need to be eradicated from … the planet,” with her preferred method to accomplish that being weaponized drones that would “take them out like flys 😎.”

That type of approach was endorsed by others in the group, including Gabriel “Kaz” Kazerooni, a former U.S. intelligence officer, Special Forces veteran, and Blackwater employee in Iraq, who described Iran’s religious leaders as “pedofile [sic] Mullahs” and a “bacteria to humanity” who he hoped would soon “die away.”

“EP [Erik Prince] has the right people in place,” Kazerooni added cryptically, saying it was only a matter of time before the “Mullah Pigs” would be removed from power.

Washington should “take out” the commander of the IRGC’s Quds Force that replaced Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani, who was killed in a 2020 operation ordered by President Trump, Lara Logan said. Prince had urged he be targeted for killing four years earlier, when he was informally advising the Trump campaign, in a memo to White House chief strategist Steve Bannon.

Logan proposed the U.S. also assassinate other “key targets” in the Middle East, specifically mentioning “the head of Hamas,” whose name she didn’t mention, but she presumably was talking about Mohammed Deif, who leads the group’s military wing. “That will send a message,” she said.

Nathan Jacobson, a 69-year-old Canadian Israeli businessman who told The New Republic he is a longtime friend of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and fought with the IDF as a young man, had a more ambitious proposal. In order to topple the Islamic regime, he said blithely, “We need to hit” Iran’s nuclear facilities, ports, Qom, where the mullahs reside, IRGC headquarters and bases, and oil industry production facilities, which would shut down the country’s economy for months.

The calls for carnage elicited pushback from two Off Leash members. “The problem is while doing nothing could empower them, bombing might empower them more,” warned Mark Farage, who owns a firearms and ammunition manufacturer in Virginia and made the joke about the “unsupervised” subgroup’s ever-growing list of countries they wanted to be targeted for airstrikes. “I don’t think we have successfully bombed anyone into an ally since WWII.… Maybe we should consider more tools than just a hammer?”

“Huge mistake to attack Iran directly,” concurred Matt Heidt, a Special Forces veteran who deployed to Africa, South America, and Asia, including a 2007 stint in Iraq’s Anbar Province. “We would be inviting 10/7 here.”

Jacobson was infuriated by the criticism of his blueprint for war.

“We don’t want them as an ally,” he said in a comment directed at Farage. “Let them spend their time stoned on qat and screwing their sheep.”

He was even more contemptuous of Heidt’s opinions. “You remind me of the Jews in Germany in the 30’s that thought that by being quiet that the problem would go away,” he sneered. “We have no choice but to hit them hard and then kill these cells if they raise their ugly heads. Why are you taking a coward’s standpoint?��

“So you’re going to waddle your fat ass over there and put some skin in the game or are you content to put others at risk?” retorted Heidt.

“Unlike you, I’ve had skin in that game for years,” said Jacobson, who served in the IDF in the 1970s. “What have you done?”

“Retired SEAL Senior Chief with a Bronze Star with V,” shot back Heidt. Bronze Stars are awarded for heroism in a combat zone, and are not uncommon, but a Bronze Star with V, for Valor, are relatively rare.

Those in Off Leash’s overwhelmingly dominant hard-line faction were having none of the namby-pamby defeatism from Heidt and Farage.

“Bomb the hell out of them,” Kazerooni insisted. “Mess with US and you will eat your Sh_t. We the United States Of America is still the strongest Country in the world.”

More recently, the Off Leash crew has been in a chronic state of agitation over political developments that have led them to further ratchet up their calls for jihad against their worldwide enemies. In mid-April, after Tehran fired missiles into Israel in retaliation for an airstrike in Syria that killed two of its generals in a diplomatic building, Sloat, the psyops specialist, excitedly declared it was “time to disintegrate Iran.” In May, their fury turned to Biden’s brief pause in arms shipments to Israel, though none were surprised by the president’s treachery, as his “Regime is infiltrated by Muslim Brotherhood” (Yudelson) and “compromised … by Iranian regime influencers” (Zinke).

The group finally got good news recently with the helicopter crash that killed Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, though nerves frayed as they awaited confirmation he was dead. If he’d tragically survived, wondered Tzvi Lev, perhaps it would be possible to dispatch a Special Forces search and rescue unit to “disappear” him before he was found.

The Future of American Democracy: “It’s Trump or Revolution!”

Even more worrying to group chat members than the state of global affairs was that democracy was under attack across the world, especially in the West and most of all in the U.S. They blamed the same barbarians at the gate science fiction writer Robert Heinlein pointed to in To Sail Beyond the Sunset, which was published in 1987, the year before his death. “Democracy often works beautifully at first,” but the day the franchise is extended “to every warm body … marks the beginning of the end of that state,” Heinlein wrote. “For when the plebs discover that they can vote themselves bread and circuses without limit and that the productive members of the body politic cannot stop them, they will do so, until the state bleeds to death, or in its weakened condition … succumbs to an invader—the barbarians enter Rome.” The passage about bread and circuses was posted in its entirety on February 16 by former Virginia Congressman Tom Garrett, who offered it as an explanation for why democratic governance made it impossible to address the problems facing the United States.

“Definitely an issue,” agreed Scott Taylor, another former House member from Virginia, and Republicans were responsible as well. Too many GOP lawmakers campaigned as principled opponents of government spending, Taylor wrote on the list, but were “more concerned about their individual selves then actually advancing conservative policy” and chased federal money for their home districts like common Democrats in hopes of currying favor with their pleb constituents.

Former President Trump’s campaign to return to the White House posed an even graver and more imminent threat to American democracy. It wasn’t Trump, per se, or his efforts to reverse the results of the 2020 presidential election that troubled the group, needless to say. The danger was that following his landslide victory this November, which was a foregone conclusion, the deep state would “steal it again,” just as it had four years ago, Yudelson posted. “I just hope and pray that they will not JFK Trump before the elections, physically, or with some of their other methods.”

Despite such trepidations, Congressman Zinke spoke for the group when he wrote, “There is only one path forward. Elect Trump.”

“It’s Trump or Revolution!” Yudelson chimed in from the chorus.

“You mean Trump AND Revolution,” a right-leaning Canadian businessman shot back. “The Left is too violent to sit back and let Trump win again.”

John Mills, a retired Army colonel who held a cybersecurity post at the Pentagon under Trump, was overcome with emotion when his hero appeared at the Conservative Political Action Conference in February. “Tears streamed down my face,” he wrote to the Off Leash group chat from the event. “DJT and the J6ers are in the house.”

The view that Trump represented a unique hope was shared by group chat members outside of the U.S. “He is the best thing … even in Africa,” offered N.J. Ayuk, a native of Cameroon who currently lives in Johannesburg, where he founded a law firm that assists clients with interests in the oil and gas sector. “Trump all the way 💯”

“I live in darkest west Africa,” posted Emma Priestley of GoldStone Resources Limited. The overall situation was such an irredeemable mess, Trump himself might not be able to “save this shithole of a continent.”

“Completely agree,” replied Ayuk, who once worked as an intern for the late New Jersey Democratic Congressman Donald Payne but was deported in 2007 after pleading guilty to using his boss’s stationery and signature stamp to illegally obtain visas to the U.S. for citizens of his home country. The Biden administration had been “a disaster” for Africa. “They only give us lectures and talk about renewables,” said Ayuk. “These latte liberators are actually the problem.”

That was a minor offense among the long litany of crimes Off Leash participants laid at Biden’s door. “Looks like the globalists are enabling this mass illegal immigration,” Yudelson, citing an article at Zerohedge, wrote in one post. “Surely with tremendous assistance from the Biden Regime.” But Biden was merely a figurehead controlled by “elements that are actually ruling for the Deep State,” he continued. The real problem was that Democrats had been “in cahoots with the Muslim Brotherhood and infiltrated by their proxies and agents, as well as Ayatollah sympathizers” ever since President Bill Clinton’s administration.

With the Democratic Party captured by Islamic terrorists, Marxists, globalists, and other foreign and domestic evildoers, the U.S. was “being destroyed from within,” warned Kasraie, whose fears were shared by many among the Off Leash crew.

“The insurgency within our country today is going to bite us,” said Scott Freeman, the CEO of a Virginia company called International Preparedness Associates, which designs “unique special programs” that help defend U.S. national security, friendly foreign governments, and private-sector interests, according to its website.

Many Off Leash participants were even less restrained. When a chat group participant posted a story that revealed JPMorgan Chase had hired General Mark Milley—whom Trump appointed chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff but clashed with during and after his presidency—as a senior adviser, Lara Logan went off the rails. “Milley is a piece of shit and a traitor and he deserves to burn in hell,” posted Logan, who holds a seat on the board of America’s Future, a conservative nonprofit chaired by Off Leash member and former Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, Trump’s national security adviser for less than a month.

At a February 23 America’s Future event, Logan shared that she’d originally been skeptical of the Pizzagate conspiracy theory, which spread in far-right circles during the 2016 election and proposed that Hillary Clinton and other Democratic Party officials were running a child sex trafficking ring out of the pizzeria Comet Ping Pong. However, after conducting her own independent investigation, Logan told the audience at the event, she’d discovered, “Holy guacamole! This actually is all true.”

What, then, was to be done?

The answer was clear to Freeman, a.k.a. “ScottyF” in the group chat. “Apply all tenets of warfare internally against the many enemies living among us. America is capable of being fully capable again. Do we have the will to levy the toll?”

Jesse Barnett, a retired Navy SEAL specializing in “Active Shooter Prep ... and Crisis Prevention” who ran the Indianapolis-based indoor shooting simulator Poseidon Experience, offered a harsh but necessary recipe. “We need a Nuremberg style clean up of this global cabal,” he proposed. “Only through accountability can we cleanse our spirits.” Once the cleansing was out of the way, security could be maintained by using “technology to identify sociopaths and keep them in their place.”

On the roster of Off Leash participants, there was one—a poster with the handle of “S,” whom it took me weeks to identify—who stood out as a particularly dark character. There were some in the group who expressed more unhinged views and others who more casually called for violence against their enemies; what made S distinctive was his dry, bloodless manner and businesslike espousal of a disciplined worldview that was unmistakably fascist.

“This is no longer politics, this is an open war against freedom and human nature. And wars aren’t won with more balloons and confetti as we know,” S wrote. “It’s no longer a ‘game’ either.… It is time to adapt strategies to reality and stop pretending that we live in a free democracy in the West.”

S was later revealed to be Sven von Storch, born to a German family that left for Chile after World War II, whose wife, Beatrix von Storch, is the granddaughter of Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk, Hitler’s finance minister from 1933, the year he took power, until he killed himself in Berlin in April 1945, as Russian troops closed in on the bunker where he and the dregs of his loyalists were holed up. In his last will and testament, Hitler appointed von Krosigk to serve under Joseph Goebbels, his handpicked successor as chancellor, but since his minister of propaganda committed suicide the day after Hitler, von Krosigk became the Third Reich’s head of state during its final days. “Von Krosigk never wavered in his enthusiasm and labors for the Nazi cause,” prosecutor Alexander Hardy said during his trial at Nuremberg, where he was sentenced to 10 years for financing the concentration camps and other crimes.

Beatrix von Storch is a leader and Bundestag member with Alternative for Germany, arguably the most radical of Europe’s far-right parties, which calls for a crackdown on immigration into the country to protect its “Western Christian culture,” a variant of the “great replacement” theory espoused by white supremacists in the United States. Sven von Storch doesn’t hold elected office, but he’s considered to be a prominent figure in the AfD. An admirer of Steve Bannon, von Storch has close ties to Chile’s pro-Pinochet political bloc; he and his wife met with Jair Bolsonaro, the country’s former president, at the presidential palace in Brazil, and the latter’s powerful son Eduardo gave the couple a bottle of the first family’s brand wine as a gift.

“Law and justice no longer mean anything in the West,” von Storch wrote during the same conversation. “Stupid and naive people may still believe it. And probably not even them anymore.”

It’s not clear how many in the group knew S’s real identity, but he was clearly a pedigreed German fascist who even within the rarefied far-right ecosphere of Off Leash sat at a distinctly extreme end. No one seemed troubled by his views, and indeed von Storch was warmly embraced. “This is getting interesting,” Kazerooni wrote in response to his post. “Love this Group.”

Freeman was one of a number of group chat participants who, like the former psyops specialist Sloat, wanted to look for ways to implement their policy ideas. A group with so much “experience, accomplishments and resources” should look for a few issues we “might be able to influence together,” Freeman proposed. “Not to save the world or the idiots in the USA but rather a core of us or perhaps a broader group of like minds/patriots of some sort. 🤷‍♂️”

Reading the group chat’s conversations would be comical if it wasn’t so pitiful and disturbing in equal measure. Group members clearly regard themselves as natural elites who are more intelligent, virtuous, and honorable than Heinlein’s tired, poor, unwashed plebs.

Yet none of the four current and former members of Congress who are active in the group distinguished themselves as model public servants. In 2018, Zinke resigned as Trump’s secretary of the interior after an Inspector General’s report concluded he was a serial violator of ethics laws. Green withdrew his nomination to be Trump’s army secretary after being criticized, including by GOP John McCain, for past statements he’d made that called for his fellow citizens to “take a stand on the indoctrination of Islam in public schools” and labeled transgender people “evil.” Garrett resigned his House seat in 2018 after it was alleged he and his wife used his congressional staff to run errands, chauffeur their children, and clean up after their dog, though he denied those charges and cited alcoholism as the reason he had stepped down. Four staffers who worked on Taylor’s 2018 reelection campaign were subsequently indicted for election fraud, which he said he knew nothing about, but he lost that race and did again when he ran for his old seat two years later.

Even more farcical was the manner in which group chat members portrayed themselves as rightful guardians of democracy, even as they proposed employing military force against their unarmed domestic political opponents and rounding up members of the “global cabal” for trial at a Nuremberg-style tribunal. It’s blazingly evident that many in the group can’t even define democracy, and those who can don’t like it.

Dallas real estate developer Scott Hall informed the group he was moving his family to the UAE, which is ruled by an authoritarian monarchy, because “freedom is real” there. When President Gustavo Petro, Colombia’s first leftist president, was running for office two years ago, the rural oligarch Sergio Araujo Castro publicly declared that his employees “have the right to vote freely for whoever they want,” but he’d fire any who supported Petro. After protests against the Biden administration’s support for Israel’s assault on Gaza erupted at Stanford in January, Goldhorn wondered how it was legal that students who took part weren’t summarily expelled as they received benefits from the U.S. government, but “[wished] for its destruction,” which he evidently equated with criticism of its policies.

I sent messages seeking comment to Prince and the 29 participants whose comments in the group chat are cited in this story. Prince did not respond. Of the others, only Barnett, Jacobson, and Goldhorn were willing to be interviewed.

Barnett, who once worked for Blackwater, said participants in the group chat “love the country and want good solutions” and that he was not an ideologue and favored “checks and balances, and transparency.” A “centrist who leans libertarian” and Barack Obama voter in 2008, Barnett said the 9/11 attacks seven years earlier were an “inside job 100 percent,” and that they “woke me up” and triggered the political evolution that led to his current “conspiracy observationist perspective.”

Barnett said he was a Trump fan in part because “the establishment hates” the former president, adding that the Russiagate scandal that led to his first impeachment had been cooked up by Democrats as part of a politically motivated attack to drive him from office. (An opinion I share.) When I told Barnett his remarks about the need for a new Nuremberg tribunal sounded like a call for an attack of the same type but against enemies of the group chat, he said he didn’t favor a politically driven kangaroo court but envisioned a scrupulously fair judicial process that “truly enables our country to move forward,” which could be ensured by establishing panels with impartial experts such as journalist Matt Taibbi, psychologist and commentator Jordan Peterson, and others of similarly “high integrity” to help determine who would be prosecuted.

Jacobson also said his remarks in the group chat sounded harsher than he’d intended. Despite having been friendly with Netanyahu for many years, he said the Israeli prime minister and his government were “long past their expiry date,” and he considered the military attack on Gaza to be “a complete failure.” On Iran, Jacobson said he “loved Iranian culture, cuisine, and people” and noted that he’d spent time with Reza Pahlavi last week when the latter was in Toronto, where he lives.

“I hate the mullah’s regime,” Jacobson added, but “I’m not calling to go to war” but to help the domestic opposition bring the regime down by bombing Iranian oil infrastructure and related targets. About a month ago, he’d proposed that during an informal discussion with an unnamed Israeli official, telling his interlocutor that Iran’s missile strikes against Israel were “our opportunity to hit their oil facilities so they can’t make money to finance terrorism.” About Off Leash itself, Jacobson said, “I enjoy the banter of the group, but it’s not a political conspiracy.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Goldhorn, who told me he knows Prince “very tentatively,” replied when I paraphrased his remarks about dropping nuclear weapons on Gaza and regarding the Houthis. “I didn’t see anyone proposing or discussing such actions in the group, so I can’t really comment on these claims.” When I sent him the relevant excerpts, his memory was refreshed regarding the Houthis, though he said he was “referring to the naval threat mostly,” as the group was seeking to sink merchant ships. “I was not [referring] to the Yemenese [sic] people as a whole, only the military organization.” He continued to insist he’d “never suggested to nuke Gaza, which is a laughably dumb idea,” though I had excerpts of the respective conversations about both topics, which were faithfully recounted earlier, and the quotes from Goldhorn are verbatim.

Off Leash’s participants want a “democracy” where the “plebs” vote the way they want in every election and the government only approves their preferred policies, which would give them the absolute certainty they want that their outsize wealth, privileges, and influence will be protected. That’s not the way democracy works, it’s the way dictatorships do, which no doubt feels comfortable to group chat members who have thrived doing business with corrupt, repressive regimes and leaders, which is the way many met each other and Prince, and how they came to be part of Off Leash in the first place.

To paraphrase the assessment of Nazi officials made by the U.S. diplomat from Erik Larsen’s In the Garden of Beasts, during ordinary times, people who hold such opinions would be receiving treatment somewhere. However, to continue with the analogy, many Off Leash participants currently hold powerful political roles or are intimate allies of those who do.

The key to expanding their influence, in the collective view of the group chat, and not only its American members, is a victory by Trump in the November election. “The freedom of the Western world is decided in the USA,” as von Storch put it. “As long as the USA lets the globalists do whatever they want, we patriots in the rest of the world can only try to maintain and survive our positions.”

Comparing the contemporary United States to Nazi Germany is an admittedly imprecise analogy. Nevertheless, it’s impossible not to be alarmed by the crypto-fascist, off the leash views expressed by Trump’s allies in the group chat about exterminating their foreign and domestic enemies and needing to “find the will to levy the toll.” However imprecise the comparison, as a model political capital, Berlin 1933 is far more compatible with the worldview of Off Leash participants than Washington 2024, and in the event they and like-minded associates gain power in the U.S. or elsewhere, they’ll be pushing backward in that general direction.

#erik prince #off leash #israel #iran #blackwater #guillotine #eat the rich

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cattatonically · 2 years ago

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Want You Bad - Day 3

This is part of a series for #sterekvalentineweek - I would suggest reading them in order.

What you can generally expect - hilarity, chaos, mishaps, slow burn, strong language, and vague descriptions of some minor criminal activity.

I hope you have as much fun on this adventure as I did!

Day 1 Day 2

If there was one thing that Stiles could say for himself, it was that he was a damn good friend. And damn good friends support their friends in need. Even when said need involved a hammer, nails, heavy lifting, and the egos of community theatre actors.

Erica, of course, was the exception. And because she was the exception, and Stiles had hit a brick wall on a case, he really couldn’t say no when she asked for his help getting the stage set up for opening night. (And if he got to sneakily ogle at Derek doing some heavy lifting of his own, well, that was his little secret.)

Stiles was well into hammering out the last few planks onto a set of prop stairs when the door at the back of the theatre burst open.

“Sorry, sorry!” the dude running down the aisle apologized loudly. “I got caught up!” When Stiles looked up, his eyes went wide.

“You!” he bellowed, catching the attention of everyone else on the stage, including Derek.

This was the guy he’d been looking for. He had been tasked with serving this asshat a court summons for months and months of child support back pay. Peter had brought the case to him personally. Stiles wasn’t about to let his payday go without a fight.

He dropped his hammer, and tried to make his way down the actual stage stairs to catch the guy, and sit him down so he could call Kira for the summons papers. However, his feet had other plans.

Just as Stiles hit the first stair, his foot got caught in a piece of rogue fabric. The fabric tangled, sending him sprawling down the stage steps, enveloping him in dark burgundy velvet. Stiles struggled to get the velvet off his face, only to be met with Erica’s amused smirk looking down at him.

“Wow, Stiles. Just. Wow.” Then Stiles spotted her phone in her hand.

“Erica, if you love me, and I know you do, you will not post or send that to anyone.”

“Too late, Batman!” Stiles felt his phone vibrate, and by Erica’s shit-eating grin, he knew she sent whatever she’d captured of his epic fail to the group chat.

“Well. Fuck.”

“Not even if you ask nicely, Boyd doesn’t like to share.”

With a groan, Stiles extricated himself from his velvet death trap. He spun around, hoping he wasn’t too late in catching the douchecanoe, only to spot Derek sitting on him in one of the audience seats. “Uh,” he said, eloquently.

“This was the guy you needed, right?” Derek asked, as if he didn’t already know. God, he looked good - even covered in dust and sweat.

“Uh. Yup. Yeah. Yes. Yes, that is the guy I need. No! Not need! Was looking for! Yeah. That one!” Stiles knew his face was turning various shades of red. He could hear Erica snickering at him, but that was a problem for Later Stiles. Right Now Stiles needed to deal with this.

“Right,” Derek said slowly. God, Stiles really wished the ground could open up right now and swallow him whole. “Well, you do what you need to do, and we’ll be right here while you do it. Trust me. He isn’t going anywhere without your say so.”

Instead of replying, and risk more unfortunate flailing word vomit, Stiles opted to nod. He turned to make his way back up the stage stairs so he could call Kira somewhere Erica wasn’t having an epic giggle fit.

And just his luck, Stiles’ foot caught the edge of the velvet fabric again, and sent him careening up the steps. “Why is this my life?” he asked the floor he was facing.

“Because you’re Stiles Stilinski, and no one else can be you but you.”

“It was a rhetorical question, Erica.”

“And you got a non-rhetorical answer. Now, stop trying to destroy our fabric! You have a job to do.”

“Yeah yeah, Catwoman, I’m on it.” It took ever ounce of self-control Stiles had not to look back. He really did not want to see the look on Derek’s face.

Lucky for him. Erica had managed to capture it on video, meaning everyone and their uncle (mainly Peter) would have opinions they were only too happy to share with Stiles.

God, why was this his life?

#sterekvalentineweek2023 #Teen Wolf #Stiles Stilinski #Derek Hale #Erica Reyes #Slow burn #sterek is endgame #Stiles is a bit of a disaster #Catt writes

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libraryofgage · 5 months ago

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I hope you don't mind but I wrote a little something lol

Also please ignore typos hfjkds

---

Eddie is driving, of course. He'd drive everyone crazy with his fidgeting if he didn't. He's still fidgeting a little, his fingers tapping the wheel along to the music in his head instead of what's playing on the radio. His left leg is bouncing, barely brushing the bottom of the wheel. His teeth are digging into his bottom lip, the copper-taste of blood creeping into his mouth.

He should have noticed sooner. He should have realized what was happening long before....well...

Before Dustin's frantic phone call and Robin's shaking video call and the group chat that had been collecting dust for the past three years (last used to plan a virtual birthday party for Steve that eventually fell through because of life, which leaves a bad taste in Eddie's mouth even now).

And now he can't stop thinking about it, about his text chat with Steve being untouched for three months. He wasn't even the one who sent the last message. That had been Steve, congratulating him on another tour and asking how the newest album was coming along. Eddie had meant to answer, but he got distracted and it slipped his mind and and and

And nothing. How many times did he see a funny animal and think of texting Steve about it? How many times did he almost send Steve a meme? How many times did he find himself working on that damn album, staring down the lyrics of the title track of an album dedicated to Steve in his heart (like he didn't always dedicate them to Steve and Wayne in his heart anyway), thinking about Steve and his hazel eyes and sunny smile and those two freckles on his cheek?

And now? Now Steve has been radio silent for a month, not even talking to Robin or Dustin for four weeks.

And that's a problem.

"He could be dead," Erica says from the last row of the van, her voice clipped and cold as Eddie's hands tighten on the wheel.

"Don't say that," Dustin hisses.

"We're all thinking it, and if we don't talk about it now, we won't know what to do if it's true."

She's right, of course. Erica is always right, especially when it really hurts. Eddie forces himself to take a deep breath as they pass the sign welcoming them to Hawkins. The sun is slipping below the treetops now, casting shadows and orange light across the road as Eddie forces his foot off the gas pedal so they don't get pulled over.

When Eddie left Hawkins, he never looked back. He chased after a future that nearly escaped him with such single-minded focus that he barely remembers the drive out of his hometown. But he does remember that it didn't look like this.

Hawkins always had a few farms and homes on the outskirts, people who wanted to be surrounded by forest or make a living on pumpkins. When Eddie left, those houses had been lived in; bikes were haphazardly left strewn across lawns, fields of crops were carefully tended, people sat on porches with sweating glasses of lemonade and iced tea in their hands, and lights streamed out from the windows.

Now, those houses and fields are in an unbelievable state of disrepair. Some have smashed windows, the fields of crops are dug up and wildly overgrown, and every single house is dark. If he weren't so sure this was his dimension, Eddie would wonder if they'd somehow driven into the Upside Down when they crossed the town line.

"Uh, that's weird, right?" Dustin asks, nose practically plastered to the window as the town passes by.

Every building is dark. The sun hasn't even properly set, but the streets are empty and the town is dead. It's eerie, sends shivers down Eddie's back, makes his hair stand on end. His jaw clenches, his grip on the wheel tightens, and he tries his damnedest to not imagine the worst case scenario.

He doesn't have to hold off for long as he turns down a residential street. Before his brain can force images of demogorgons attacking Steve to the forefront, an actual demogorgon rushes from behind a house ahead of them, petal-mouth flared wide and teeth on display as its roar forces something Eddie had once buried to flare to life.

Amid the screams from the back and Robin suddenly grabbing the wheel and jerking it to the side so avoid the demogorgon, Eddie somehow remembers to slam his foot on the brakes. The tires squeal painfully, the car drifting sharply and perfectly angling them to face the demogorgon head-on.

Eddie's throat is straining, and he doesn't know why until he realizes he's also screaming. His heart is pounding against his ribs, and his brain has started chugging into over drive. How is he going to get the kids out? How is he going to get Robin out? Who's going to tell his bandmates and his agent that he fucking died the one time he visited Hawkins?

And then he notices a figure (a boy, achingly familiar) sprinting out from behind another house, sliding between the car and the demogorgon, bat raised and swinging with ease. It catches the demogorgon in the stomach, tearing through skin and muscle and sending it sliding back a few precious inches. A shot rings out a second later, the demogorgon's head jerking back. A second shot follows, and the demogorgon's head explods, viscera and a few teeth splashing across the windshield.

The boy with the bat, wipes away some of the gore, turns to another house, and waves a hand. Eddie is already rolling down the window, getting it open just in time to hear the other shout, "Thanks, Ms. Dithers! I'll see you on Sunday for book club!"

Eddie follows the direction of the wave to see an older woman in the upstairs window of a house. Her hair is gray, her glasses are huge, she's wearing a nightgown, and she's reloading a shotgun as she smiles. "Don't mention it, Steve, dear. You'd better bring those Savannah bars again, or I won't be letting you in the door!" she calls back, waving kindly at Steve.

With one more wave, Steve turns to the car. He locks eyes with Eddie first, and Eddie gets the joy of seeing them light up, Steve's whole demeanor suddenly shifting into something bright and happy as he hurries over to the open window. "Hey, guys!" he says, "What brought you down? How come you didn't call ahead? I'd've told you about the curfew."

He leans on the door like it's easy, like he isn't a breath of fresh air Eddie didn't even know he needed. He smiles just as easily, and Eddie is breathless. He definitely couldn't speak for the fucking life of him.

"You didn't answer your fucking phone, dingus!" Robin shouts, barely managing to get her seatbelt off before she's launching herself out of the car. She jumps the hood in a moment of unprecedented grace and crashes into Steve's arms.

She spurs everyone into action, like she made them realize Steve is real and alive. The car shakes as everyone else piles out, surrounding Steve and pushing until he's forced to take a step back before he trips. Despite that, Steve looks...overjoyed.

Eddie tries to be a little calmer as he exits the car, desperately hoping his hands aren't shaking like he thinks they are. He can feel himself on a precipice of something. He's teetering over the edge of a cliff he can't name; or, well, a cliff he doesn't want to name.

And then Steve meets his eyes again, and Eddie is lost in hazel. He's doomed by freckles and sun-kissed skin and a smile that's just for him. He's trapped by warm hands pulling him into a hug, the subtle smell of hairspray, the inescapable stream of Steve, Steve, Steve coursing through his brain.

How the fuck is Eddie supposed to walk away again after this?

okay but a like post-series fic i want that's like: steve harrington being the only man left in hawkins fighting monsters

and not like a 'everyone died, last man standing' way but just. they beat it back, the story ends, nice little tie-up and neatly concluded, eleven loses her powers because their world is completely cut from the other. and life goes on. eddie (yes, eddie lives au don't fight me) goes off with his band, robin-nancy-jargyle off to separate cities for college. the kids go to high school, graduate high school, and scatter across the country. joyce and hop buy a beach house far-far-far away from goddamn hawkins indiana.

steve though. steve stays. he does it too without comment, takes all their calls telling him all these amazing things. the years pass. the calls are fewer and far between. he's mostly in contact with only dustin and robin. except robin's out of country doing some crazy temp job in some remote country, she never catches him at home right now so just leaves him messages. and it takes a couple of weeks for dustin to realize he hasn't gotten steve on the phone.

frantically he calls around "have you heard from steve???" except the most people talk to steve anymore is like phone calls during holidays and holy shit what could have happened??

and what if it's back?

cue everyone who can in that moment, rushing back. eddie hopping on a flight from fucking london direct to indianapolis somehow, heart in his throat. he manages to meet hopper in the airport and they pick up max and dustin at the bus station.

they get to hawkins that is even more different that what they left. a smaller town, a town that shuts down completely when the sun sets. it's creepy and deserted.

except for the fucking upside down monsters of course.

and they're in their stupid little rental in front of this demogorgon and they're screaming but then the thing just goes splat on the concrete and steve fucking harrington is blinking owlishly at them.

"Oh, hey guys!" he calls jogging up to the driver's side window. "Wow, what brought you back down this way? You should have told me, I would have told you about the curfew!"

turns out steve just forgot to pay his phone bill that month, didn't even realize he was missing calls and he's been fighting monsters the entire time because actually they WEREN'T cut off from the upside down at all and he's just been casually fighting monsters for the remaining hawkins residence—the whole town knows now and steve's the guy you call when you have a monster problem

sidebar: WAYNE still lives in hawkins, and he and steve are best friends, eddie munson you are gonna LOSE YOUR MIND

#steddie #steddie fic #steve harrington #eddie munson #dustin henderson #robin buckley #erica sinclair #stranger things #my writing #this idea had me in a damn vice grip hfjksd #it's short and sweet and obviously they get together but for now it's pining and yearning #also love the idea that eddie knows he'll never leave again if he walks back into hawkins and sees steve #because even a steve that doesn't want him the same way (which would never exist but he doesn't know that) is a steve he wants to be around #and it was already hard enough walking out the first time when he could delude himself into thinking steve would be leaving soon enough too #and then there'd be nothing for either of them in hawkins and steve would always have robin so eddie wouldn't be needed right #but he is actually and steve would be the first to admit that he can survive sure but he isn't really living without the people he loves #and so he finds more people to love and he joins book clubs and babysits and is “the monster guy” but it's never the same and never enough #and he's gonna be hard pressed to let go of eddie or robin or anyone else as easily as he did before now that they're back #anyway ignore the whole ass other fic vibes in the tags hfjdks

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erin-bo-berin · 2 years ago

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hear me out Steve Harrington x fem!reader at a bonfire at the beach with his friends & it’s the first time reader is meeting them but steve is touchy and comforting to reader?

Can you imagine a bonfire with the entire gang though? That would be so fun 🥺

It was your first time meeting the family-like tight knit group of friends your new boyfriend, Steve had been telling you about.

He had constantly reassured you that they would love you, that they were all eager to meet you, but when he pulled up the bonfire beach party that you’d both been invited to, the nerves kicked in.

Your stomach was in knots as you saw a crowd of at least a dozen people around the bonfire.

What if they didn’t like you?

What if they thought you were all wrong for Steve?

He took your hand and everyone turned when you two approached. You feel scrutinized, like you were under a microscope and felt yourself trying to fold into yourself.

Steve pulled you close, sensing your instant timidity, making sure you knew that he was still right there by his side.

“Everyone, this is Y/N,” he introduced.

“Y/N, this is Dustin, Robin, Eddie, Mike, Lucas, Max, Erica, Nancy, Jonathan, Will and El.”

Your mind swam with the numerous names and you were sure the panic showed on your face, trying to match names to all the numerous, curious—but not unkind—faces.

He turned to you, an amused tilt of his lips apparent on his face.

“I know it’s a lot of names, but don’t worry. They’ll answer to pretty much anything,” Steve joked.

“Yeah, you can just go “hey you” and we’ll answer,” laughed one of the girls your age—Robin, if you remembered correctly.

“It’s nice to meet you all,” you smiled, feeling a bit better about the situation now.

“Now be nice,” Steve warned, “You treat my girl right, okay?”

“Who us?” the curly headed, younger teen, Dustin said, “We’re angels.”

“That fell from Heaven,” Steve muttered.

“I feel like Steve just hit on me,” Dustin mused.

You sat down in the sand, near the warmth of the bonfire.

“Would you like a s’more?” a red headed girl asked you, “I’m Max,” she reminded you, kindly.

“Sure, that’d be great,” you smiled up at her.

She came back with two sticks with marshmallows, handing them to you and Steve. You thanked her and held yours out toward the flame.

You felt Steve pat your thigh, an innocent, loving and reassuring gesture.

“See? They don’t bite.”

“Okay,” you relented, smiling as you agreed, “You were right.”

“They’d be crazy not to love you.”

He sent you one of the pretty smiles he was famous for and you returned it.

Throughout the evening, you found yourself chatting with numerous members of the group. All the while, Steve kept touching you, his gentle touches just there for reassurance and comfort, even if he was deep in his own conversations with his friends.

He would always make sure his girl was okay.

#steve harrington #steve harrington blurb #steve harrington fic #steve harrington fluff #steve harrington x you #steve harrington x fem!reader #steve harrington x reader #stranger things #stranger things blurb #stranger things fic #stranger things fluff

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josjournal · 2 years ago

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Bet My Life On It (Full Moon Ficlet #508 - Faith)

Written for @fullmoonficlet

Stiles stood on the porch of the newly rebuilt Hale House. He knew Derek had finished the night before when the Pack group chat had received a text from Derek inviting everyone for a barbecue that weekend. Stiles, being Stiles, didn’t want to wait that long to see the house. He’d texted Derek to ask if he could come over that morning but hadn’t gotten a response.

He had a drink carrier in one hand and a paper bag in the other. Using the hand holding the paper bag, he knocked on the door and waited. After a few minutes, Stiles heard nothing from inside the house. He glanced over his shoulder to see Derek’s SUV and knocked again.

After another couple of minutes, Stiles put the edge of the paper bag in his mouth and used his now free hand to try the handle. The knob turned easily under his hand, and the door swung open. Stiles’ breath caught as he took in the foyer of the house. He’d seen it before as a blacked-out shell and again during construction, but he’d never imagined it would wind up so beautiful.

When Derek had announced that he’d planned to rebuild the house himself, with only the occasional help from contractors, the Pack had laughed at him. Stiles had gone to the library and checked out many construction books. While contractors came, he’d sat at the house because the strangers made Derek edgy. Even as the house came together, the rest of the pack bet on how long until Derek either gave up or the house fell down around them.

“You can’t be here yet,” Derek said, startling Stiles. Derek stood at the top of the stairs, looking down at him, but he wasn’t glaring.

Stiles noticed the way Derek’s hands twitched. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

“Inspector’s coming,” Derek explained. “The house isn’t officially habitable until it passes inspection.”

“You already sent out the invites for this weekend,” Stiles pointed out.

“Might have been a few steps ahead of myself.”

“Derek,” Stiles said, setting the bag and carrier on the small table to the left of the front door and heading up the stairs. “Everything is going to be fine. The house will pass inspection.”

“You don’t know that. You haven’t seen anything except the foyer,” Derek argued, but Stiles saw the corner of his lip curl up slightly.

“I have believed from day one that you could do this,” Stiles said. “My faith in you and your determination never wavered.” A knock sounded on the door, and Derek pressed his lips together. “Now, c’mon, let’s get this house okayed to live in so I can pick out my room.”

The following weekend, Stiles sat next to Derek on the back steps of the house while the Pack ran around, roughhousing and eating. The house had passed inspection with no problems. The inspector had claimed that it was the highest rating he’d ever given in all his years as a housing inspector.

Stiles nudged Derek when Scott approached, looking sheepish and his hands deep in his pockets. When he reached them, Scott pulled out a wad of cash and handed it to Stiles. “You had to have cheated,” Scott muttered as he walked away.

“What’s that?” Derek asked as Stiles counted out the money, taking half and handing it to Derek.

“The pool winnings,” Stiles said. “I was the only one who bet you could do it.”

Derek’s smile was small as the tips of his ears burned pink. “You bet on me?”

Stiles grinned. “I’ll always bet on-” Stiles cut off when Derek leaned forward and pressed his lips to Stiles’. “What was that?”

“You like me,” Derek said, reaching out to tangle his fingers with Stiles and flipping Erica off when she started cheering. Stiles saw money changing hands out of the corner of his eye, but he couldn’t look away from Derek’s face.

“You don’t know that,” Stiles said but not arguing because Derek wasn’t wrong.

He smiled and kissed Stiles again. “I’d bet my life on it.”

Cross-posted to AO3

#fullmoonficlet #sterek #eternalsterek #sterek ficlet #my writing #bet my life on it

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thebigoblin · 3 years ago

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Sterek Fic Recs Part 3

[You can find the first two lists here: Fluffy Sterek Recs & Sterek Fic Recs. Also here's a special fic, check it out]

First off, thank you all for a 100 followers!! As of September 7, 2021 you've made me feel really, really good about my obsession with two oblivious idiots (with sprinkles of the hale pack and other fandoms), and this is my way of thanking you ♥️

If you're on PC, you can see that there is a page dedicated solely to fic recs, which caters to other ships & fandoms too. So don't feel left out if you're looking for something other than Sterek!

Without further ado, let's get to it then!

an awful curse

Isaac is asleep in a chair. The angle of his neck makes Derek wince in sympathy.

"Isaac," Derek says.

Isaac snaps awake immediately.

"You're-"

"Where's Stiles?"

"Stiles?" Isaac asks.

Jesus. It's not like they know more than one.

AU - Canon Divergence | 6.3k | By blinkiesays

Throw Away The Key

Stiles knew it was stupid to go to the hunters’ headquarters all by himself, so when he finds himself caught, he can really only blame himself.

It shouldn't surprise Stiles when the situation quickly goes from bad to worse as the hunters throw him to a feral werewolf waiting to tear him apart.

Sucks that it's Derek, though.

AU - Canon Divergence | 5.9k | By mommymuffin

Whatever Happened Last Night, Why Did Glitter Have to Be Involved?

Derek rolled out of bed in search of his phone - quickly finding it in the pair of jeans that had evidently been tossed aside haphazardly on the way to the bed. Seeing the pants sparked flashes of memories - wolfsbane-laced alcohol, loud music, multicolored lights.

Peter’s new supernatural-friendly club - the pack had gone to the opening night party.

He unlocked his phone and opened the pack group chat, which Erica had affectionately named ‘Moon Sluts’.

>>Derek: What the fuck happened last night

[or: Derek wakes up with three things on his mind: he feels like he was punched by a troll, his mate is missing, and there's glitter covering his bed. Oh, and the pack group chat is mildly helpful]

Prompt #159 - “Also, my bed has glitter in it for reasons I do not recall.”

Crack Vibes | 1.2k | By ash_mcj

Good to Eat

So if Stiles married Derek Hale, he could become Jewish too? Perfect. It was settled. Stiles gleefully shoveled a forkful of cheesy shells into his mouth.

"Uh oh. I know that look.” Claudia shook her head.

"Don’t worry, Mom, ” Stiles said, reaching for his plastic Batman cup.

"I’ve got a plan.”

"Good luck, Derek Hale,” his mother muttered.

Rude.

AU - Childhood Friends | 1.7k | By Jmeelee

Murder Brows and Avoidance Tactics

Derek gets the wrong end of the stick.

Written for prompt: "You're jealous, aren't you?"

AU - Everybody Lives | 2k | By Dragonink13

Double Vision (only registered users can read this one)

"So what caused my hearing and sense of smell to dull?"

Deaton's brow furrowed, all amusement vanishing from his face. "What do you mean?"

Derek snapped, letting loose all of his anger and fear at the man before him. "I mean I can't hear your heartbeat or the cars down below or the birds in the attic! I can't smell the flowers in Mrs. Everett's apartment, I can't smell the rotting burger in the fridge that Isaac left in there a month ago, I can't smell or hear anything like I normally can!" Deaton mouth was pressed into a thin line. "Can you explain that?!"

Tumblr Prompt: Derek jealous of himself.

AU - Everyone Lives | 6.1k | By Novkat21

Kiss?

Derek likes kissing Stiles, honestly he does. Until he doesn't.

Fluff | 3.6k | By clotpolesonly

Oblivious Misadventures, and Other Such Tales

Going to college was exciting and new, a chance for new friends and a fresh start, and the best part was, there was a supernatural fraternity on campus, meaning Scott finally had the freedom to be himself.

Then he met the resident human who came with a stalker alpha. What was the point of a supernatural fraternity if he still had to pretend to be human. And seriously, did Stiles ever fall asleep somewhere normal?

(aka - Five TImes Scott Found Derek and Stiles Sleeping, and the One Time He Didn't)

AU, Supernatural is real but not known by everyone, Alive Hale Family | 11.2k | By Little Spoon

Call Me (Cliché)

When the sheriff's sister ends up in a wheelchair for the duration of summer, Stiles' dreams of three months full of pack bonding, late-night video games and bro-time with Scott come crashing down. He's temporarily relocated to Redford, a three hour drive away, and he can already tell he won't be getting many visitors.

Sure the pack will forget about him while he's gone, Stiles is determined to make the most of his summer of isolation, training his body and mind - and his magic - so he can come back with a bang, and maybe catch a certain Sourwolf's eye.

Then Derek shows up at his window one night with a flimsy excuse about needing research done. Suddenly, his summer away is looking a whole lot more interesting.

AU - Canon Divergence | 84.6k | By Orphan_Account aka the author has dissociated themselves from the fic

Shiver

Stiles has really, really cold hands. Luckily, Derek knows just what to do about that.

Established Relationship | 1.7k | By canistakahari

Derek Hale's Possible Heart

An anon sent me a sterek prompt for Laura teasing Derek and Stiles joining in, then somehow sharing their feelings for each other in the mess of things.

AU - Canon Divergence | 4.3k | By loserchildhotpants

What's a Secret Identity?

Stiles sipped at a mug of coffee, absently watching the news play in the break room. Because of course a news station couldn't play anything other than its own content, even in the one part of the office that was supposed to be a safe space from work. His interview with Superman was making a rerun and Stiles glanced at Derek before commenting absently, “I’d totally let Superman fuck me.”

Derek, who had been in the middle of a swig of coffee, choked violently, “That’s not something I needed to know at nine in the morning, Stiles.”

Stiles raised an eyebrow. “What time would you prefer I tell you about all of the things I would let Superman do to my body?”

AU, Derek is Superman | 7k | By Chrystie, imabignerd and kate882

i see that you've come so far [just like them old stars]

But her big brother’s unwillingness to touch anyone, like he thinks he doesn’t deserve it isn’t the only thing she notices. She also notices how Stiles doesn’t touch him.

Everyone reaches for Derek in some form or another, but Stiles- Stiles is something different altogether because he reaches for Derek but he never makes contact.

He’ll be trying to shimmy past Derek and instead of putting a hand on his arm like most of them do, he’ll reach out with a hand and stop it scant centimeters away from Derek’s skin.

Or they’ll be walking alongside each other and Stiles will hover a hand on Derek’s lower back.

It’s both fascinating and tragic to watch, like NASA lost control of one of their robots and instead of it landing on the moon it’s fated to gravitate around it.

AU - Canon Divergence | 2.3k | By crossroadswrite

Déjà Vu

There’s a shop in Beacon Hills that no one knows anything about except that the mysterious proprietor, a witch in whispered circles, knows what you need before you do and that the things given are always just what you need.

Derek, lost after a breakup, heads into the shop to see if he can find something to help him forget his ex. The witch gives him a potion to drink, and when Derek wakes up, he finds he’s sixteen again and there’s a new student at his school, Stiles Stilinski.

Everything is familiar and yet not, and Derek finds he’s strangely drawn to Stiles in a way that is entirely supernatural.

AU, Supernatural is Real | 8.8k | By gremlins-came-and-got-me and StaciNadia

Start Small, Like Oak Trees

The months following Allison's death have passed Stiles by in a haze of monotony. He sleepwalks through days that seem to lose their color, an unwilling passenger in a body he no longer trusts. Eventually, he thinks, he'll just fade away. He isn't sure anyone would notice. Then, during a spur of the moment grocery run, he stumbles upon Derek Hale attempting to console a lost child, and for the first time in recent memory the world doesn't seem so awful.

He's not sure what he'd been expecting when he eventually convinces Derek to move into the Stilinski's spare bedroom, but a newfound passion for weeding and topsoil certainly isn't it.

AU - Canon Divergence | 24.2k | By SmallBirds

Undercover K9

As it usually goes, Derek acts before he thinks. This time he has a good reason, though-it's all Stiles' fault. Mostly.

Or, that time when Derek volunteered to spend all his spare time as a wolf with the Beacon Hills Sheriff's Office K9 Unit, just to protect Stiles' dumb ass.

Future Fic | 17.9k | By Cobrilee

Rose Colored Glasses

“Obviou—um, what? Derek?” Stiles managed. “What? You’re not colorblind. You’re colorblind?”

“Yes.” Derek said gruffly. “And?”

“And? What do you mean and? You can’t see colors?” Stiles demanded, thrown. “Does it—what kind is it? Red-green? Blue-yellow? Why doesn’t—oh my god, is this why your entire freaking wardrobe was completely black until like two years ago? Oh my god!”

“There’s nothing wrong with having a favorite color, Stiles.”

Established Relationship | 2.2k | By SassyStarboard

1,460 Days (gotta clean my slate)

Two years after Scott becomes Alpha and Derek gives it up for Cora, Stiles gets hurt during a fight and ends up in a coma for two weeks. According to the nurse, a guy has been visiting him every day and, as much as he wishes it were Derek, it sounds a lot like Scott. Except he and Scott aren't even friends anymore.

AU - Canon Divergence | 10k | By army_of_angels

This is it for now. Happy reading y'all! ♥️

#sterek #my sterek fic recs #sterek fic recs #derek hale #stiles stilinski

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kittykatstiles · 3 months ago

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erica sent stiles slutty macbook selfie that went viraled on twitter to the group chat and streets are saying derek hale broke his phone again

#was just digging my slutty macbook selfie and thinking #yea stiles in college would nail this so hard #like 7 million views and 50k likes #he would be so famous on tumblr too #sterek #btw it’s derek 7th time to get a new phone this year #my sterek

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morganbritton132 · 1 year ago

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I feel like Steve's non-Upside Down friends definitely have a group chat for all their Steve-based conspiracy theories that's just filled with really off the wall excuses and tidbits that Steve's said - how panicked is the government agent-babysitter about it?

The first-year teachers definitely do, for sure!

The chat was originally called ‘The Steve Harrington Experience’ because every conversation with the man is something else, but they ended up changing it after Kathy pointed out that it made it seem like they all experienced Steve Harrington, ‘Sexually, u know?’

“Yes, Kathy…” Marissa said in an exasperated voice note. She must be driving. “You didn’t need to spell it out. We’re changing it.”

‘Not saying I’d be opposed 2 the experience,’ Kathy added helpfully in the group chat. ‘U see those trousers he wore yesterday. Not much left to the imagination there.’

‘Thank you, Kathy.’

The group chat was changed to the ‘Support Group for David’s Obsession’ which is just, haha. Funny. David is not obsessed with Steve Harrington. He just isn’t.

Sure, nothing about the man makes any sense.

And yeah, maybe David talks about that fact a little too much. Maybe he has asked the group chat probing questions about Christmas lights. Maybe he even made a dentist appointment with Edward Harrington, DDS just to make sure he wasn’t the Eddie Harrington they knew.

He wasn’t obsessed. He was just due for a cleaning.

The other day in the parking lot after work, Steve asked if David could see the license plate number on the white 2015 Mazda CX-3 that was circling the block. David read the number off for him and Steve wrote it down. He didn’t explain anything.

David texted the group chat about it, ‘Maybe he’s a spy?’

‘Do you think spy organizations sent out a lot of epileptic agents with service animals?’

‘Maybe the epilepsy is a cover.’

Kathy replied, ‘It’s not.’

David kinda hates how he only tunes in to the staff meeting about Career Day when Steve mentions that Erica can’t come. Something about pissing off her constituents by favoring a community in a state she doesn’t represent. Yada, yada, yada, “Dustin’s still coming though.”

“Dustin,” David repeats, feeling the amused way that Marissa is looking at him. He can’t even be bothered by Jordan hiding a smile in her hand. “Your brother is coming to Career Day?”

Steve beams, “Yeah, man. He comes every year.”

Kathy was a second-year teacher that was definitely here during last year’s Career Day. She could have mentioned it. David can’t even fully digest this information when Steve knocks his knuckles against the table and snaps his fingers, “Oh! My ex works for the paper. I’ll see if they can come.”

David somehow gets roped into finalizing the rest of the list of speakers for Career Day (i.e. they need to confirm if Steve’s people are going to be there and Cindy didn’t want to do it). When he stops by Steve’s classroom at the end of the day, he is surprised to find that Steve is not alone.

There’s low music playing from the corner of the room now that the students have gone home and Steve is at his desk grading papers. Eddie is standing at the board, drawing a dragon-like creature with dry-erase markers.

Eddie is humming along to the song on the radio, occasionally brushing his fingers along Steve’s shoulders when he reaches for a new color. It’s a cozy moment and he almost hates to interrupt, but David has leftovers in his fridge that he wants to get home to.

He knocks against the doorframe, “Steve, you have a minute?”

“Yeah, what’s up?” Steve asks, leaning back in his chairs far enough that his head brushes against Eddie’s back. “Babe, you remember David from the cookout?”

“The history teacher,” Eddie hums, distracted by his drawing. He erases a line of red from the fangs with his finger. “Stevie’s saying great things about you, kid.”

“I – wow, that’s – thanks! It means a lot! I, uh. I’m finishing up some things for Cindy and she just needs a confirmation on your people for Career….” David trails off when Steve makes a sound between his teeth like a hiss and gives him a big wide-eyed look. “…Day?”

Steve’s wide-eyed expression forms quickly into an innocent smile when Eddie turns to look at him, “Babe-“

“Career Day?” Eddie asked scandalized, hand to chest. “Career Day is coming up, Steven? I had no idea.”

Steve’s eyes flicker away from Eddie’s over to David’s and he says, “Yes. Yep, they’ll be here with bells on. Henderson and Wheeler. Just them.”

“Wheeler?” Eddie manages to sound even more scandalized. “Stevie, you – you invited Wheeler to Career Day and not your own husband? I have a career!”

“Yes, you do,” Steve says in a voice that’s a little too ‘second grade teacher’ to not be a little bit insulting. “And you’re amazing, and I love you, but they wanted people with career paths that didn’t start so…infamous?”

David starts inching out of the room because as much as he wants to know more about Steve, he doesn’t want to witness an argument he started. He’s almost to the door when Eddie says, “I worked for my success.”

“Yeah, I know,” Steve sighs like he’s remembering something awful. “If only there wasn’t a mob.”

David is out the door when he hears that and he pauses for only a second before pulling out his phone like, ‘what the fuck, guys????’

#Steve unknowing distressing everybody in one way or another #David’s just like ‘mob????’ and also like ‘I might have just caused an argument between a mobster and his spouse’#and Marissa is just like ‘no hun’#I don’t think the cia babysitter is aware of the gc because Steve isn’t watched too closely and also the gc doesn’t even know Eddie’s name #eddie munson tiktok saga #eddie munson #steve harrington

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occasionallykettle · 2 years ago

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stranger things 5 wishlist

stranger things 5 wishlist – in no particular order

max waking up from her coma, but still being blind. i hope they don't just brush her literally dying and coming back to life off and continue like nothing ever happened (that kind of happened with will in season 1 and 2 but i can't blame anyone since it was important for the storyline that everything was kept a secret and stuff) because having a blind character would be interesting, since she could prove that she can still be helpful to the party despite now having a disability.

dimitri (enzo) coming back for season 5. i am honestly kind of hoping that the whole russia storyline is over, since it was painful (a bit boring tbh) to see joyce, murray and hopper doing totally their own thing for the entire season, however i still want dimitri to come back. he was a pretty interesting character, in that he didn't backstab hopper, joyce and murray after they escaped and stuck with hopper the entire time. he couldn't have gone back to russia (at least i don't think so) because he must be considered a pariah/fugitive, so is he somewhere in america now? i guess i wouldn’t mind yuri coming back as well, i just think he fulfilled his role in the series and isn't needed anymore (that's where he differs from dimitri).

mike and will (possibly argyle and jonathan as well) having a much greater role in season 5. i was kind of disappointed when will and mike, who are supposed to be part of the og party, were on a road trip for half the season, so the fact that they are getting a bigger role in season 5 makes me ecstatic.

byler happening. if there is one season that is perfect for byler, it will be season 5. i mentioned this in a previous post but 4 and a half seasons of build-up will make byler incredibly satisfying when in inevitably happens.

it would also be great if they were to address the painting. like mike has this "oh my god" moment about the painting and the last letter that el sent to mike. mike could find the letter on the ground and read it again and then connect the dots.

more scenes with murray, joyce and hopper working as a team (and, as previously mentioned, dimitri). they are a pretty intelligent group and fun to watch. great dynamics between all of them.

robin and vickie. need i say more?

will shoots a gun and saves someone as a result of it. we know that he knows how to load and shoot a gun (and most likely done it before with his father), and no one has seen him do anything to harm someone in order to save someone else (something like smashing billy's head with a pipe, which mike did, or threatening to hurt billy with steve's bat, which max did) and we all know that he is far more capable than he seems. will shooting a gun is the bare minimum, for me.

if and when max wakes up from her coma, i really want erica to be there. i think it was really sweet when she stayed at the hospital with her brother despite barely knowing max, because her brother was there. i believe and hope that she will have a greater purpose in season 5, since she is a part of this vecna mess now.

robin and will finally meet (for real this time) and have a good talk about something they share in common. being different. i'm pretty sure robin has come to terms with her sexuality and has accepted it far better than will has. and jonathan is great, but he is most likely straight (he hasn't shown signs of being otherwise) and he can never relate to the struggle that his brother faces every day like robin can, and thus cannot help him as much as robin can. i am aware that the duffer brothers stated that they wouldn’t be doing smaller storylines in season 5 (for example, getting steve a girlfriend) like they did in the previous seasons, however this is not a small storyline. it's will byers' identity, one of the main characters of season 5. and when he does eventually get with mike, it will have been worth it to have a chat with robin, and make a lot more sense.

i was originally not planning to post this one publically because i know that a lot of people strongly disagree, but i am kind of hoping that eddie doesn't return for season 5. his character was great, but he did seem like a one season character. like bob, alexei and barb. and if eddie does come back, then literally none of the important characters (maybe papa but he was destined to die from the beginning anyway) died. eddie died at the perfect time (writing wise – not so much for the characters) and if he were to be brought back to life, then i would personally just be confused and a little disappointed. joseph quinn did say, however, that he would be returning for season 5 (or something similar), so eddie might come back in flashbacks or something. or at least, that's what i hope. also, if eddie were to come back, then that just adds another character that needs an important role in the storyline, or what would have been the use in bringing him back? there's already will, mike, dustin, lucas, el, possibly max, joyce, hopper, jonathan, nancy, steve, robin and probably some more that i forgot, that need to play an important role in season 5 for all the build-up to be worth it. and besides, did the duffer brothers not say that it would be down to the core 4 to defeat vecna? that means that all of the young adults (that includes eddie) will not be involved in the final blow to vecna, and so that kind of disproves the kas theory (there is the possibility that i am misinterpreting what the duffer brothers said about the core 4).

el gets some independent badass moments. i think she already established that we was capable of doing great things by herself but now we need it to be explicit. and also, more centred around her personality – how her compassion, loyalty and bravery helps in the time of battle.

mike or will to get vecna'd. i feel kind of mean saying that, but it could be very beneficial to the plot. think about it, if one or the other were to get vecna'd, that would allow for a very emotional scene directed by the person that doesn't get vecna'd. i actually made a post about this here already.

we see more of jonathan and will being brothers. they were shown to be quite close in season 1 and 2, but then they started drifting apart after that. it's still very clear, though, that they both care for each other very much, and i would like to see a lot more of that in season 5.

similarly, more scenes with el and hopper. i think they were awesome in season 2, like they could both teach each other things. and el needs a proper father figure, since she has literally never had one before in her life. i liked how hopper was there for el in season 2 when she was closing the gate, since that really shows that even the strongest and most independent of characters need other people to help them sometimes.

this list is unfinished, but these are the ones that i think are most likely and/or my top ones. this post is also mainly for my documentation purposes so that when season 5 comes out i can find this list easily, so if i was unclear on some things, i apologise!

#stranger things 5 wishlist #stranger things

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batcat46 · 4 years ago

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cyborg fish? - rory keaner x reader (no pronouns)

Walking out of chemistry the final class of the day, you tapped down my jean pockets looking for your phone. Opening it already open to your message chat with rory you sent him a text asking where he was. You pushed open the doors to the front of school, phone buzzing simultaneously. Rory had responded with a simple yet ominous “catching lunch” you had just joined the friend group and were yet to know the secrets of the town. You were confident when you had first moved you were gonna be the only out of normal thing there. You were quickly proved wrong. There were times when Rory got really excited his eyes would glow yellow and he would just smile with his mouth shut. And there was one time you two were in detention for pranking Mrs. LOL and he got a papercut when you offered a bandaid in your bag it was already gone. Then again the first time he was over your house he found scales on your bathroom sink. Every weekend you usually hung out with the group at someone's house. It was usually Ethans thanks to his parents being gone more than they're there. But first it was Erica and Sarah who bailed then next was Benny and finally Ethan caving in for benny. That left you with Rory and some poor Wendy's workers alone for the night. You rapidly apologized to the worker as Rory had a beaming smile on his face walking away from the counter with 4 trays of fast food. Sitting down at a table across the restaurant from the poor overworked employees you smiled at him. “I think you might be a little hungry when you finish” he immediately looked up a nugget half in his mouth with a confused look. He finished off his nugget and asked “you really think? This is usually enough for me to get by.” you smiled at his cluelessness. And he smiled back one of those iconic rory in love smiles, with a minor difference. Your smile dropped immediately and your eyes widened the nugget you have taken from him dropping onto the table. His smile dropped in response to your out of normal actions. “What’d i do y/n? What's wrong?” he asked worriedly. “Rory do you have a secret you've been keeping from me?” you asked not knowing whether to hope he was a vampire or not. It dawned on him, he reached a finger and lightly prodded the pointy long tooth. “I may or may not be a vampire” he said with a questioning voice as if he didnt know what the answer was. You let out a bright smile. His worried face dropped, an awkward smile replaced it instead. “Oh thank the gods. you breathed out. “My turn to ask if you have a secret” he rebutted. “You remember that scale you found one time?” he laughed, “yeah you still never showed me your cyborg fish, now that i think about it how would that work, like wouldn't it short circuit do something similar to-” “it was mine.” you budded into his long ramble. “ i said that so you wouldn't question me and think i was a weirdo.” “sick you grow scales!! Benny did that to me once with some janked up spell i think it was supposed to-'' you cut him off again, “rory im a siren.” he paused but his face stayed the same in that iconic rory smile and he said simply said “oh ethan and benny defeated one of thoise once that isn't that bad'' and laughed. “We need to introduce you as siren y/n to their group, at first we all thought someone normal was gonna be in the group.” you cocked an eyebrow and he realized you did think everyone was normal. He listed off everyones supernatural ability and you sat there ready to catch a fly.

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

You sighed after the long table of explaining you grow and tail and live forever and at one point lured a guy to his death, they all cheered. Which definitely caught you by surprise but you were glad nonetheless. “Can i call you fishy now?” Erica asked with a smirk.

#rory keaner #mbav #mbav rory #vampire #siren x vampire #rory #my babysitter's a vampire imagine #my babysitters a vampire #rory x reader #rory x y/n

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wulfnerd · 3 years ago

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Does it make sense? No idea. Is it beta'd? Nope.

Drabble idea got away from me, now it's a oneshot. ＼（〇_ｏ）／

Find Our Kismet, sterek, t, 1,6k w ◌ Stiles needs to pee. [AO3]

Kira had sent a group text last month about how her record label is sending her on a concert tour for the first time. Her recent single had made a big enough splash that her label wanted to capitalise on it and get her working venues. She'd be an opener for more established singers and have some side performances, her being the main act. After everyone had sent their congrats, she sent a doc link that listed the first half-dozen or so dates and venues. The one tonight she was going to be the main draw. Stiles had sent a message directly to her this morning that he'd be going.

The club decided to have an opening act, some whiny heart-broken white guy, but he was almost over, and Stiles might miss Kira's first song. He drank too much waiting to get admittance, and now he really needed to pee.

If the queue would just move a little faster.

He hears a muttered, 'If we don't move soon, I'm going to end up using this wall as a urinal.' Really? He's just going to whip it out right here and pee everywhere?

'Dude, please don't. These are new shoes.'

He hears a small laugh from behind him. A very familiar one. It can't be. He turns around, and a few guys behind him is a guy with his head down on his phone. Dark hair, grey suit jacket over a red V-neck, and jeans, hints of chest hair peeking out. It could be him.

'Derek?'

The guy looks up.

'It is you! How are you?'

He hasn't changed a bit since graduation. Just as breathtakingly beautiful, only now his jawline is accentuated by real stubble and not that stuff he had at eighteen. It's truly unfair. And then the beaming smile he gets when Derek recognises him. How is Stiles supposed to live with that?

'Stiles! It's good to see you, man!' He sees Derek slip his phone in his pocket and glance at the guys between them, fingers tapping at his sides. It looks like Derek wants to cut the queue to hug him. Stiles is willing to do some very stupid things for a Derek hug. He glances in front of him, the queue still is barely moving. So he says a silent prayer not to pee his pants and lets the five guys between him and Derek cut in front of him.

'You didn't have to do that, Stiles,' but Derek is immediately reaching for the hug, so Stiles knows he's thankful too, 'it's so good to see you.'

'You too, Sourwolf,' Derek looks bashful at the nickname, 'so you here for Kira? I didn't see you on the group chat.' He would have told Kira he was coming the instant he saw Derek was instead of telling her maybe and texting on the day of.

'Yeah, I wasn't sure if I was up for it. You remember how I am with crowds.' Derek was always unique in that way. He could play with the crowd at a game when it was just as much about a team as him, but alone he couldn't stand them for long. It's probably best not to call attention to the fact that they're in a queue with a dozen dudes waiting for the bathroom before they go out to the couple hundred or so other people in the club.

'So, what have you been up to the last five years?' Stiles knows some of the basics from when he and Erica were regularly talking.

He and Erica had gotten closer when Scott got held back a year and decided on his new group of friends rather than stick with the old ones. After high school, Erica spent the first two or three years keeping up with what everyone was up to, practically running a 'Hale Pack' newsletter. Of course, then she and Boyd decided to start their family early. Between her ambitions of becoming a public defender and the baby, she barely makes Instagram posts once a month, let alone keep everyone up to date.

Really, besides his and Kira's texting this morning, Stiles hasn't texted any of his old friends in months. That's partially on him he knows, but it takes two to tango and all that.

But man, his crush on Derek hasn't dissipated at all. His beautiful sparkling eyes, his smile, those dimples, even his eyebrows. And dammit, he still smells the same. The whiff he got from the hug earlier being maybe just a hint deeper and muskier. Holding the focus of all his attention has brought it back in force. Once more, he's that scrawny kid who is in love with his best friend.

'Uh, nothing much. Just been up here a couple months helping open a new branch of my parent's consultant business.' He seems to honestly think it's not much to be proud about because it's not all his own. His parents financial consulting business helps so many people, and that's not considering they always have weekly free consultations for those who need help the most. To be a part of that is a big deal.

'Dude, that's so great. Opening a new business all by yourself sounds like a lot of work. Still can't believe you went into finances. You hated numbers.' Derek was a lost cause at any maths unless it was calculating what angle to throw a basketball to get into the hoop. He really could be such a jock at times. It was adorable.

'I only passed Flemming's class because you tutored me all semester. Remember when you yelled at her for taking points of the final because I forgot to show my work and threatened to call my mom?' Derek's laughing at this, holding onto Stiles' shoulder. Stiles may be having an out of body experience.

'I thought she was going to rip up my test and fail me for speaking out, but she deserved it. You worked so hard.' He really did. Derek even skipped a few practices to study with Stiles before the final. Finstock hated Stiles for that.

'Are either of you going to move?' Some guy with a voice like a squawking crow interrupts them.

Stiles slightly jumps while Derek looks ahead guiltily, removing his hand in the process. Stiles wants to punch the guy.

Walking forward is a mistake as his need to pee is coming back with a vengeance.

'Are you okay?' Derek whispers directly into his ear. If Stiles wasn't so distracted by his desperation, he's sure he'd react differently, but right now, all Stiles can do is nod as he starts rocking on the balls of his feet in place.

'We could go somewhere else,' and now there's a hand on the small of his back, the universe is taunting him, 'Kira will understand if we left before she could start.'

'Please.' The wall guy is starting to look smart at this point.

It probably ends up looking like Derek is kindly escorting the drunk guy away when Stiles clutches his arms and starts deep breathing. He trusts Derek is going to take him somewhere soon, but it better be real soon.

He looks up when he registers they're going through a door.

'I thought you knew where another bathroom was, dude.'

Derek has led him right to an alley outside the club and is looking up and down both directions, even glancing up the wall for cameras and people, he guesses.

'Nope, never been here before, but the wall was a good idea. Just not inside in front of thirty people.'

'Thanks, man.' This is the kindest and weirdest thing someone has done for him in a while. He's kind of stuck looking to where Derek's meeting his eyes after.

'No problem.' That hint of a smile is distracting but not enough for right now.

'So uh, turn around, I guess.'

'Right!' His eyebrows are still just as expressive, flying up to his forehead.

Stiles has a moment where he really considers how strange life is, here he is unzipping himself feet from his high school crush to pee on a wall outside a club, but then the relief comes. Quick as possible to end the embarrassment.

As he zips, he wonders what's the protocol on peeing outside. Does he still need to wash his hands? He'll need to research that later. He turns from the wall back to Derek, gives himself a second of being a creep.

'Done. Wanna try to go back inside?'

Derek turns around but is looking down and typing on his phone.

'Nah, I'm texting Kira to let her know we had to go and sorry we missed her so she can get it after her set.'

Derek looks up at him at that, as if asking if he did well. Derek's changing his plans for him, Stiles smiles, then asks the obvious.

'Now what?'

'I was thinking we could go out for milkshakes and catch up. I remember how much you like milkshakes too.' Derek is smiling like it's a fond memory. He's cute.

Though they are weird memories for Stiles. Derek loved milkshakes, so Stiles always got one too. They're just alright to him, but he'd anything to spend more time with Derek. They also always got different flavours and exchanged them before they finished. He used to love the idea of Derek's mouth on the straw he'd just used. Maybe Derek's willing to do that again?

'As long as we also get curly fries.' He really is that same kid right now.

Derek's hand rests on his back as he starts to direct Stiles, 'What do you take me for? I'm not a heathen,' then falls back down between them.

As they walk and Stiles listens to Derek reminisce about their younger years, he knows this is it. He's not scared of asking for what he wants anymore. By the end of tonight, he's going to ask Derek for a kiss.

#sterek #sterek fic #mine.app

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